See Change Happen

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Amazing Urban Art Project - Blu > Muto

A few days ago, I was talking to a friend about whether we had seen any inspiring contemporary art that wasn't remixed digital content. We couldn't come up with anything, but clearly we weren't looking very hard, because this morning, I saw a video on Wooster Collective that blew my mind.

Using public or existing spaces as the medium is cool for so many reasons - for one, the "canvas" is used over and over and is contextualized by the city or place where it was created. And, because the content is constantly being recreated it only exists, holistically in video form. It makes me think of my early art history classes where famous paintings would be x-rayed so experts could study earlier versions that had been painted over.

My favorite video comes from a group called Blu from Buenos Aries. Anyway, check it out... Blu>Moto.

The Hybrid Revolution

In "The Life and Times of the Thunderbolt Kid," Bill Bryson describes the massive automobile boom of the 1960's and sums up the American psyche at the time with, "Happily, we were indestructible." 

Unfortunately, we've since learned, we were not.

After reading a recent story in Wired about Hyundai launching a hybrid vehicle, I tried to piece together the history of the hybrid over the last 10 years. It appears, the massive increase in gas prices combined with the widespread concern over global warming has created an environment where consumer demand is driving car innovation, rather than the other way around. I love it when the consumer influences the products companies create.

For example, the Hummer enjoyed about 5 profitable years before the flurry of critiques began to overshadow the car's merits. Remember "Fuck you and your Hummer too"  http://www.fuh2.com/, where people posted pictures of themselves giving the finger to Hummer?  I once worked with an editor who gave part of his paycheck to charity because he felt so badly about cutting together the ads. Outside of Texas and rap videos, it has become incredibly uncool to drive a Hummer.

And thus, sales have rapidly declined. Last month, the Dallas news reported, "sales of the brutish H2 are in a free fall – they dropped from 28,898 in '04 to 12,431 last year. No one saw all of these changes coming," Mr. Walsh said this week at the Dallas Auto Show. The segment five years ago was very strong. I don't think anyone could have foreseen all these shifts." 

Seriously, no one could see it coming? No one noticed the increasing negativity towards Hummers?

Last week, the NYT did a story on GM trying to officially sell off their Hummer division to "Gulf Investors." It felt like a consumer victory.

Anyway, the boom and bust of the Hummer (and the rise of the hybrid) is indicative of a rapidly changing, increasingly agile, consumer driven marketplace.

Everything from the economy to life stage to choice in web browser now influences purchase decisions. And, with the proliferation of information, consumers are accessing and processing data that contributes to these decisions faster and more frequently than ever before.

Corporations, which once were able to define the world for the consumer are part of a paradigmatic shift towards prioritization of the customer need. While this may be the norm online, the offline world is just catching up.

But, accordingly to this time line of the Hybrid models, it is happening quickly.