Communative

The theme of the mean meme

"Hey man, have you seen that clip yet? You know the one: that snippet where a bloke creeps up behind his sister, screams her name, and then slaps here off her chair? LOL! Or, oh God mate, you’d love this one: that meme about the little boy who’s close to tears because of the side effects of his anesthesia? Nearly ROFL’d my waffle!" 

Hmm… not such an endearing missive. In fact, both of the clips mentioned, and their endorsement (3 million and 22 million views respectively), rile a certain amount of moral rebellion in my gut. This is not to say that neither of them inspired nervous laughter when I first watched them. Nor is it to say that I didn’t lean creepily close to the LCD to watch the hi-jinks unfold. In fact, I have noticed that, like so many seeking their entertainment on the net, I have begun to develop a sort of morbid fascination with this more “extreme” breed of web viral. In fact, it is this category to which this post is dedicated.

This is a trend spotting piece. A tract where, as a net-based social trend flies bye at a brain frying pace,  I whack a socking great flag in its slithery  belly, just so we can demarcate it from the rest of the thousand-mile an hour hocus-pocus. After that's done, I will then conclude with a suggestion of how this might affect the business of communications.

The trend I am skewering this week is “morally questionable comedy”. Not such a snappy title, I know, but it does the job.

Firstly, I must make it absolutely clear that there is a distinct and important difference between this title and the seemingly similar subject of “immorality in comedy”. This is a truth threefold. Firstly, when one talks of morality and ethics, the issue of theology rather quickly rears its head, and from the outset I must confirm that I am, indeed, an atheist. I simply do not have any biblical references for absolute definitions of my ethics, nor do I have any sort of missionary axe to grind. Secondly, I am sympathetic with Hume’s “guillotine”. In the great man’s “Treatise of Human Nature” (1739), he uses the aforementioned slicer, to severe the world of fact from the world of value (i.e. what is observed, is just that, and that only). Put simply, I do not believe that descriptive statements (“is” statements) have any logical connection with prescriptive statements (“ought” statements). Those oughts (in my opinion) tend to originate from the observer. Thirdly, (and this is the important bit) I do not intend to re-write Philosophy’s rule-book, or re-invent its wheels. Absolutists, consquentialists, deontologists, naturalists, non-cognitivists, objectivists and subjectivists alike, will all have definite and variously cogent opinions on the moral scale of this matter, and I do not intend to wade in and embarrass myself. Although I am prone to them, on this occasion I will not be indulging myself with a spleen purging pub rant.

This article is about an identification, not an evaluation, of “morally questionable comedy”.  It is written in recognition of a variety of internet meme that raises eyebrows and stimulates the sort of discussion most ably marshalled by the tribes mentioned above, but most fervently pursued by the Daily Mail. This is not to say that this genre intrinsically holds content that is moral or immoral – just that its ethics are quite frequently up for debate.

In short, this "meme theme" (or "MT") could be seen to fit snugly under the umbrella of “black comedy”. All of the trademark attributes, be they separated or working in conjunction, seem to be present and correct. Indeed, broad satire, the comically shocking, protracted humiliation and taboo subversion run through this trend like a carotid artery, pumping life into its fibre. And, certainly, this supply is profuse and direct; this is an incredibly vigorous genre.

Beyond this simple description, the MT is characterised by 2 further ideas: a fascination with the visceral and a progressive celebration of the extreme. This is what gives the trend its edge. It doesn’t just represent black humour, it consistently represents it in its superlative form; incrementally amplified and mutated to be more base, more graphic and more downright disturbing than the what has gone before. Potent stuff!

For immediate evidence of this progression, just check out the notorious history of the "random" (or "/b/") forum on 4chan.org (not for the fainthearted), or the back-catalogues of failblog and keyboard cat. All 3 (the last 2 being pretty closely related) find energy in the principles outlined above. Indeed, /b/'s content frequently follows this path to its natural conclusion; hosting content which is eventually a concern for the police.

So, I suppose, some attempt should be made to speculate about why there is such an audience for this stuff; why are people fascinated by videos of teenagers being berated by their folks for being atheists, or by clips of Japanese men being thrown down ski runs in the nude?

