Having just made a myspace page for me old band 'o brothers  this seemed a good opportunity to promote the page - if you wanted some light relief  and to talk about what happened when we started the band back in the 1980s because although no one then talked about collaboration and co-creation what happened was so extraordinary that it got me thinking - and now what is accepted as a normal part of web 2.0 activity I recognise as something that happened then and can happen just as easily offline.

We went to a festival to busk around the site. One thing led to another (it was quite a weekend). Friday night we busked in the rain. Saturday we busked all over the site. Saturday night we were asked to play one song on a variety show with 1000 people in the audience. Sunday night we got asked to fill in as warm up act in a venue with a capacity of 2000. Monday we got our own gig in an acoustic venue with an audience of perhaps 200 which was interupted when we were asked to move to the 2000 seater venue to do an entire set. Its nice remembering what an adrenaline high the weekend was - just unbelievable. This for a band who had never performed. My younger brother was 17 and I don't think had stood up in front of any audience before.

Now we come to it. Since we were so woefully unprepared we had of course no idea of merchandise. 

Within a week of the gig the fans had sent up 3 bootleg tapes of busking sessions - plus photos

After a month the photos had mutated into badges - which the fans also sent us and then posters of te band

And after 3 months one enterprising fan had made a band Tshirt and sent it to us.

 By which time we had gone into the studio and recorded an album as fast as we could - 3 days including the mixing down! Which went onto sell some 3000 copies. 

What I've never forgotten is that in the following 2 years we never produced anything which our fans hadn't made first. So here's the moral. When a product gets a tribal following people buy to join in. And if they can't buy they make it themselves.  I mention this because so often the selling process is trying to persuade one person to buy. Once. When group participation is much stronger as an incentive - it is being part of something - the purchase is just a way of joining in. Our prices were modest but price really wasn't the issue - we could have doubled our prices.  I have filed this under culture vultures because completely accidentally it turned into a group buy in - and the fans were well ahead of the band. Think about how you could trigger a similar effect. Remember its not about selling but about giving people ways to participate.   And you're welcome to participate in the Woebegone Brothers rather long in the tooth reformation. There's 3 tracks from the albums and a video from a gig last summer - there will be more video to follow!

check out www.taggalaxy.de. Which should be on the waggledancers bookmarks page for several reasons.

 Firstly because finding the right image on Flickr for a presentation can be difficult and this site makes it much much easiers.

Secondly because the interface is cool and addictive - you'll want to share with others -yup it will make you waggledance!

Thirdly because it gives an indication of where the web is going - this is a snapshot of what some have called web 3.0. At present you have to go to delicious or digg to find the relevant tags. And taggalaxy only arranges flickr tags for you. But in a few months time it will become possible to search for anything and have the tags get you the most relevant content. And the interface will be a lot more like tag galaxy than a google search page. So enjoy tag galaxy.

It seems topical to say my piece now that Xfactor is done and dusted for another year. There are lessons we can learn from this show. Chief of which is that this format doesn't necessarily favour the talented. Nor does it get the best out of them. What we have is a crash course in the  judges - all of whom stand to make a great deal of money from the contestants in the short term ruthlessly knocking them into shape so they can get a couple of singles of them before they disappear off into the void well before the circus starts again next year.  Mediums in the grand Victorian heyday of spiritualism could conjure entire bodies out of a mysterious substance called ectoplasm. By the time the contestants have told us for the nth time that this is the most important thing in their life and that it has already changed their lives for ever - both completely untrue I hope for their sakes - they are putty in the paws of the judges. Every year some stroppy hopeful throws her toys out the cot and decided to make all the decisions herself because she has noted that the judges decision making is not in her interest. Every time there's lots of headshaking - and he or she gets knocked back into shape the following week.

Now alas this kind of ectoplasmic activity is happening in your departments. With the best will in the world you will recognise and reward those whose way of thinking and working is closest to yours. And if you head up a department for years then gradually the polarisation will settle in as law. Those who don't fit will be weeded out or will choose to walk the plank but won't tell you as much in the exit interview.  I have been told with straight faces by many managers that no one has ever left their department. What they mean is that no one GOOD as they perceive it has left and there is peculiar selective memory about every one else.  Good leadership involves setting forth good policies and clear direction - there will always be those on the edge or outside of this and they are by now means unemployable. They may be potentially your best people. They're just not like you.

