BarCamp Saigon - A truly impressive start

I attended BarCamp Saigon today with no preconceptions. No, that's a lie, I expected it to be boring. I figured I'd go for an hour and walk. From all I had read and seen on the Internet I envisioned a few rooms full of siliconmunist geeks, embroiled in their own laptops and discussing obscure programming language that only a Linux devotee could love. But this was my first BarCamp so a learning curve was in store for me. What I found instead, was many rooms full of many different kinds of people that was a perfect mix of Vietnamese, multinationals and a few Cambodians thrown in for good measure, discussing everything from New Media to "How to Start a Start-up" to "Sexy Cambodian Bloggers". It was fun, it was refreshing. It was interactive.

It was everything that the advertising business used to be, but doesn't seem to be anymore. And that's a shame - for the ad business anyway. Over the last eight years, or maybe longer, the biz has been steadily eaten away by "New Media" businesses, many represented by the variety of people in the rooms today and what I felt, in a more than general nature, is that this is where the business of creativity has moved for the future. Many many years ago, in the 1960s, Marshall McLuhan said, "The medium is the message" in reference to the burgeoning dominance of mass media in American society and today that statement was more than fact. McLuhan also coined the term "Global Village" and today was just part of the realization of his prediction.

To understand my description of the advertising business' decline over the last eight years one need look no further than to the current share price of WPP, the world's largest communications business holding company, at $26.50 today vs. $100 in the year 2000. I still own a few hundred shares. Ha! It's a sad, but real decline and representative of the entire industry. And a lot of it happened, because the ad business had tied itself to an old 15% commission model based on the purchase of mass media at a time when the masses were moving into more personal and segregated forms of media - and the ad agencies had no new media products or ways to charge for them. No, Martin Sorrell didn't make this happen - the consumer made it happen - because he/she wanted to consume his/her information in the new ways that were being made available in the day, and not in the old ways, where the company or government said the same thing to everyone and everyone had no choice but to hear it and sit down. The consumer began to not only have a choice, but a voice in their message channels and content. User- generated media was born. Over the last eight years New Media has enjoyed an upwardly spikey growth chart whilst television and mass media expenditures have declined consistently.

One of the most interesting comments of our BarCamp day came from a Cambodian blogger who said that in Cambodia "Blogs have become the most trusted form of receiving news because people no longer believe the mass media". This sentiment has been echoed by people worldwide over the last few years when, America, the former bastion of free speech, became the home of "embeded" journalism and government controlled media. By the time anybody in mass media checked the constitution, the bloggers of America and the world had already printed the stories of the day and citizens all over the globe had read them. I'm happy to have been along for that ride.

My Barcamp started at the registration table at RMIT University . The event was sponsored by RMIT, IBM and VinaGame. I was asked to sign a form and given a name badge and a program (in Vietnamese only) and informed that it was lunchtime so I could use a voucher for 40,000 VND inside my packet to have lunch. How cool. So the first thing I did was have a free lunch and a Pepsi. Sweet. My afternoon was full of bopping from room to room where I found active discussions, cool speakers and simple but interactive presentations. But the most impressive part of all was the interactivity. These audiences weren't the typical "sit and listen to the professor" type. Rather they weren't audiences at all but participatory bodies who drove the discussions into areas even the speakers hadn't considered. I've included the day schedule here. You can double-click on the images and make them large enough to read.

The afternoon finished around five o'clock with a wrap-up presentation in the auditorium. All the sponsors were thanked, and there we many aside from the three biggies, and we were given free t-shirts from the event and invited to an after-party with food and drinks provided gratis at a restaurant nearby. And unexpected treat. The RMIT team, a big one, came out jumping around and hugging each other to cheers from the crowd, camera flashes and spirits hitting a big high.

To finally wrap the event, cordless microphones were dispatched to the audience and we were each asked to state just one thing we had learned at BarCamp that day. The best comment came from a Viet student who said the following:

"Today I learned the meeting of Free. Free lunch, Free dinner, Free beer, but most of all Free Thought. We Vietnamese need to learn to speak more freely and share our ideas to build a better future and better businesses. Today I felt a Freedom of mind that I want all of us to continue in the future".

That comment illicited the biggest applause from the audience and probably the best feeling, all of us had had all day. The after-party was more fine conversation with a good solid dose of networking and a liberal sprinkling of food and drink for all.

A totally successful event I would say. Thanks to Kevin Miller, Thomas Wanhoff and the whole huge crew who pulled this off. (sorry, I don't know all your names)

For more on blogs, blogging and bloggers, check here:

Advertising People & Blogs - The Travis Diaries VI
How to Write the Best Damn Blog in the World
Throw That Blog a Bone!
If Blogs Are Free Are They Worthless?
What If Gutenberg Had a Blog?
If You Like the Blog, Read the Book>/a>
2008 Annual Report - The Wild Wild East Dailies
Blog Redesign WWED
BarCamp Saigon 2008
Attraction vs. Conversion - How to Power Your Blog
Are the Bloggerati Missing the Market?

