Machines Using Humans To Make Better Machines

While browsing social media, have you ever encountered something that made you just so angry you couldn't stand it? Well, that's a feature, not a bug. As media theorist Douglas Rushkoff states:

“Researchers have found, for example, that the algorithms running social media platforms tend to show pictures of ex-lovers having fun. No, users don’t want to see such images. But, through trial and error, algorithms have discovered showing pictures of our exes having fun increases our engagement. We are drawn to click on those pictures and see what our exes are up to, and we’re more likely to do it if we’re jealous they’ve found a new partner. The algorithms don’t know why it works, and they don’t care. They’re only maximise whatever metric we’ve instructed them to pursue.”

- Douglas Rushkoff, Team Human

It struck me how far we've come from the 1950s, when Norbert Weiner's theory of cybernetics - humans using machines to improve humans - has turned itself on its head. We're now using machines to exploit humans to refine the machines. We can either program (the insidious "learn to code" meme) or be programmed.

The machines are trying their best to remove us from the human equation. We have metrics, dashboards, bounce rates, pageviews, conversions; some of us talk in this machine language that would've made Dr. Weiner's head spin. We're trying to be like computers, but we can't. A computer has perfect memory, perfect algorithms, perfect recall. It can know you better than you know yourself.

Unfortunately we cannot go back to a previous time; you can't cut smartphones or the Internet out from our culture; no more than you can remove your liver or lungs. It's transformed our entire society, whether we like it or not.

In French sociologist Jacques Ellul’s view, the bargain we make with new technology is Faustian; what problems new technology solves seems to take something away at the same time.

I remember a time when I used to (well, still do) blow up innocent pixels in flight simulators and first person shooters. My Dad couldn't understand the unrestrained glee I was having, using (simulated) weapons of mass destruction.

I said these disintegrated people weren't "real." Instead, "they" were computer-generated characters programmed to fight me and die trying. We can obviously distinguish between what's real and what's not (though deepfakes and other misinformation might muddy those already hazardous waters), but when we end up serving machines, we often lose sight of the human element.

Often, clients become folders, deadlines, and metrics. They're no longer people with struggles of their own, reaching out to me for help with something. I think in the PPC, CPC, "machine" algorithm age, many of us don't take the time to value a client for who he or she is.

A computer can't really recognise the value of something unless we tell it to.

We can.

It's hard, but I think it's worth doing.

Leaders Are Not Our Masters

“A man who follows someone else not only does not find anything, he is not even looking. But surely you are going to walk in your predecessors footsteps? Yes indeed, I shall use the old road, but if I find a shorter and easier one I shall open it up. The men who pioneered the old routes are leaders, not our masters. Truth lies open to everyone. There has yet to be a monopoly of truth. And there is plenty of it left for future generations too.”

— Seneca, Letters from a Stoic

The world of words we inhabit is so continuous and ever-changing, it is near inseparable from the world of non-words, or things. Sometimes we call this reality. Reality, as author Philip K. Dick defines it, is the “part of life that doesn’t go away when you stop believing in it.” It was this I was pondering when reading Seneca’s Letters from a Stoic the other day. Leaders are made, not born. They are believed in, which gives them their power.

Mastery over others can follow leadership, this is true. The charisma and cunning of leaders throughout history have moved nations into greatness; others have led them straight into a firing line. Once we have accepted someone as leader and master, is there any resolve left to carve our own path? Can we all be leaders? Can we be leaders without being masters?

In my previous blog on mastery, I talked about mastery as the command of a subject or process to it’s highest degree, not mastery as a person having dominion over others. The dominion is a voluntary process; there is no natural law that decrees one person having control over another, at least not in this day and age. Leaders as Masters may use rhetoric, “fear, uncertainty, and doubt” and other tricks to get others under their thumb. Living in a “post-truth” world, they purport to have a monopoly on truth, the same monopoly Seneca denies to any one person.

In business, some think of “leadership” as “mastery” - that they are the boss, they know better, and others should do what they say. This is not leadership, let alone mastery. Mastery, as I discussed earlier, is the attitude that one has achieved so much that there is nothing more to be learned. This too is folly.

I think that leaders can be learned from. Leaders who have both succeeded and failed in their pursuits are excellent learning tools. They led the way into a new market, a new field of study, a new path; and right now is the time we push the frontier of what’s unknown back a little more.

As humans, we are the only creatures we know of that bind time; that is, project our knowledge into the future through our children and (hopefully) build upon it. This is what Seneca means by “there is plenty left for future generations.” Their chase for wisdom has only just begun, and may teach us something in the process.

When I see “thought leaders” and “business leaders” in print, my mind turns to the “mastery” definition of leaders - that they must have followers to be leaders. I don’t think that definition, at least for me, cuts it any more. Perhaps we should think of leaders as those who got their first, or those who are trying something new, or those who speak truth when it falls on deaf ears. Leaders need not be sitting atop piles of riches to be leaders. Military leaders can charge into battle and be forced to retreat. In the absence of anyone willing, leadership appears when someone says “I’ll do it.”

