communication. community. cognition.
Language
War of Words
Oct 22nd
Our Bible study on Wednesday night started with a question:
What’s the difference between happiness and joy?
War of Words
I thought I knew, but didn’t really. I had my own ideas, but was curious to know how others stacked them up. So, being the diligent linguist, I posted the same question to my Twitter and Facebook. More >
Words of Mouth
Sep 8th
I got my teeth cleaned today.
Listen to "Words of Mouth"
Don’t worry, I won’t gross you out. There was no evidence of any major dental issues. I did have a little bit more plaque than normal, which I attribute to a change in toothpaste to a gel that doesn’t leave me feeling fresh. Also, there were a couple of spots where I had some abrasion, but nothing too serious. No additional pits or pains, and I’ll be back in six months for some annual x-rays.
Still, that was probably more detail than you wanted.
I talked with Lisa, my long-time hygienist. We were joking about the fact that the Alice In Chains song coming across the Muzak was out before some of the staff could even write their names – and that the songs now on Oldies formats are better than the crap they call music these days… More >
The Flow of the First Mover
May 6th
In communications, framing is everything. And when it comes to branding, it is essential.
Want proof?
What’s the longest river in the United States?
It’s the Missouri River, which is about 200 miles longer than the Mississippi.
But wait a moment, are we comparing apples to apples?
Let’s look at the map of the great Mississippi River Basin.
The mighty Mississip’ is shown in the dark blue from its headwaters in Minnesota all the way to the delta and the Gulf Coast.
It’s certainly an impressive river, and has played a key role in the development of trade an commerce in the cities up and down the banks. It cuts a swath of 2,320 miles through the middle of the United States.
Just look at its mighty tributaries, the Ohio flowing from the east and the Missouri from the west.
Here’s the Missouri River, highlighted in orange. It stretches 2,341 miles, which is just 20 miles longer than the Mississippi. Even though it is longer by just a little bit, the Missouri is considered the tributary to the Mississippi.
Yet again, we let our first understandings and preconceived notions cloud our thinking.
The measurement of the orange line stops where it intersects with the Mississippi.
Let’s take a look at how the Missouri River ought to be treated on the maps.
When you take the very top of the Missouri’s tributary system, all the way back to Bower’s Spring (on the Jefferson) in Montana, and stretch it down as a single navigable route all the way to the Gulf, you have gone 3,900 miles.
Now that is a river.
But why is it the Mississippi? Why isn’t the Mississippi considered a tributary of the Missouri River? (Factually speaking, and depending on drought conditions, anywhere from 45-70% of the volume of the Mississippi comes from the Missouri’s watershed!)
And for that matter, why isn’t the Missouri considered part of the Jefferson River?
It all has to do with First Mover Advantage.
Big Mouths Do the Defining
If you want to persuade, you need to be first and loudest in framing the discussion. The words you use (and the words you intentionally avoid) are essential to getting others to view the situation through your lens.
Was there a tragic event that might have been preventable? Always bad, but made better through a lens focused on comparative advantage, or a track record of success.
In the river example, the Big Mouths actually do the defining. The Mississippi River doesn’t start in Mississippi, it ends there. And given the length of time it was considered the boundary of the United States, it’s obvious we knew a lot about the Mississippi long before we had an inkling the Missouri was even longer. That’s why, at least as far as the definitions stand today, the mouth of the Missouri is considered to end where it connects to the Mississippi, instead of the other way around.
Once we knew more about the makeup and length of the Missouri, and the breadth of its watershed, we might have changed a few things. But that takes an awful lot of effort. By that point, there were too many maps to change, too many preconceived notions, and too many catchy ditties about the mighty Mississip. Yes, the Big Mouth at the Delta did all the defining, and defies any logic to change it.
What you have to ask, though, is given a change in the initial condition, would people still think the way they do about the Missouri/Mississippi relationship?
Icy Rocks and Chads
If you think this is not a big deal, let’s look at a couple of other cases where First Mover Advantage played a part.