So what to do about it? For this you need a number 2 in the department - this person will be very experienced and you may have privately concluded that your number 2 is not head of department material. They can function as a lightning rod for dissidents - remember the adage keep your friends close and your enemies closer.If you find you are losing confidence in one of those in your department - consult with your number 2 - who will concur if they really are not up to scratch but who may well take the side of the individual you have a problem with. Somehow you have to have a way to allow dissidents to grow and flourish - its healthy for your department but difficult to do yourself. So get someone else to do it for you.  And give the juniors room to do it their way. It won't be as bad as you fear. If you time manage OK it will teach them a lesson if it doesn't work out and it will teach you a lesson if it does.  Just don't pull your trousers up too high. You really don't want to pick up any more of those dreadful Cowell habits..  

Many years ago I read Cliff Stoll's book the Cuckoo's egg where he patiently tracked down a hacker. This is a welcome re-discovery. I call him a waggledancer because he is such a compelling speaker - using distraction and eccentricity to keep you hooked. You honestly don't know where he's going but you can't leave till you find out. And his final point makes sense in the light of the journey he has taken you on. I'd love to do a presentation based on what I've written on my hand but having seen him do it I don't think I would dare. This is waggledancing - making you want to learn.

Here are two versions of a song one original the other a cover. Which one would you say is the original and which the cover version?

Did you get it? Actually Sting wrote it though on youtube you find it far more often credited to Johnny Cash. Who sings the simpler version.  

If you're the type of person who gets given the job of waggledancing chances are that you enjoy thinking and exploring ideas. And you are comfortable with complexity. Which is dangerous.  Effective communication almost always involved distilling and simplifying - art is what you take out not what you put in. I like the Sting version of the track - no way could he play it like a straight country and western song.  The best bit for me is the joy on the face of the late Kenny Kirkland his keyboard player - playing 5 beats to each bar is musically interesting but does it really add to the somg? Turning to Cash's version which I heard before I heard the Sting original - at first I couldn't believe Sting wrote it because Cash sings it as if he wrote it. And the song follows a familiar Cash theme of cowboys, guilt and of course his own death. Stripping it down makes it powerful. Works the same for messaging.

One other thing - it was quite hard to find the Cash version on Youtube because there are so many covers - of people singing what they think is a Cash song. That's because its a simple song to play. But that makes it easy to play badly or cheesily. Making something simple is not dumbing down. Simple is actually difficult. Anybody can play an easy song. Its takes art and practice to sing simply.

This is a tip drawn from market research briefings but it applies just as much to any other kind. At a briefing meeting what is articulated is the Explicit brief. But there is always another one which researchers call the Impolicit brief. Its the one the client expects you to answer whether or not you know that its there. Your job at a briefing is to find out what the implicit brief is.

I had one earlier this year. The explicit brief was to research a new design for a magazine. The implicit brief was to find a relevant role for the magazine which was threatened with closure. Funnily enough the client didn't choose to share with me the one line brief: help me save my job. But that was the implicit brief. Research is conducted to kill products and ads, to get people promoted, to get them better regarded in the organisation, to use the budget this fiscal year so they don't get their budgets cut next year. And almost never in a briefing does anyone mention this. But its the real brief. And its your job to find it.

The sweet thing is that the client almost always lets it slip - because it is on their emotional agenda. So there are always tell tale signs. They just can't bring themselves to say it out loud. So ask questions. Good questions which make it possible for the client to tip you off about what the real deal is. And they can tell themselves they were just offering clarification.

 Here are some candidates: 

Has a study like this ever been done before?

Who most badly needs this information?

What will be done with the findings of the reseearch when it happens?

If this research didn't take place what is the worst thing that could happen?

Have a look at these two films - both about the way agencies work. What is the difference between them? Well apart from the wisecrack that one agency seems to have far too much to do and the other not nearly enough.. Gwen Yip's ingenious film comes across as a series of confrontations.

Which is why I prefer the flow of the second ..silly as it is.