GIDE 2012 + Other Business

mind maps + scribblin'

I have been rather quiet as of late on this blog, as I have been beavering away so to speak at several other things.

GIDE is one of the main things on my mind at the moment - for more information see my separate blog for all related posts over on the dark side at Wordpress!

Aside from that I have been working away in the studio, and have taken well to the new course structure, including my new module entitled Critical Making. I shall post separately on this.

I have also this year become a student ambassador for the University of Dundee, attending visitors days and helping the University promote itself to potential future students by providing tours. This has been a fantastic opportunity to meet other students as well as learn more about how our campus operates.

We have of course also moved to our new studios, which, although are having heating issues at the moment look set to be brighter and more spacious than our old location - and I also have a wall space to populate, which I can't complain about!

Sketchup and AutoCAD however, are calling...I have to admit I've missed the project buzz!

Design Studies: Creating The Questions

For our second last design studies assignment of the year (*tear*) we had the pretty cringy task of interviewing people.

Dealing with drunk strangers from the other side of the bar at work - no problem. Asking for assistance in a shop - no problem. Phoning up a call centre about something (albeit a tedious task) - is also no problem. Standing in the street like some sort of person you'd expect to be wearing a bib with "Greenpeace" or "Amnesty International" on it, no so easy. Watch as the people avoid you like you are some kind of Moses, parting the seas of people by your mere existence. Embarrassing.

So, myself and Kirsty from Jewellery (JMD) decided to tackle this assignment together, as we had both derived similar topics from The Tipping Point in first semester. I had covered a derivative of the Airwalk Case Study, where alternative advertising was discussed, and Kirsty had researched semiotics in advertising from The Stickiness Factor. As we had slightly different areas covered, we aimed to do two things: create a set of questions that suited both of our needs, as well as educate each other about the slightly different path from our own. Win, win really.

Below is the mind map we created in order to generate our questions. We were careful not to create closed questions - a question that can be answered by a simple "yes" or "no" - as less can be learnt from these. We tried to consider how to reveal the questions to the participant, so that there was a mix of content shown before an answer and vice versa where an answer to the question was given, then the content be shown.

click to enlarge

Our final questions are as follows:

General topic to pursue: "Does alternative advertising increase your knowledge of a product, and/or make it more memorable? Does this then lead to possible purchase of said product?"

Tell the participants the following:

Viral advertising is when a product is advertised through a “gimmick” that may or may not be related to the product itself. These are often released online, but can also be seen on TV. 

Questions for Assignment 4

1. Below are three adverts. How many, if any, are successful “viral” adverts?

2. After seeing the following popular advert(s), how were you left feeling?

3. Why do you think companies chose to use adverts that do not seem to connect with the product? 

4. Can you remember what music is used in any of the following adverts? 

5. Who is your mobile phone service provider?

6. Can you summarise what the advert(s) for Windows 7 are? Can you also tell me the tagline used throughout?

7. Listening to the short sound clip only, can you tell me what product this advert was for?

After creating our list of questions, we created our consent form for

participants to sign prior to interview. These allowed us to use their information during our write up.

Finally, we had a set of questions to use. As our questions required video footage, we decided to use Kirsty's iPad for this, to make it simple and easy for participants. 

And also cause I wanted to play with it.

Design Studies: Service Design Tools

For our current Design Studies assignment we had to visit some websites that document ways to help you when researching for design. One of these was designstudiestools, to which I found the case study for Blueprint quite helpful.

Blueprint is similar to how we work during the early stages of a project - listing the main issues on post it type notes and sticking them under the corresponding group. This enables you to see patterns and visualise connections between topics. This also ties in with my relatively recent interest in Infographics - which also aim to visualise information, in a more simplified form.

For future projects I may continue with my front line of attack with sticky post-its, however I may then re structure my findings in a more easily understood visualisation in the likes of Photoshop, for future reference. The clearer a picture you can get before delving into designing, the cleaner design you will end up with, so it would seem.

Design Studies: Polysemy, Trolling and Lolcats

I hate trollers.

For those of you who do not know what trolling is - it's the act of leaving online comments on blogs, forums, websites and articles that aim to take the wrong meaning and cause an argument. A good example of endless trolling is YouTube. They aim to antagonise readers, and provoke unrest, irritation and ultimately, an argument.

