nevermind the bricolage

Trendwatching

I spend quite a bit of time exploring consumer and trend watching sites, some of the exploration is for work-elated stuff but mainly it is out of general interest. Trendwatching publishes some really good information that you can sign up for and have just released their December trendbriefing that looks forward to 2011. The offer up a number of trends that they feel will define consumer behaviour in the next year. A couple stck out to me. Made For China, examines the gorwing number of products and services created by companies exclusively for the Chinese consumer, everything from Levi's jeans to BMW's M3Tiger, a limted edition orange-metallic car celenrating twenty-five years of BMW presence in China. This underscores the growing place of China in the world economy, and of course points to the pervasive power of consumption in our lives.Perhaps even more interesting is Generation(G)--for generosity, emerging generosity on a global scale is something that the report focuses on. They say that brands from emerging markets will be expected to do more than just 'sell and take.' According to the report they "will increasingly be expected to give, donate, care and sympathize versus just sell and take. And not just in their home countries, but on a global scale. It's a profound cultural change and a consumer demand that their counterparts in mature markets have had a few years to getting used to. Some fun stats:

86% of global consumers believe that business needs to place at least equal weight on society’s interests as on business’ interests.

78% of Indian, 77% of Chinese and 80% of Brazilian consumers prefer brands that support good causes, compared to 62% of global consumers.

8 in 10 consumers in the India, China, Mexico and Brazil expect brands to donate a portion of their profits to support a good cause. (Source: Edelman, November 2010.)
The number of millionaires in India in 2009 grew 51 percent, to 126,700. (Source: Merrill Lynch, June 2010.)
88-year old Yu Pengnian became China’s first billion dollar philanthropist in April 2010. The Yu Pengnian Foundation today has USD 260 million of bank deposits, and a Hong Kong and Shenzhen property portfolio worth just under USD 1 billion, which is expected to contribute USD 50 million of cash each year to the foundation. (Source: Hurun Rich List, October 2010.)
In September 2010, Bill Gates and Warren Buffett hosted a dinner for China's ultra-rich to promote philanthropy. The event was similar to their efforts to get US billionaires to pledge to give away at least half their wealth, although the two denied that they were recreating the pledge or pressurizing people to give, merely using the event to answer questions and discuss issues around developing a culture of philanthropy. (Source: Washington Post, October 2010.)
In 2011, any brand or individual doing exceptionally well, will be expected to join GENERATION G.

This connecting between sales and philanthropy is something that has been gaining ground in the West for some time (think RED campaign etc.), and seems to becoming a defining charateristic of 21st century economics and consumerism.

I think there are lots of connecting points for churches and religion in these trend reports, clues as to where people are focusing their attention and desires and offer some strategic ideas for engaging them, not just for the brand-marketers, but for anyone interested in connecting with people in some meaningful way. They are like little temperature gauges.

Patti Keeps the Flame

An essay by Patti Smith on Creative Voyage, there is some wisdom here.

"Keeping the Flame" In Praise of the Bright Thing Inside us
    When I was young, everything seemed so simple. I felt the calling toward art and literature, so I decided I would be a writer and pen a magical book like "Peter Pan" or "Alice in Wonderland." But no matter how fixed I was on my path, something always drew me away and I tramped unexpected roads with great twists and turns. And what I learned is that we are all Pinocchio: We begin our life, waving to our mother and father with our schoolbooks in hand, hoping to do well. But we are turned this way and that. We make mistakes, we move from our course, we falter, flounder, and may suffer remorse, rebellion, or a sense of defeat. We seem to lose our way. But no matter! if we keep our little flame alive, our first feeling of enthusiasm of who we are, without the influence or intervention of others, we will prevail. And like Pinocchio, despite all his transgressions, find the courage to reunite with our little flame and be rewarded. And the reward is this: We become ourselves.
    In my life I have made many mistakes. Sometimes I was careless and inconsiderate of others. Fate drew me to singing and performing around the world, and yet this was not what I dreamed for myself--sometimes I felt it took me from my true path, that of a writer. But I found performing brought me closer to the people. It gave me an opportunity to travel, to explore, to communicate, and concern myself with my fellow man.
    In 1979 I gave up my life in the arena of rock 'n' roll to marry and raise a family, another divergence from my pursuit as a solitary artist. But through my family I learned the final lesson of Pinocchio--what it is like to be human. And always through everything, through sacrifice and success, I have tried to stay close to my little flame, reminding me of who I am.
    The cricket tells Pinocchio, "Always let your conscience be your guide." These words, by a small, insignificant insect, give us all we need. The best person to tell you who you are, what you should be, is ultimately yourself."

