What’s the difference between art and craft?  Oh … about $1000.  How about: Craft comes with instructions and art doesn’t?  Or how about: Crafts take skill and art doesn’t need any – Nah – too confrontational.

A good simple definition of art is the manifestation of human emotion through medium.  Notice I’m not saying good or great art, just art. Art is a starting point for expression. If you reveal art you are an artist. A child who explores finger paints is an artist – maybe even the purest type.

We all know artists; the most random of thinkers. They are driven to emote. It’s in there and it must come out, no practice required. To practice is to do.

Craft is guided by an external force. Craft’s starting point is void of internal emotional expression. Practice a craft and your skills grow. They are measurable. Honed over a lifetime your mastery can reach great heights. It’s easy to recognize fine craftsmanship because it took great skill to produce.

Art schools teach skills or the craft of communicating emotion. The schools of craftsmanship teach high skill but will also move students toward self expression. It’s as though they are teaching the same thing from opposite ends of a spectrum.

In the middle of the art craft spectrum you’ll find fine art and beautiful craft sitting side by side; indistinguishable over time like paintings of the Dutch masters. Great artists become skilled at communicating their emotions and fine crafts people become emotional expressionists through their medium. It’s the same thing but approached from different directions. Neither is easy.  Neither is superior.

(this article was originally published in 2007)

Look at Dad take pictures of little Ethan go down the playground slide. Wait – hasn’t he already taken about 300 shots of that 2 foot bundle of cute?  Oh yeah, our lives are digital now. Content is overwhelming: words, images, sounds. Proud Papa uploaded this week’s most precious 150 images to the Ethan’s Cute website, so all his dedicated fans can view the little darling.

Those phone photographers are in play too.  The phone is now a ubiquitous capture device making no one immune from the serendipitous photographer documenting our most inelegant moments.  Everyone is a photographer and everything is a camera. Unedited, they’re thrown up on Flickr and Facebook for your viewing pleasure; for everyone’s viewing pleasure.

Pleasure?  Not so fast.  Just like the jokes we forwarded through email back in the day as web-neophytes, they abruptly become annoying.  We learned only to forward those that were extra-specially, extraordinarily hilarious. The best ones go viral, but as with a healthy immune system, minor viruses are cured with a delete or in the case of a bad cough – blocked. Despite that, how do we cure the information pandemic? Who’s going to help me edit my life?

As a professional photographer, I eagerly validate the intimate relationship between quality and quantity in a healthy creative psyche.  The more bad photos I take, the more apt I am to discover greatness. From birth, mistakes are how we learn; creativity is fearless. A cautious photographer is destined for mediocrity, no matter how pleasant and salable it is. Albeit true, just because we can, does it mean we should build our digital bulk?

Editing is where the skill lies. Revered is the talent of knowing great when seen, and nurturing its growth to new heights.  With digital creativity, old shackles are released only to be instantly replaced by others. That flawless haystack needle is buried in a mountain of bad byte bails. I used to push against the budgetary boundary of exposing greatness onto 20 rolls of film, but presently find myself pushing against the time limit of editing five thousand digital frames down to the lean and mean 20.

Editing for greatness; isn’t that one of life’s goals? Editing choices of careers, reading, films, friends, business acquaintances, life partners, food, and on, and on; choose the quality and toss the swill. Digital dating can amplify the old commitment dysfunction now that choice is categorized by body preference, lifestyle, and zodiac sign. An employer who uses on-line job services finds a 6 foot high pile of resumes after a few short days.  It’s the spam of life: where do we find the filters?

More than ever, the closer one gets to “on the spot” editing, the more their skills are in demand.  I’ve demonstrated in transparent fashion that I’m not always good at editing my personal life, but I have had some luck at the point of image capture as a photographer. Even so, I’ve often been confronted professionally with editing thousands of images further reminding me to hone my skills with “on the spot” editing. Seemingly no matter how sharp my skills become, quantity pays dividends. More, more, more – is the mantra of the digitally enlightened.

