Archive for July, 2010
July 29, 2010
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[“Never Pick A Fight” print here.]
OK, now this is interesting…
Of the forty of so entries to the Cube Grenade competition, about one third of them are for businesses and starts ups, and about two thirds of them are for nonprofits and worthy causes.
I was expecting the opposite ratio, to be honest. [BTW There’s still a couple of days left to submit an idea, so go for it etc.]
So what does this tell us?
1. Causes are more idea-driven, rather than “rational-utility” driven. “Here’s why this matters”, more than “Here’s why you should buy our product”. I think Cube Grendes are the same. They’re designed to spread ideas and start conversations, not to SELL. Designed to hit a nerve, not to just tick of a box on some random marketing checklist.
2. As nonprofits are rarely funded with anything like what they really need to get the job done, they have to be creative. And I’ve always thought that everyone has to be creative, not just those with no money. So there’s a fit there.
But there’s a fit EVERYWHERE. Business need to be more like causes. Causes need to be more like businesses. Which is what makes this whole thing so much damn fun…
July 25, 2010
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[“Breakfast”, which I sent out in the newsletter recently. You can buy the print here etc.]
“TREAT IT LIKE AN ADVENTURE. AN ADVENTURE WORTH SHARING.”
1. Now that Evil Plans is at the publisher’s and in production (Release date: February 17th), the newsletter and the art gallery chugging along nicely, I’m starting to think about my next adventure.
Some people live paycheck to paycheck. Some people live project to project. I prefer living “adventure to adventure”.
I reckon that if you can’t treat what you’re doing like an adventure, it’s not worth doing. You might as well be dead.
What’s my next adventure about? Haven’t quite decided yet. Something to do with Cube Grenades and the next book I plan to write. Plus the cartooning, of course.
It’ll all fit together somehow…
2. Here’s what I’ve always noticed about us humans: We all want the feeling of adventure. It’s just about the closest you can get to God while you’re still alive.
And often, we fail to heed the call. We’re too busy with IMPORTANT things. Cars to buy, bills to pay, people to schmooze and meetings to attend.
It’s not the American Dream if it kills you for stupid reasons. Sorry.
3. I wrote this little rant earlier today, while in a grumpy mood:
Fuck y’all.
You know who you are.
Your endless droning on about nothing, the endless tedium that is your career…
Well, it makes the CEO of your employer rich, but does little else.
Surrounding yourself with the overpriced, plastic baubles you learned about from TV, like anyone actually cares.
And you’re raising your kids the same way, raising them to be the same fine specimen of nowheresville. Lucky them.
You are boring. You are boredom. And that’s what you peddle.
Every day. To anyone who is desperate enough to listen.
An empty life, followed by an equally empty death.
Fuck y’all and good riddance.
My definition of “Mediocrity” is: A Triumvirate of small minds, smaller hearts and even smaller deeds. Usually with some lame-ass, entitlement power trip going on. One rarely has to look very hard to find it; it’s everywhere.
To have an adventure, is to reject that.
4. The Cube Grenade idea is all about making drawings about other people’s adventures.
That’s why I started the Cube Grenade giveaway competition. That’s why I hope you’ll nominate somebody. That’s why I hope you’ll go read some of the nominations.
It’s all about the adventure, People.
5. [TO BE CONTINUED…]
July 22, 2010
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A wee “cube grenade” commission I recently did for crashcourse.ca, an education resource. Yes, I wrote the headline. Go see.
[Commission your own Cube Grenade drawing.]
July 16, 2010
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The other day I got a message on Facebook from Chad Oler, somebody I hadn’t met before.
Hugh,
One of our mutual Facebook friends, Brandon Haskins, was murdered yesterday — shot to death by his step father in Troy, Ohio. His last Facebook post was just a couple of hours before it happened… he posted your drawing, ‘Life is too short not to do something that matters’. I am a small screen printer and have been asked by one of his friends to print a t-shirt for other friends and family with some kind words and, if possible, you art. No profit will be made and there will be absolutely no self-promotion on my part. Is it possible?
Thank you.
Chad Oler
So of course, I let Chad go ahead and make the t-shirt design (see above). On the other side of the shirt are printed the words, “Grace Happens”, which is a lovely little sentiment.
I hadn’t really met Brandon before, either, other than letting him friend me on Facebook. And now he’s gone; he was only 23 years old. What a truly heartbreaking story.
My deepest condolences to his family.
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I’ll be in New York next week, speaking at Supergenius, the Word-Of-Mouth conference organized by Andy Sernovitz and his team.
I designed two prints for the event, based on Andy’s two favorite WOM lines.
My take on Word-Of-Mouth? Two thoughts:
1. Would anybody tell a friend? If it’s a social object, yes.
2. Advertising is the cost of not being a social object.
I’ll let you figure the rest out on your own…
Thanks to Andy for putting on such a swell show. Can’t wait!