Now this is a huge question, but some educated guesses can be made.

• The first knee-jerk reaction is to suggest that humans have always enjoyed watching others fall down, and that pathos has forever been an excepted tenet of humour. Indeed the misfortune of others is apparent in almost every form of comedy ever realised: from ancient Greek satire, right through to the most saccharine of children’s television.
  

However, this is a pretty unsatisfactory conclusion, as this trend isn’t just about mocking – it is also fuelled by an obsession with the excessive and the visceral. With this in mind, 2 possibly contributing factors might be:

• It exists, because it now possible for it to exist...
  Thanks to the internet and readily available audio-visual technology (see the Flip for confirmation of this), the production of entertainment is now firmly in the hands of the people. More of the grittier, weirder and more shocking bits of life are being documented than ever before.

• Modern life is meh!
  Thinkers, such as the infamous Bakhtin, see the ritual of carnival as a way for society to subvert norms and so access a more natural form of experience. We might consider something similar for our MT; where people fore-go mainstream sanitised culture to indulge in documentations that are more visceral and emotionally relevant. Maybe what clips like "David after the dentist" offer is merely a little life affirmation. 

Finally, we might pay some thought to the implications this MT has for the communications industry. It may have become increasingly visible to the mainstream, but does this mean brands should start fooling around with it, trying to appropriate its sense of humour? Possibly not.

To my mind, it would be rare to find a brand that would sit comfortably with grand-scale hyper-realistic humiliation. Moreover, attempts to tone it down would only see its relevance disintegrate (see the Dominoes' Britain's Got Talent spots for evidence).

To this end, we should perhaps view this trend identification in another way. Rather than replicate its superficial traits, perhaps we should further examine this MT's motivations. Indeed, I would moot that instead of watching the TV screens for its infiltration, we should be starting to more conscientiously consider the consumer mindset that is propelling it and where this support will take it next.

Romancing The Rich Bird

In my last post I discussed how it was important to understand the function of Twitter, if we are ever to use it to commercial ends. Accordingly, it now makes sense to do a little exploration to feel out the sorts of ways that this might be done. 

The first thing to lie out in front of us is an affirmation that Twitter can, of course, be used to generate money. This should not be doubted; there is opportunity aplenty. However, there are some very important caveats that must not be overlooked.

Not least amongst these is Twitter’s reach. There has, admittedly, been an absolute orgy of media buzz surrounding the site since its inception 3 years ago. The world, his wife, dog and mistress claim to tweet these days (check out the clip below for confirmation of this).

I’ll think you’ll agree that it has all been very impressive. In fact, one might be forgiven for presuming that having a presence on Twitter is analogous to cradling the entirety of the world’s consumers in the palm of your brand’s hand.

However, although you could be forgiven, you wouldn’t be right. Far from it. In reality, Twitter can only be assumed to have around 2 million active users (at the turn of the year, ComScore reported a total of 1.9 million). Now this is fine, numbers are continuing to increase (HitWise recently claimed that Twitter has passed Digg for weekly users) and we have every reason to believe that this rise will continue through the year, but if it is mass coverage you want then look elsewhere. For example, it may not have satisfied intellectual curiosity in the same way, but an advert during the final of last year’s Britain’s Got Talent would have secured the gaze of 9 million more sets out eyeballs.

Next up in our run-down of considerations, is the type of relationship that Twitter provides. As mentioned, the site cannot promise the goliathan reach of the biggest and best TV spots, but what you do get is a very particular sort of interaction. Whilst your audience might not be huge, marshalling the site’s possibilities can procure a deeper and potentially more persuasive connection with the people that you are talking to. This sort of advertising is most definitely only of use to a very specific sort of client; floor detergents, for example, shouldn’t be looking to make in-roads any time soon. However, when all things client, brand and consumer are considered meticulously, this variety of tweet-based discourse can be devastatingly effective. A great case-study for this is the teaser campaign for Peep Show series 6. In the run up to its television launch this summer, the show’s writers Armstrong and Bain, have been weaving some incredible magic on the site. After setting-up and utilising fictitious user profiles, they have been tweeting as their shows’ characters; effectively playing out their lives in real-time. Fans have been aloud the chance to interact with the protagonists and hence enter into the dialogue of drawn-out virtual episodes. Pretty clever stuff, and the perfect thing to whip up expectation and devotion amongst the fan-base.

