Week Notes // 1st January
Triptych August 1972 by Francis Bacon. On display at Tate Britain alonside the work of Henry Moore
The Christmas break is drawing to a close. Everyone in the house goes back to work or school on Monday the 8th. As nice as the break has been, I’m looking forward to getting back to the office and all that it entails: getting dressed, the walk to the station, reading on the commute and interacting with colleagues and clients.
As hackneyed as it might seem, New Year always a good opportunity to think about the new habits that I’d like to establish. Specifically have been thinking about how I can engage with people in the wider Strategy team more effectively following a discussion amongst the senior strategists last year. There is a clear need to try and break down some of the silos which exist in the agency, silos which are a function of the way we work with clients in a global agency. The theme of the wider discussion in the team has revolved around the notion of craft: How do we ensure we’re thinking about this word as a verb, not just a noun?
I’ve also been thinking about how I can incorporate productivity tools better into my work. Having been a little overwhelmed at the start, have managed to get the hang of Notion and thinking about how I can use it for scheduling of work and tasks. It’s also useful for recording ideas that are in development. Have been using for recipes and other more ‘domestic’ applications, enjoying the process of building databases. In time will find a way of transposing this from the purpose of storing and sorting recipes into an idea we have for the newsletter. Want to create a database of the case studies we’re recording and the associated pieces of work that we reference.
Issue no.2 of the newsletter went out this week. Subscriber count now stands at c.250. A number I think we’re both pretty pleased with. The graph is definitely quite a steep one. Publishing weekly is going to prove challenging and will require discipline and process. Our workflow is currently a little organic and spans a google spreadsheet a google doc for ideas and drafting, respectively. We then move into substack for final drafting and copy tweaking and more of the ‘production’ intensive elements such as videos and links. It’s all glued together by a bit of whatsapp and sticky-tape. Editorially too, there are some moving parts. I’m sure we’ll get there.
Elsewhere, the break has afforded time for the consumption of lots of media in both A/V and physical foms. Some highlights:
Went back to Tate Britain for another visit to Sarah Lucas’ Happy Gas before it closes next week. Sadly the Rothko room is ‘on it’s holidays’ according to one of the assistants. Nearby though a is newly installed room which juxtaposes the sculpture of Henry Moore and some paintings by Francis Bacon. Some consolation, I s’pose. It’s decisions like this which expose curation for the magic that it really is. Settings like this really help the viewer understand concepts from art criticism such as being in ‘dialogue’ and bring it down to practical application. It’s a shame how people who re-share links on the internet seem to have co-opted that word. There always has to be a value add.
Had a mini Studio Ghibli season at home: Spirited Away (Dir. Miyazaki, 2001) and Howl’s Moving Castle (Dir. Miyazaki, 2004). We didn’t subject P to the former as it’s a bit full on… he thoroughly enjoyed the latter though. It’s always a pleasure to see him engage and embrace new things. Especially when they might employ a different ‘vocabulary’ than the things he normally spends time with. Have been especially struck by the clear and direct line that runs from these movies straight into the two most recent Legend of Zelda games. Hadn’t really put two and two together there.
Some kind soul has uploaded a bunch of old Advertising Annuals onto Google. Inspiration for days.
Loved Matt Webb’s blog post on Ternary diagrams. Ever wondered how you add another dimension to the humble 2x2? Try a triangle diagram. In particular enjoyed this observation - “Ternary plots are the 21st century tool we’ve been waiting for. They’re different from the management consultant’s usual 2x2 – where you categorise by sorting into a small grid of A or not-A, combined with B or not-B….Triangles share the 2x2’s legibility and ease of rapid whiteboard sketchability. The memetic power. But 2x2s tend towards binaries and division. Even Venn diagrams, another typical diagram, as combinatorial as they are, have underlying binary assumptions: something possesses a quality or it is outside the circle. Whereas the triangle describes a landscape”. Memetic Power. Exactly that.
This week’s internet wormhole: V60 Coffee recipes and coffee grinder reviews.
Reading lots about AI Hallucinations. For perhaps obvious reasons, am interested in how Generative AI and LLMs will impact my work (and my livelihood, long term). As always, we’re seeing a case of Amara’s Law in action. The results provided by Chat GPT and the like resemble accuracy but aren’t always entirely accurate. A bit like mansplaining, perhaps. Say something, no matter how idiotic, with enough confidence and people will be inclined to listen. The issue of hallucinations is an interesting one. It’s playing havoc with Google results and even encouraging on-site assistants in platforms like Wordpress to make recommendations which are entirely impractical.
More reading about RSS. Reminded of articles about the internet ‘rotting’. Enjoyed re-reading this one from The Conversation, especially this line: “For the first time in human history, remembering is the default –- simple, easy and seemingly free – and forgetting is hard”
Was captivated by the Darts. Luke Littler was incredible to watch, and particularly astounded by his ‘board management’. Left wondering what the coaching system around Darts is (ditto Snooker). Is it formal for example, like Golf Tuition. I have a soft spot for the game having played alot in The Swan. My old Colleague RDH summed it up best, perhaps: “I love that we humans are instinctively fascinated by someone being great at something obviously very difficult to master, without needing necessarily to care particularly for the thing itself”