Remember the furor that erupted over Pluto’s status as a planet? This was brought back into my attention while watching a Stephen Hawking documentary which referred to our sun, and its eight planets.
It will still take me a while to get used to that, even though I know for a fact there are nine planets. (You see, the Earth and its Moon really act more like a dual-planet system than a true planet-satellite, but there’s yet another example of First Mover at work…)
Then there is that whole election thing from November of 2000. While there was a huge confusion in Florida involving ballots and butterflies and chads and who won the state, there was also a consensus notion that George Bush was in the lead and that Al Gore was behind. Hand recounts done long after the fact tend to support the eventual outcome, and I don’t intend to reopen that debate here. But the communications coming from the Bush team in the days after the vote were bolstered by the appearance that he had won, and Gore was painted into a corner of communicating from behind.
Be aware of the Flow of the First Mover, and how important it is to define the terms before someone else does.
Is the ‘Good Ole Boy’ so dumb, or crazy like a fox?
Apr 30th
If you asked a group to describe the prototypical “Good Ol’ Boy,” I would imagine the adjectives returned would not be that flattering.
From The Free Dictionary:
A man having qualities held to be characteristic of certain Southern white males, such as a relaxed or informal manner, strong loyalty to family and friends, and often an anti-intellectual bias and intolerant point of view.
From Wikipedia:
Good ol’ boy is a slang term used in the United States and Canada, either to self-identify as or to refer to a male, usually white and of Northern/Western-European descent, who lives in a rural area and/or subscribes to a traditionally “rural” lifestyle. The term is generally thought to originate in the rural areas of the southern and southwestern U.S. While other terms such as redneck, hick, yokel, “Bubba“, and “white trash” are also applied, though usually pejoratively and are often interchanged with “good ol’ boy,” the “good ol’ boy” is more of an idealized image of rural Americans.
Politically, good ol’ boy refers to representatives that engage in cronyism.
Cronyism.
In the business world, references to a “Good Ol’ Boy Network” are at best a way of hinting at exclusion through ignorance, and at worst an accusation of intentional discrimination.
So how do you identify the Good Ol’ Boy?
- Manner of dress?
- Speech?
- Homespun stories?
- Tone?
I was having lunch with a coworker the other day, and she was talking about her supervisor. She called him a real Good Ol’ Boy, but he was surprisingly effective as a communicator. Everything he communicated was through anecdotes and story, and even years later she remembered just about every detail of what he said.
The Story Factor
We already have more facts than we can process. Story persuades and motivates.
I’ve always been a huge fan of Annette Simmons’ book The Story Factor, where she outlines the kinds of stories that resonate with people, and the way you can use them to communicate more effectively.
Now look at the guy in the suit above. His clothes are communicating a belief in the prevailing corporate culture.
Listen to the drawl. It’s measured, yet accessible.
Consider the anecdotes and tales he weaves. They’re about past experiences that happen to pertain to the issue or challenge at hand.
And listen to the tone – a good story is meant to entertain and engage, while also informing.
Too many people are willing to look at the above attributes and write off the rube for being too slow and too folksy to be of any value.
And when you get a bunch of those folksy, homespun rubes working in upper management, then it’s clear they all got there by conspiring to trample on the careers of their faster-talking, smoother and hipper competitors! Thus “Good Ol’ Boy” enters the collective consciousness as a pejorative. Psychologically, it’s easier to write them off as evil and manipulative rather than understand they might just be on to something effective.
Maybe there is a thing or two to learn from them. Particularly when they get results.
Symbolic Statements
Feb 5th
We live in an age where information is too available. We have more facts than we can assimilate or use, and very little context.
One of the ways we manage to transmit all of this information comes from research done in “packing” of information. How much can we compress data, then “unpack” it later without appreciable loss?
I won’t go into that as a deep dive now, don’t worry. But it is something to consider, especially when “packing” of data means that individual pieces now mean multiple things depending upon what is around them.
The other day, I saw a license plate. Maybe it’s indicative that I spend too much time playing with letters and numbers and glyphs in my brain, but almost immediately I saw how close this was to spelling out a word (and a word that I wouldn’t want either of my kids repeating.)