18th century community terrorism

"one lone idiot pimping an 18th century brand of community terrorism" is how Jason Linkins characterized the now media-famous Terry Jones (he of the fundamentalist religion and collector of 80s porn moustache), and his campaign to burn the Quran on Saturday, the anniversary of the 9/11 attacks on New York. What a fucking idiot, but how, did this guy get so much press? I have resisted making any comments but as this thing continues to play out I think I have to weigh in a little. I suppose we are experiencing the downside of living in a mediated age--anyone and everyone can get their opinion, ideas, thoughts etc. to the public on an unprecedented scale, particularly if, through sets of circumstances (and I would love someone to chart the developmental arc of this media clusterfuck) the media somehow grabs hold of their story. All of this apparently threads back to the debate that has been raging lately over whether or not to build a mosque at Ground Zero etc. Although it isn't actually at Ground Zero, its a couple of blocks away, and there is already a mosque down there anyway, so who cares?!!! This stuff is so inane and doing absolutely nothing to aid my growing frustration with religion. I don't want to make it all about me, by any stretch of the imagination, I have been having many conversations with people and this stuff comes up without any nurture--people seem utterly perplexed by the sheer level of ignorance that is permeating this issue. There is no real discourse just sound-byte sloganeering. As Linkns writes, "As soon as the media saw themselves a shiny shiny shining thing shining shinily in New York City, they pounced! How perfect! Something for us to talk about during the slow-news summer! I mean, we could talk about the nation's unemployment crisis, but that would mean we'd have to talk to poor, jobless people, and there's no currency in having access to a bunch of poors. Right away, they accepted the premise that this was a "Ground Zero mosque," when it wasn't. And so, by the power vested in the media, things that weren't in fact true were accorded the privilege of being "one side of a great debate" and "an interesting point of view."

All week long a line from Imagine, John Lennon's classic peace epic, has been floating through my head--and trust me, I seldom find Lennon's lyrics in my head--"above us only sky"--I think this will be the title of my adieu to religion and the beginning of my journey towards a world without god--or at least the kind of gods that seem to fuel this kind of madness.  As for the media, what can be said? in the chase for dollars, something of value has been lost and what has replaced it is, well, I don't even know where to begin. Jones leads a church called Dove World Outreach Center I believe. 50 or so people in Florida, with ambition to reach the whole world--well with the media's help they sort of succeeded and I don't feel particularly happy about it. Linkins offers these words towrds the end of his worth-reading article,

"They got played, and played badly, by a dude with 14th-century religious beliefs, 19th-century facial hair and ultra-modern media savvy. Terry Jones has essentially blackmailed some of the most important people in America, with the assistance of the media.
Let's remember that all of this paralysis was caused by 50 people who wanted to burn a book that's available for free, on the Internet!"

The Sound of Failure

I have just finished up leading a two-week intensive class on Theology and Popular Music. It was a bit intense, these classes are quite demanding--four hours a day for ten straight days, but they also yield some fruitful conversations, as the immersion deep into a topic seems to have a different dynamic than a class that is stretched out over a regular term. I was attempting some synthesis between understandings of the function of meaning(s) in popular music and the intersections, departures and challenges of theological responses to the world around us. We covered the developmental history of pop music, some of the key genres, artists, producers, managers etc., and of course, the 'business' side of the music industry, as well as the role of technology and culture---essentially, way too much stuff for a couple of weeks, but we did our best to touch on at least some of this in a meaningful way. On the final day I attempted to sketch out something of a beginning posture for the initiation of a conversation between these two elements. Posture, being the operative word, because for me, any act of theology requires a posture, an attitude, from which it springs, and for me, this is first and foremost, listening--to the other--if you don't listen, you can't hear and if you can't hear, you cannot know. All too often, in my experience, people begin with a pre-formed schema, which is then imposed over whatever it might be, and then, what fits is accepted and the bits around the edges are cut-off--negated etc. A bit of a broad dismissal of the theological enterprise I know, but I use that analogy simply to say that my approach is a bit different--I am interested in the surprising intersections that arise because of the rupture and disconnect as well as the congruity and synchronicity between various elements.