Another, “watch out” that should be attached to the development of Twitter-hosted relationships, is that the conversation you will hold will not be totally within your control. This is old news for digital enthusiasts but is worth pointing out nonetheless, as some brands have already felt the consequences of ignoring such an old truism. For an example, we need not look any further than the one shown below, where Skittles suffered dearly for streaming a live feed of brand related tweets on its homepage. I urge you just to click into the image and read the comments list – no further explanation is needed, just be aware of the risk involved.

Finally, it is vital that we remember that people are on the site for social reasons and not commercial ones. This seams all too obvious, but it’s worth reiterating that if you communicate in this medium you will need to add to the consumer experience and not leach from it. For evidence that this is actually achievable, we need only to look back to the Peep Show example above. However, this is just one example, and for those of us not re-launching one of the nations best loved comedies, new ingenious plans will have to be formulated. As a starting point, it is probably worth refreshing our understanding of the driving forces behind internet socialising, and then (with a newly heightened sensitivity to the consumer mindset) progress from there. Included below is a great little clip that certainly helped me clarify the old first principles.

So, as this quick minefield navigation draws to a close, it can be concluded that using Twitter as a commercial comms platform is a real proposition, but one  that (like any media opportunity) should be scrupulously deliberated in the context of the brand and all other alternative platforms. Either that or prepare for a grizzly war of attrition with Rob Manuel, Shitmaster and co.

Understanding Twitter to be Less Bitter

Okay, so it’s Wednesday morning and I’m being bullied. It’s particularly bad today. This torment has been a part of my life for almost 3 years now, and recently it has become quite ferocious. My adversary is not big, not hulking and doesn’t flush my head down the toilet; but it is fiendish. I am being bullied by a question.

This particular morning, it’s so bad that I am forced to externalise. I blurt it out at my fellow academy member: “For God’s sake! What the hell is Twitter?”

Lilli, cool as a cucumber (as of per usual), curtly replies: “It’s where you update the world on what you’re up to, in 140 characters. It’s calling itself a micro-blogging service.” The pressure rises and the internal valves start to shake under the stress. I’ve probably turned red.

“No”, I seethe, “not what is it literally. What does it represent? What is its social function?”

“Ah” she says. Silence falls.

You see, plenty of ad folk have a fair grip on Twitter’s most obvious facilities (for those still catching up, a rather excellent clip explaining its most literal ins-and-outs is included below).

Our problem was that neither of us had a firm grasp on the far more slippery subject of its significance. Worse still, by the looks of things, neither did Twitter. No official line had been given on its reason for existence, its positioning, or its ambition.

You might think that all of this is really rather academic, and that the only solution I should be recommended is a planned course of tranquilisers. Well, I probably shouldn’t argue with you on the second point, but I will come at you full-force to contradict the former. I will stop you dead with: “if we don’t understand it’s social utility, we can’t use it as a commercial tool”. Not so academic anymore, huh?

As a result, in this update I will be exploring Twitter’s substance: its shape, how it sits, what it is. The first thing to get out of the way, is the pub-philosophy that Twitter simply represents the incredibly dull and self-important wittering into the dark about their preference of breakfast cereal (for a fully-fleshed out treatment of this aspersion, please see "The Twouble with Twitter").

Although the above video is excellent and does contain certain elements of truth, it is unfair to assume that it surmises all Twitter amounts to. In fact, the counter argument is quite clear. Faced with such blunt satire one can snappily retort that whilst people may be seemingly “micro-blogging” about the most mundane minutiae of their daily routines, other users (through the use of the “@” function) are replying. Moreover, one can moot that these replies are of a form and length that equals that of the original post. It can be continued, that these new comments can then also be responded to, and then those replies of replies can be met with subsequent....well you get the idea. 

In short, it can offered that, far from solely enjoying e-rhetoric, Twitter participants also savour lighting the dialogical touchpaper - and then sitting back to watch as a self-perpetuating exchange crackles into life.