[Commission your own gapingvoid print etc.]
July 15, 2010
3 Comments
[A little Blue Monster “cube grenade” I designed for my old buddy over at Microsoft, Steve Clayton.]
As I’ve said many times before, the best thing about being a blogger is the people you get to meet.
Case in Point: White Box Edibles nominated themselves for the Cube Grenade competition I’ve currently got going on.
“A medical marijuana edibles company in sunny Boulder, Colorado”?
Whatever your views on marijuana (I’ve always been fairly indifferent to it), I kinda dig the sheer chutzpah of the enterprise, don’t you?
Or this one:
Little shop of happiness
This could make a movie.
Hungary, 2006. A retired teacher of French and Italian (Diane Keaton) and a retired ear-nose-and-throat specialist (Meryl Streep) open a pastry shop. They can’t afford the rent anywhere in the city, so they open it in a small town (Solymár), beside the highway.
It’s not your typical pastry shop, however…
People quit their jobs to start like crazy-ass businesses like these every day. Why? Sure, they want the independence and the feeling of control over their own destinies and all that, but…
I believe one of the biggest drives is:
They want to be able to tell a good story.
We all want to hear a good story about the world, that we can buy into. And we also want to create equally good stories of our own to tell. This capacity to create, absorb and share metaphors is what separates us from all the other animals.
And if we can’t do that; if we don’t have these stories that we can believe in [our own AND other people’s] something inside us starts feeling like it’s dying…
And dying, as you know, is no way to live.
[Submit your own cube grenade story here etc.]
July 13, 2010
5 Comments
July 12, 2010
19 Comments
1. I’ve been working my ass off, all hours, seven days a week, for the last year and a half. And I was working pretty hard before that, as well.…
2. I recently sent off the FINAL edit of my second book, EVIL PLANS to the publisher. Besides checking the proofs, my part is done. It comes out in April.
3. With the book finished, I’m thinking I need (and deserve) a break. I’m taking some time off.
4. The “Daily Cartoons” Newsletter will still be going out every weekday, as usual. No change there.
5. The Daily Bizcard will go on hiatus for a few weeks, while I rest and regroup.
6. You’ll still be able to find me on Twitter.
7. Besides the newsletter, my only other interest for the next while will be working on developing the Cube Grenade idea. That’s going to be my main focus of my blog and my business for the next while. If you see me post anything here in the next few weeks, it’ll most likely be about that.
8. Thanks for your support. See you on the other side. Cheers.
July 9, 2010
3 Comments
July 6, 2010
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Today’s “Daily Bizcard”, “Business Model” goes to Editor of CNET’s News.com, the veteran technology journalist, Dan Farber.
The cartoon was originally from a print series I did earlier this year to commemorate SXSW 2010, which I attended. I thought it would make a very groovy business card for anybody working in his space.
I’ve known Dan for a while; we used to appear on The Gillmor Gang together. We’ve hung out a few times in San Francisco; a very cool guy.
[Daily Bizcard archive]
[Commission a drawing from Hugh]
[Every weekday I give away 100 free printed “Daily Bizcards” to people and companies that I admire. If you’re in my firing line I will also send you an email from gapingvoidbizcard@gmail.com, to find out what details you want printed on the back. Thanks!]
July 5, 2010
9 Comments
Today’s “Daily Bizcard”, “Recession?” goes to affiliate marketing maven, Jeremy Schoemaker, the fellow behind Shoemoney.com.
Jeremy’s done very well. Apparently that wasn’t always the case. One day it seems that some sort of switch went off inside his head and since then, there’s been no looking back.
I like it when switches go off. Makes life far more interesting, not to mention enjoyable…
[Daily Bizcard archive]
[Commission a drawing from Hugh]
[Every weekday I give away 100 free printed “Daily Bizcards” to people and companies that I admire. If you’re in my firing line I will also send you an email from gapingvoidbizcard@gmail.com, to find out what details you want printed on the back. Thanks!]
July 3, 2010
9 Comments
[“Sacred Zombie Cow”. A cube grenade I did for organpreneur.com.]
Back in June, we started a competition to give away a free “Cube Grenade”. All you had to do was submit an idea for your own business or non-profit, and from all the entries we’d pick the most interesting one as the winner.
Well, I’m happy to say, the competition is still on. And, I’m utterly delighted by the responses submitted so far.
However, as we went through the submissions, and emails from people still working on their submissions, it became clear that A) There are lots of people who would submit, but don’t know about the offer, and B) People have asked if they could submit on behalf of people, businesses or causes that they loved.
So, we’re extending the contest until August 1st, and until then, If you’ve already been working on your own submission, we will give you till the end of the US July 4th holiday weekend to get it in.