Polysemy is the study of meaning in signs - and the conclusions that may be derived from it. Text confirms a specific meaning, and on the flip side, a stand alone image may result in several possible meanings to be interpreted.

So, trollers aim to purposely derive a meaning from a post, but purposely take the wrong meaning from the topic in hand - thus causing the aforementioned friction. They ask stupid questions, hoping to lure people into an argument. They are basically petty people who have nothing better to do than sit online causing fights and continuing to be deficient in vitamin D.

I found a fantastic blog post on this from via Flowing Data by Courtney Stanton, an interactive media and video games producer from Boston, MA. She documents the troller comments left on her blog, and has some good examples of how the meanings get crossed - through the use of mind maps, generated using Many Eyes.

world map of trolling comments

An article in The New York Times explains exactly what trolls do, and how it all began. Take a look - but it's quite disturbing, and frankly, extremely sad.

This then leads us to the internet meme. A good explanation of this can be found on thedailymeme.com. As it states, a meme can evolve - thus meaning it is an example of polysemy, where an image has over time developed a new meaning. The popular site icanhazcheeseburger.com is the home to the popular internet phenomenon the "Lolcat", where images of cats doing things are interpreted by overlaying text. Without the text - it is merely an image, with quite probably a reasonable explanation as to why the scenario has occurred. With the added text however - a new aspect is brought to the image, giving the viewer a different context to perceive the situation. This is an example of predicate transfer, by which assumptions are made due to a sentence, that may not in fact be true.

Of course this cat is not actually editing Wikipedia - however if you imagine this photo without any text, it is merely a photo of a cat near a laptop, however with the text - you instantly have a sense of a "personality" and get the general scenario that is insinuated by the text. 

Mac Update

I recently updated my MBP after continuously declining, and came to the inevitable conclusion that I was eventually going to have to accept a software update.

Included in this, aside from changing my iTunes logo (to my annoyance) was the new addition of the AppStore in my dock. It's quite a nice feature really. I'm currently in the process of downloading the Twitter app to allow desktop updates - along with a feature that allows control-click tweets from anywhere.

While browsing the free app's catagory, I noticed the top rated one was "MindNote". This is a nice little app to create mind maps with, so will be downloading that when I remember my AppleID login - which amused me, as you are redirected to "iForgot" to reset your details. Lolz.

Time Lapse Photography

Today I received my much anticipated remote timer for my D-SLR. To explain - a remote timer allows the user to set a continuous time delay, thus allowing for time lapse photos to be taken. It also means that as the remote is separate from the camera, it reduces if not eliminates camera shake, and produces (what should be if executed correctly) perfect repeats of the same scene. Ultimately these can then be put together in a sequence to produce a time lapse video. Below is an example of what can be achieved:

Alas, I'm an amateur photographer at best, so you could say I'm a complete noob when it comes to this. Originally I had intended on buying Canon's TC-80N3, however during further research came across a cheaper alternative online, mimicking all of the TC-80N3's functions for a fraction of the price. I figured that I would work up to buying the more expensive Canon replacement depending on how I got on with my initial buy.

I need to work out how to use this first!

I've been interested in experimenting with time lapse videos for a while now, however like many things, never seem to find the time to do so. After my last project where we compromised by using time delay video footage instead of individual photos, I decided that now would be a good time for me to pursue this avenue further, with the intention of being able to perhaps draw on this technique during future projects.

I'm more curious than anything, as to how easy this can be done. I'm not sure exactly how I may be able to incorporate this into my work within interiors, it may in the end be nothing more than an interest and personal hobby. Not everything I suppose must relate. Perhaps I'll try doing a short sequence of our studios; documenting our process of development.

I might even try it over my desk space at some point, while mind mapping, or during model building for our forthcoming project - I'll just have to see what takes my fancy throughout the semester. It would be quite a nice way to document work for presentation, as seen in our last attempt. As I said before though, I suppose I will just have to wait and see how this develops and how it may be of use to me inside and out of class.
I'll post up anything I make as soon as I can.