All can be leaders, if we live in accordance with nature; that is, seek truth and concern ourselves with “what is going on” instead of “what’s inside our heads.” Following the majority will lead to mediocrity after all, as Seneca once wrote in his Letters.

Leaders only have mastery over us if we give it to them.

Was Obi-Wan ever a "Master?"

If you haven't seen Star Wars by now, I have to question your parents' devotion to you and whether you had a childhood at all. (This is my way of telling you there's spoilers.)

Anyway...

In the first Star Wars film (I refuse to retroactively call it A New Hope), Jedi Master Obi-Wan Kenobi sacrifices himself facing former pupil Darth Vader, allowing Luke Skywalker and his friends to escape the Death Star. In Star Wars lore, the master in Jedi master owes more to a Jedi Knight taking on an apprentice and showing him or her the ways of the light side of the Force.

The word mastery denotes control and supreme knowledge. It connotes having a thorough command of a subject or process, something "one could do in their sleep."

Last month, I had some time with a good friend Earl Livings, who himself is a writing teacher and fiction author. I had shown him the fourth draft of a short story I'd written back in January. He gave me some praise; however the markings, corrections, and suggestions told me I was a long way from "mastering" anything.

Was Obi-Wan really a master? Or was he in the process of learning too? He made a few blunders by withholding from Luke the true nature of his father.

Of course, failure is always feedback. Each red line through my prose is another step towards "mastery," though attainment of such a state may always be another step ahead, no matter how far I travel. I don't feel that the skills that comprise one's profession requires complete "mastery" as there is always more to learn.

I always fear the person who says they are complete in their knowledge; as this is rarely mastery at all.

Do you feel like you need to "master" subjects or skills? Or are you always a work in progress, like me?

Let me know in the comments below.

Have I Become Obsolete? (and other fun)

Have you ever got a link in your email or WhatsApp and got the shock of your life? I did the other day.

A friend of mine linked me to an AI-powered natural language application to Talk To Transformer.

What's that you ask?

It's a machine that completes text for you based on a few lines of input.

Just like The Simpsons archvillain Mr. Burns ordering a thousand monkeys to write the best novel in history, this AI called GPT-2 works on kind of the same principle. It scours the internet as its source, completing sentences, paragraphs, and perhaps one day, entire books as it learns what you need it to say.

It predicts the next word one might have said, much like a predictive text application in your smartphone.

Despite the occasional "Sorry honey, running late for yogurt tonight", machine generated language is not new. Last year, Facebook's own AI developed its own internal language without user intervention.

Australia's very own ReporterMate, an AI-driven journalism program, spat out this article about political donations prior to the Federal Election for The Guardian. The Associated Press also uses AI to help assist reporters with articles.

So it's off to the trash heap for me! Well, not quite.

There may be a time when a machine will write better than I could ever hope to.

I don't think that time is now.

Humans using machines as tools or extensions of ourselves will become more complex and more useful. Perhaps language generators such as these will automate some tasks such as modifying legal boilerplate or updating business information.

I'm not running scared yet; but I am fascinated to see what lies ahead.

As for what Talk To Transformer came up with as an alternative to this post, see below.

Default - The two bitterest words in the English language

Last year, I was pitted against a client turned enemy - someone I’d trusted until one day…he simply refused to pay.

Until a business owner is faced with a bad debtor, it’s hard figuring out what to do. Thanks to some help from friends, family, and the good people over at Flying Solo, I tried my hardest to recover what was owed to me.

Enter Client X

Client X, as I’ll describe him, was something of an entrepreneur himself. He had a few fingers in more than a few pies. He dabbled in marketing, lead generation, and sales of parts in the construction industry. He hired me to bolster his personal brand. This was in August of last year.

I wrote some blogs based on his opinions, which he supplied to me. He also asked me to come up with some “inspirational quotes” for his Instagram. The type successful people never post on Instagram, because they’re too busy chasing the next opportunity. I digress.

As usual, I sent my invoices out with 14 day terms.

As the 14th day arrived, I sent out a reminder. Then an overdue reminder. And another. Then another.

After about a week or two, Client X confessed he was having trouble with his own debtors. I sympathised, and suggested we work out a payment plan. He paid about 20% of the invoice and promised to pay the rest off over the next four weeks.

The payments never came.

What to do? My only real recourse was to send him a Letter of Demand. This came back “return to sender” and “no such address.” Something I didn’t expect, since I gained the details from an ASIC extract.

So I had to go down the legal route. I told Client X by way of my assistant I’d take the case before VCAT.

I did.

I won (plus the VCAT fee.)

It wasn’t enough.

He came back with a laundry list of excuses as to why he wouldn’t pay. He said the company had no assets, and all he’d be willing to give me was another 20% of what I was owed.

I told him that was unacceptable.