But does this then mean that Twitter is simply an e-message board, catering for all varieties of personal conversation; from the bogglingly complex to the arm chewingly mundane? That would be neat.

Too neat maybe. In fact, it would probably be healthy to view even this more sober conception with a spoonful of cynicism. The most obvious loose thread dangling temptingly from the weave of this neat little cardigan of an idea is the evidence that Twitter has also been used for conversations on a grander than “personal” scale. We might consider that over the past year it has adopted a “societal” function. This may seem a little involved, but bear with me, I can explain.

Remember the discoveries made by the Phoenix Mars module, in 2008.  On the 31^st July, the craft reported back to Houston news so huge that it threatened to redefine a scientific epoch; water had been found on the surface of the red planet. This was massive, it was fundamental that the world’s population knew as soon as physically possible. And how, you may ask, was this information disseminated? Well, firstly, by Twitter, of course.

This variety of incredible Twitter reportage littered the chronology of 2008 (for another “must Google” try the real-time coverage of the Mumbai disaster - staggering).

Its presence is not only of interest because of its novelty, but it also lends further structure to our concept of Twitter’s social significance. The fact that administrative bodies have entered into the fray definitely signals something bigger than the previously mooted “e-message board theory”.

With this mind, surely Twitter is a grand forum in the Roman tradition; where conversations held by governmental, commercial and social participants are floated on the same air?

Well, maybe, just maybe, that is it. The wool from our cardigan would have been woven into a far more complex suit, but we’re left with a fine article nonetheless.

But, as with so many internet phenomena, the key tenets are not so easily assembled and to parade this conclusion around as the absolute truth would again be demonstrating chronic simplification. Twitter just isn’t that clear-cut.

There are a whole host of other Twitter-ish concepts that, having melted into its fundaments, completely tangle the "grand forum" definition.

Firstly, we might consider that, unlike almost every social network to go before it, Twitter encourages lop-sided interaction. Tweeters can follow exactly who they like without having to be followed in return. Vice-versa, users can accumulate a whole host of followers to whom they need never pay the slightest hint of attention. This is clearly not the sort of behaviour that would go down at all well in our Roman forum.

Secondly, we should pay at least some mind to hashtagging. These little articles have caused a real stir in the blogosphere. In the tradition of all great ingenuity, hashtagging is an idea that is incredibly simple in concept but hugely impressive in practice.

To clarify, a hashtag is simply a “#” demarcated phrase placed at the end of a tweet, used to label the content of the post. For example I might tweet: “Thought Sir’alan was a bit rough last night. Probably just needs a hug. #Theapprentice”.

Now, as mentioned, this is all pretty uncomplicated, but its social effect deserves a little more attention. Using Twitter Search, surfers can enter tags to see organised lists of the global chatter surrounding their chosen topics. The forum analogy takes another blow here, as we can now see that Twitter’s conversations are even more uniquely textured than originally thought: they are selectable by subject matter alone.

Then, thirdly, there is its adaptability: its facility to be used for unpredicted ends. As a magnificent side-effect of its indistinct purpose, Twitter has become rather elastic: changing and evolving in-line with the needs of its users.

Facebook’s apps are used for specific, pre-designated purposes. The same is true for the functions of Bebo, Linked-In and Orcut. On Twitter, however, things are far less restrictive. Not all of its functionality is handed out in neat little pre-considered packages, where all conversational eventualities are provided for and guided. Supplied with a natty openly interpretable information architecture, the Tweeter is free to make of the space exactly what he/she wants. A fine example of this is made by the inveterate Tweeter, Steven Fry (or Uncle Steve, as he is known in my flat). The traditional mechanisms of the site suggest that if a user was following someone and wanted to be followed in return, he/she would send them a direct message to request this. Uncle Steve, however, has found himself in a social situation that inhibits such tactics: he has 427,242 followers. If everyone that wanted to be followed by him adhered to the orthodox practice, then his account would become an unmanageable nightmare. In reaction, Stevie has taken the incentive and found a way to use Twitter’s undefined structure to his own benefit. Using his comment wall, he simply asks all of those that want to be seen by him to post an update labelled with a “followmestephen#” hashtag. In this way, all the great Frymaster need do, is use Twitter Search to see a tidily arranged list of every single one of his requesting followers: their pleas taking up space on their own walls, not his.