Design Studies: Airwalk, Virals - And An Afro Ninja

As I chose to go more deeply into the Airwalk Case Study section of the book, and as I had quite a keen interest in that field of advertising anyway - here is my related poster in response to the first part of Assignment 2, as documented in my "Design Studies: Storms a' Brewin'" post.

After our brainstorm and subsequent discussion afterwards, I looked more deeply into what starts of a word-of-mouth type viral advert. Firstly, to explain, a viral advert is an advert that does not necessarily depict the product to which it intends to sell, however gains popularity for it's funny/interesting/off the wall content. Via this, it gains momentum - often these days through the internet, and subsequently acquires  attention and publicity for the related (or quite often non related) product - thus selling high quantites as a result. Bingo! Easy really...

Well. The issues (as Airwalk and Lambesis found out) can be that it is very difficult to kick start something like that. I included an example of a successful Airwalk advert in a previous post. 

These days the world is littered with YouTube "stars" - off the top of my head I can name at least 10:

Sneezing Panda

Leave Britney Alone

Tay Zonday - Chocolate Rain

Laughing Baby

Worlds Greatest Freakout

Numa Numa Guy

Star Wars Kid

Afro Ninja

You Dun Goofed Up!

and most recently: Bed Intruder Song

Out of all of these my favourite is still Dramatic Look .

Now I am not for one second saying any of the above are talented, or indeed entertaining (well maybe a few) but for one reason or another they gained notoriety, thus becoming an "internet phenomenon". People often parody these, which although can also be entertaining, only add to the original's popularity all the more. These are exactly the types of things advertisers aim to replicate in order to gain publicity for their products. A few notable examples of this are:

Cadburys Gorilla Ad

 - with follow up Eyebrows Ad

T-Mobile Flashmob Ad

None of the above have any examples of the product, they purely feed off entertainment. They do however, come in more forms other than video marketing. There have been Viral Ad Campaigns in the form of various other media, such as promotional games, websites, images, and obviously videos laced throughout the internet, which then are picked up on by unsuspecting viewers. Subtlety is also an issue, as sometimes it works in a brands favour to allow it to seem like an unrelated source, to which it builds up and is released as the advert. Clever, huh? 

Time is another aspect to which is crucial in making these work. For example, websites that are only online for a set length of time, with for example a count-down timer to release etc. builds interest as it is limited - you have to get on quick to know whats going on. This works well for films. Websites that are quirky and unusual are also known to be successful - such as willitblend.com which tests BlendTec's blending power - by blending whichever product the public request. Engaging the public works well, as if the status of the advert is to progress, people are often enticed to return to catch up with the latest. 

Alternate Reality Games (ARG's) have also been used numerous times as viral adverts in order to promote several things, however they often relate to film and video game release. Cloverfields - which was released in 2008, had clues throughout their trailer that you had to work your way through their sister ARG at 1-18-08.com. 

I've linked in the trailer and related ARG site - so feel free to have a go!

I could honestly talk about this aspect of adverts for hours, but I shan't bore you all with my endless examples I have come across in my time. As viral ad's are not restricted to displaying or conveying the product in question it is entirely possible to use these as a way to attract attention to your project/company. Throwing boxes and boxes and boxes of stickers of your company's logo from above Times Square for example would work in the same way - aim attract confused attention. People immediately question what is going on and as we are inquisitive creatures, approach the commotion to find out what it's all about. I would however of course suggest contacting the local related authorities before clambering up the sides of buildings in the name of advertising.

So thats it really. Cause a stir, a commotion, a ruckus - and people will come flooding.

And well, the rest is history I guess! As easy as that!

Design Studies: Storms-a Brewin'

Finally, the four of us finally got some time today after our lecture to finish our brainstorming from earlier in the week. We then went on to do the related discussion. Below are images documenting the rest of our brainstorm: 

After completion of our brainstorm, it was on to the discussion; to which we rearranged some of our ideas into better groups: 

By the end, we had added a lot of ideas and information to our sheets. Thinking back to the beginning of this assignment, we never thought we would have so much to discuss. It definitely became easier as we went on, and using the contexts in which we learned about the issues brought up in the book to help relate the topics to design helped a lot. I never realised how much of the book I was able to retain until now!

