Filed under: Digital Strategy
Filed under: Great Stuff
Ok- confession time. I’m a physics nerd. I love it. I had the most amazing, passionate teachers who romanced my classes with stories of Issac Newton and Einstein and Galileo. Only when we knew about their lives and the context of their discoveries were we introduced to the mechanics. It brought what might have been remote and dusty into sharp relief and fostered a life long interest in how things work.
I can introduce you to a similar teacher, Professor Lewin the iconic brilliant scientist who is at once larger than life and totally accessible. Professor Lewin delivers his lectures with the panache of Julia Child bringing French cooking to amateurs and the zany theatricality of YouTube’s greatest hits. He is part of a new generation of academic stars who hold forth in cyberspace on their college Web sites and even, without charge, on iTunes U, which went up in May on Apple’s iTunes Store.
In his lectures at ocw.mit.edu, Professor Lewin beats a student with cat fur to demonstrate electrostatics. Wearing shorts, sandals with socks and a pith helmet — nerd safari garb — he fires a cannon loaded with a golf ball at a stuffed monkey wearing a bulletproof vest to demonstrate the trajectories of objects in free fall. He rides a fire-extinguisher-propelled tricycle across his classroom to show how a rocket lifts off.
“We have here the mother of all pendulums!” he declares, hoisting his 6-foot-2, 170-pound self on a 30-pound steel ball attached to a pendulum hanging from the ceiling. He swings across the stage, holding himself nearly horizontal as his hair blows in the breeze he created.
The point: that a period of a pendulum is independent of the mass — the steel ball, plus one professor — hanging from it.
The professor, who is from the Netherlands, said that teaching a required course in introductory physics to M.I.T. students made him realize “that what really counts is to make them love physics, to make them love science.”
So my Christmas gift to you all:
The MIT Physics 1: Classical Mechanics course- lecture notes, problem sets with solutions, exams with solutions, links to related resources, and a complete set of videotaped lectures. The 35 video lectures by Professor Lewin, were recorded on the MIT campus during the Fall of 1999.
» Download the complete contents of this course.
Filed under: Get Activist
This is brilliant. Everytime you visit the United Nations Free Rice site and play the word game, grains of rice are donated to the United Nations World Food Program.
There are reports of schoolkids from all over the world sitting in class playing this, increasing their vocabulary, and at the same time feeding other kids.
It’s only been launched a month or two, and already the number of grains of rice donated (in lieu of click thru advertising revenue on the site), is in the billions.
My only wish is that you could play within a banner or widget. That way people could embed the service within their own sites.
Go and play for five minutes and see how many dishes of rice you can send. Then pick up your own banner and spread the word here.
Filed under: Get Friendly
Most of the InterestingSouth presentations and are now available for your viewing pleasure!
My favourites so far:
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and Dr Adrienne Whithall’s presentation on happiness.
In fact, ALL the presentations were fantastic … take an hour or so and fill your mind to the brim. You’ll be all the better for it.
A huge thank you to the guys at Precinct for their fabulous filming and editing. And to pureprofile for their big, glossy hosting.
Filed under: Digital Strategy
In the book Extraordinary Popular Delusions and the Madness of Crowds, Charles Mackay wrote about tulip mania. The term originally came from the period in the history of the Netherlands during which demand for tulip bulbs reached such a peak that enormous prices were charged for a single bulb. It took place in the first part of the 17th century, especially in 1636–37.
In 1623, a single bulb of a famous tulip variety could cost as much as a thousand Dutch florins (the average yearly income at the time was 150 florins).
By 1635, a sale of 40 bulbs for 100,000 florins was recorded. By way of comparison, a ton of butter cost around 100 florins and “eight fat swine” 240 florins.
In February 1637 tulip traders could no longer get inflated prices for their bulbs, and they began to sell. The bubble burst.
I’m sure that you’ve seen or heard of (or even experienced) many economic manias like this- llamas, emu eggs and about a hundred thousand websites.
So much a part of educating clients is helping them navigate an essentially manic environment: ‘build me and internet’, ‘get me a Facebook’, Second Life the creation of Linden Labs…or Lewis PR?
We can get terribly focused on the bulb- on the device that will deliver the results that we are after. As strategic guardians of brands we need to remember the heart of what it is that we are trying to deliver- to plant a seed so that a flower will grow.
Filed under: Digital Strategy
This is my current best explanation for what I do without using the words ‘advertising’ or ‘consumer’:
Identify stories and experiences that will help connect brands with the people that will increase the brand’s value.
I first used ‘create’ to describe the stories and experiences, but in our content creation environment it is much more accurate and flexible to describe how those stories and experiences can be identified without necessarily being proscriptive about who actually makes them. This also means that you’re not limited by what you can produce, and can actively seek what fits the brand messaging best.
I’m also enjoying exploring the increased territory of ‘the people that will increase the brand’s value’. So often there are messages that need to be created for internal and external stakeholders that might not necessarily be people who buy your product at a cash register.
Filed under: Get Friendly
One of the recent highlights of my time spent in Morocco was an adventure into the Little Sahara- trekking on camels under the stars, sleeping in a Berber tent and generally feeling the powerful symbols of the desert.
We arrived at Zagora at sunset after driving over the snow capped Atlas Mountains- a long day’s journey into night. We were then put on the back of camels and lead into the desert. There are more stars in the African sky than I could ever have imagined. And my mouth-open amazement at this glittering canopy kept me amused for hours while I tried to learn the gait of the creature that was carrying me. I still have the scars.
Every now and again a Land Rover would blind us with light as they crossed our path. I came to understand the importance of darkness. How often we overprivelage light to illuminate us and turn away from the knowledge and insight that a curtain of darkness can bring. You could miss a million stars by only looking at the light.
Darkness comes in many forms. We had darkness manifest itself in a person, and as Rumi might say:
i don’t need
a companion who is
nasty sad and sour
the one who is
like a grave
dark depressing and bittera sweetheart is a mirror
a friend a delicious cake
it isn’t worth spending
an hour with anyone else
My new friend Eli, a delicious true mirror who exhibits enormous courage under pressure, brought to life to me one of my favourite quotes: “Nothing is so strong as gentleness and nothing is so gentle as real strength”. His ability to keep both his feet on the ground in the midst of a dark hurricane, with wry good humour and a compassionate ability to see all sides brought me enormous comfort in some difficult situations.
There is a cost that must be paid for grace, but because the recipient of it’s gift can only see an effortlessness it is not often perceived. Sometimes you need darkness to truely appreciate stars. And so I am thankful.
