Archive for the ‘Intel’ Category

March 21, 2013 (4 weeks ago)

Art is a GREAT way to spread ideas internally. Every day more CEOs realize this etc.

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Screen Shot 2013-03-21 at 3.17.20 PM

[“The pro­ces­sor is an expres­sion of human poten­tial.” One of the art pie­ces we did for Intel, loved by the CEO, now han­ging in their boar­droom etc.] 

1. In terms of govern­ment spen­ding, Rome’s first Empe­ror, Cae­sar Augus­tus pretty much had the big­gest art bud­get in his­tory. Even more than the Medi­cis. Way, way more than modern moguls like John Paul Getty or JP Morgan.

Augus­tus spent so much money because he knew what peo­ple in power have always known, that of all the ways of sprea­ding ideas, Art is pro­bably the fas­test and most effec­tive way of making it happen.

As Seth Godin famously said, “The ideas that win are the ideas that spread”.  Ergo, Augus­tus was very keen to spread the “Augus­tus is awe­some” meme all around the Empire. He star­ted spen­ding big-time, in all the major Roman cities, on art that glo­ri­fed his name. He pretty much crea­ted a wides­pread cult of Augustus.

“I tur­ned Rome from a city of bricks, to a city of mar­ble,” he famously quipped.

Of course, he was ope­ra­ting in a time before mass media, mass lite­racy, prin­ting press, tele­vi­son and radio etc etc. Back then “Art” had a vir­tual mono­poly on sprea­ding big ideas.

Later empe­rors– Hadrian, Cara­ca­lla, Diloc­le­tian, etc– lear­ned from his exam­ple to pro­mote their personalEmperor-cult brand . And even before the Goths sac­ked Rome in 479 A.D., the Chris­tian Bishops were doing the same, albeit for a dif­fe­rent deity.

2. Art is a GREAT way to spread ideas, period. It doesn’t mat­ter if we are tal­king Warhol’s Camp­bell Soup Cans, or The gaping­void Blue Mons­ter,  art has a magic qua­lity that makes peo­ple want to share. And in today’s hyper-connected world, that is magic.

Empe­ror Augus­tus got me thin­king how funny it is that, in today’s busi­ness, it’s the “exter­nal idea sprea­ders” (adver­ti­sing, PR etc) that get all the glory. TV com­mer­cials and PR cam­paigns are sexy, expen­sive and glamorous.

Far less sexy is what they call “Inter­nal Com­mu­ni­ca­tions”, or “Inter­nal Comms” for short. Peo­ple pretty much asso­ciate that with cor­po­rate memos and news­let­ters full of dry lan­guage, stock pho­to­graphy and unins­pi­ring graphic design. Ugh.

But why is that?

Seriously. It SHOULD be sexy, and it isn’t.

It’s such an impor­tant part of lea­dership! Lea­ders can­not lead unless their ideas first spread inside their com­pany.

This should be a much big­ger deal than it is. It cer­tainly was a big deal to Augustus.

3. So how exactly  does a power­ful CEO with offi­ces in Lon­don, Hong Kong, Dubai, New York, Chi­cago, Sao Paulo, Nai­robi etc etc tell his 5,000 or 50,000 emplo­yees what he or she REALLY cares about?

In such a way that peo­ple actually want to talk about it in an inte­res­ting an mea­ning­ful way?

Send a memo? Will it be read? Will it be sha­red? Will it mat­ter? Exactly.

Com­mis­sion an tra­di­to­nal adver­ti­sing cam­paign? If you have A LOT of money and A LOT of time… Do you really have that? And even if you do, will it actually work? Exactly.

4. With the value of lea­dership at an all-time high, the “Inter­nal Sprea­ding of Ideas” is an area that busi­nes­ses and orga­ni­za­tions need to be more crea­tive about. 

I think art can really help with this, big-time. That’s why I got in the busi­ness in the first place.

With that in mind, I’m currently loo­king for inte­res­ting exam­ples of this “art in busi­ness” thing. Not for mere deco­ra­tion, but for rea­sons of the afo­re­men­tio­ned inter­nal com­mu­ni­ca­tiona. Be it my art or any­body else’s art, it’s something I really want to riff on. If you know something in this depart­ment, I’d be happy to talk to you. Email: hughATgapingvoid.com

Thank you.

 

January 11, 2011

c.e.s. postscript: “intel processors are smaller than a postage stamp. intel has 80,000 employees. how do you fit so many people into an object so tiny? that’s what amazes me.”

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[Alan Wein­kranz- an old Texas con­nec­tion of mine– and myself at CES last Satur­day etc.]

“Intel Pro­ces­sors are sma­ller than a pos­tage stamp. Intel has 80,000 emplo­yees. How do you fit so many peo­ple into an object so tiny? That’s what ama­zes me.”

I am wri­ting this from home in Miami Beach, a day after retur­ning from the Con­su­mer Elec­tro­nic Show in Vegas. Here are some notes:

1. CES is big. Very, very big. We’re tal­king roughly TEN times the size of SXSW Inte­rac­tive. To give you a sense of just how big CES is, my friend, Robert Sco­ble wal­ked through the entire CES venue with a video camera run­ning the who time. It took him 45 minu­tes just to get from one end to the other [I make a brief cameo appea­rance about 16’30″ into it].