For more on digital marketing and social networking see:

Xing vs. LinkedIn: Round II
Trial and Error: The New Normal
What's Wrong With My Social Networking? Xing vs. LinkedIn I
Low Tech Germany. Who Knew?
Advertising People and Blogs
How to Write the Best Blog in the World
What If Gutenberg Had a Blog?
If Blogs Are Free Does That Make Them Worthless?
Detri-Viral Marketing II: The Top 10 Social Media Blunders
Bright Lights, Big Internet and the WWED
Saigon Digital Marketing Conference Successfully Avoids Plumbers Convention
A Tale of Many Marketing Conferences
Detri-Viral Marketing I: How Web 2.0 Can Go Against A Brand
Marketing Predictions for 2009
Barcamp Saigon 2008
"Ignore Everybody" is Born: A Plug for Hugh MacLeod
Are the Bloggerati Missing the Market? Asia has Risen,
Into the Gapinvoid - Web 2.0 Social Networking Born 20 Years Ago

What's Important this Veterans Day?

A few months ago, I did a post about a little Vietnamese boy I did not know, grabbing my hand as we both edged into a sea of motorbikes to cross the street. The original is here.

Tonight in reviewing and re-publishing my work over this last year I ran across my old post again but had forgotten the beautiful and poignant response from Ken Herrmann, who had been here during the war. Today we only fight motorbikes in Vietnam. That's important to remember.

Ken Herrmann Jr said...

Your post reminded me of late 68 and early 69 when I lived in Hiep Duc village, thirty=five miles southwest of Danang, as the liaison for the 196th Light Infantry Brigade. There were 1,500 locals resettled in the village and me. I lived on a small hill next to the village. Each morning a few kids from the village would wake me. One I called "Mao" because he was the spitting image of a tiny Mao. I ate breakfast with him and his buddies, before walking down the hill to feed the village with hundreds of boxes of stolen C-rations. Later each day an ARVN surgeon came to the village for a medcap. Sometimes Capt Goldberg, the 4th/31st Infantry Battalion surgeon came to treat the people. I recall Mao holding my hand when a little girl, about four-years of age wandered into the village one morning. She walked and stared at us, but I looked at her brain. Her skull had been blown off the night before. The ARVN surgeon told me he would bring her home that day. "I don't know what my wife will say about this." He had brought home about a dozen kids I had begged him to help. I wonder what happened to her. I wonder what happened to him. I wonder more when you write about the little boy who held your hand. Some things never end. Some thoughts are never silent.

Thanks, David.

Ken works as a Professor of Social Work at SUNY and runs a Vietnam and foreign studies program there. He and I have been corresponding for nearly three years now, well before the birth of this blog, based on a PSA I did for his program.

Thank you for reminding me of this, Ken.

The Language Barrier : The Asian Business Conundrum - Your best speakers are not always your best employees

I first heard this from David Miller, outgoing managing director of Leo Burnett Korea as I was coming in to the country as a managing partner with our office there.

"Your best speakers are not always your best employees", he said and went on to explain that as a new foreign manager that I would have an immediate withdrawal reflex and lean immediately on those who could speak English, bypassing a whole building full of people who could possibly solve my problem. And he could not have been more right. Foreign companies are absolutely classic at populating meetings full of elegant orientals who can certainly talk a good game, but are miserably inept at managing anything when the job gets back to the shop. And this can happen in two ways:

1) They are Asian of national descent but were raised overseas. In Korea they are "Kyopo". In Vietnam they are "Viet Kieu". And while western managers are just fabulously happy to have people like this on the ground, the locals can many times resent them because they didn't grow up in country, don't really know the culture, and talk funny. Additionally, can be perceived by the locals that the imports are getting a better deal than those who have fought for their country and don't deserve it - so they often have great difficulty getting anything done inside their native culture.

2) They are miserable managers. And therein lies a huge problem in Asian education, western hiring practices and any sort of management whatsoever here. The preference for excellent English over excellent thinking. Has anyone noticed that Putin never speaks English at a summit? Or that any other number of foreign leaders from everywhere from France to Argentina don't either, yet run perfectly solid countries with minimal crap over time - yet many African leaders with Indian and Pakistani ones thrown in, speak perfect English but have box-of-rocks countries that are rife with problems.

Back in the US you see it in a way that is almost comical, but common. At Leo Burnett we had an account manager named Bob Chen, who was of Chinese American descent, and had been put in charge of the Nintendo account, a one hundred year old Japanese company. No one seemed to be worried that the histories of Japan and China at war over thousands of years could be an issue but the decision was much more simple than that. In a 50 storey building with 2300 employees, we didn't have any Japanese. Rumour was that management was running around the office looking for "yellow people" before the pitch and Bob was what they could find. Close enough, right? Bob worked hard but he didn't really understand the business and certainly didn't know fuck all about Japanese management. There was another instance, in which Sony had expressed a preference for German design in it's ads - you know, real clean, spare, cold stuff, so a German designer was shipped in. What a nice guy, but the entire account staff just regarded him as an alien. America has just been fabulously insular forever whilst claiming to be a "melting pot" but that's been largely crap. Happenings this week are the first hope I've seen. Ever.

But the problem has now reversed itself for me. It's the local companies who plant good English speakers in front positions and then direct with old men and an opium pipe from the back room. Whenever I walk into a meeting and meet a room full of perfect English speakers, I am immediately suspicious. Not a one of them is a decision maker. They're props. Actors, TV talents. And the sooner indigenous and foreign companies alike realize this, the further they will come towards getting a great group of different people working together. Not myself or a one of us is going to be able to erase this prejudice, but as managers we can recognize it and take real big extra care to include everyone in the projects. I leave you with two examples from my initial assignment in Korea.