Enter CreditorWatch

The drama dragged on into December. I was at a wits’s end. I turned to the Flying Solo forums. Many offered a bit of camraderie, but similar head scratching. Until Tracy Fowler replied:

There are a couple of things you can do. You can list a default against him with a credit reporting agency... this will affect his credit rating for a period of 5 years whenever he goes for finance, as he is a director, it will affect his personal rating as well. You must give adequate notice of your intent to list a default... I usually send 3 emails or letters giving 7 days to respond, with the fourth contact 3 days later, and the fifth and final notice on the day I intend on listing the default. For the default, I would recommend using Creditorwatch, there is a $20 or $30 monthly fee for joining, but it gives you up to 5 credit reports, (which everyone should use prior to giving credit terms) and listing defaults are free. Creditorwatch are only for B2B transactions and the debt has to be over $150.00…
I have had debtors come back 2 years after a default and pay the debt and costs to have the default amended to paid, so that they can obtain finance. There are no guarantees, but at least it is a warning to others.
The other thing you can do is take yourself off to the local magistrates court and use the VCAT order to obtain judgement. This also stays on their credit file for 5 years, and affects their ability to obtain finance in the future.

I knew about filing defaults against individuals from my finance copywriting, but not about companies - this was golden advice.

Once I wielded the word default aloft like Excalibur, the fur started to fly.

“I’ll Sue for Deformation”

Client X was dogged in his determination to hold on to his money. When I said I’d lodge a default against his company through CreditorWatch, he was furious.

He ranted and raved that he’d sue me for “deformation” (I think he meant defamation) even though I’d dotted every “i” when it came to getting what I was owed. He said he’d get my default “removed within a day”. I retorted (perhaps cheekily) that if he had enough money to pay for a lawyer, he had enough money to pay me the full amount.

December rolled into January 2019, and I did indeed register a default against his company. This company is now in voluntary administration. Will I ever see the money? I doubt I have a Cuba Gooding, Jr. like confidence to shout it at anyone in particular.

The Lesson

Some friends asked why I just didn’t take the money and settle it. At one point, I tried. He wasn’t acting in good faith, and I rescinded the offer. He was trying to get this monkey off his back by any way possible.

What Client X owed me wasn’t a massive amount (less than $500), but it was significant. Either way, it was the principle of the thing. If I allow myself to get fleeced, have my boundaries violated, then who else might take advantage? As a solo business owner, I value my time, which is why I dare make a living off it.

I think as a professional communicator, the meta-communication in this says “If you value my product, you must also value my time - and I trade my time for money.” I hope other soloists and small business owners can learn from my experience. As frustrating as they were.

Paul from the FS forums summed it up best: “Order work, then pay for it.”

Special thanks to Tracy at BDM Credit Management for all her help and advice!

Why being someone’s “my” is the ultimate business referral

Imagine this scenario. You’re at the gym with your good friend, and you wince as you get up from a particularly gnarly stretch. Grabbing your back, your friend tells you, “You should see my chiropractor. She’s great.”

Of course, your friend hasn’t captured this hapless medical professional and stored her in the attic, just in case. But the language around who we trust with our business is that of ownership.

Owning our opinions, choices, and mistakes is an integral part of maturity. It is one reason “I” statements demonstrate that willingness to “own our shit.” 

Owning whom we place our sacred trust in is vital to our business experience.

Read more at Flying Solo.

Everybody's Doing It, Why Not You?

If you've stepped outside since October, it's beginning to feel a lot like Christmas.

What that actually means to you is as various as people in general. It could mean dragging plastic trees around the house; spending up big and forgetting it until your statement arrives; or you could be of a faith that only observes this bizarre ritual at a distance.

The language of Christmas - and likewise the language of anti-consumerist sentiments in opposition to it - are quite similar. They both try to persuade people into adopting a tradition that only dates back a couple of generations. Christmas as the gift-swapping, Turkey-engorged ritual we observe every 25th of December is as "made up" as Halloween; though detractors of the former will happily embrace the latter.

Many "traditions" are what we'd refer to today as "viral marketing campaigns"; the DeBeers diamond cartel insisting men save up at least 'three months salary' to buy their fiance an engagement ring with a diamond encrusted on top. That was dreamed up by the N.W. Ayer ad agency in the 1900s, to prop up what was once an abundant and intrinsically worthless gemstone.

We as humans (seem to) need ritual, repetition. It feels safe, and it feels predictable. If we arrived home after work each night and our keys worked one time in ten, we'd feel pretty out of sorts. Marketing and advertising around Christmas often depicts the familiar and cozy - even though a snow-driven Christmas is largely a product of the American imagination. Our drink containers, wrapping paper - even Christmas crackers - all show us images of Snowmen, candy canes, and hot cups of cocoa. All this in the middle of blazing summer, on a continent far removed from the frosted-over driveways of Europe or the United States.

Even as absurd as it sounds, this holiday has near universal support. Is that a good thing? Like most decisions we make in life, that's up to us and us alone. It's a weird one, when you think about it!

