The Hall of Awesomeness

It most industries I have encountered, advertisers lie.  This is obvious to most and the distrust bread in the general public is now at a point where I believe most people have stopped believing what advertising says to us.  When the celebrity comes on to our screens and smiles showing us, ‘you can look just like me’ an uneven false image is created.   You can’t hope to look like them.  Yet advertisers build their campaigns around a deep down truth that is a lie we tell ourselves.  Things such as:

You can look younger by using skin cream

You can improve you health by drinking this

Take these pills and you will lose weight fast with no side effects

And so on and so on. Why do we buy these lies?  Even television channels do this by piquing our interest with clever editing in the commercials.  They place a well-crafted lie in a commercial and we accept it… or do we?  I think we know it’s false and realise the lie but buy things in hope.  We don’t believe false advertising with our minds, we believe them with our actions, often against our better judgement.

I think this is kind of theatre we have grown accustomed to and expect.  Take for example the following advertisement:

In a strange way Cadbury are selling chocolate by way of entertainment.  A marketing guru I saw on the Gruen Transfer argued that chocolate sales went up as a result of that ad.  I would say it this way: Interest was piqued in chocolate because of that ad and people remembered why they liked it and went and bought it.  I don’t think you need to advertise to sell chocolate, just sell it at a reasonable price and people will buy it and this is the point isn’t it?

What Advertising people do so well is play with our Engagement, the way we think and act in social settings.  Engagement is a word I have used to talk about how people think and how that influences the way they act.  Advertising plays on both.  If I was being a pragmatic philosopher I would say, ‘thinking is acting’.  That is, advertisers make us think and because that influences our behaviour.  That’s no surprise but what is: they deceive us to do it.   For my final example, I will use real estate advertising.

Real Estate is a controversial area.  So many people have been ‘ripped’ off by agents in one way or another.  Yet, the way a house is sold relies explicitly on the honesty of the buyer and the real estate agent.  My father in law told me how he recently pulled out of buying a house simply because the building inspection came back as showing evidence of termites.  In Australia, especially Brisbane, this is a big deal.  It can mean you have massive damage to the structure of the house and you will be up for thousands of dollars in repair bills.   He had built into the contract that subject to a building inspection, he wouldn’t purchase the house.   So he didn’t.  He lost his deposit and recent reports show that the same house has been resold twice in three years.  All that pain could have been avoided if an honest approach prevailed.  Yet, you can’t sell a house unless you lie… right?

Putting aside all arguments about ethics, integrity and character, there is another pragmatic issue for advertisers here that needs thinking about.  That is, the issue of how to sell things in an economy where attention is the scarcity.  Does that mean more dishonesty should come in so we pay attention?  Are we really to believe the claims of real-estate agents?  I think not.  Yet, these are the social connections we have forged.  It doesn’t mean every real estate agent is a liar or a cheat.  Of course not.  But, which one that you know would happily point out the termites in a building and say, ‘hey check this out, there’s a huge problem that’s going to cost you thousands of dollars.’  It’s ‘buyer beware’ because that’s the society we live in and that’s what we expect.  So it is in advertising, we know it’s pretend so we go along with so-called false advertising and accept it because we know we are being lied. It’s a social contract.

The question is: why have we come to accept it?

We often argue with people simply to prove our point or win.  Take for example the following debate:

‘I believe in free will I can do what I want.’

VS.

‘I believe in FATE everything is predetermined.’

For the record I don’t know what I believe.  Back to the post.  How can you ever resolve this?  You can’t.  It’s a bipolar idea.  It has one side which is a the down side and one which is the upside.  Do you know what these ideas have in common?  They are based on an assumption/assessment of the future.  Yet there is a connection here.  If these people both went about their lives something would happen… something magical.  They would eventually die and at some point they are likely to pay tax.   Yet they would never report the event in the same way:  It’s God’s will that I pay tax, I choose to pay tax.  It’s God’s plan that I die, I die because I choose to keep living.  Both ways of thinking are different yet can never be proven outside the frame of human thought.  Why?  Because, they are bipolar ideas.  If one says the sun is up, the other says it’s down.

