Noisy Decent Graphics

"Companies make their biggest mistakes when things are going well."

Someone told me this recently. I think it was said by John Bartle of BBH fame. Saving here.

I got ninety nine problems but I chose this one

"We can’t not have problems, we can only choose which problems we have."

From Russell.

"I am of the opinion that the boldest measures are the safest" Horatio Nelson

From a book on Churchill, who quoted this when asked if he would consider a "safer" course of action to the radical one he was proposing.

Photo advice

I've been working a lot with Guy Featherstone at w+k recently and one thing he keeps saying, which I think is advice worth repeating,

"No such thing as a bad photo only a bad crop".

He didn't invent that, someone else did, but I can't rememeber who right now. I'll get back to you.

UPDATE: Guy says it was Terry Jones from i-D magazine who said that. Bizarrely Terry's wikipedia page has been deleted so check out this Eye interview with him instead.

Day to day living.

 

Typography by Joe Harries, found on Tom's blog.

3. "Good design is as little design as possible"

This year saw several new articles to back up my strategy of "Good design is as little design as possible". Dieter Rams said that, not me.

There's currently a Dieter Rams exhibition on at the Design Museum and accordingly there's a whole raft of interviews on the web, which is a good a time as any to review his 10 design principles. They're all great, but "Good design is as little design as possible" is the one that's closest to my own personal design philosophy.

Often, more design gets in the way. Often, more design doesn't help, it merely adds more problems. The trouble with this philosophy in a job where you get paid to design is that people think you're shirking the working. Or that you're trying to get away with doing very little.

This isn't the case.

As Rory Sutherland (again more eloquently than I) points out, "the problems arising from excessive intervention – because “we must be seen to do something” – outweigh the benefits." In July he wrote a brilliant article about the perils of intervening because you have to justify your existence. And in the way only Rory Sutherland can he cited the examples of the many people with personal physicians who die young.

"I can imagine what it must be like to be a personal physician. Every day you must feel you have to do something to justify your existence. Yet, in truth, most of the time people are better off being medically left alone most of the time. And most illnesses may be best treated with rest and a little warmth."

It's a brilliant article, well worth a read.

To further elaborate on my point eloquently read this article by Michael Bierut. As I pointed out earlier in the year he lists several pointers to being a successful designer. Here are the first three.

1. Keep it simple.

2. Don’t reinvent the wheel [Part 1].

3. Don’t reinvent the wheel [Part 2].

Can you see a pattern building?

Good design is as little design as possible. The problems arising from excessive intervention outweigh the benefits. Keep it simple.
 Don’t reinvent the wheel

Very eloquent.

That offensive Stephen Bayley book

As previously discussed I can't stand Stephen Bayley.

I don't like Germaine Greer much either. But her review of the offensive book is worth a read. If only for this quote;

"The book seeks to answer the question: if woman was designed then what exactly was the brief?... When the verbiage is shaken down, we discover that for Bayley the imaginary brief is to design a fuckable thing.".

As previously discussed I can't stand Stephen Bayley.

"Always design a thing by considering it in its next larger context - a chair in a room, a room in a house, a house in an environment, an environment in a city plan."

Eliel Saarinen

"my advice to startups in this particular category is if you’re going to put your product in beta — put your business model in beta with it"

Joe Kraus, CEO of JotSpot via 37signals.

"Our view, counter to what you expect, is that conspicuous consumption is not productive, and should be discouraged".

Sir Martin Sorrell, in Marketing Week.

"The importance of the unimportant"

Richard Seymour

So you think you can, erm, you know, present?

A couple of weeks ago I went to the BBC's Media Futures Conference. The best bit of the day by miles was Peter Day.

That's Peter over there, top left in the blue shirt and the cream trousers. There's a better picture here and his BBC biog is over here. But you all know who Peter Day is, right?

He didn't speak, he only chaired a session. But he was very well briefed, very well prepared and he spoke persuasively and intelligently. He had this great quote from Paul Saffo, "Just because something is inevitably going to happen, it doesn't mean it's going to happen any time soon".

What struck me most was how he never once said, err.