Why every soloist should journal

Dear Diary, I feel a bit nervous telling everyone about writing in you. What if they laugh at me? What if they think I’m being precious? Worst of all, what if they ignore me?!

Well, at least I got it out there. I tried my best. That’s all that matters.

Journalling is a time-honoured tradition. So many people that shaped the world jotted down their thoughts for the day, every day (or close enough to it.): Albert Einstein, Marie Curie, Alexis de Toqueville, George S. Patton, Charles Darwin, Thomas Edison, George Lucas, Alfred Deakin, Teddy Roosevelt. That’s some great company, there. Research even tells us that outstanding leadership requires insight, and writing a journal can help achieve that.

That’s not to say journalling will spur you to instant success, of course. But it does give you pause to reflect, analyse, and process where you are and where you’d like to go.

Read the entire post on Flying Solo.

My First Piece, All Over Again

When I first started out in journalism, my first ever piece was published in Buzz Magazine, the "biggest" street press in South-East Australia (it asked you to take out a ruler and measure.) I remember holding it in my hands, proud as a father taking home his newborn. Of course, as time marched on, the afterglow of publication dimmed. (When you're an editor, you sell the dark lightbulb for ad space.)

I'm chuffed to say I experienced it again over the weekend, as Pascall published a social post I helped create (the post ideas and action copy) for their Better Together campaign. It was a lot of fun to make with the entire Online Circle Digital team - I'm so grateful for my time there and how it turned out! See it below:

Rely on friends to warm up your winter moments. Get cosy with our delicious duo - Pascall Marshmallows and Cadbury Hot Chocolate! #Pascall #Cadbury #lollies #NewZealand #BetterTogether

12 Likes, 1 Comments - Pascall (@pascalllollies) on Instagram: "Rely on friends to warm up your winter moments. Get cosy with our delicious duo - Pascall..."

Thinkpiece Marketing – is it a thing?

I went to university. I studied what would be termed a “liberal arts” degree by the American definition. When I graduated, I had exactly zero marketable skills. Until the internet thinkpiece revolution happened.

Back in the early 2000s when apps, video, and “content” in general got a “New Media” tag, thinkpieces were the exclusive province of the magazine. They soon found their way to the internet. We’ve dedicated entire platforms to the thinkpiece: Medium, Vox, and Australia’s own Junkee comes to mind.

When I began my own journalism career, the thinkpiece was the easiest piece of copy I could pitch and write. It required no research, little in the way of fieldwork, and I could knock it out over coffee and an afternoon. A thinkpiece requires a thesis, a vigorous defence of said thesis, a bit of pre-emptive rebuttal, and a (hopefully) thought-provoking conclusion. 99% of such pieces are pretentious, self-unaware, and full of cultural markers demonstrating the author’s position as a “cultural interlocutor.” My biggest criticism of self-declared “pop culture critics” is they call it a real job with a straight face. But they do have a function. They are the unacknowledged marketing conduit through which “highbrow” culture circulates.

The quest for organic, i.e., unpaid reach and engagement among marketers is endless. How does one market to a well off demographic, trained in the black arts of advertising and marketing, and emerge on the other side as a squeaky-clean, “authentic” expression for little to no outlay? You market to the thinkpiece crowd, of course.

As of writing, the thinkpieces on American rapper Childish Gambino (aka actor Donald Glover) new video for This Is America, number in the dozens; and that’s just page one of Google search results. The Atlantic, TIME, High Snobiety, AdAge, Rolling Stone, Vulture, and even the conservative National Review have all penned pieces in response to the violent, symbol-laden video. Their interpretations don’t even have to be correct, thanks to a liberal arts theory called “Death of The Author.” That is, a creator’s intentions should have no bearing on its final meaning. Even if Glover gives a definitive explanation, it won’t invalidate these competing viewpoints. Pretty neat, huh?

I KNOW WHAT YOU MIGHT ALREADY KNOW

Even still, do we need these people to tell us what it all means? Of course we don’t. But savvy marketers are in silent league with these haughty writers; give them fodder to write about, and they justify their own existence. Academia confers “high art” upon “pop art” through intense critical study; the thinkpiece does the same, in a compressed way.

McLuhan said that the medium is the message, and the message is buy this record, or at least consume this content. After the honeyed glow of the late 60s and early 70s “counterculture” wore off, sociologists Joseph Heath and Andrew Potter in their 2004 book The Rebel Sell declared it a “pseudo-rebellion.” The gospel of sexual liberation and generational identity became a “smug ritual.” This is what we’d now term “virtue signalling”; expressing a generic viewpoint to gain acceptance with a certain crowd.

It makes sense to produce “thinkpiece” inspiring content. It has to appear to have some deep underlying message which these “cultural interlocutors” can ferret out with their critical theory skills. Whether it has a message or not is beside the point.  When it comes to creating content, there is no non-commercial part of it, especially for rappers riding on big investments in their craft.