From Wild Wild East:

Jinook Kim was our motorbike delivery man at Leo Burnett. He was also a TV producer, but as the low cub on the totem pole, was stuck with delivering tapes, first to the censors, then to the TV stations at god-awful hours in the morning. But Jinook's boss was such a complete bum, that had acquired such an earned disdain from me that I came to rely on Jinook for anything of importance. His boss, a Mr. Park, had been trained at Columbia College in Chicago, arguably the top broadcast school in the city, and it was obvious that during his time in Chicago, he had done nothing but take the train from Korea-town, attend class, and go back to Korea-town and drink beer with his buddies at the end of the day. He could speak English but was creatively worthless, had never been to the Art Institute, a Sox or Cubs game and didn't even know who Al Capone was (I'm serious).

Jinook, conversely, couldn't speak a lick of English but spent his entire day in the office, while waiting to do his evening editing and deliveries watching videos. Hundreds of videos. I called him Tarantino, (he had no idea what that meant) because Quentin Tarantino taught himself to write and direct films by working in a video shop. Jinook had gone to a crappy trade school and was treated like dirt by the other Koreans. He was also paid less than even a secretary and was my lowest paid staff.

Over time I came to realize than Jinook's talents lie not just in his technical and creative ability, but in his negotiating skills in getting persnickety censors to approve stuff at 4am.

One day we had a huge issue with a Reebok commercial. The censors had rejected it because it featured Shaquille O'Neal having his head shaved to reveal a Reebok logo on the back of his head at the end. Harmless. But the censors had called head shaving "degregating to the human spirit" and refused to put it on air. We, of course, had just received the film from the US and put a Korean voice over on it.

Arriving the next morning, I was apprised of the situation and informed by Jinook that he had already created a solution. Remember, Jinook could speak no English to me aside from things, like video, movie and Speilberg.

He showed me the revised cut and my jaw dropped. It was fucking brilliant. "How, how, how", I said, "did you think of that?", I asked him. "Because, I know your mind", he said, "I know your mind".

Jinook had simply re-cut the commercial, using the same voice over to run the entire film in reverse, beginning with Shaq and a Reebok logo on his head, and ending with a happy Shaq and a full head of hair. Crisis averted. Censors appeased.

My second story comes from the same company and a different employee, a writer.

Ms. Lim, was regarded as our top writer and had a well earned reputation for churning out mildly humourous and engaging radio commercials for BMG music on artists as scintillating as Whitney Houston and Bobby Brown, and we know where they are now don't we.

All writers and artists had their copy and ideas approved through me and it was usually done with Mrs. Woo, our department mom and creative director, providing the translation.

I reviewed the script and made a comment about changing the joke at the end and what I got what an obviously incensed Ms. Lim. "You no speak Korean", she belted, "You no read Korean. You no!", and she stormed out. As was sometimes the case, I just suspected that this issue world be referred to the president and he would over ride me, so I didn't loose much sleep over these cultural flairups.

The next morning I arrived in my office to find a wide ribbon of beautiful rice paper rolled and tied with a bow on my desk. I grabbed my coffee and sat down to open it. As I stretched it out, it was written with a simple black pen but in a penmanship that was elegantly Ms. Lim.

I am paraphrasing here and imitating her dialect but this is the general gist:

Dear David;

When you come here, I no have confidence for you.
You not Korean. You no speak Korean.
How know you Korean writing?
I mad to managers about give us you.
But last night, I thought about your idea,
and it is good one.

Thank you,

Ms. Lim

Ms. Lim and Jinook ended up on a film trip to Chicago later that year to make a television commercial for Kelloggs. We ate at at all sorts of restaurants, they visited my house, met my wife and generally had the time of their lives. They were the first Korean staff to have ever worked outside Korea. On the shoot, we had big, 10" plastic cornflakes so that we could shoot high speed film and get proper definition on the "milk spash" shot. Jinook wanted to take one home but we had to say no. Trade secret stuff. Koreans can copy anything, even plastic cornflakes. Jinook's salary was appropriately raised from $12,000 a year to $18,000 by the end of my tenure.

Jinook ended up being one of the city's top commercial directors, working for the best production company in Korea and may even have his own company now. Ms. Lim became the principal freelance writer for my company, CarlsonCreative, and enjoyed a stellar career as an advertising writer. Both of them learned to speak impeccable English.

And there is the moral in this story: Infuse your employees with passion for their discipline, reward them and let the benefits come back to you. The English will come as they want it to come, if you inspire and support them.

For more on Creativity, Education and the like, check below:

"Do Our Schools Kill Creativity?" - Sir Ken Robinson
Brand Marketing and Staff Training in Vietnam
2009 Marketing Predictions
The Language Barrier - An Asian Business Conundrum

The Vietnam Advertising Association and the Golden Bells: RIP for the Bells?

