by alec on August 29, 2006
Jeneane Sessum is taking shots at the latest marketing buzzword — “attention”. Whether you agree or disagree with her viewpoint, please go and read what she has to say. She takes the mundane, and makes it poetry. Revel in the words. Jeneane is one of those rare talents who can turn a phrase.Â
For instance, arguing against the concept of “gestures” she writes:
More and more, my gestures reflect not what I am paying attention to, but instead are sideways related to what I’ve dropped my illusions about. In surrender of control, then, not in clinging to it, we wander here. We value most those instances of delight so fleeting that they are the opposite of thought and reason; they are out of time; they scatter us to the wind rather than draw us in.
They repel us outward, until we are untraceable, exiled, free, and only in knowing me severed will I tell you how you can find me whole.
Wow!
by alec on March 19, 2006
Doc Searls has a great piece on the Intention Economy vs. the Attention Economy. The basic thesis is that you, the user, ought to be able to express your intent to purchase goods, rather than devote your attention to the vendors advertising. It’s a user controlled world, rather than a vendor controlled world.
Interestingly, it was this initial view that drove Howard and myself to create iotum. The very first problem we looked at solving was telemarketers: how do you give the user control of which commercial messages are received by telephone? We realized that the technology we wanted to build was generalizable to managing any kind of conversation request, based on intent. Doc’s concept of the Intention Economy drives right to the heart of the matter — what is a relevant communication (i.e. pertinent to what I am currently doing), and how do increase the volume of relevant communications I receive?
