Digital Narcissism

One to watch. A new book out soon. By Andrew Kern. Controversial!

Who's 'The UK's answer to Mark Zuckerberg'?

Edward, son of Maurice, Saatchi, according to Harriet Dennys in City A.M. 24 October.

Check out his tech start-up National Field.

The 'self-preservation society'

A sad inditement of advocates of CSR from Chatham House's Dr Bill Durodie, writing in City A.M.'s the forum.

To hear him speak go to the Battle of Ideas festival at the Royal College of Art on Saturday 29 October: www.battleofideas.org

SoLoMo

Social. Local. Mobile is where growth in transactions are. So says Wired UK editor David Rowan, speaking at the IPA 44 Club last night. He has it on good authority. None other than venture capitalist and serial entrepreneur John Dare.

You cannot fail to be moved by 'Killing in the name'.

Check out www.globalsurvivors.org, the website which Carie Lemack has created to give victims of terrorism and radicalisation a platform on which to speak out; and don't miss the compelling excerpt from her Oscar-nominated short documentary film 'Killing in the name'.

Carie's mother was killed on the plane which hit the Twin Towers. She was awe-inspiring, as she recounted her story at last Thursday's Wired Event at the St Pancras Renaissance hotel.

Inspirational!

That's the word used most often on our feedback forms at last week's IPA Future of Talent conference!

Not surprising, given the quality of the line-up and content from Ian Livingstone (Next Gen), Mark Howe (Google), Dinah Caine (Skillset) among others.

All superbly intertwined with connecting dialogue from moi, naturally!

The economy cannot grow unless we have more spending power

Hurrah for Janet Daley, writing in 9th October's Sunday Telegraph (page 28). She raises an issue dear to my heart.

"Until the households of Britain feel that it is possible - and sensible - to spend, all the funny money that comes off the the Treasury printing presses, and all the government grants to brave little enterprises, will not amount to a hill of beans."

Daley calls for tax cuts to increase real household income and stimulate consumer spending, arguing that the growth that would be stimulated by that spending would in turn provide more tax revenue.

I agree.

This quarter's IPA Bellwether Report, released last Thursday, shows a modest rise in expenditure but the most significant dip in business confidence ever recorded in its 10 year history.

This apparent contradiction is not surprising when you realise that the majority of expenditure is behind communication of promotional activity; a desperate bit to incentivise short-term purchases which will only lead to profit erosion, if IPA research and analysis based on previous recessions proves accurate.

My message to Government both echoes Daley's and adds a new strand.

Corporates need to be encouraged to spend too, and tax incentives against previous year sales are not a bad place to start. They need help to release investment in mid to long term quality brand communications. This will stimulate real consumer demand, get money circulating in the economy to support the cultural and creative industries, return businesses to profitability and deliver organic growth.

An alternative lifestyle

If City life is getting to you, try this as an alternative:

David Bendon, as reported on BBC Breakfast today, is a licensed acorn supplier. His job is to pick up 1 million acorns a year from the ground under oak trees; then grade them; and sell them on!

Makes you think!

Visions of Light

If you haven't seen this classic American Film Institute documentary, you should.

It takes you through 50 years of cinematrographic history; from black and white to colour, from no sound to sensurround, from naturalism to expressionism, from square formats to panavision and cinemascope.

It shows the full flowering of the Studio System in the 1930s, when every studio had its own lab and wanted to be distinctive.

It leaves you with a lasting impression of the inventiveness and passion of the people behind the camera.

"The director is the author of performance. The cinematographer is the author of the use of light and how it contributes to the story."

Visions of Light: Art of Cinematography [DVD] [1993] [US Import]

R.I.P. Steve Jobs

Of the many tributes I've been reading my favourite is by Farhad Manjoo on www.slate.com (Wed 5 Oct 11.52 PM), "The Man who invented our world".

He tries to picture what the world would have been like, if it hadn't been for Steve Jobs and explains how whole industries have shifted after Jobs pushed Apple into them.

"While every other company in tech has been shaped by the forces of technological evolution, with their products getting better as chips got faster and cheaper", Jobs was "the intelligent designer". His best talent was "his ability to spot the pain points in every technology he touched." His role was "to separate other people's great ideas from their terrible ones - and to refine the best ideas into workable products."

Consumer-focused, committed, commercial and creative. A leader and diagonal thinker! The world will be the worse for losing you, Steve.