The least cynical but most ironic part of marketing in the 21st century, seems to me the “thinkpiece”. What’s your interpretation?

Vero: The Social Media Bluff

When the railroad and the automobile came on the scene, those who wanted could still travel by horseback. But now there is no choice. A businessman cannot acquire a computer just because he likes progress. The computer brings a whole system with it…the technical system has become strongly integrated…offices, means of distribution, personnel must all be adapted to it. - Jacques Ellul, The Technological Bluff

---

If you've flicked through Instagram, Facebook, or Snapchat over the last 48 hours you've likely seen users flocking to a new social medium called Vero. Vero's tag is "true social," which Forbes says enables one to "share what you want to share with who you want to share it with, unencumbered by the crush of third party posts that show up with ever-increasing frequency in other social networks."

This is a boon to brands and advertisers (some of which are bedroom guitarists showing off mediocre covers on Instagram) - no algorithm? No advertising? It sounds like a dream come true.

The media scholar in me says - not so fast. As a student of Neil Postman, media ecology, and everything else that goes with it, my mind tends to this maxim by the late, great Professor:

"New technology is a kind of Faustian bargain. It always gives us something, but it always takes away something important. That’s true of the alphabet, and the printing press, and telegraph, right up through the computer."

So what makes Vero so different? Why could it prevail over other networks such as the now defunct App.net, Mastodon, and even Google+, which had the search behemoth behind it despite dismal take up?

Well, right now, we have a pronounced network effect. This is the increased perception of usefulness due to a rapid surge of new subscribers. The more people seen to use it, the more useful it looks, and eventually becomes.

But success is not assured. As you can see, Twitter and Facebook, for example, were true "new" technologies. They were as revolutionary to media as a culture as the printing press or television. They both had a transformative effect.

Twenty years ago, we could not conceive of a public official communicating directly with his or her constituencies in near-real time, using a common platform. I am of course talking about the rise of Presidents Obama and Trump using Twitter.

Whether the network effect peaks and deflates, much like the Pokemon Go phenomenon (how many tweens do you see in parks catching electronic monsters these days?), remains to be seen. This is the major stumbling block: Vero is not offering an automobile in the age of horseback. They are just offering an alternative automobile, a Chevrolet Series C Classic to Ford's Model T.

Vero offers many of the same features Google+ did when introduced in June 2011. You can share with pre-defined circles of friends, share limitless text, links, images, and video, and also does not rank content according to algorithms or advertising. Even though G+ is baked into every Google account on the planet (boasting 540 million monthly active users at one point) those users only engaged with it for 3-7 minutes on average, compared to 7.5 hours for Facebook.

Enter Mephistopheles

Of course, there's a dark side - the fine print. Uploading content to Vero grants them a:

limited, royalty-free, sublicensable, transferable, perpetual, irrevocable, non-exclusive, worldwide license to use, reproduce, modify, publish, list information regarding, translate, distribute, syndicate, publicly perform, publicly display, make derivative works of, or otherwise use your User Content...

Which basically hands over your moral and copyrights over to the service. Forever. It still affords effortless social interaction (like Facebook) but takes away the nuance and depth of face-to-face communication (also like Facebook.)

Vero's success will owe more to human behaviour than any other media theory I could reference: habit. Social media isn't just where everyone "is", it's also a daily (hourly?) ritual giving us a little rush of dopamine. If likes and strokes (in the Eric Berne sense of the word) are few and far between on Vero, people will cling to what they know.

What do you think? Will Vero take off, or will it too end up a "digital ghost town" like so many "Facebook-killers" that have passed before it?

More on the network effect, by TechAltar

When A Full Stop Means Serious Business.

Some of us get text messages that are very serious business. Or in text speak, srs bsns.

But what makes a text go from light-hearted banter into draft UN Resolution? It would seem, the absence or presence of punctuation, such as full stops.

This phenomenon is called code-switching, the "practice of alternating between two or more languages or varieties of language in conversation."

Those of us with parents or grandparents born overseas will have seen this in action many times before. My Baba was notorious for speaking "Maso-lish", a mashup of Macedonian and English. My favourite was "Don't be a boudala," which means don't be an idiot. It would seem I was called that rather often. (Another favourite was "Otfori na computer", or "open the computer.") This isn't limited to multi-lingual people, however. We all do it.

Code-switching is almost seamless in terms of how we interpret language, and is controlled by our amygdala (lizard brains.). However when we expect short text messages or instant messages such as those over WhatsApp or Facebook Messenger, adding full stops, capital letters, etc. may break that implied code.

Many of us tend to believe a code-switch from informal (text speak) to formal language indicates a seriousness or gravitas to a conversation. Some of us just refuse to code-switch, employing the same tone and style across all mediums.

This requires some brainpower in realising your conversation partner isn't upset, being sarcastic, or whatever. Of course, much of what we mean when we type is lost, as we don't have visual and auditory cues such as facial expression, body language, and tonality. When in doubt, we can always Skype someone!