Now I taught this class whilst in the midst of what I can only describe as a major life-shift presently underway on my life. I can really fully express what I am going through--I am coming undone, in the best possible ways. This is of course, scary and exciting at the same time, but I want something else in my life and am now at a point, for a number of internal awarenesses to begin the process of making it happen, however challenging that may seem at times. All that to say, that much of what we talked about in class had resonances for me that went way beyond the topics we were discussing. Yesterday for instance, I utilized some of Brian Eno's thinking in an attempt to wrap some things up. I think Eno is insightful, he thinks tangentially and seems to possess remarkable curiosity and insight into many things. Here is a quote from him that I used,

Quitting...?

"For those who care, and I understand if you don't: Today I quit being a Christian. I'm out. I remain committed to Christ as always but not to being "Christian" or to being part of Christianity. It's simply impossible for me to 'belong' to this quarrelsome, hostile, disputatious, and deservedly infamous group. For ten …years, I've tried. I've failed. I'm an outsider. My conscience will allow nothing else.As I said below, I quit being a Christian. I'm out. In the name of Christ, I refuse to be anti-gay. I refuse to be anti-feminist. I refuse to be anti-artificial birth control. I refuse to be anti-Democrat. I refuse to be anti-secular humanism. I refuse to be anti-science. I refuse to be anti-life. In the name of …Christ, I quit Christianity and being Christian. Amen."

A Facebook post from Anne Rice about her latest life transition regarding faith. From the Vampire Chronicles to her re-telling of Jesus stories, she now seems to have found herself in a place many people I know find themselves in at present. We had this essential discussion in class just this morning, the challenges of coming to terms with the inner conflicts of a slow-changing machinery form of faith versus the fluidity and shifting times in which we live. As always an intense and revelatory conversation about the meaning of faith in the 21st century.

McSweeney's

TWEET. BY OYL MILLER

I saw the best minds of my generation destroyed by brevity, over-connectedness, emotionally starving for attention, dragging themselves through virtual communities at 3 am, surrounded by stale pizza and neglected dreams, looking for angry meaning, any meaning, same hat wearing hipsters burning for shared and skeptical approval from the holographic projected dynamo in the technology of the era, who weak connections and recession wounded and directionless, sat up, micro-conversing in the supernatural darkness of Wi-Fi-enabled cafes, floating across the tops of cities, contemplating techno, who bared their brains to the black void of new media and the thought leaders and so called experts who passed through community colleges with radiant, prank playing eyes, hallucinating Seattle- and Tarantino-like settings among pop scholars of war and change, who dropped out in favor of following a creative muse, publishing zines and obscene artworks on the windows of the internet, who cowered in unshaven rooms, in ironic superman underwear burning their money in wastebaskets from the 1980s and listening to Nirvana through paper thin walls, who got busted in their grungy beards riding the Metro through Shinjuku station, who ate digital in painted hotels or drank Elmer's glue in secret alleyways, death or purgatoried their torsos with tattoos taking the place of dreams, that turned into nightmares, because there are no dreams in the New Immediacy, incomparably blind to reality, inventing the new reality, through hollow creations fed through illuminated screens. Screens of shuttering tag clouds and image thumbnails lightning in the mind surfing towards Boards of Canada and Guevara, illuminating all the frozen matrices of time between, megabyted solidities of borders and yesterday's backyard wiffleball dawns, downloaded drunkenness over rooftops, digital storefronts of flickering flash, a sun and moon of programming joyrides sending vibrations to mobile devices set on manner mode during twittering wintering dusks of Peduca, ashtray rantings and coffee stains that hid the mind, who bound themselves to wireless devices for an endless ride of opiated information from CNN.com and Google on sugary highs until the noise of modems and fax machines brought them down shuddering, with limited and vulgar verbiage to comment threads, battered bleak of shared brain devoid of brilliance in the drear light of a monitor, who sank all night in interface's light of Pabst floated out and sat through the stale sake afternoon in desolate pizza parlors, listening to the crack of doom on separate nuclear iPods, who texted continuously 140 characters at a time from park to pond to bar to MOMA to Brooklyn Bridge lost battalion of platonic laconic self proclaimed journalists committed to a revolution of information, jumping down the stoops off of R&B album covers out of the late 1980s, tweeting their screaming vomiting whispering facts and advices and anecdotes of lunchtime sandwiches and cat antics on couches with eyeballs following and shockwaves of analytics and of authority and finding your passion and other jargon, whole intellects underscored and wiped clean in the total recall 24/7 365 assault all under the gaze of once brilliant eyes.

