“Fake it til you make it” was one of the many mantras of personal development and motivation in the 1980s. It was probably one of the most enduring pieces of poor life advice. “Nosedive,” an episode from the surrealist Netflix series Black Mirror, pushes “faking it” to the limit. Whereas in our reality, economic credit […]
Learning about character from Shakespeare
In William Shakespeare’s Romeo and Juliet, Juliet muses about the conflict between her family, the Capulets, and the family of her beloved, Romeo. The two families are feuding and she’s been trained to hate the name “Montague,” yet she’s still managed to fall in love with someone from that clan. Jul. O Romeo, Romeo! wherefore […]
Investments and charitable giving
Investing and charitable giving are two different ways for someone with resources to contribute to an organization or cause. I’ve conflated them in the past, but recently read an article advising people not to. In Market Watch, Berman, Barasch, Levine, and Small explain that people give when they feel emotionally connected to a cause, not necessarily because […]
The price of the purple cow
Seth Godin, who posts thoughts on marketing, value, and originality on his blog every day, published the book Purple Cow back in 2003. Online marketing hadn’t yet peaked then but web marketers were already challenging conventional advice about how businesses should map out and manage their public-facing communication, influence and impact, and reputation. Purple Cow […]
On Branding
This morning I came across a few links on the U.S. Republican Party’s post-election re-branding conversation.* This conversation has been going on for the last three months, and while a new “Growth and Opportunity Committee” has formed to move it forward, the recurring themes are still the same: “The conservative message sells,” said Saul Anuzis, […]