How To Make Your Writing Out Of This World

Originally posted under the title "How To Make Your Writing Effective" at SavvySME

The iconic space station, Deep Space Nine.

One of my favourite TV shows is Star Trek. My favourite spin-off is Deep Space Nine. My least favourite is Voyager. Let me tell you a story about both of these shows. (Be prepared for a journey through time and space until we land back on Planet Earth!)

Star Trek: Deep Space Nine was a bold effort in television at the time. (Not as bold as its rival Babylon 5, but that’s another story.) This was a science fiction show using their abundant technology to stay still. Star Trek was, and is, about exploring strange new worlds. Deep Space Nine was set on a space station. Things interacted with it, not the other way around.

Star Trek: Voyager put a twist on what had come before, however. The premise of “exploring strange new worlds” was still the pillar of the show. However, this time the crew of the titular USS Voyager finds themselves stranded in the Delta Quadrant, 70.000 light years from Earth. Even with the futuristic faster-than-light tech that Star Trek relies on for storytelling, this means a 75-year journey back.

During season two of their epic seven-season run, Deep Space Nine began serialising their stories. They introduced a chilling antagonist in the Dominion, bent on destroying the peaceful Federation and her allies. For a show that was set on a space station, their adventures and conflicts took place between people and tough moral situations. This was an age where binge watching and catch-ups weren’t an option (1993-1999). If you missed a week, you missed a vital part. The final season wrapped up narrative threads artfully set up in the preceding five seasons.

Voyager was the opposite. In comparison, Voyager was a cartoon. Anything that blew up the ship, imperilled the crew, or caused mischief in the Holodeck reset the next week. Voyager was indestructible, from a narrative point of view.

Deep Space Nine was created with no endgame in mind. Voyager had an endgame – get back to Earth. In fact, production staff titled the last episode Endgame. As predicted, they returned to Earth. They had to, right?

So what does this have to do with writing and communication?

Back To Earth - Communication with Purpose

Screenwriting is a form of communication – to directors, actors, prop masters, designers, costumers and so on. So is your writing – to managers, customers, distributors, suppliers, and so on.

Every piece of writing you set to create must have an endgame. There has to be a reason for it, and a set of outcomes you want to achieve. If you lose sight of that endgame, people will tell. It’s why fans pilloried Voyager at the time (and still do to this day.)

Some pieces of writing such as an annual report or a request for comment have an endgame baked into it. A request for comment is defined by its title - it’s asking for requests for comment! But the endgame is not enough. It has to reach out and touch someone. This is the basis for all types of writing. Sharing our wants, needs, and experience using the medium of words.

Connecting With Humanity - Communication with Passion

Once you’ve established an endgame, Deep Space Nine, unlike Voyager, had vulnerability. This vulnerability served a purpose. If your message has no heart, it is pushing uphill to connect with people. If you write without exposing yourself as a vulnerable individual with conflicts and feelings of your own, it falls flat.

Vulnerability is how we connect with readers - the Ancient Greeks called it “pathos”, a critical part of rhetoric, or the art of persuasion. You can connect with readers in a book, an essay, or even a simple email. Vulnerability expert, author, and TED sensation Dr. Brene Brown says vulnerability is the beginning of courage, and courage helps us belong in the world. She says:

“Because true belonging only happens when we present our authentic, imperfect selves to the world, our sense of belonging can never be greater than our level of self-acceptance.”

Perennial business cliche (and he’s a cliche for 74.8 billion reasons) and Berkshire Hathaway founder Warren Buffett always has an endgame and a vulnerability. As he says himself:

“Whenever I sit down to write the annual report, I pretend I am writing it to one of my sisters. Though highly intelligent, they are not experts on accounting or finance. They will understand plain English, but jargon may puzzle them. My goal is simply to give the information I would wish them to supply me if our positions are reversed. To succeed, I don’t need to be Shakespeare; I must have a sincere desire to inform.”

When you reveal yourself as a real person through your writing, you make every instalment an unmissable piece of your story. It must have passion, and it must have purpose.

So in your writing, what will you be? Deep Space Nine, or Voyager?

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Want copywriting that's out this world for your business?

Do you have once-a-year books?

Philip K. Dick.

In the writing game, I feel that you need to consume more than you produce. That is, writers should really read more than they write. Busy lifestyles command more of our time in ever thinning slices, but reading should be a top priority for anyone who communicates in a professional setting. How you divide that time is up to you: some prefer magazines, others prefer non-fiction. I maintain that a variety of styles and sources is best for a well-rounded “education” on writing. I think reading deeply is as important as reading widely. The path to mastery is not one, but many. I try to read the most pertinent in my collection at least once a year, to remind myself of certain facts and certain perspectives.