Then after that, you can’t submit an idea for yourself. You have to submit an idea for a friend, business or cause that you love. (*)
Know someone with a great idea, business, start-up or nonprofit? Submit something on their behalf. Tell them that you’re doing this if you want to, or don’t.
To give y’all more time, I’ve pushed back the deadline to August 2nd. Same deal as before: Submit your idea on the gapingvoid Tumblr page, and/or leave a comment below with a link to your blog. We’ll answer emails with questions as quickly as possible.
I look forward to hearing about your friends. Thanks!
[*That’s right, it has to be something that just your friend is involved in. You can’t have a stake in it yourself. No cheating 
]
13 Comments
This rather sad article in the New York Times about long-term, middle class unemployment got me thinking…
Got me thinking about the cartoon above, in fact.
Any long-time blogger knows this: The only way to keep people reading your blog is by “Constant Re-Invention”. Keep on finding new things to talk about. Keep on DOING and CREATING new things worth talking about.
i.e. Creativity. Yes. That. Exactly.
And what has always been true for bloggers is now true for anyone hoping to live above the basic subsistence level.
The only way to keep your job nowadays is to constantly re-invent it.
Again, Creativity.
And that’s your responsibility, not your boss’. If your boss won’t let you do that, then quit. Right now. Do something else. It’s your move. Nobody else’s. Sorry.
It isn’t rocket science. But sadly, it’s something far too few of us ever think really hard about.
[UPDATE– Sam makes a really good point in the comments: “I’m finding the same exact principle applies to entrepreneurship… unless we’re constantly pushing our creative edge, and generating the next opportunity for engagement, and the next, and the next – we’re behind (and we only launched our web presence two months ago). We’ve gotta start inculcating and embedding that value in our culture, from the very beginning of life.”]
6 Comments
This is one of two prints I designed for Andy Sernovitz’s Supergenius conference in New York, July 20th, 2010. I’ll be speaking there, along with a lot of other authors.
The headline is one of Andy’s two most famous Word-Of-Mouth mantras. As he says,
Advertising is the cost of being boring.
If people won’t talk about you for free, you have to pay them to do it.
There is a direct relationship between being buzzworthy — earning word of mouth — and how much you’ll have to pay to promote yourself through paid marketing.
Give people a reason to talk about you for free, or you’ll have to buy advertising to get the message out.
It’s easier, more fun, more rewarding, and more profitable to focus on being remarkable and earning the type of fans and followers who will promote you, for free, forever.
These big ideas should be taped to your computer monitor, stuck in your wallet, and hung in your conference room.
Thanks to Andy for a great commission– looking forward to being in New York again!
[Hugh’s Commission page is here.]
1 Comment
Today’s “Daily Bizcard”, “That Kinda Girl” goes to Nancy Lublin, author of “Zilch: The Power Of Zero In Business”.
Nancy’s message is simple: you don’t need a lot of money to do well in business, you jut need a lot of smarts, creativity and sass.
Nancy’s background is in working for nonprofits. They never have any money, but they can get amazing results anyhow, just by having, like I said, a lot of smarts, creativity and sass. Nancy’s career has been the embodiment of that.
It’s something I can relate to. I’ve always been a shoestring/bootstrap kinda guy, and I have no intention of ever changing. Neither does Nancy, from what I can tell.
[Daily Bizcard archive]
[Commission a drawing from Hugh]
[Every weekday I give away 100 free printed “Daily Bizcards” to people and companies that I admire. If you’re in my firing line I will also send you an email from gapingvoidbizcard@gmail.com, to find out what details you want printed on them. Thanks!]
July 1, 2010
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[You can get the print here etc.]
Today’s “Daily Bizcard”, “CFA” goes to Austin-American Statesman tech writer, Omar L. Gallaga.
Besides his newspaper beat, he’s also a contributor to NPR’s “All Tech Considered” segment, which airs Mondays on “All Things Considered.”
What the hell, it looks like I’ll be spending a lot more time in Austin this year, so I might as well get to know some of the techies here. Omar seemed like a good place to start.
Although I don’t know Omar personally (we did meet once during SXSW, but that evening’s a bit of a blur, to be honest), I thought I’d turn the “CFA” design into a business card, even if there’s a chance he might find the card a wee bit rude for his tastes. Though Lord knows, as a journalist, Omar will run into tons of CFAs every day, so he might find it as funny, instead. We shall see.
[N.B. Every weekday I do a Daily Bizcard for people and companies I admire for free — if you’re in my firing line I will also give you 100 printed for free as a thank you for being an inspiration to me — but obviously only once I’ve emailed you from “gapingvoidbizcard@gmail.com” to find out what you want written on them ! Thanks.]
[Daily Bizcard archive]
[Commission a drawing from Hugh]