Beyond this example, it is clear that Twitter will continue to evolve and grow as the whims of its users fragment and multiply. What makes this especially striking is its eerie reflection of the freedoms of “real world” interaction.

At this point, insisting on the integrity of the “grand forum” concept might seem a little churlish. Perhaps we should look towards an entirely separate definition - one not yet mentioned.

Bearing all of the above observations in mind, I would argue that Twitter offers a glimpse of what a truly democratised global scale e-conversation looks like. 

So that’s it; not a pretty catchphrase but as near to a discreet designation it's currently possible to get myself.

Welcome to Communative

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Please bear with me - all potential issues will be targeted and sorted as soon as spotted; I run a tight ship!

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Communative

The Avoidance of Fly-tipping on Quality Street

The internet is nothing new. The proliferation of new media channels is similarly old news. There has also been lots of time (approximately half a decade) to consider the reality of the growth of digital content. Surely, by now, we should all be perfectly comfortable with these developments and be merrily manipulating them to best commercial effect. In reality, the advertising world’s understanding of how to use “projected cities” (as Barber had it in 2002), the “glocal” (as Friedman asserted in 2005), or just the good old fashioned web is too often revealed to be languishing behind the curve.

Each year the digital world develops, deepens and further secures its position at the centre of consumer culture. However, as this time passes, the marketing calendar remains perennially replete with talks and seminars that outline the existence of rudimentary digital phenomena. It can safely be said that there is absolutely no shortage of talks on social networking, user generated content, or the digital native.

In essence, there is nothing wrong with the persistence of these introductions, but surely what we need now is a pragmatic and employable framework to guide industry thinking towards the effective manipulation of this new-fangled media.

There is definitely more to be said. At this point in digital history, there is unquestionably more advice to be given.

The 1st tenet to erect is the understanding that digital content is well beyond being “kinda interesting” or “something to watch out for”. Right now, it is arguably the most important form of entertainment on earth. A bold assertion, maybe, but if one considers that “.tv” URL addresses rose 40% in number through 2008 (www.thedomains.com, 2008), and that everyday 1.3 million new blog entries are posted (WARC, 2008) and 100million Youtube clips served (www.techcrunch.com, 2008) then it is soon easier to agree with. Any lingering doubt, suggesting digital media to be exclusively “youth media”, should also be swiftly quashed when one notices that 80.6% of 35-64 year-olds are internet users. It is very clear that all of us should be nurturing an active interest and involvement in this “new” media; there really are no excuses.

The 2nd pillar to winch into place is the idea that the level of quality required of our digital comms has never been so high. As suggested by the above figures, we are presently subject to an absolute deluge of digital information. Amongst other distractions, there are now approximately 180 million websites to explore (Netcraft, October 2008), 13 million MP3 to purchase (Page and Bud, 2009), and 125,000+ iTunes podcasts to download (Apple, 2007). There is an absolute truckload of digital content to enjoy. However, the crucial truth is that it is impossible for people to consume all of it. The public are forced to cultivate a prioritised receptiveness – in short, they only really notice good “stuff”.

This point rings true regardless of intelligent media choices or self-conscious attempts at innovation. Unhelpful and unexciting content that is novel and highly targeted is still unhelpful, unexciting, and will probably be ignored. The only way to scythe through the extant smorgasbord of entertainment available to the public, is to be brave enough to offer quality; i.e. something people will want and like.

The situation puts me in mind of a sketch Stephen Fry and Hugh Laurie wrote, about the 1990 British Broadcasting Act. Fry, acting as a waiter in a chintzy restaurant, serves MP Keith Bennet (a then chief advocate for de-regularising broadcasting). Noticing that the minister only has a set of silver cutlery, Fry quickly and apologetically clears the offending implements away, and rushes back to replace them with an entire bag of disposable tea-stirrers. When the cover looks aghast at the mountain of plastic on his table, Fry simply replies “Well at least you’ve got the choice now. They may be complete crap, but at least you’ve got choice” (www.youtube.com/watch?v=6T2zUEiVQU4). A fairly blunt piece of satire, perhaps, but you get the idea.

