Archive for October, 2009
Empty Seats? Or the End of the World?
Last night was the first game of the World Series between the New York Yankees and the Philadelphia Phillies. Some of you are unbelievably excited about this, and some of you want to douse your eyeballs in acid to avoid reading anything else about it. But stick with me, and don’t do the acid-dousing thing. [...]
Awaiting the Great Pumpkin, er, Great Performance
Washington Post writer Anne Midgette set off a very interesting discussion with her column about orchestra conductors and their value as business speakers. Here’s a key tidbit: “…to hold up orchestras, and their relationship with conductors, as a business model is to subscribe to an idealized view of classical music as a happy sphere of [...]
Puritans and Cake Without Icing
In any field of human endeavor, you will find people who like things stripped down to their essence, free of trappings, and “pure.” The Puritans come to mind, for example. Their whole outlook on life was that the Church had become too much about religion and not enough about God. To them, you found God [...]
Digital Dust in the Wind
Today, GeoCities is finally closing. (For an excellent overview of this, read this piece from the LA Times.) Ten years ago, GeoCities was the unquestionable king of online community and user-generated content. No one was even close. In fact, when I worked at GeoCities, we were not only in the top 5 sites in worldwide [...]
U2 and How Not to Milk It
Tomorrow night, U2 is invading Goldstar’s hometown of Pasadena, California. Traffic inconveniences aside, the Rose Bowl show has generated a lot of excitement. But why should that be the case? This is an OLD band. To put it in equivalent terms, it would be as if the Beatles toured in the mid-90s or as if [...]
How to Sound Like a Social Media Genius
First, this article may help you SOUND like a social media genius, but it won’t make you an ACTUAL social media genius. Seem fair? Good, then let’s proceed. If someone asks you something like, “What do you make of this whole social media thing?” Say one or all of the following: 1. It’s all about [...]
How Your Organization Can Be As Awesome As Cirque Du Soleil
This morning, I’m savoring the memories of the Santa Monica premiere of Cirque Du Soleil’s “Kooza.” If you’ve never seen a Cirque show, this is a great one to start with: funny, silly, crowd-pleasing, fast-paced. Some of their work is a bit more serious, but this show just kicks out the jams and has fun [...]
It’s a Real-Time Feedback World, So You Might As Well Like It!
I’m a big fan of public feedback for businesses, live entertainment venues, and just about anybody selling/promoting wares of any kind to the world. That’s true not only because it helps buyers make decisions, but also (and more importantly) because it keeps you, as the producer of whatever is being bought, viewed, or discussed, focused [...]
Safe is Dangerous
There is a theatre near you that you probably think of as successful, and with good reason. They’ve been there for a long time, have a good reputation, and sometimes have shows that pack ‘em in. I know there’s a theatre like this near you, because there’s a theatre like this in every mid-size to [...]
How Not to Be Audience-Centered, ‘Stealing from Little Girls’ Edition
Earlier this summer, a young girl at her all-time first baseball game with her grandfather caught a home run ball. What a special memory! Even better, it was a valuable home run ball, the 200th homerun ever hit by young homerun hitting phenom, Ryan Howard. Super duper cool! The Philadelphia Phillies approached the girl, congratulating [...]
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