I guess in theory, I’ll get so skilled that the quality > quantity intimacy will send my career into hyper-drive. I’ll find that digital equilibrium that budget seemed to control in the past. My chosen career makes me a work in progress, but what about Ethan’s Dad?  He seems to be an endless source of content no longer worthy of my short attention with no filter in sight.   If I only had an easy edit button for the massive digital swill.

I find that photo above my mantle irresistible.  If I gaze into it long enough my spirit sings; I’m there, in that place where the photographer found a peaceful moment early in the morning.  What I feel is the intent of the captured moment.  The photographer – Paul Camponigro – did a great job of connecting his experience with mine through his creation.

Emotions are the simplest reality; our first awareness.  Our thoughts can carry us to complex reaches of imagination, but our feelings are more primitively connected to the earth.  Emotions lead the mind; we feel before we think.  In effect, a statement like, “I can’t believe the way I’m feeling about this” implies that there are two of us: our thinking selves and our feeling selves.  Emotional feelings are distillations that can explode into complex thought. Both learned and inherited, we have emotions before we know what we are feeling.  We are indifferent until emotions are triggered

It’s difficult to discuss emotions relating to creative artistic expression without digging at the roots of emotions themselves, but it’s not hard to experience the emotive nature of creativity.   Artistic expression or performance has an emotional component: Etta James in full voice, an Ansel Adams retrospective, or a dance company performing the Nutcracker are good examples.  Back in the 80′s, I choked up watching Larry Bird trade baskets with Dominic Wilkins during a critical NBA playoff series; a creative human performance at its most inspiring.  Perhaps a Brahms Concerto brings tears to your eyes or is it the accomplishments of the 17th Century Dutch Masters?  What’s up with that?  How do these feelings reach us?

Peppering a musical staff with shotgun holes and playing them as notes is music.  It’s music because it is in the form of music and can be played.  Provoking as it may be, shotgun music is bad unless you are lucky enough to shoot holes corresponding to a Beethoven Symphony, or at least an emotive measure or two. That is, an emotion other than anger at being subjected to noise.  Like a computer randomly selecting musical notes, the artist (marksman) made no attempt to interpret, reveal or otherwise transmute a feeling about their creation.  Yet, I wouldn’t discount luck.

The next rung on the “low emotion” musical ladder is that designed for public soothing; those homogenized tonal equivalents of raw tofu.  A grocery store tune crackling through a 4″ speaker is an emotional wasteland.  Imagine you’re eagerness to connect a friend with the best psychiatrist you know if they boasted an intense emotional connection to a Musak interpretation of the “Long and Winding Road”.  His psyche would need investigation, don’t you agree?

Wedding bands play mechanical versions of old favorites, as if the goal is to add as little of their own style as possible.  “Hey, that sounds exactly like …” Fill in the blank.  At a wedding last month, a version of “Stairway to Heaven” was close enough to the original to make me groan out loud.  It was followed by the best “Last Train to Clarksville” replication I’ve heard since the Monkeys split.  Each member of the band is a talented musician producing near soul-free versions of familiar once popular tunes.  At the same time as the music is played, creativity is scantly identifiable without a fresh contribution from the artist.  Show me emotion; risk something.

Sharing our feelings makes us vulnerable.  With artistic expression, emotions offer a distinction between artificial and genuine art.  The artificial are those masquerades – no matter how well performed or polished – that pretend to be creative through imitation or rote.  Even a small emotional connection at the right moment can change lives.  While that may seem melodramatic – it’s frequently true.  Artistic expression sans emotion is a dead end; it connects with no one.