This is an important lesson, one which we all must do our best to take on. We must ingest the news that although there are 13 million MP3 files available to buy on the net, just over 10 million of them have never been downloaded (Page & Bud, 2009). We must also find meaning in the experience of Handbag.com’s “Are you in fashion?” application that achieved a grand total of  68 users (WARC, 2008).  And conversely, we must learn from BBC iPlayer’s astounding viewer figures, that trounce even those of the “great” unedited Youtube (Thinkbox, 2008). It is clear that all digital content (and so, by extension, advertising) must now stand on its own, based on its intrinsic utilitarian or emotional value.

The 3rd beam to secure is the realisation that digitally involved people are just people, and that communicating with them through digital is no harder than through any other medium. We must trust this logic in a way that the majority of the industry is still yet to do.

For many, this whole area is still cloaked in mystery and is the source of much apprehension. The commonly held perception of digital, as an infinitely complex and unconquerable network of marketing platforms, has been left unchallenged as the industry has developed an anxious fascination with the thoughts of an increasingly high-theory focussed literature (Nyilary & Leonard, 2007).

Whilst there is nothing essentially wrong with the hypothetical cerebral exercises of Gibson & Presky etc, we need to be careful to keep our gaze where it is really needed – the consumer. We must remember that they are absolutely “not a new kind of species” (Yakov, 2007). The majority of the public is not over-awed by technology, does not become conflicted in the face of channel selection and has maintained its natural focus on the materials that bare the most interest. As Marc Giusti (2008) puts it, they just don’t ever think “media fragmentation, it’s upon me!”; they simply interact with the most compelling ideas, content and brands. To summarise, we must have the intellectual confidence to stand, aware of the existence of various hypotheses, and still perceive digital marketing through a pragmatic and quality-focussed lens.

A brief analysis of case-studies (1 acting as a warning, 1 as encouragement) makes this point even clearer. Firstly, we might consider the content produced by Inbox Digital for the sadly departed Woolworths. Most specifically, we should pay attention to the brand’s Catapult application, used to launch their Big Read Book in 2008 (www.catapultassault.com). At the very least, the game was a little too hidden and esoteric in meaning. But, its real down-fall was that it just was not that entertaining. There was no real reason to play it; a point made all too clear by the news that, throughout the year, the game attracted just 5 players (WARC, 2008). In this case, it feels as though the marketing team (both agency and client) fell prey to the impressive buzz surrounding novel media and social networking (there’s a Facebook group). There seems to have been an acceptance that if they took the literature’s sexiest headlines of “interactivity” and “sharing” and added them together, huge user figures would emerge from the other side of the equation.  No-one checked to think “would I actually play this?” We absolutely must forget our anxieties about the new and the digital, and not let them cloud our judgement, eventually forcing our nervous hands into producing ineffective content fit for landfill.

So, secondly and positively, we might turn our attention to Sony’s “Balls”. Now, some will gasp and exclaim that I have mentioned a traditional ad in a missive concerning digital, but please bear with me. Launched in 2005, Balls was a campaign that not only entertained on “proper” screens but, because of its sheer creative worth, was also embraced by the digital community (Sinnock, 2008). The point being that its initially planned channels of distribution can be considered academic – people simply gravitated towards something of outstanding quality. The consumers didn’t see channels, channel choice, or a division between digital and real. They were just aware of great content. In its year of launch, Balls became the most viewed ad on YouTube and four years on it is still fertile ground for user generated spin-offs. The result? Well, Balls (and its equally impressive follow-up “Paint”) took Sony Bravia from also-ran to market leader in under 2 years (Campaign, 2006).

In conclusion, we must gain some perspective. We must coolly consider industry alerts concerning the digital revolution, avoid developing reactionary strategies out of reverent genuflection, and instead believe again in producing the most relevant and entertaining messaging and executions possible. Over half of the public have admitted that they do not mind if content is commercially motivated; just as long as it is good (Bauer, 2007). So we must go forth and have faith that, if given the choice, people will always plump for the silver cutlery. Regardless of any remaining industry worries about technology and the unknown, quality will prevail.