Here’s a third option

Try another idea.  Why not say somethings are predetermined others are not, because I choose.  Or let’s just do away with the whole stupid bipolar idea in the first place and say it this way: I have no idea.  I pay tax because I don’t want to go to jail and I die because life stops at some point.  No big deal.  It’s just the way it has to be because I choose to pay tax.    Or because I can’t cheat death I choose to keep living until I expire.  The predetermined has now become my choice, even though it’s not a choice at all.

Breaking your brain?

Maybe.  But remember it’s only an idea and that’s all it could be ever ever ever.  Why?  I don’t know why it’s just what I believe.  An idea only has the power to convey the abstract long enough until the reality of life hammers it out.  Yet, I won’t know that a turtle rules world as suggested by some religions and Stephen King until I die.  Even then I may never find out.  It may be black and I will be alone.  I still believe in Ghosts.

Is there more than one answer?

To Bipolar ideas?  No.  They are the same idea but looked at from two different points of view at once.   Not all ideas are bipolar some tripolar some have no polar, others are simply unanswerable.   Some ideas though have a special quality in that they are the same idea but because they are dealing with a difficult concept you can actually see them two ways at once.

See what happens when you do a PhD kids you eventually go crazy.

No.  Why not?  In my limited experience there comes a time when you have to make choices that will benefit the corporation and hurt people.  You can only go so far before you will be required to sell your soul to get ahead.   There might come a time when the organisation is ‘restructuring’ or ‘changing direction’ and guess who they call on as the toe cutter?   Your choice?  To keep your job, you have to tell them who to get rid of.  One person I know once had to sack a group of people, one who was a good friend and dying of cancer, because shareholders didn’t have enough money.   It takes a lack of heart to do things like that, and a small piece of you dies when you do it.

Call it corporate objectives, call it ‘profit’, call it what you like, but the minute you put money and the corporation ahead of human decency you have sold your soul to the corporation and you have become it’s property.  Just wait until the wheel turns and it’s your turn to be crushed into powder.

There is a dog, a proud member of the canine species called the Chihuahua.  Some of the uneducated call these wonderful creatures, ‘rats’ or some such pejorative, which portrays the Chihuahua as ugly or evil.  There are big raggedy dogs, loyal but stupid, that most people cling to as if they were Lassie or a member of the four-legged elite.  They lick you and jump around as if they can’t work out you are right in front of them and to a certain extent they are lovable..two full stops here! Yet there is only one Chihuahua.  This breed stands as the most wonderful and loyal of all companions a man or woman could have.

I remember a dog that was in our family, owned by the most annoying of all relatives, that was large, ungainly, smelly and loud.  When you saw him for the first time in a while, he would rush at you wagging his tremendous tail, knocking over vases, cups, small children and whatever stood in reasonable distance.  He was clumsy and would overpower you with his weight for that bizarre licking ritual that big dogs like so much.  When that happened you would wind up being covered in saliva, waving your arms about like a helpless moron and wondering why you made the journey to said relatives place in any case.  To say that big dogs are ugly and annoying is not fair because you can’t blame the dog for its form. You just have to except it.  And yes, a big dog is very loyal  (Loyalty, a quality absent from most organisations and sadly from most people) but the Chihuahua offers more than any of the other species of dog.

You could be under attack by a swooping bird (and I have been many times) or a Doberman and at the risk of all that is reasonable or even ‘worth it’ for most dogs, your Chihuahua would come running at the speed of light to ‘save’ you from the would-be assailant.   I remember once that my late Chihuahua attacked a dog at least twenty times his size, only to be picked up in the bigger dogs mouth and spat out, simply because he felt his owner was threatened.  When my first child was brought home, he sat there faithful watching over to make sure nobody could come near her, he was her ‘protector’.  Such is their loyalty, they will defend you and be there no matter what, even if it means their own hide.

