[Repost from my entry at the openexchange.org.]

Created by Google Creative Labs,”3 Dream’s In Black” is part art experiment, musical collaboration, part CGI video and breakthrough web coding assignment. Driving a culture of experimentation, all Googler’s are encouraged to pursue experiments both relatable and non-relatable to Google’s business. All to drive a passion of innovation.

How Google makes innovation part of the cultural fabric, not a project or a siloed process.

• Democratizing Ideas. Engage “the people.” Have people magnify the mania and become your evangelists. The user is your marketer.
• Gaining Credibility through the right partners: With finesse of smart salesmanship to make ideas happen.
• Challenging conventions. Question how things should be done (e.g., YouTube and the Guggenheim??)
• Don’t do marketing. Solve problems.
• Know the user. Know the magic. Connect the two. What’s the emotion behind the idea? * taken from Jeffrey Davis’s blog, post his visit to Google Creative Labs.

Rome: 3 Dream’s in Black is an impressive feat with famous musicians including DJ Dangermouse of Gnarls Barkley fame, Jack White and Nora Jones. For most of us it might appear interesting, but not far from what we expect from video games and animated movies. The true stunner, is that this was essentially built with web code, “Web GL-JavaScript” and HTML 5. And.. through a Google Chrome Browser, you can steer and immerse yourself within it.

Amazing. Say hello to the future, the 3D virtual web experience.

Great stuff under the direction Chris Milk, Google Creative Director, Aaron Koblin and @radical media. More about the project at Mashable.

[Quote from Oscar Wilde.  As presented by Jeff Swystun of DDB in "Brand Consistency Redefined"]

Recently,  A colleague asked me for some thoughts on “The Importance of Brand Consistency.”   I haven’t jumped down the branding philosophy rabbit hole in some time, but this topic is one that hits close to home.  Having bridged the world of traditional brand planning, identity design, advertising and digital, it’s a big topic to chew on.  My simple answer:

“Brand Consistency has never been more important.  Brand Consistency has never been more meaningless.”

Consistency has had to evolve to be more nuanced, take into account media fragmentation.  In fact, because a brand’s platform to connect with people has expanded so much and (of course) the “consumers are control” thing, consistency has had to evolve to a brand focusing less on being consistent and more on becoming a brand in concert with it’s activity and the people it connects with. There’s a ton of rationale out there for this, but I particularly like this articulation by friend and colleague from Upstream, Tim Sweeney.

There is no average consumer so brands should be customized to individuals

Brands should/must conform to different contexts people may be in… which runs contrary to consistency.

Articulations of this aren’t completely common I find.  More so, I think there’s a ton of smart marketers that haven’t really been exposed to this change in paradigm beyond CGM driven ad campaigns and talks on transmedia.  Corporate communications leaders and the passionate designers responsible for brand guidelines and identity find themselves in the mostly fruitless job of playing brand cop.  They keep on pounding the drum of consistency

Maybe the job of brand identity management should be more orchestral and open minded.  It certainly would make people lives somewhat easier.  “Open source” branding may just work, though not perfect.  Releasing your  control as a brand manager, creative designer and identity manager to the loose architecture of brand experience design might, in fact, be liberating.  And it doesn’t have to mean crowdsourcing and foresaking the beauty of thoughtful design.

Here’s the story I tell about the (r)evolution of consistency as it relates to brand strategy and brand identity:

1) Brand consistency is as important as ever in a digital, disrupted media world..but the notion of how it works and is applied is changing dramatically.

2) A Brand and it’s consistency has traditionally been attached to Brand Identity.  Today it’s important that one not equate THE Brand as being THE Brand Identity, rather Brand Identity is a part of the overall Brand Experience.  In a traditional media world Identity led the process and Brand consistency was an effective method.  With media fragmentation, replicated consistency in look, tone, feel and message shifts to a need for a connected Brand Experience and story across mediums, with shifting narrative and presentation.