The creative season is upon us in Vietnam and with the "Big Show", scheduled for early December people are just getting warmed up. Conversely, one would expect the Vietnam Advertising Association to be firing up their "Golden Bell" awards...but no? I don't know, you Google it, but I've not heard a thing and have already made a fairly large point about VAA's needs in that area and don't need to put the boot in anymore. Instead, I'm going to reprint my review of last year's two shows at the end of this post, and I can tell you, I was as journalistically critical of both as one could have been, but also fair and even handed in not trashing the whole scene. The scene just needs work. And a lot of it. My suggestion at the end of the review was that both shows talk to each other and join hands to bring the industry out of a foreigner vs. local mentality, but that certainly hasn't come to pass. The Big Show, will go on, as always, and certainly be better than previous years. It has every year I have been here. The Golden Bells? No info.

Recently, I received a note for the staging of "Annie Get Your Gun" the first fully staged Broadway musical to hit Vietnam and this IS impressive:

"This massive co-production is the result of collaboration between the International Choir of HCMC, the HBSO Ballet Symphony Orchestra and Opera, The Saigon Players amateur theatre group and the DanCenter. Saigon has never seen the likes of this kind of show before!"

And this is what needs to happen in the advertising business. But it won't happen so long as the former said AD organization, won't involve the whole industry. Period. As support for this I need to relate a recent experience that happened independent of anything I had written previously and independent of any work I have done in the business thus far.

A few months ago, I had discovered an Institute called ARTI, , The Advertising, Training and Research Institute, and made a point to drop by and introduce myself. And I did. On the day I stopped by they had just finished their opening ceremony. I walked into a small working room and was introduced to a number of men in suits and women as well. They were very warn. Business cards around the room and my CV given to the staff, they were all over it. "He came from Leo Burnett in Chicago - he worked for this client - he worked for that client. He won a lot of awards" As is customary only the younger people speak enough English to ask the questions, but the questions were obviously being fielded from a more senior man in the corner. I will not mention his name here but his card indicated a high position in VAA. They all handed me a pile of cards in return but you really do have to know that none of the younger people in the room even had a title above "housepainter", no matter what they call them. Sorry, but that's the way it is - same as Korea. Even if you thought the big man in the room was a decision maker there's always a bunch of wizards behind the curtain in these association deals that you can not see. Basically, he's not going to give you any decisions or money. Associations don't make money.

Thank you emails exchanged and I was contacted a few weeks later for another meeting.

At this meeting the big guy was not there, but I was able to talk with the staff. They were animated and had a young guy, who had previously spoken before, but not this day, just circling the room and videotaping everything I said. I found it annoying but said nothing. I put on my best camera face. The meeting began with them handing my a syllabus for a Brand Management class that was just phenomenally well written and on top of the game. "Did you write this?", I inquired. Another man responded, not sheepishly at all, that it had come from Columbia University in New York. I then proceeded to ask if they had any way to execute it. You know, lesson plans, visual examples, case studies, etc. I also inquired to see a textbook and was shown one paperback on Asian branding and told they had e-books. Hmmm. Has anyone checked the e-book offerings on branding recently? I'm sure all the big gurus are just giving away their books for free on the net.

I spoke of my design of a brand management class I had done for Vietnam National University a few years ago and also mentioned that I had 11 PowerPoint case studies done by my students for their final grade. That school had paid me well and I had worked hard to write and deliver their course. The interest level was more than palpable. There was talk of me teaching a course, being a guest speaker and other things. I had mentioned that I would have no trouble representing the program to the multinational agencies in town, and selling the thing, if I could be assured it was of some real value. Multinational agencies need well trained employees and the VAA needs a soft intro to the multinational community. They currently only have one of those agencies on their membership roster.

This wrapped up and I was invited to yet another meeting on Saturday, the same week, to meet the woman who would head the Brand Management class. As is customary, I did a conference report detailing the meeting and sent it by email that evening to the key parties. In it I promised to bring a copy of my VNU syllabus. Mine doesn't differ much from Columbia's, just more simple and applicable to the market. You couldn't teach a course from it. It's an outline.

Saturday arrived and the room was full of yet more people but not the big guy again. A woman from a reasonably huge multinational client was there, and if you know anything about meetings, and dog sniffing contests, she certainly didn't want to meet me. I was there as a foreign advisor and she wanted that like she wanted holes drilled in her head. I'm sure she gets her butt handed to her everyday at work and the last thing she wanted was to come to a meeting at a part-time job with a very experienced person. Hell, I was just looking for, honestly, a small bit of work. I didn't want her job at ARTI and never would.

The meeting began and the first thing on the agenda was my conference report. The main guy there, but not the real big guy, went through it and said immediately, "You forgot something." I asked what and he asked for my PowerPoint case studies. Things immediately became awkward and the video man was circling again. I explained, in as much of a logical way as they could not understand, that those were the result of my previous work and a vital part of any teaching I might do, not to mention my hundreds of video references and other PowerPoints that I only keep on my computer. I also explained that there was an entire website for the class but that that, required a code to access and of course they could not have, pretty much ever. Seems their e-books were not enough.

Things then just took a turn for the odd and they handed me the Columbia University syllabus again and asked if there was anything I would change. I crossed out about half of it and said, "Look, you've got to make these concepts accessible and interesting to your students" and you've got no backup or Viet examples of the theories in practice. My case studies came up again.