Many years ago I used to have the privilege of visiting a farm for horse riding.  I was very lucky considering that people in my socio-economic class were lucky to even see a horse let alone sit on one.  I remember that the lady, a close friend of my mothers, had a little Chihuahua named ‘Garlic’.  A horse was taken by this little dog and thought it a novelty and placed its giant nose over the dog to see what it was.  I was surprised when the small, three-kilogram, dog jumped up and bit the horse squarely on the nose.  The horse was so shocked that it took two steps backward in utter dismay at the small creature that had dared to bite him.  Not only is the Chihuahua loyal, but they have attitude.  Most dogs are dumb, sad to say, and will run around chasing Frisbees or copulating with anything that looks even remotely doable.  A Chihuahua, despite the relative size of its brain, is cunning. You only need to realise that they can make you believe that it’s your fault for biting a horse, that you know this to be true.  If the little dog could speak it would have said,

‘I’m sorry but what the hell was the horse doing near me anyway, this is my space not his!’

Another thing a Chihuahua brings to a relationship is a sense of knowing which assholes not to let into your life.  They are excellent at detecting people of poor character.  I remember one time my aforementioned dog (may God rest his soul), would constantly attack a woman that would visit.  For no reason in particular, he would launch and begin biting her furiously[1].  My wife and I were left with no idea as to the reason for this violence. (Perhaps she wore a scent that made him think). Then a few years later, through the grapevine, we found out that she had abandoned her husband and taken to sleeping around with more than one person, and left him largely in the lurch with a small child they shared custody of.  Our dog knew she was a slut long before we did!  Incredible to think that a beast, no taller than a workman’s boot, can sense evil when it sees’s it.  This was not a singular affair either, it was on many an occasion.  One time we had to work hard to get rid of the problematic person but we eventually did it, long after my little Chihuahua had passed on. Yes, I have lost even more friends because my dog didn’t like a particular person and to this end it has always worked out for the best.

The final and most important part of having a Chihuahua is the love they offer in return for your companionship.  You will have friends that will dessert you, your dumbass relatives will fight with you but no matter what you do to your poor little Chihuahua, they will never leave your side.  You could be engulfed in flames or dying on a floor from a gunshot wound and your dog would defend you and sit there beside you.  You could hit the dog with a rolled up newspaper and they would forgive you, almost instantly, because they know what loyalty means.  Most people I have had the displeasure of spending time with, want something from me and aren’t interested in me or what I have to say.  It’s not about companionship, loyalty or friendship with most people, it’s about what’s in it for them.  With a Chihuahua they ask for your trust, love and companionship right to the very end of their short, meaningful little lives.  Their eyes never betray you for an instant, they never really have a secret plan to steal your job, or go behind your back to take something from you because they love you, unconditionally.

They never ask you for money or take advantage of you, sure they might steal your pillow or your seat when you rise to grab a coffee or to go the toilet, sure they are cunning, but that’s part of their spirit and I like that.  They don’t want to borrow or beg, unless of course ham is involved.  They need us and we them and put simply that’s why the Chihuahua is a wonderful dog: they exemplify what a dog should be… a true companion.

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[1] Now I should point out at this stage that the dog didn’t actually bite her, he was merely offering a warning by gumming her.  Although on at least one occasion he made her bleed.

Recent articles like this one and this news article raise a very important point about file sharing.  Namely, that people like my good self you are interested new internet business models based on file sharing: are asshats.  In particular, we are thieving, stealing asshats.  Without once again dragging up the rhetoric surrounding this debate let me quote noted singer James Blunt:

“The music business is made up of thousands of jobbing musicians, producers, mixers and engineers creating and shaping popular music and culture, but illegal file-sharing is cutting off the income from their work. Without the revenue from established artists, record labels cannot fund emerging musicians.” Quote taken from here.

I do not wish to argue the case here except to say this: What a load of crap.  The music business is made of layers of people who never make real money and hardly any of them actually get paid.  This has turned me off buying any more music from a mindless twat like James Blunt.  Mind you, I never listened to that soppy crap anyway (I hate that song… prefer Weird Al’s version).  This is what annoys me about his statement: as if he cares.  He is a superstar and does not represent musicians in general.  You want to see the people he is talking about?  Go to the places where these emerging artists are?  Well and truly before piracy artists where getting reamed up the pipes by industry.  Long before, LONG BEFORE Lars Ulrich put another million dollars in the bank.  Heres my key point:

Making music for a living is not a right, it’s a privilege.