 

Saving Books

One of the much touted apps. for the new iPad is iBooks--essentially a reading application like Kindle, allowing the user to download digital copies of books and magazines. The 'saving' of books and the publishing industry along with it,  has been one of the hot topic discussions around the new device from Apple (quite a brilliant by the way, someone in my house, but not me, owns one already!!). As a lover of books I am happy that reading them is the focus of public discourse. I am of two minds about digital books--some books I dont care to own, but others, for some inexplicable reason, I need to have in the physical form--to smell the pages, pour over the content and generally revel in the ancient art of reading in the old form. With all the talk of books and reading in the ether, I was really struck by a picture of Karl Lagerfeld in a new book, The Selby, an interior design book from the magic blog. It is well-known that Lagerfeld, an avid collector of many things, is an obsessive, if not compulsive, reader and the images of just one of his libraries is testament to his love for books (and for possessions obviously!!). And alongside of that I came across an interview with Keith Richards, who declared that he always wanted to be a librarian, and is also the possessor of a great number of rare and antique books, as well as an ongoing library of contemporary publications...who knew, Keef, the pirate of rock is a bibliophile!!

The future of books, like most things it seems, is contested, nothing to be taken for granted anymore. That reminds me of Nic Hughes comments on his erratically curated blog, "It is tempting to declare that there is not a single system, flow or relationship that doesn’t need revising or ‘redirecting’. Virtually every institution and practice is outmoded and obsolete— not fit for purpose. A new planetary metabolism is required, one that not only revises human-to-human relationships, but the relationship of all things."

 

Weapons

At War with Walls and Mazes has been one of my favourite musical journey's since it came out in 2008. Son Lux (Ryan Lott) created a collection of songs that were fully informed by pop sensibilities but which abandoned the traditional binary approach to song-craft (verse/chorus) for a more chant-like approach, with rhythms and vocals moving around anchoring melodies--it needs to be heard, that is all I have to say. Apparently he felt that this idea needed a bit more exploration so he recently released an EP called Weapons. Weapons takes its name from one of the main tracks on his first release and uses it as a launchpad for a collection of songs derived from a single source. You can find out more about it here.

Negation

Last February, Alain Badiou gave a lecture at Art Center on the poetry of Piero Pasolini. The lecture was titled, Destruction-Negation-Subtraction. He focused on a poem written by Pasolini called, Vittoria., well, a portion of the poem anyway. Badiou used the poem as a way to get into what I think is an interesting discussion ultimately about how change comes about. As I have thought about what he said over the past few months, I think there is something good here. He spoke about the link between destruction and negation--he said that destruction viewed as the essence of negation  was a fundamental idea of the 20th century, and argued that a fundamental idea at the beginning of the 21st century was to link negation with subtraction. Now a word about negation--a formal definition declares it

Precariat

Precariat is a word that emerged from Japan I think, it combines two English words--precarious and proletariat--and refers to those workers(the proletariat) whose lives are precarious because of part-time or contract jobs which offer no long term security. It is a word I relate to well--most of my adult life I have been a precariat--but that is about to change a little. As of Monday I have two real jobs! Well, I couldn't do just one, my interests are a bit broad and neither is completely full-time at present,