One needs to be as kind but firm in situations like this but did they ever ask themselves why I would be willing to give away privileged information for free? Probably not. What I did realize though was that I was the only man in the room, not on the payroll and the only one who had written a damn thing for the meeting. I had a conference report, a VNU syllabus and had edited a Columbia University document in 30 seconds. This meeting was soon to be over. They had gotten quite enough from me and I had gotten nothing in return.

The meeting ended with a woman, apparently the top account girl at the big guy's agency, the guy who wasn't there, handing me a complete document detailing the profile of a foreign client and asking me if I could help them write a response to an RFP. I asked her immediately, who the competition in the pitch was and she told me she didn't know. "It's a secret", she said.

"Find out or walk away", I said. Jaws dropped to the floor. "You can't fight ghosts", I explained. "If you find out the competition is big famous companies, or very good ones, that gives you a way to place your own company in the bid. If they're little guys, you learn something else. But if you don't know anybody in the mix you'll just be giving away reams of your own information and costs with no understanding of what they mean to the client in the mix." The ARTI man agreed with me and told her, "It must be fair". Interesting, her boss had sent her to get even more free consulting than I had already provided. But she did get good advice. In the end I saved her money and time.

There were a few pleasantries exchanged but they couldn't get their case studies out of me for free and had no intention of even hiring me to teach one class. A few emails exchanged the following week. "Would you be a guest speaker?", they asked. I sent them a more than fair price and that was the end of communication.

I write this not to really upset anybody, but I wouldn't mind shaking this VAA organizational tree a little. And I've not been a Trojan horse either. The following review was made aware to them in the middle of our discussions and I mentioned that's it's critical but in the end constructive. Advertising's a bitch man. Fragile egos will get you nowhere.

Here's last years run:

Vietnam Advertising: Trying To Find It's Face

Ho Chi Minh City played host to two different advertising shows this weekend and if you ever wanted to find two completely different faces on one city this was the place to do it – and what a confused face both sides combined to be.

Friday, an independent group called The Creative Circle staged their ninth annual display of work at the Galaxy Cinema in the courtyard outside and it was a massively attended event. Well over 700 people gathered to see all the print work displayed on gallery panels and then crammed SRO into one of the theatres for the TV showing with over 20 local agencies displaying works.

It was a summarily impressive event, except for the quality of the work, which aside from a few single entries, failed to impress or inspire most of the attendees. What the show accomplished in spades though is what advertising shows should accomplish: It brought people together, gave them free food and drink and encouraged them to discuss, debate and grouse over the some of the best and least inspiring work in the country.

For it's purpose, the Creative Circle Show was not a juried nor judged show – so no awards were given. No blood, no foul, as they say – and maybe not so good.

But if one were looking for fouls, the Vietnam Advertising Association show, The Golden Bell Awards, on Sunday was a sure fix. A poorly promoted and garishly festooned TV special, this show had all the look of a Bollywood extravaganza with seemingly none of the professionalism that should go along with any kind of awards show.

Transparency in judging would have been the main issue with some of the awardees not even having appeared on the festival website for the last few months for supposed "voting". http://www.goldenbell.com.vn So poorly attended was the event that the organizers, a TV production company, had to stack the audience with high school kids to get 400 people in the seats because the industry from Friday was just plain absent.

When the judging panel should have been a "Who's Who" of the industry, this panel engendered more of a "Who's that?" question – with not a single major advertising name on the list – not even the head of any local agency. If the government was looking to find extra duties for under-worked bureaucrats this was perfect, because the list of judges and committee members was exactly that. Nobody.com. Politicians.net

Interestingly enough though, the work in this show was of much higher calibre than the show on Friday. Even a panel of dimwits would have had a hard time making a bad choice. But if more than 1% of the agencies were represented here, even that would have been a stretch. With over 5000 companies claiming to be in the advertising business in Vietnam, this show was an embarrassment – only because the association representing this industry couldn't seem to advertise enough to get anyone to enter or show up for the show. Entry fees were outrageously high, compared to even international shows, and no posters, print material or newspaper ads promoted the show.

In the end, it was loose–loose for both shows – because neither one did a complete or comprehensive job. The Creative Circle was good for cocktails and conversation but no real outcome, and the Golden Bells managed a TV program, good for viewers of same-old, same-old Vietnamese variety shows, but absolutely no socialization, platform, education or advancement for people in the business – an inaccurate and disappointingly staged event.

To grow the business in Vietnam it's obvious that both camps could benefit from each other's expertise. The Creative Circle certainly know how to throw a proper show that attracts the industry, and the Golden Bells know how to make statues and TV programs.

Working together in the future may be a bold and politically risky suggestion but it's the only one that makes any sense considering the shortcomings of both efforts this last weekend.

[David Everitt-Carlson has worked in the advertising business for more than 25 years and is a consultant in Ho Chi Minh City: http://www.linkedin.com/in/DavidEverittCarlson

Obamanation: Yes we can.

I surprised myself Wednesday morning (Vietnam is twelve hours ahead of Chicago) watching the returns and finally Obama's acceptance speech in Chicago. There was nothing particularly stirring in his speech, save for the opening line that stated roughly, "If anyone still thought that the American Dream was dead, today should put that notion to rest". But the vision of a black man delivering the line, and the gathering of black and white people on the stage at the close of the speech really went straight to my heart. "Now, that looks like my country", I said to myself. It was nearly tear-in-the-eye stuff and has been sorely absent from our nation's government for far too long. It felt really very good.

