World Of The Wars

Reading the article about Spielberg and WOTW in Wired early this morning during a gusty, choppy hour at 16,000ft, provoked some comparisons in my mind today's world.

Written during the old imperial glory days of the British Empire, WOTW spoke to the ufathomably unlikely fear that a greater force would emerge to challenge and displace British global supremacy. Later transposed to an American context by which time the crown of global supremacy had drifted across the Atlantic, the same thread still applies today. If not moreso than before.

Like the story of nations being invaded by stange aliens with superior technology, hell-bent on the destruction of the locals. Pick any one of several conflicts over the last twenty years for that one.

In the Wired story, Spielberg is noted as believing that aliens wouldn't traverse light years of space simply to be destructive, and that the most likely motives of such alien travellers would be discovery. But like the past European 'invaders', discoverers and cartographers of the world as we know it, it's not so much that the nice guy in the first ship that's the problem, it's his nasty, ill-intentioned chums who show up some time later with disease and other vices that you need to worry about.

Many interesting contemporary parallels in WOTW.

Eight Years Of Email

Marc Eisenstadt who, as it happens, works but only fifteen minutes from my home, has been studiously collecting his email for about eight years. If that sounds a lot, then Marc's actually quite perturbed that he's only got eight years worth and that he lost the previous decade or two's. Anyway, he's been compiling some stats on this personal mail mountain which are really quite interesting.

Sadly, I have only about four or five year's worth, all my early emails from my initial steps online around '94-95 got wiped with various system rebuilds when I was less bothered about keeping them.

He Is Reason

I'm sure I've blogged about this many times, but perhaps not so much recently.

The book, The Cluetrain Manifesto, fundamentally inspired, alerted, awoke, challenged, awed, taught and elegantly dragged me by the earlobe to a simple but profound appreciation of the chronic dysfunction that had infected (and largely still does) much of what passed for enterprise in the age of today's emerging web connected markets. The book was born in the middle of the ill fated dotcom but much of it still resonates 5 years later.

I'm sometimes uneasy about heaping such voluminous praise, as I have heaped on the individuals behind the book in the past, for fear of characterising the kind of fanaticism associated with cult followings.

But so all encompassing is the subject matter of the book - for this writer anyway - it is hard for me to ignore the extent of its expansive applicability, whether to me as a consumer or as a businessperson. Basically, for me it ticked multiple boxes under the heading of Personal Relevance.

During my own dotcom dysfunctional episode (the company I'm now (safely) running was taken over by a lunatic dotcom business in early 2000) and during some very dark days, I sought refuge in the basic fundamental common sense that can be found scrawled over the essence of its 95 theses. At the time I sent the text of Chapter 1 to several colleagues under the heading, Salvation Lies Within. And still today, the tone, manner and basic human voice which is now evident in my 'all staff emails', my meetings and discussions with collegaues and customers, and anyone else for that matter, owes a great deal to my reading Cluetrain.

After reading the book, I duly signed up to the email discussion list and over the course of 2000 and 2001, I took part - mostly lurking, sometimes sticking my head above water - in some fascinating discussions. The now dead Cluetrain list provided a useful pre-blog era medium to discuss the implications of both what the book covered and the many follow-on debates it inspired.

--In a probably futile attempt to cut an already long rambling story short...

Chris Locke, co-author and pre-eminent bedfellow (in the Morecambe & Wise sense) of RageBoy, his altar-ego (no, really) - for various reasons, not least the violent allergic reaction experienced by the global business community immediately post 9/11 which, fatefully for Chris, also co-incided with the release of his Cluetrain follow-up, magnum opus (not P.I.) Gonzo Marketing - Winning Through Worst Practices and failing personal relationships to name but two) found himself cut adrift just when he could (or, indeed, should) have been kicking assess and taking names.

****Hi Chris?, Mr FUBAR is here for your eleven o'clock and is waiting for you in reception.***

It was around that time, as subscriber to his EGR e-zine, I followed the chance to meet up with him back in 2002 when he was in London on a business trip. We had an albeit foreshortened blast. Plus some expensive steak sandwiches courtesy of the BBC.

...See, I said it would be futile--

Fast forward to today and just as the post dotcom drying-out period is drawing to a close and people are beginning to get their senses back - to paraphrase Tom Peters! who approximately said something like "...I believe that there was a problem with the hype surrounding the internet. And I believe that the problem with the hype surrounding the internet is that IT DIDN'T GO ANYWHERE NEAR FAR ENOUGH.", or thereabouts - Mr Locke with RageBoy in tow, displays such stupendous timing as to show his face round these parts once more. (he never really actually completely entirely disappeared, mostly managing to keep the home fires burning through his darkest days on his EGR blog)

OK, enough of the structured grouped random letter evoking meaning things.

Basically, what I'm saying is; Locke is 'back on the blocke. Please subscribe to EGR and C.B.O. and slice off a slither of your precious attention and pass it his way. You absolutely won't regret it.

And if you stay awake and pay attention at the back of the class, neither will your bank manager. Plus you might get some hot chick action.