(Not So) Used Ideas

I think that I speak for nearly everyone in the world who’s been on the internet that Wikipedia is an amazingly useful website. Just blows my mind the ways I use it and to think of what I had to do to find the same information before it came around.

But while wikipedia is a great site for THE information on a topic at this very moment, what about the historical record?

Many times I’ve wanted to “go back in time” and get a perspective on something at a certain moment in time. What would the wiki page for the band Duran Duran have been in 1987? Where would I find discussion on the “latest” add by Pepsi in 1992?

We all know it’s easier to look back at what happened with rose colored glasses and think that’s really how it was. But it wasn’t. Things were different at every moment in time. Those moments are being written over every time someone updates a wiki entry to make it “up to date.”

So the idea would be to have an entire wiki for each year going back in time. People could write entries on places, people, events, products that existed at that moment in time. One could only reference that moment as “the present” and could also talk of anything previous, but the future was just the future.

Would a wiki for every year be enough? Need one for every month?

Of course, there would be a lot of extrapolating to fill in the historicalwiki record, but there’s a lot of data out there from the past that’s floating around, uncategorized. Libraries have archives with first hand materials from various ages. Companies have archives full of product advertisements from all points in the distant past.

This would be the perfect framework to catalog that past, as well as keep a running tab on the future of presents and pasts still to come.

I was having a chat with a friend about the effect of things moving towards free. There are cameras now that use the “free” storage space to capture photos continuously such that when you actually press the button, it can identify when you might have meant to take the picture (right before the Groom blinked) or before you shook the camera. So all you know is that you got your shot, it doesn’t matter the “cost” of using all of the processor time and disk space, because it was sitting there unused.

Well, I’m thinking why couldn’t this be used elsewhere?

If you’ve used an iPhone you probably have run into Shazam or the like – applications that listen to a song playing and tells you what it is. But what if you can’t get to the app (you’re driving) or you never thought to use it. It’s later that day (or the next) and you are humming a song. What was it? Well pull up the web app because your iPhone was listening and sampling music in the background all day and you can see on a timeline all of the songs it identified. No, it’s not recording your conversations, just listening or music.

What a better way to recall the song! Or how about just going back to see what was the soundtrack of your day? Or to REALLY know what song was playing the first time you kissed her? No reason it can’t save a database of songs going back forever.

And talk about a Nielsen moment! The data that could be mined…

I originally thought this could be a separate device, similar to the radio bookmark thrown in with donations on fund drives, but it’s so perfect for Apple an the iPhone. Everything is already there.

Rock on!

You’ve had the reunion tours, the all-star line-ups, but what will concert promoters do next to bring in the audience attention? How about concert mashups?

 How about Metallica & Neil Diamond in concert together? They can take turns.  That way the fan who secretely likes both can see both acts without losing any of their credibility from their friends.

 Or better still. Doesn’t it keep Mick Jagger up at night trying to figure out some flimsy excuse to tour again and make a ton of cash? Why try and write a new album that no one will care about – just sing any old songs.  How about The Rolling Stones do Neil Sedaka? Or Britney Spears does The Beach Boys? (Wait, that last one might deserve a whole new category of idea.)

I work for a certain Financial Services firm and I see various legal and disclaimer text every day. It’s often (sadly) hilarious what requires disclaimers and how unlikely it is to release anything without it.

And it makes me wonder whether disclaimer text has any unconscious effects on consumers. I am not sure that the mere presence of tiny text at the bottom of a page makes me instantly wary or turns me off of the advertisement, but I do know that many times I’ll read some claim in an advertisement and instantly look for an asterix.

So – whether it’s actually legally possible – could a financial institution capture some of those unconsciously disillusioned prospects by discarding the small print?

I could almost imagine faux disclaimers then popping up that say “No disclaimers needed, honest.”

Well, I can dream, can’t I?

So, first there were brands sold as brands and store labels hidden where no one could see them. Then store labels became brands themselves. Now is there anything considered “Generic?”

So in a world that’s branding everything, where your brand can reinforce or even reimagine what your product is, why not brand the products no one thought anyone would ever brand?

What do I mean? Well, consumers are starting to buy anything labeled organic. Brands that promote an earth-friendly, organic element adds & legitmates a premium pricing on anything.

But what about the products that aren’t so environmentally sound? What about the same old, preservative heavy foods our parents grew up on? Why not take a stand and brand them? Make them cool through the power of the brand.

We could have anti-biotic, feed-lot fed milk branded as MELK with the tag line of Discover the Sweetness of Inorganic and reinforced by adding extra sweetness to the mix. Could “organic” get away with that, I think not.