For the last eight years, I have felt, as an American living abroad, that our core values, beliefs and philosophies have been rampantly deconstructed to the point that the US today has felt more like the Soviet Union of the 50s - and our influence and perception overseas has been so miserably trodded upon, by our own regime, that most nobody wants us around. Being an American overseas has been a war in itself since Bush. Claiming any moral high ground over any other country has been ludicrous.

From Wild Wild East:

"I remember particularly, his "Axis of Evil" comment in relation to North Korea as I had been running a business in Seoul, South, Korea. Whithin a week of that, clients began to call and put all their advertising plans on hold. Six months they said. I had already lost a Philippine airline, launching a new route to Seoul, after 9/11 because they could not get a guarantee from Boeing on delivery of their new plane. In the Axis of Evil case, I knew that most people, certainly Americans, didn't know the difference between North and South Korea and that nobody would be launching any new products anytime soon. From the Korean side, they put their American advertising plans on hold becuse nobody in the US would want to buy a car or TV made in the Axis of Evil. We were fucked.

Whithin six weeks, Bush and Condi Rice were up at the DMZ reviewing the troops and trying to mend business fences in Seoul with one of our most important trading partners. The American Chamber of Commerce was pissed, and all of us were trying to drown the issue in all the Korean beer we could get our hands on. I closed my business on March 1st, 2002, after 6 months of no income and returned to the US to figure out next steps. We were broke. I was broke."

Watching Obama on Wednesday, I felt that, at least, he could sell an unpopular idea without riling up half the damn planet. In general, I have not been a detractor of the "Change" campaign theme. From a very pragmatic side, you need to do that before anything specific can happen at all. Change first, pick the leader, and then figure out exactly what and how to change later. What the hell was "America First"? Wasn't that the exact problem with our foreign policy under Bush?

In closing I must, really tearfully, bid fairwell to Governor Sara Palin. She has been an almost endless source of comedic material, and I, along with the entire Saturday Night Live writing crew will really be in dire straights now that she has gone. I had read a few months ago that the late-night comedians and many in the political humour business were having a rough go at their work because of the common perception that you can't make fun of a black man running for president And there has been quite a bit of truth to that. I took a few shots and didn't really get a big response, nothing even remotely close to what I've gotten from the Mensa and other assorted Palin jabs. I will miss her for sure but many have commented that she may have a future similar to an American Idol runner-up and do better than the winner in some ways, just because she's so damn funny.

I wish President-elect Obama the best and I, for one American, need the positivity back in our nation's direction and felt Wednesday morning that he has the ability and fortitude to do that.


For more on Obama, click below:

Obama to Send 30,000 Troops to Tiger Woods House

Rick Wagoner Makes History - First CEO To Be Fired By A Sitting President
"I Vote For Black Man!" - Obamanation II
Lunch With Obama: Perspective XVI - The Little Things IX
A sex Redesign obama For scandal The oprah Wild oral Wild butt East iPhone Dailies
"Yes We Can": Obamanation
MENSA Endorces McCain/Palin
Obama Splits Ticket, Boots Biden!
Belgian Prime Minister Quits Over Budweiser Purchase!
Obama Brandishes a Bud For The Bubbas!

Welcome Afghanistan!

Shit. We just got our first hit from Afghanistan. You now join Brazil as one of my smallest country readers. Cheers. Bush couldn't find Bin Laden but I think I've got the biotch on the run! He loves the Internet, I hear. Here are the stats:

IP Address: 119.59.84.147 [Label IP Address]
Host: 119.59.84.147
ISP: We Have Establihed Mirowave Link From Kabul
Entry Page Time: 3rd November 2008 14:02:13
Visit length: 5 hours 43 mins 43 secs
Browser: Firefox 3.0.3
OS: Windows XP
Resolution: 1280x1024
Location: Kabul, Kabol, Afghanistan
Returning Visits: 0
Entry Page: http://wildwildeastdailies.blogspot.com/2008/11/attraction-not-conversion-little-things.html
Exit Page: http://wildwildeastdailies.blogspot.com/2008/11/attraction-not-conversion-little-things.html
Referring URL: http://wildwildeastdailies.blogspot.com/2008/11/attraction-not-conversion-little-things.html

Bloggers rule. Tell the New York Times or Vanity Fair to call me. I've got scoop. Notice also that they spent 5 hours, 43 minutes and 43 seconds on the site

Oh. dear, Bin Laden's in Pakistan now, but I get a few hits from there every now and again.
Must have been a Taliban SEO guy. Yeah, that's the ticket.

Kimmy Robertson & Twin Peaks: What Have I Done For You Lately III

Every once in awhile I get the chance to trot out some of my older work in advertising and today is one of those days. In my email, the ubiquitous message from YouTube, "Someone has left a comment on (insert video title here)". Oddly, joy does not immediately wash over one for the possibility that it's a complete slam is extremely high. I have one channel that features all of my professional work but the idea that anybody actually made any of the mazzilions of commercials on the Tube seems lost on many viewers. I had one punk call me a thief and said he knew I was claiming a work that was not rightfully mine. I sent him the director's name and listed the creation crew and never heard a thing back from him. Certainly not an apology. Advertising is a thankless job. Sometimes.