Granted, Peter Day is a professional broadcaster and he's been doing it for years and years, but still, he never once said "err". Not once. No umm's, no erm's, no you know's. I was so startled by this I counted erms and umms for the other speakers. On average (and my survey wasn't very scientific admittedly)  no speaker could get through one minute without and an erm or an umm or a you know.

I realise that dropping countless 'you knows' into a presentation is mainly a stylistic issue and in the right circumstances it can be effective, but more often than not it's just lazy. It's very easy in this industry to convince yourself that you're a good presenter when actually you're just average. Good speakers are people like Peter Day, Tony Blair or Winston Churchill. As Jon Steel points out in his brilliant book (you have read that book haven't you?) Winston never needed any PowerPoint to get his point across. Neither did Peter Day.

I know Blair and Churchill and the like are talking about much more important things than the difference between Arial and Helvetica, but even your local MP could stand up for 45 minutes and give a competent speech about the local door knob society. No notes, no PowerPoint, no erms. John Dodds once saw Seth Godin stand on a char (in the middle of Buckingham Palace or somewhere) and talk about funny coloured cows for nearly an hour. Could you do that?

Next time you speak, try and do it without any erms.

Rodchenko Quotes

I've just found some quotes from the Rodchenko exhibition that I jotted down when I was there. Here they are.

Rodchenko's maxim was "Our duty is to experiment". Isn't that cool? Imagine if in your job description it said, "Your duty is to experiment". Rodchenko pushed boundaries precisely because he kept on experimenting.

Here's another one, "Enough depicting, time to build". God, I love this. "Enough depicting, time to build". I feel like getting a tshirt done with this on for meetings. After 20 minutes I could stand up and grandly declare, "Enough depicting, time to build".

How many good ideas die of over "depicting". Too much talking no enough doing. You know that bit in the middle of a conversation when people say, "That's it. Do that." But then they keep on talking for days. Let's just stop at the "That's it. Do that" bit.

As my old boss used to say, "The work doesn't get any better the longer it sits around, old son".

"In my spare time, I devise schemes to create more spare time."

Step forward Chris Glass. Brilliant.

"You have fewer ideas, but you use them better"

I've always believed this. As you get older you don't get better ideas you just get better at getting them from your head on to that bit of paper in front of you.

That's why experience often leads to better execution and the youngsters often have more ideas.

"Centred type is bad enough, but centred images is taking the piss."

As said by Tom, the official hater of centred anything.

"CO2 neutrality is the biggest fucking scam ever"

Marcus Brown.

"You can't move in London without someone giving you the news"

I was talking to someone the other day and they said, "The last thing the world needs is another news website. You can't move in London without someone giving you the news". I love that quote. It's really stuck with me because it's so true, isn't it?

So since he said that I've been taking pictures every time I see someone (or something) giving me the news. That picture above is your standard noughties office reception. The news on three big flat TV's.

Here's another one. But this huge big glass fronted building allows the news to spill out on the street.

As does this one. They've used four screens, so they can show four different news channels.

I know it's a bad photograph but this is just outside Waterloo station. More news.

This is inside Waterloo station, also taken on bad photograph day.

Continuing the station theme, this is Kings Cross. So, inside office receptions, visible through the window, outside stations, inside stations.

At the airport.

On the way back from the airport. I appreciate this is a promotional thing for Bloomberg, but it's still news being thrust at you.

Likewise this is some promotion for Reuters who are situated just across the street. But still. News. Everywhere. These are all razzy screen based things, but there's also the more traditional method of London news delivery.

And now we have this new menace. They literally thrust the news at you.

Look there's one dressed in purple and one in yellow. Remember, "You can't move in London without someone giving you the news."

Look at this one. Watching. Waiting. Ready to pounce and give you the news.

And if you manage to make it home without being given the news, it's waiting for you at the Tube station. It's there all around you. Unavoidable.

The news even creeps into the most two hallowed places of British life. Tesco's.

And the pub. Why do you need the news in the pub? Why do you need the news in Tesco's?

Why do you need the news in a cheeky little Belgravia bistro? "You can't move in London without someone giving you the news"

"When the facts change, I change my mind. What do you do sir?"

John Maynard Keynes

"Be compact, be brave, be confident. And keep your fingers crossed."

Fabio Capello talking about his new start up agency.

Actually, he was talking about this bunch of clowns, but I think that would be a fine statement of intent for any agency.