Do you see it? Because the thought that came to mind for me was feeling sorry for the person two places ahead in line. They likely got this plate:
There.
Does that make it easier to see?
Do I have to spell it out now?
What happens is our brains decode the curves and lines based on context. When we expect to see letters, we see letters. When we expect to see numbers, we see numbers.
And when we’re accustomed to looking at words, the quickest glance will force our brains attempt to fit those shapes into the anticipated context.
Here, try this one.
See it now?
I feel sorry for that person.
One of the ironies here is that if you tried to go and get that specific combination as a vanity plate, you would be suspiciously grilled as to your motive. They would want to know exactly what it means.
Yet, through the power of spontaneous decoding, the state of Alabama has inadvertently called an innocent motorist a “sphincter.”
Who knows? Maybe they’re right.
Or maybe ugliness lies in the eye of the beholder.
One thing leads to another
Nov 12th
Remember the Association Game? Say the first word that comes to mind when you hear a certain word?
Well, the web is ten times better than you are, and it has the advantage of collecting our aggregate wisdom in ways we’d never expect. In fact, if we did a remake of Family Feud, we could do it all with Search Engine results instead of spending money on polling.
This came to mind when I got one of those placeholder pages that you see when a domain name registration has expired. The temporary owner of the parked domain tries to make a few pennies by possibly getting credit for redirecting you to something similar to what you were looking for.
In this case, Geekedoff.com led to this:
Now, granted, the Dallas Cowboys aren’t exactly having the greatest decade in franchise history, but putting Cowboys next to “Tranny?”
Maybe there is something in Tony Romo’s wardrobe of which we’re not yet aware.
SEC Draws Line at Commercial Competitors
Aug 18th
I just got my hands on the SEC’s new Social Media Guidelines for fans at sporting events, and I believe the new language is clearer and ought to placate the fan base.
Specifically, you’ll find two paragraphs that more clearly delineate what the conference would deem a “threat to commercial interests and contracts:”
No Bearer may produce or disseminate in any form a “real-time” description or transmission of the Event (i) for commercial or business use, or (ii) in any manner that constitutes, or is intended to provide or is promoted or marketed as, a substitute for radio, television or video coverage of such Event. Personal messages and updates of scores or other brief descriptions of the competition throughout the Event are acceptable. If the SEC deems that a Bearer is producing a commercial or real-time description of the Event, the SEC reserves the right to pursue all available remedies against the Bearer.
Absent the prior written permission of the Southeastern Conference, game action videos of the Event may not be taken by Bearer. Photos of the Event may be taken by Bearer and distributed solely for personal use (and such photographs shall not be licensed, used, or sold commercially, or used for any commercial or business purpose).
The first paragraph explicitly mentions the intent of the publisher. So a Tweet from the stand that says “Touchdown LSU! 24-14!” would be perfectly fine… but an account that specifically tries to build audience for the purpose of replicating play-by-play would be out-of-bounds. (It’s not inconceivable that someone could create a closed Twitter account, and sell access subscriptions to other users.)
The second paragraph answer the question about friends who take pictures of each other at the games, and clearly mentions “personal use.” Such pictures could not be sold.
Here is the policy in full, and here is the short version that will appear on the backs of tickets.
Obviously, you could not fit the full language in the summary, but here is a sentence that might be problematic in the short term:
Additional terms and conditions governing use of this ticket are posted on the website of
the SEC (www.secsports.com) and are incorporated herein by reference. By using this ticket,
user agrees to be bound by such terms and conditions.
Additional terms and conditions governing use of this ticket are posted on the website of the SEC (www.secsports.com) and are incorporated herein by reference. By using this ticket, user agrees to be bound by such terms and conditions.
I spoke with a source in the commissioners office, and recommended the use of a URL that is not the main page; instead linking directly to the policy page. This could be done with a “/policy” or something of the sort appended to the link. I was told this would be too late for football season, but could easily be implemented for SEC basketball tickets and beyond.
It’s good to know the league is listening. Maybe the other conferences are too.