But not today. Today, I received a note from KimmyGloria who later revealed herself to be Kimmy Robertson from the American TV show "Twin Peaks" directed by David Lynch in the late 80s and early 90s.




We had cast Kimmy as the ditzy but oh-so-much-smarter-than-her-meathead-husband because she had gotten a free book of football stats with the purchase of a twelve-pack of Miller beer. The work was done at the Leo Burnett agency in Chicago. I had based the character on my partner, Alex Kroll Jr.'s, girlfriend at the time who could rip up a room full of footballers with her knowledge of everything from history to stats, strategy and players of the game. American football of course. Alex was the son of Alex Kroll Sr., then CEO of Young & Rubicam advertising in New York. He had been a star player on the Yale and Rutger's teams and did a year for a pro team which later became the New York Jets - so I had powerful real people from which to draw the concept. Kimmy was cast because of her innate sweetness and smartness and this is probably the only beer commercial ever made, save for the entire "Swedish Bikini Team" series, where the male characters are played exactly as most beer drinkers of this variety are. Dim. Kimmy is physically small but she carries this off huge as the only person in the room who knows WTF is really going on. The commercial won a number of awards and was well received by the client and viewers, Her note to me reads: "DEC you are now and always were so kind to me. Thank you!" Thank you Kimmy.

P.S. Kimmy's followed up her earlier note here: " Hi David, This is so interesting to me. I have watched stuff on YouTube but never posted a comment before. I only hoped you would see it. You were one of my really good memories, magic. You worked with magic. Only a few ever do."

Love,
Kimmy

Attraction vs. Conversion: How To Write the Best Damn Blog in the World - Perspective XIV: The Little Things VII

At first, the number of disabled people - no, let me change that - the number of crippled, maimed and deformed people, on the street in Vietnam can be startling. But once one has lived here for awhile another observation becomes much more astute - how well they fit in - how they are part of not just the environment but the consistent social fabric and neighborhood in terms of relationships, businesses and the daily goings on of things. The shop owners take care of the beggars. There is an obvious harmony that I can not ever remember from America. There we called them street people and since Ronald Reagan cut federal funding for care facilities we banished our disabled to the streets to die. We later re-classified them as homeless to seem more caring. I recall Pioneer Square in Seattle, an historic area of charming cast iron front buildings, putting chain-link fence around all the park benches so the street people didn't sleep on them, which would have destroyed the quaint Americana experience for tourists. At that time, in the late 80s, they said the average lifespan of a street person in Seattle was 18 months, before they died from disease and exposure. Ethnic cleansing? We only like people who are perfect like us. Wash the others out. I thought the chain-link really added to the charm of the area - in an Alcatraz sort of way. The only people I've seen who have made a worse mess of their needy, other than the Americans, for a wealthy country, have been the Koreans. They're just absolute assholes to those who don't fit their Oriental/Arian idea of the perfect Hankook. Koreans hide their disabled and shame them. But that doesn't happen here, and whilst this Communist utopia has about the same health care program as the US, people do get along, and fit in. Maybe that's something to do with having fought and won a war against a fate that would have been much worse than what they have now. Visiting Iraq in 30 years will be interesting to see what America leaves behind. ? The two boys are having a full throttle row on the sidewalk, straight out of Smack-down's greatest hits. He spins and does an awkward lunge in the air which appears to provide a kick to his opponent whilst protecting him from the tiled pavement below. Stunt-man school in Vietnam. And three girls and a very little boy sit in portable plastic chairs as if at ringside cheering the bigger boys on. One of the girls pops up with a piece of plastic leg from a broken chair to mimic a microphone and proceeds to narrarate the match for the remaining crowd of two girls and the little kid. I just eat my noodles and smile. ? Forlorn poor bar girls populate my Internet cafe surrounded by forlorn looking foreign men, Japanese, Korean and Western in an odd dating match that seemingly pits companionship and money against each other with the possibility of sex being a sideline but I can't imagine that much of the western baggage around here can get it up anymore. One guy claims to be celibate but has this rotating cadre of odd girlfriends. Loneliness is fought with a serious arsenal in post war-torn countries. Your wallet. Choosing a paycheck or a meal over a shag is really quit sensible. Chalk up a score for the girls around here. ? And my coffee man smiles, again. I'm at the wet market this morning for a week worth of veggies and am particularly enamored with the fish. But not today. Stories can be told by the palms of the hands of the woman who sells me my vegetables. A gaunt conical hatted vestige, she bears the marks of at least some trying farm work in her earlier years, maybe harvesting sugar and tearing long vertical lines from her palms down to the tips of her fingers. Her fingers are all misshapen in some way from breakage and who knows what and the idea of fingernails has been whittled down to just sort of dirty stumps at the ends. This market work must be a blessing considering the past. She is as sweet as can be and is there, 7 days a week, doesn't speak a lick of English, but always calls loudly to me when I turn onto her outdoor aisle of the market. Big pile of tomatoes, onions, peppers and what-knot. 10 thousand dong. 75 cents. ? Move along cowboy. ? Halloween hit Vietnam last week with a vengeance and had pretty much wasted itself before the actual date. A friend told me the bars were packed on the 30th but I wasn't out that night. He said the Vietnamese couldn't wait. They love ghosts and horror films. I made the colossal mistake of attending a Halloween event hosted by the "Creative Circle", an advertising creative club in Vietnam founded by Aussies, who apparently don't celebrate Halloween, and I did something unheard of to the crusty old dogs who populate the thing - I wore a costume. Now admittedly, it wasn't a very outrageous costume - I went as Martin Sorrell, CEO of WPP Group, arguably the top communication holding company in the world, and it only took a nice suit, one of those "Hello, my name is Martin Sorrell" tags, and a pair of glasses that look exactly like his (cheaply procured here for 2 bucks) - but it was a funny fucking idea, at least for that crowd. Yawn. Imagine the guys at the Creative Circle not doing anything creative at all for Halloween? Seemed normal to them. Only two other people, of roughly 30, wore a costume and they were treated as oddities. I did meet a few other people from Shanghai who were interesting and had a nice conversation with the guy who designed the packaging for my favorite beer in Vietnam, Bierre Larue. Other than that, is was thoroughly disappointing with one young Viet art director leaving, after being informed that there was basically no program for the evening, just beer drinking and a bunch of old foreigners. Yawn. My costume went over much better in my local pub where nobody knows fuck all who Martin Sorrell is, but the girls were all jazzed to see me in a very nice suit. ? The man in the booth next to me at the Internet cafe is talking to himself. He does this often - almost every night after the requisite amount of sud-swilling. Elvis plays. It's surreal as shit. Figuring out if it's PTSD he's affected with or more basic alcoholism is not really possible for me, - sure, I drink beer as well, but I sit at my computer and write. The greater majority of the place has no idea WTF I'm doing. That can be turned into a cocoon of sorts that keeps them all out - and lets this happen. ? So you're just itchin' aren'tcha? What the hell does the title to this post mean? What is he talking about? - The concept of Attraction vs. Conversion has become a bit of a Web 2.0 topic these days. Some like Mark Earls, describe it as "push" vs. "pull" marketing tactic. My friend Ken Johnson, who reviews business books for Amazon, reminded me recently, in his review of "The Peter Principle", that the core concept is over 40 years old. It's the idea that the more I actively market this thing, the less real readers I get. And I mean real readers as opposed to people who come in for the 99 cent special. I get all sorts of hits but only 25% come back over and over - and that's a good thing - considering that of that 25% there are 10% who stay for more than an hour each time. And I can deal with that. - Here's one of the latest of my more interesting readers. He congratulates me for being rejected by a major aggregating service for being "unclassifiable": - "First congratulations. I used to work as a journalist and I am inured to writing to a certain degree (an occupational hazard) - your blog has become riveting precisely because it is uncategorisable. It is not about anything, which in a modern Koan-like manner, makes it almost about everything. I really enjoy the writing and because I understand the drive, I will not deign to be condescending with the trite keep-it-up." - This is the kind of thing that keeps this blog going. This is the pull strategy in action. I didn't ask for this to be written. But I certainly don't mind an "atta-boy" or two. ? The guy in the booth next to me cuts right through the more than omnipresent Elvis that's playing - muttering, "fuck this shit", "fuck you", "fuck Bush" ? All I did today was go shopping and get this post up. Little things, but enough for today.