...and then it was time for a break

Design Studies: Think BIG!

After it being commented on during the lecture that everybody had posted their Design Studies work during the night before the deadline - I thought I would take the opportunity to get my work up early. As keen as it sounds, my previous work for Design Studies had in fact been posted for a few days, but as a draft - so I hope you are reading this, Jonathan! Yeah!

That aside, myself, Ross, Fawn and Esther decided to begin Assignment 2: Think Big! We took over a small section of the gallery outside the I&ED studios. Stupidly - it was decided to do this during the Bomb Project, which was chaos. Probably not the best idea we've ever had. Fret not however, as we ploughed into it all quite keen to get it done none the less! The fun atmosphere around us actually helped rather than hindered, as I had suspected it may at first.

This was when we realised that the task itself was not as easy as first thought - due to our initial topics discussed. Esther and myself had both covered the "Airwalk" section of The Tipping Point, which as a group we decided to tackle first. Viral advertising is essentially what Lambesis created for Airwalk - so it was questioned how we could relate this to design. Viral-ad campaigns are becoming increasingly popular, so it is highly likely that we will come into contact with these in our line of work.

The remainder of our brainstorming will be completed and updated tomorrow - as one must dash.

I have work y'know.

Design Studies: The Tipping Point

As previously mentioned two posts ago (in My Tipping Point), there are some things I need to add in order to complete my tasks for Design Studies.

The tasks are as follows (all relating to Malcolm Gladwell's "The Tipping Point"):
Read the book
Mind map the book as a whole in small groups
Mind map an area of interest individually
Harvard Reference the end notes of your area of choice
Annotate your references
Highlight said references within your area of choice
Tie the references in to your mind maps
Post as a blog post

Jonathan had also warned us that merely ticking the above boxes would only gain us a pass at a D level. In order to increase our grade we must take things further, which I suppose is reasonable.

I have chosen to reference the entire book, as I don't like having just bit's of something like that done. I suppose normally it would annoy me but, since it will hopefully aid my final grade, I guess I don't mind so much.

As I have read the book, and posted my joint mind map previously, I will cut to my individual mind maps. I chose to map the whole chapter of "The Law of the Few". I subcategorised these into the subtitle of the chapter Connectors, Mavens and Salesmen. The assignment had stated we do not need to do a whole chapter, just a selected area of interest, but as I couldn't decide I have done all 3. I have also chosen to map out the Airwalk case study and the Baltimore Syphilis outbreak.

Below are my mind maps of Connectors, Mavens and Salesmen respectively (including their references). Click to enlarge:

Connectors

Mavens

Salesmen

Above, in the Salesmen map, I have added in some well known salesmen that I have come up with, as I felt my map was not as full as the others.

My mind map of the Airwalk case study:

Airwalk Case Study

and finally, my Baltimore Syphilis outbreak map:

Baltimore Syphilis Outbreak

Below are my references by page they occur throughout the book. I have annotated the references used during "The Law of the Few" and the "Airwalk Case Study" in blue. References for the entire book can be found on my page entitled "Tipping Point Bibliography".

CHAPTER TWO: THE LAW OF THE FEW
Page 30:
Fischer, D. H. (1994). Paul Revere's Ride. New York: Oxford University Press.
This reference is used throughout the book to put Paul Revere into context as not only a Connector but also a Maven.

Page 34:
Milgram, S.(1967). The Small World Problem. Psychology Today. Vol. 1, p.60-67.
Relates to how are humans connected. Six degrees of separation test. 160 people from Omaha, NB to get their letter to a stockbroker in Sharon, MA. 24 made it, via the use of a Connector.

Kochen, M. (1989). The Small World Problem. New Jersey: Ablex Publishing Corp.
Six degrees of separation.

Page 35:
Werner, C. & Parmlee, P. (1979). Similarity of Activity Preferences Among Friends: Those Who Play Together Stay Together. Social Psychology Quarterly. Vol. 42 (1), p.62-66.
Study showed 88% of people living in the Dyckman projects in N. Manhattan have their closest friends in the same building. People chose similar ages and races to them as friends. Univ. of Utah found people say they make friends with people who have "similar attitudes" when really it is that they live in a close proximity. 