You know why?  Most people who write songs, paint paintings, write novels make no money.  James Blunts of this world are far and few between (less than 0.0001% I would argue).  Even the people who appear on independent radio stations make little or no money from their art.  Is this because of piracy?  No, it’s because the industry has extremely high barriers to entry and high competition.  In essence, it’s the perfect business model.  You don’t have to create new talent often, just find a hit from the cream of the crop to support all your failures and presto!  You have a business model.  It reminds me of something I read about the death of the midlist… but that’s another post.

So why did file sharing make me who I am?  Almost all of the papers I read to do my PhD were given to me by others, or shared with me.  Programs I needed but couldn’t afford and so on and so on.   I could have done none of this without file sharing.  But that aside, there is a key element in file sharing that made me who I am and it can be summed up by this word: sharing.  The fundamental human trait that those who are successful fail to remember.  Your fans are paying for your mansions, your clothes, your cars and that ridiculous haircut.  They like your music and pay for it to support you.  In droves!  So why are you turning on them?  Don’t you already have enough?  Emerging artists?  If you believe so much that it’s hurting them why not go and find them and help them by introducing them to your friends in the record industry? In 1960 there was a very high barrier to get in, was this because we listened to the radio?  Bullshit!

In closing my argument (if you can call it that) let me add that file sharing isn’t the real issue.  The issue is: finally we may have an opportunity to create balance in an industry that is horribly one-sided and over compensates popular artists more than any other.  This is critically unfair and needs to change.

I recently took a little time out to see District 9.  Now, I am slow when it comes to the latest trends and usually miss things because I am too busy with my head up my ass (or some equivalent).  Usually I don’t recommend movies because my taste is incredibly different than most.  For instance, I liked the Adventures of Ford Fairlane when I was a kid.  I refuse to watch it now because it may suck.  That said, District 9 is a movie you have to see to believe.  The main reason I liked it so much was not really the social commentary or the special effects but this:  I couldn’t guess what would happen next.

I always spoil movies because I make statements like, ‘you know what’s going to happen…’ then add what I think… and it’s usually right.  I’m no genius, it’s just movies are so predictable these days because filmmakers and movie studios are too focused on audiences and familiarity instead.  Other movies like this are: Blue Velvet, Weekend (Godards one) and to a lesser extent the Usual Suspects.   I love a movie that surprises me!

I think that every now and then that someone comes along who is what we might call a ‘thorny’ character. De Soto, might be put in that class by some people but for me… I admire his practical attitudes and courage, even though I may not agree 100% with his politicals. I would urge you to watch this… there are some interesting points made about global politics and the way in which we can make a difference. That and you can learn about this interesting man.

My faculty is going through a movement.  Yes that kind of movement.  They are looking for ways to get rid of the information systems discipline. This got me thinking… how can we have business without systems?

The picture above is Hal – the AI from 2001 – A Apace Odyssey.  As a young (at heart) information systems lecturer, I have always felt marginal.  It was like the management and business people knew they needed us, but couldn’t see the point.  The IS (information systems) area has been in steady decline in most regional non-big city areas since about 2002 and indeed with the exception of a few big IS centres, it remains to be seen what the future of IS holds.  As for me, I may be found *coughs* “surplus to requirements”.  What a horrible HR phrase that is!  In short, I might be in line to “get the arse”.

To be “surplus” as I call it, means that you are no longer required, not needed.  Kaput.  I remember when Operations Research died and became IS (actually I don’t – it was relayed to me by retired people) in Australia, and I remember thinking about how I needed to escape the fringe ‘sub-disciplines’ of the business school.  Herein lies the core of my problem, systems are not sub-disciplines.  They are not even fringe, they are core and essentially to business strategy.  It took me a long time to realise that and herein is the issue: the IT enterprise does not have what it takes to make for good business strategy.  IT people generally are not exposed to management strategy until they become managers.   Programmers are not very good leaders… although I have met many that are. I digress.