Non-fiction

Amusing Ourselves to Death by Neil Postman

I’ve mentioned this book on the blog before, but it’s more relevant than ever. Those scratching their heads at how the US populace could elect a Reality TV president, this book written 30 years prior gives insight other commentators merely skirt around. I mean, we already had the Reality TV war (Iraq) and the Reality TV terror attack (September 11), was a Reality TV leader of the free world that far-fetched? Postman shows us a media culture obsessed with “feel-good” over “facts,” and the biases of our mediums that conspire to keep it that way.

Language in Thought and Action by Samuel I. Hayakawa

The “popular” text on General Semantics and language studies, a must for those who want to discover their own semantic biases and the biases of others. It too delves into logic games, multi-valued orientations vs. two-valued “absolutisms”, poetry and the advertiser, what words really “mean”, and much more. An essential book for those working in communications.

Fiction

Nineteen-Eighty Four by George Orwell

This book was one of the first I’d read in high school and has stuck with me ever since. I think I’m attracted to the linguistic element of the book, Newspeak, and the narrowing of our experience as Big Brother eliminates complex ideas. “You don't grasp the beauty of the destruction of words,” says Parsons, our protagonist Winston Smith’s co-worker in the Ministry of Truth. Reading it sends a chill down my spine each time. Compare “Ministry of Truth” to “Social Justice” or “Fake news.”

Ubik by Philip K. Dick

One of the first ever books I’d read of Philip K. Dick, and one that demonstrates the power of words to craft an alternate reality. The mention or non-mention of certain phrases and passages turns a world on our head, as does the revelation and suppression of certain bits of information. It’s a philosophical tome, a book about running out of time, and much more.

Do you have once-a-year-books?

Who's Hired? - A Modern Parable on Communication

John, a man in his late 20s, well-educated, and from a loving family home is sitting across from two executives in a modern, fishbowl-style boardroom. We hear the faint murmur of keyboards clacking, phones warbling and footsteps on carpet. John has hung up his suit jacket on his chair. Amanda is looking through his crisp white resume, scribbling notes and lines on it every so often. Peter, who is wearing an open collar chequer shirt, has his hands clasped in front of him on the oak table. John is angling to be their next communications manager.

John feels that the interview is going well. He’s answered all their questions without so much as a stumble, and the vibe in the room is upbeat, positive. He has a strong rapport with both Amanda and Peter, and they seem to be warm to him.

“So,” Peter says, “Do you have anything you want to ask us?” Amanda places the resume on the table and meets John’s gaze.

“I do,” John says, smiling. “What happens if you don’t find a suitable candidate?”

Both stare him a blank.

John clears his throat and shuffles around in his chair. “For this job, I mean. What happens next?”

Amanda narrows her eyes and cocks her head. “I’m not sure what you mean by that.”

“Well, do you each have a boss? Someone you both report to?”

“Yes, of course,” Peter replies.

“So, let’s say you don’t find the right person. What happens next?”

Amanda and Peter turn to each other. Wheels are turning in Amanda’s head as she begins her reply at John

“Well, we’d have a meeting with our senior partner in charge of recruitment,” she says. “We’d outlay all the candidates and provide reasons why they were unsuccessful.”

John nods his head. “Yes, go on.”

Peter leans back, easing himself into the hypothetical.

“Then we would plan for how to fill the position.”

“I see,” John says. He searches his lap for a moment, and asks another question.

“So how would you find new candidates?”

“Oh, we’d ask the recruitment company to conduct a wider search. Cast a wider net.”

“Would you offer more money? More benefits?” John asks.

Peter cracks a wry smile. “That’s up to our senior partner,” he says with a smirk of pride.

A beat of silence follows. John is lost in thought for a moment.

“And who would be responsible?”

Without hesitation, Peter answers.

“Oh, the recruitment company. They should have done their job, considering we’ve paid for a service.”

Amanda agrees. “Absolutely. If they don’t perform again, we’ll probably find another recruitment company who will.”

“Yes, I see,” John says. “Would the senior partner get upset?”

Peter clears his throat again. “Kevin can be a hot-head at times, but I can’t see him getting that upset about it.”

“No,” Amanda clarifies, “I doubt he’d call for our heads, or anything like that,” she laughs. Peter laughs too, though John can see he’s a bit nervous.

“Cool,” John says. “Well, I can tell both of you right now how you can avoid that meeting, if you’d like. Just a complimentary thing,” he holds up his hands in mock surrender. “No strings attached.”

The pair both lean forward to listen. “Shoot,” Peter says, smiling.

“You could hire me right now, and you wouldn’t ever have to schedule that meeting. Just saying.”

John smiles as both Peter and Amanda chuckle.

A little later, John shakes both Peter and Amanda’s hand and thanks them for their time. He wishes them the best of luck in their search. Peter and Amanda are puzzled.