For more on the "Perspective" or "Little Things" series, click below:

My Morning Wake-Up Call - Perspective XX: The Little Things XII
We'll Have A Gay Old Time - Perspective XIX: The Little Things XII
"Rolled Foggy Disposed Ricepaper" - Perspective XVIII: The Little Things XI
Joyeux Noel - Perspective XVII: The Little Things X
Lunch With Obama - Perspective XVI: The Little Things IX
One Motley Crue On The Bus Today - Perspective XV: The Little Things VIII
Attraction vs. Conversion: How To Power Your Blog - Perspective XIV: The Little Things VII
A glass box full of deep fried chicken heads - Perspective XIII: The Little Things VI
Seoul Searching - Perspective XII
He Would Have Shot Me 40 Years Ago - Perspective XI: The Little Things V
Chomsky on Colour & Sleep - Perspective X: The Little Things IV.2
Running With Scizzors - Perspective IX: The Little Things IV
Henry Miler II - Perspective VIII : The Little Things III.1
Henry Miller - Perspective VII: The Little Things III
Big Brother - Perspective VI: The Little Things II
This Carnival of Life! - Perspective V
The Art Walk - Perspective IV: The Little Things
Bentley #5 - Perspective III.2
Bentley vs. Vespa - Perspective III.1
Bentleys Invade Vietnam - Perspective III
Death Of A Colleague - Perspective II
Perspective

For more on blogs, blogging and bloggers, check here:

Advertising People & Blogs - The Travis Diaries VI
How to Write the Best Damn Blog in the World
Throw That Blog a Bone!
If Blogs Are Free Are They Worthless?
What If Gutenberg Had a Blog?
If You Like the Blog, Read the Book
2008 Annual Report - The Wild Wild East Dailies
Blog Redesign WWED
BarCamp Saigon 2008
Attraction vs. Conversion - How to Power Your Blog
Are the Bloggerati Missing the Market?