The re-imagining process

When something fails or goes to the poop factory like IS has, the thing to think about is why?  Why has there been a steady decline?   My view is that people need it, but because technology has so masterfully woven into the discipline by academics they have accidently wedded the discipline to technology.  What a tragic mistake that was.  Why do that?  Technology changes, is superceded and moves on.  IS should be about themes, concepts and meaningful things that are useful in any application.  Not simply a subset of business or IT… but a set of concrete ideas that are useful in many areas.  And herein lies the problem: IS never formed a coherent body of thought outside of technology.   We got as far as the technology acceptance model – they we set up camp at MISQ and realised this is it, we have made it.  The problem?  Our discipline had promise, it had themes, now it’s a bad joke based on old concepts that have been stolen back by management scholars and IT people.  What I am saying here doesn’t even matter because I could argue about why the IS school is miles apart from IT.  I could.  But, if you don’t already understand what I am saying and it’s not obvious then we as scholars have failed.  Yes we have failed, just like e-commerce models from 1998, FAILED! So I have decided to re-imagine systems in my own world and think about what IS means to me.

IS is a core body of ideas centred around information and it’s purposeful use in a wholistic way.  It captures: systems thinking, information flow, data resources and most importantly how to solve problems for humans by humans with technology.   It’s about humanising IT (hat tip: Richard and Tristan).  It’s not software engineering, it’s not information technology, it’s not business process management.  IS, is simply put the human and social and technical systems and how they cohrently form to make wholes and why that is important.  Yes, IS is about people, activity and lastly technology and how the intertwine.   Now let’s throw that away, it’s dead.

What would we have if we could have anything?

Firstly, a set of ideas not tied to technology.  So we have to ditch the word ‘systems’.  It’s BS anyway, and too many people think systems = computers.  I no longer have the energy to point them to Senge, Churchman, Ackoff, Checkland, Mingers, Jackson and many MANY others to prove my point.  You win, it’s your word.   What about the idea of information?  No, this too is too commonly associated with computers.   The core idea is that people solving problems and acting in a strategic way (without the implications of studying strategy from the dominant finance point of view), thus it has an applied pragmatic focus.  The phrase ‘problem solving’ has been stolen by educators so we can’t even use that, people almost always bring up the staircase and that makes me violently ill.  No no –> we need a new concept.  Hmm.

I have it, let’s take the four core concepts and see what we can make:

1. Information flow

2. Systems Thinking

3. Human Activity

4. Problem Solving/Design/etc etc etc etc (probably should be IFSTHAPSEEE)

How about ‘ISHP’ (note: this is a working title perhaps SHIP?).  So that way we could borrow from arts, management, science technology and design science disciplines and NOT have to make it about technology. That way we could study how people form social groups and if they use technology great!  So scholars in this field (ISHP scholars) focus on how systems thinking impacts human activity problem solving and how that in turn impacts on the way information moves around an organisation.  THEN once we have established ISHP as a theoretical framework for analysising and synthesising human problems (not computer ones) and how they solve them we introduce technology as a byword.  That way, we are always relevant and always interesting because we have new and useful ideas all the time about stuff that matters.  You could tell a colleague, ‘ISHP’ do you want to look at how the global economic crisis emerged and what can be done?  Then talk to ISHPs… they know, they know it all, because they know how to synthesise information for forge new interactions with the world and they know how to make NEW knowledge that works.  Oh yeah, ISHP it’s the BOMB.

ISHP Faculty

We could have a faculty with social psychologists, next to education people, next to problem solving experts, next to HR people, next to mad scientists and designers!  Imagine what we could achieve if we put technology into the background and focused on themes.  We could create a transdisiplinary environment of scholars who create new concepts from their disciplines,  it would really work well.   ISHP is a discipline where we focus on key issues to do with people, places and things… from a strategic/systems level NOT from a granular.     In theory, we could not publish in each others journals informing people of new ideas and concepts around social groups, explaining emerging phenomena from a comprehensive ‘systems’ perspective.  We could leave the mining up to the management scholars, accountants, and like-minded disciplinarians.  I want a department where we can collaborate on each others projects to create new ‘meta’ knowledge without those disciplinary constraints.

ISHP the future?

I doubt that, but to survive IS needs to be reimagined.   It’s way too scrugged (a word meaning ‘shotgun’ approach to concepts – blast you in the face with a whole heap of stuff with no depth) at the moment.  Thoughts?