2. Alan Wein­kranz also made videos at CES. Here’s one he did of me. Excuse the sound qua­lity etc:

3. My time at CES was spent pretty much exc­lu­si­vely at the Intel stand, sig­ning prints. It was great. Just… great. I tur­ned up in Vegas with over 500 of them. By day three we had run out. We took a lot of pic­tu­res– a cou­ple of hun­dred of them. You can see them on Flickr here.

4. Intel was at CES, of course, to intro­duce their new 2nd Gene­ra­tion Intel® Core™ pro­ces­sor. It’s sma­ller than a pos­tage stamp. Intel has 80,000 emplo­yees. How do you fit so many peo­ple into an object so tiny? That’s what ama­zes me. That’s what I kept thin­king about the whole time I was there. We live in inc­re­di­ble times…

5. Yes, I’m exhaus­ted. Yes, I’m  a wreck. Yes, it was worth it. Intel was an fabu­lous client. A spe­cial thanks to Mar­cia Han­sen for get­ting me involved.

January 5, 2011

greetings from las vegas– here for c.e.s. and @intel

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Gree­tings from Las Vegas!

I just got in…

I’m here for CES, on behalf of my client, Intel, who are launching their new the 2nd Gene­ra­tion Intel® Core™ processor.

Like I said on my last post, I’m here to sign prints new Intel limi­ted edi­tion prints (sui­ta­ble for fra­ming yak, yak, yak). We edi­tio­ned only 50 of each image for the show, and when they’re gone, they’re gone etc.

Intel’s Mar­cia Han­sen has some of the details, as well:

To kick things off, we’re going to offer you free CES swag! It’s not just a t-shirt, mag­net, or cof­fee mug. It’s high qua­lity art­work with key the­mes from Intel and CES. Check out the ima­ges we’ve got for you below. (click on any image for the full-size version).

Intel visibly smart 1 Intel visibly smart 2Intel visibly smart 3

Throughout CES this week, not only will we be show­ca­sing the visibly smart tech­no­lo­gies from Intel, we’re going to be wor­king with Gaping­Void, other­wise known as Hugh Mac­Leod. You pro­bably already know Hugh. He’s famous for crea­ting car­toons on the back of busi­ness cards. Plus, he autho­red Ignore Every­body, a book about crea­ti­vity that was a Wall Street Jour­nal best seller.

Hugh is going to be at the Intel booth seve­ral times each day crea­ting live art­work and sig­ning prints for you. If you’re at CES, stop by the Intel booth, look for Hugh, and you can get an auto­graphed car­toon. If you miss him, or you’re just going digi­tal this week, check back every day here at Inside Scoop for digi­tal ver­sions of Gaping­void car­toons that speak to CES 2011 and Intel tech­no­logy.

I’m exci­ted about lot of things this week.

I’m exci­ted to be at CES– I’ve never been before.

I’m exci­ted to have Intel as a client. A huge com­pany doing inte­res­ting, world-changing stuff from the very heart of Sili­con Valley.

I’m exci­ted about the idea I crea­ted for Intel- the idea of a pro­ces­sor being akin to a painter’s blank can­vas (see the dra­wings above). I’m also exci­ted about the line I wrote for them, “The pro­ces­sor is an expres­sion of human potential”.

I’m exci­ted by the idea of “human poten­tial”, even if it is far too easy to be cyni­cal about it. Far too easy to get all buzzword-y about it.

The hard part is being sincere.

The hard part is being human. The hard part is being mortal.

[For more CES/Intel upda­tes, keep chec­king back here, or over at Intel’s site at http://scoop.intel.com. I’m hoping to be blog­ging a lot in the next 72 hours etc. Thanks!]

January 4, 2011

“the processor is an expression of human potential”

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So this was my idea for my client, Intel. You know, the big mic­ro­pro­ces­sor com­pany. “Sili­con Chips” etc.

First I drew a wee doodle of a mic­ro­pro­ces­sor, like the one above.

Then I added a tagline to the image. “The pro­ces­sor is an expres­sion of human potential”.

This was my “blank can­vas” to start with, as it were.

And then I star­ted to fill said blank can­vas with ima­ges. As demons­tra­ted below:

The ima­ges them­sel­ves don’t mat­ter per se. The fact they were drawn by me doesn’t mat­ter, either. That’s not the point.

The point is, as always, human poten­tial. And what Intel can do to help said human poten­tial reveal itself.

“The pro­ces­sor is an expres­sion of human poten­tial”. Exactly.

Then I added the Intel logo and their tagline, “Visibly Smart”.

We prin­ted these up as fine art prints. I’ll be sig­ning them and han­ding them out at the Intel stand at CES (Con­su­mer Elec­tro­nics Show) this week in LAs Vegas.

Please check out scoop.intel.com for more info. I hope to see you there. Thanks.