I’m not a huge fan of the man, but he sure tells it like it is to an audience of aspiring animators at the San Diego ComiCon a couple years ago.
This rant also applies to those of us who wish for any kind of career in a creative line of work. Take heed.
Read 37signals’ very interesting analysis of an NYT piece on Danny Meyer’s Shake Shack.
1. Have an enemy. In Meyer’s case, the enemy is fast food that strips away the human experience.
“The whole experience is to cram people into a cookie-cutter space, to feed them as many unhealthy calories as possible — then get them to leave,” said Mr. Meyer, the president of the Union Square Hospitality Group and the Yoda of Shake Shack. “That stripping away of human experience? That is where fast food went astray.”
Contrast and compare, then, with the three Shake Shacks in New York City, where patrons are cheerfully welcomed at the counter of a neighborhood-centered, urban-fantasy version of a burger roadhouse. On the menu? Whole-muscle, no-trimmings, fresh-ground, antibiotic-and-hormone-free, source-verified-to-ranch-of-birth, choice-or-higher-grade Black Angus beef.
Furthermore, “people have to wait in line just to place their orders,” Mr. Meyer, 51, said on a recent afternoon. “After that? They have to wait for us to cook their orders. And then? We hope they’ll stay awhile, as they eat. To enhance the communal experience.”
Matt of 37signals does a great dissection of Birdwell swimwear’s sales copy.
I wish I sold something that people wanted so much that they’d be willing to put up with my true and undiluted misanthropic disposition.
[On Writing] Birdwell swimwear wants “no more of this wishy washy stuff and nonsense” | 37signals
Doctorow recently published a column in the Guardian on the benefits of free ebooks:
Releasing a book as a free download isn’t newsworthy in and of itself. It was, once upon a time, especially when that book had the backing of a major publisher. Publishers are often characterised as being conservative about the net, so it was surprising when it happened. These days, many writers have convinced their publishers to dip their toes in the water on this, and it’s simply not notable when it happens again.
Which is not to say that free downloads have no role when it comes to promotion, publicity and marketing. Their main effect is to magnify any good feeling your book has generated, by making it simple for people who love the book to get it under the nose of their social circle.
via How free ebooks are good for well-known and obscure writers | Boing Boing.