3) More specifically, a Brand Experience must retain element of consistency, but be fluid with a narrative arc.  The caution is that exact sameness is easier to tune out for consumers in a fragmented media landscape.  A connected less, literal Identity can actually help retain attention and reinforce the backfrop of Brand Identity’s intent.  Guidelines apply but may be less singular and prescriptive.

4) “Branding is now like conducting a symphony… With many acts, movements, instruments, players and styles that compliment one another to engage… to create resonance.”

5) We believe Identity elements must retain a connected, reminiscent and identifiable sameness in message and presentation.  However, it does not necessarily need to be exactly executed to template.  Big brands are taking note of this, and shift and change their look and message continuously, yet lead consumers to the same conclusion, reinforce the same purpose. This is particularly the case given the impact of consumer generated media. Entertainment brands have evolved to allow consumers to take the elements of their content and brands, be creative with it and execute differently yet allowing for it to come “from the same place”. This approach embracing an open brand has led to the strategy of Transmedia Brand Planning.

6) Brands are keeping a degree of control of their brand, and it’s identity by recognizing the need to architect message, media and design in context to where the message is.  By understanding how it intersects with a consumers life… Their journey, by intersecting in the right place and the right time.  By being relevant, useful and meaning to these places and times. For brands like Apple, Whole Foods, Method, Nike and Coca Cola Brand Purpose becomes it’s bellwether for consistency.

7) The result is that Brands are spending less time and effort managing the executional elements of Brand Identity.  Rather, they are spending more time being articulate across the brand experience and keeping consistency in their Brand Purpose and Brand Experience.

More context from Henry Jenkins: Transmedia’s Role in the Shifting Experience of Brands:

More written examples.

* A great white paper on evolution of consistency by DDB from Jeff Swystun/2007: Brand Consistency.

* The digital marketer point of view on consistency: Brand Consistency is Killing Digital Advertising/ SXSW

* A POV on the continued importance of a crafted Identity: Who Care’s What Your Logo Looks Like?

* A metaphor for your marketing, Branding “in concert”: Apple is the new Grateful Dead.

* Open marketing, the storytelling experience of a transmedia centered brand: Transmedia Planning

via whatconsumesme.com

an update of the XKCD classic

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[Video tip off, courtesy of David Walker of 302 Designs]

awesome.

…more on recombinant culture from Faris.

via aiga.org

Continuing my latest dive into design fiction, check out this collaboration between Penguin Book and Six To Start an experiential design firm in London. Perhaps a bit ahead of it’s time (launched in 2008) these stories used Google maps and other immersive online media, rolling out over the course of six weeks. Very cool concept for marketers and advertisers to think about as a case study when creating experiential narratives.

See more via the AIGA blog: We Design Stories: The Digital Fiction of Six to Start by Holly Willis.

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So here’s a part one in an attempt to wrap the key takeaways into the language of the moment.

Foursquare badges:

SXSW 2010 Badge #1: Storyteller

From Drew and Gavin, curators and lead contributors to the book:

“Age of Conversation III: It’s Time to Get Busy!, the world’s leading practitioners share their stories, ideas, strategies and observations. Each chapter yields practical insight and valuable experience.

The book is broken into a number of sections:

At the coalface, Conversational branding, Influence, Getting to work, Corporate conversations, Measurement, In the boardroom, Pitching social media, Innovation and execution, Identities, friends and trusted strangers

This third book in the Age of Conversation series is crowdsourced, bringing together hundreds of authors from across the world. The diverse perspectives and innovative approaches reflects the global, changing nature of business today. All profits from the sale of the book are donated to the Make-A-Wish Foundation.”

See the full list of contributors, including Helge Tenno, Aki Spicer, Len Kendall, Rich Nadworny, Joseph Jaffe and Mark Earls after the break.

Danah Boyd’s Notes from SXSW 2010 Keynote: danah.org

Also thoughts on guard rail definitions for social network typologies here.

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