Page 47:
Tjaden, B. Brett Tjaden Project. Available: www.cs.virginia.edu/oracle/.
"Six degrees of Kevin Bacon" game. Tjaden created calculations to work out most connected actor, at the Univ. of Virginia. 

Page 53:
Granovetter, M (1995). Getting a Job. Chicago, USA: University of Chicago.
Sociologist found that 56% of technical and professional workers found their job via a connection. Only 20% applied directly.

Page 60:
Inman, J. J., McAlister, L. & Hoyer, W. D. (1990). Promotion Signal: Proxy for a Price Cut? Journal of Consumer Research. 17, p74-81.
Examples of things Mavens take note of. Signage in shops advertising low prices, but not actually cutting the price. Mavens would notice that this appears as false advertising. 

Page 61:
Feick, L. F. & Price, L. L. (1987). The Market Maven: A diffuser of Marketplace Information. Journal of Marketing. Vol. 51, p83-97.
Linda Price of Univ. of Nebraska pioneered in Maven research. Videotaped interviews with several Mavens. 

Higie, R. A., Feick, L.F. &  (1987). Types and Amounts of Word-of-Mouth Communications About Retailers. Journal of Retailing. Vol.63 (no.2), p260-278.
Research into what how Mavens shop.
Price, L.L., Feick, L.F. & Guskey, A. (1995). Everyday Market Helping Behaviour. Journal of Public Policy and Marketing. Vol.14 (2), p225-266.

Maven personality research, backing up the above.

Page 74:
Mullen et al, B. (1986). Newscasters' facial expressions and voting behaviour of viewers: Can a smile elect a President? Journal of Personality and Social Psychology. Vol.51, p291-295.
1984 Presidential election. Pro Reagan ABC anchorman Peter Jennings persuasive news casting. Survey conducted between ABC, NBC and CBS viewers showed ABC viewers voted more towards Reagan. Salesmen example. 

Page 77:
Wells, G. L; Petty, R. E. (1980). The Effects of Overt Head Movements on Persuasion. Basic and Applied Social Psychology. Vol.1 (3), p219-230.
How persuasion can be subtle. Headphone test - students told to nod/shake their heads while "testing" headphones that played messages about rising education fee's. Nodders were pro edu. fee rise, shakers were against. 

Page 84:
Hatfield, E., Cocioppo, J. T. & Rapson, R. L. (1994). Emotional Contagion. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press.
Mimicry is how this book claims humans infect one and other with their emotions. Emotions are not inside to out, they can be "caught" from outside and work inwards.

Page 85:
Friedman, H. (1980). Understanding and Assessing Nonverbal Expressiveness: The Affective Communication Test. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology. Vol.39 (2), p333-351.
Univ. of California developed the "Affective Communication Test" which aims to measure ones emotional "contagiousness'. Also related to persuasiveness. Highest mark is 117. Tom Gau, example salesmen scored 116.

Friedman, H. & Riggio, R. (1981). Effect of Individual Differences in Nonverbal Expressiveness on Transmission of Emotion. Journal of Nonverbal Behaviour. Vol.6, p96-104.
Further research into the above by Gladwell.

CHAPTER SIX: AIRWALK CASE STUDY
Page 196:
Ryan, B. & Gross, N. (1943). The Diffusion of Hybrid Seed Corn in Two Iowa Communities . Rural Sociology. Vol. 8, p.15-24.
Few famers were willing to take the risk with a new hybrid seed, however the when the risk paid off, the majority of famers followed suit. Example of "Early Adopters".

Rogers, E. (1995). Diffusion on Innovations. New York: Free Press.

Continued research into the survey above.

Page 197:
Moore, G. (1991). Crossing the Chasm. New York: HarperCollins. p.9-14.
Further research into the workings of the "Early Adopters" and their incompatibility with the "Early Majority". High end technology is used here an an example of products that have not "taken off" yet.

Page 201:
Allport, G. & Postman, L. (1947). The Psychology of Rumor . New York: Henry Holt. p.135-158.
Explores the rumour surrounding the Chinese tourist in 1945 Maine who was soon mistaken as a Japanese Spy during World War II. Three aspects - levelled, sharpened and assimilated.