Evaluate the following:

1. Why did John decline the position?

2. What did the hypothetical meeting tell John about the company?

3. Would you work for this company, given the information provided?

Turning Phrases, Turning Heads - Seminar Part 1

Part 1 of my 'Turning Phrases, Turning Heads' Seminar delivered at Sandringham Yacht Club on 9 May, 2016 for the Bayside Business Network. Part 1 of 3 focuses on recognising bad writing, identifying common mistakes that lead to bloated, vague or impenetrable prose and more.

Part 1 of my Bayside Business Network seminar, Turning Phrases, Turning Heads is now available on YouTube! I will make Parts 2 and 3 available to seminar attendees next month (October.)

The first part of the seminar covers bad writing, how to make bad writing good, and improving business relationships by looking at how you write and to whom.

I'm also conducting a pared-down workshop-style seminar at NAB Village on 14 November, 2016. Strictly limited spots! If you want to attend, sign up now!

Spare Me The Details

“Tell me all the details!” is a well-worn piece of dialogue from romcoms and sitcoms – usually as two women in pyjamas hold wine and sit down on a couch. Being the word nerd that I am, I often wonder – what if the storyteller took what she said literally?

The sometimes physicist, sometimes wizard Robert Anton Wilson once wrote that creating a map of a territory – let’s say my hometown of Melbourne – with perfect detail would require a map so large it would be identical to Melbourne itself. It would contain trillions of moving parts, right down to those fast food wrappers blowing about Flinders Street Station.  “Perfect detail” is impossible, for our brains cannot comprehend it.

An incomplete, but still useful, map.

So, communication is imperfect and subject to distortion on the way from sender to receiver. Many businesses bog themselves down in the detail, believing that more detail is better. Heaping more “detail” on with words about your product or service increases the chance of distortion. So the model you present to the world is now:

• Not representative of the whole, and;

• Possibly incorrect once it reaches the person you’re showing it to.

Politics wonks bury themselves in the detail, sometimes reams and reams of it. Apathetic types may bemoan the “soundbite” culture of politics, but politicians are savvy enough to realise detail is unimportant, because detail is incomprehensible. Elections are won and lost on getting the amount of detail wrong. Just look at former Liberal opposition leader Dr. John Hewson lose the 1993 “unlosable” Federal Election getting bogged down in – you guessed it, detail.

The days when the 6.30 shows actually meant something. Not the crap that is on now.

How much detail is enough?

So how much detail is enough? Why is detail a bad thing? Of course, it’s neither good nor bad, but most effective when applied with forethought. For a business, too much detail can end up dead on arrival to your intended audience (which is another amorphous blob that contains too much individual elements to get right.) So whatever you end up communicating is incomplete, but useful.

Take my 1:1 map example. A 1:1 map doesn’t help me navigate around Melbourne. However remove most of the detail, shrink it down into a two-dimensional representation, and I can still make my way from Flinders St. to the Town Hall up Swanston in the form of a map. The connection between map and territory is more useful, even with many details left out.

For some, the more you look the less you see. Do you ever feel frustrated by detail?

Are You Too Far Away to Persuade?

First off, thanks to all who attended my BBN Seminar at Sandringham Yacht Club on Monday, 9 May. I very much appreciated it! One of the more resonant pieces from my talk was about distance and wordiness. Wordiness - adding too many words for the sake of adding words - creates more distance between yourself and your audience.

The thing about wordiness is this: it creates more flaming hoops to jump through for your reader. If your reader has to sit there, his or her eyes scanning the page waiting for crucial information to leap out at them, they will eventually give up. If people can’t understand the value of your product or service, it may as well have no value.

I had a client that was all into arts and crafts – her business was making custom greeting cards, candles, gifts, that sort of thing. She knew her website content wasn’t working, so I looked through it. Her writing seemed stilted and impenetrable. I didn’t understand what she was selling or why she was selling it. As part of my usual process, I conduct an interview with my clients to get information on the business. It allows me to get to know who they are as people, so I can better express their unique point of view. The person I talked to was such a departure from the “person” on the website, I was almost beside myself. Jamie, or Freckles as her friends call her, was colourful, bubbly, friendly and her website was grey, static, lifeless. It didn’t make sense!

Freckles didn’t play to Freckle’s strengths. Freckles made a craft corner in her bedroom into a hobby business, which is now her full time business. She had that playful, youthful energy about her, and it wasn’t anywhere on the website. That’s because her copy didn’t cut to the core of what Freckles was about – making custom candles and gifts for you is your gift to her. It didn’t come through because there were just too many wrong words on the page for people to get a sense of her.

A lot of writing is cutting. Stephen King said it best – writing (or any creative endeavour) is all about “murdering your darlings” – cutting the unneeded words, sentences, paragraphs. However, the process of writing as writing isn’t thought about as talking onto a page. That’s kind of what it is – we’re substituting our ears for our eyes. What we can't hear we see, and what we're told to see, we imagine. We want to lead our reader down a path toward understanding, familiarity and above all, trust.

It works with business, it works with dating, it works with any human interaction - if you're writing, just be yourself first! It closes your "credibility gap" from page to person.

What do you think? Does wordiness turn you off?