Page 204:
Valente, T., Foreman, R. K. & Junge, B. Satellite Exchange in the Baltimore Needle Exchange Program. Public Health Reports.
The needle exchange program provided drug addicts with a clean way to use. "Super-exchangers" of drug Mavens used their connections around town to sell clean needles 24/7, when the van was unavailable. Dual outcome: addicts made money (employment), and the service also benefitted as it was more readily available. 

Design Studies: My Tipping Point

Epidemics.

When most of us hear that word we think disease. Media induced mayhem. Catch it, bin it, kill it. Quick, you might catch something. Keep your children indoors and immediately phone round all your elderly relatives to make sure they aren't feeling a little "off".

Swine flu. Foot and mouth. Sars. Even in my relatively short life I have been exposed to several epidemics.

But, after reading Malcolm Gladwell's "The Tipping Point" I have come to understand epidemics in another fashion. Not only disease, but society's behaviour is also susceptible to epidemics, epidemics of trend. Human nature after all, is imitation.

Contagious. There is another disease ridden word. Again though, after reading The Tipping Point I have come to understand that epidemics of trends are contagious. Not unlike a virus. It takes over, spreading through the population, working it's way through vast distances.

The kid wearing the shoes you don't think are "cool" anymore. What are they thinking? Well, 5 months later those same so called "uncool" shoes are on your feet. Trends start by special people, rare people. People who don't mind being out there, different. The thing is, these trends may drift by, unnoticed in the business world. A huge opportunity missed, as not only did they miss a chance of propelling their own product onto the stage under the beaming lights of mainstream, but they of course, and perhaps more importantly to them, missed out on profit.

Airwalk did not miss out. They spotted it. Trendy Southern Californian teens were wearing their brand. They were making a reasonable profit out of this but they were hungry for more. But how to catapult you're brand into the mainstream, yet keep it's underground original cool-ness? Mainstream after all, it not where trends are set. Mainstream is where the lingering dregs of trends hang out. By the time it's in you're local mall, it's not the newest, coolest thing out there.

This was Airwalk's issue.

So they hired a marketing company to create innovative adverts. Not unlike the viral adverts seen today, they created odd, off the wall adverts, that were highly contagious. But this took a lot of behind the scenes leg work to make sure the right topics were brought up via the adverts. They needed the topics that the underground hipsters were interested in, before it hit the fan of mainstream. This is where DeeDee Gordon comes into the picture, as she was another special type of person. Infact doubly special as she was two types out of the three types that The Tipping Point splits people into. Connectors, Mavens and Salesmen. These are the three categories rare people fit into, and the types of people who are required in order to tip a trend over the edge and into an epidemic. She is both a Connector - somebody who collects acquaintances and knows many more people than the average person - and a Maven. A Maven is someone who knows a lot. She is somewhat of a fashion Maven. Somebody who has the power of knowledge and has the ability to know when something is going to take off. Due to these traits, she was able to keep tabs on underground trends and use them through Airwalks adverts, early enough that it was new to Joe Public, but cool to the underground scene.

Thanks to the series of ad campaigns, Airwalk seen their peak profit tip $175 Million a year.

Pretty clever really. All by expoiting certain personality traits. This line of attack is seen every day in todays marketing world, although done subtly enough, you probably are blissfully unaware. Yet I'll bet you trudge as I do like a robot and buy whatever has been made into a fashion must have. Be it technology, fashion or a number of other things. Some epidemics are a matter of fate, such as the Baltimore Syphilis outbreak, yet others are constructed to happen with the benefits for the tippers themselves exponential.

Airwalk is only one of several topics brought up throughout Gladwell's "The Tipping Point".  It puts several example epidemics into the context of Connectors, Mavens and Salesmen, and explains why some trends take off, while others sink. The drop of crime in New York City during the 1990's. The Syphilis outbreak of Baltimore. The Hush Puppy trend. The Suicide epidemic of Micronesia. Paul Revere during the American Revolution, the examples are endless.

For Design Studies - part of our task was to mind-map the book and then select an area in which to mind-map further. Below is my joint one with Ross, with my own one to follow shortly. I have selected Connectors, Mavens and Salesmen as I find that the most fascinating area.