Great artists supply emotional tension to invariant forms.  A rendered tree can be a child’s pencil line of trunk and branches, but the tree in a Camponigro photograph carries a stronger emotional tension.  A tree Paul Cezanne interpreted may prevent me from seeing a tree the same way hence.  My past is projected on his interpretation; I visit emotions that the image evokes. In a sense, I find new meaning in the tree through his illustrated perceptions; I draw analogies from my past upon viewing the intimately rendered tree that make me feel something new.  He created imagery that left room for my own interpretation: mixing old with new, mine with his.

In his landmark book, “The Courage to Create”, Rolo May offers this insight: “Artists pursue meaninglessness until they can force it to mean something …They immerse themselves in chaos to give it form.”  In other words, form is an interpretation communicated through their world view, and artists bring emotion, once buried in chaos, to the surface.

Emotions disturb equilibrium – at equilibrium we’re neutral.  Exceptional art isn’t neutral and neither are significant artists.  The stereotypically tormented soul of a painter, sculpture, musician or writer, removed from their torment, risk equilibrium thus dulling creativity.  Offer an emotional pillow; comfort, or long term contentment and a muse may be ignored.  Orderliness, comfort, and contentment, eliminates the turmoil in which artists plunge to reveal their creation.  An artist in emotional retreat is comfortable; no longer struggling against turmoil or challenging complacency.

While I’m not suggesting that all great artists are tormented, [although it may seem that way] I do claim, however, that they challenge reality in a way that peaks them emotionally.  Stereotypes don’t emerge from nothing; the artist temperament is well documented. Much has been written about why artists act the way the do.  Google it and you’ll see.

Why are artists so damn sensitive [I hear you ask]?  Perhaps it’s because they’re receptive and stay emotionally in tune with their surroundings.  Or, maybe because they are hopelessly insecure – they are, after all, “putting it out there” – so to speak. I believe, In part, they appear sensitive because of risking emotional vulnerability.  That is, if they’re any good.  Artists need to stay receptive, like an antennae pointed toward the sky; emotionally open to feel the encounter with reality that brings together imagination, craft, and emotions to the act of creation.

Imagination confronts reality through its muse.  Creativity is, at least in part, the manifestation of the artist’s emotional encounter with a muse; imagination merged with reality filtered by an emotional world view.

I know from my experience as a photographer that clicks of the shutter give a nanosecond peak of pleasure; a joy of being in the moment.  The best photographers don’t look for that moment so much as they feel it.  Once in a target rich environment – whether staged or found – the intellectualizing is over and the fine nuance of emotional connection begins.  At that point, composition and other skills take a back burner to the subject / artist connection.

Finally: conformity, authoritarian power, material success, and apathy corrode our creative powers: these are anti-creative forces.  In contrast, childlike emotional freedom, when added to adult passion for creating the immortal, amplifies creativity.  Like the ultimate creation we achieve through sexual relations, artistic creations return a potent pleasure.

Google search “craft” and you’ll get crafts for kids near the top position.  No one disagrees that quilting, basket weaving, balloon animal making, flower pressing, bead working, or corn doll making are crafts – of course they are.  There is, however, an age old dispute distinguishing art from craft.   Craft often gets the bad rap, especially from self fashioned fine artists.  Do we dare call Picasso or Pollack craftsmen?  How about David Burne, Santiago Calatrava, or Steve Jobs?

Craftsmen have guilds.  Master Craftsmen apprentice, gain skill and make money – or, at least they once did.  The industrial revolution reduced many craftsmen to hobbyists, but that doesn’t change their awesome skill, only the income stream.  If a craftsman no longer makes money do they involuntarily turn artist?

Social validators maintain that craft and art separate via intent:  function or personal expression, profit or pure aesthetic.  Make reproductions of art work, no matter how fine, they become product – the reproduction is transformed into craft that performs as art – confusing to say the least if you accept the premise.  A Ming vase was designed to hold flowers, made rare by antiquity, magically becomes a work of art.  When the two are bundled together as in “arts and crafts”, does kitsch over take the result by virtue of its label?

I occasionally ponder contemporary art that I simply don’t “get”.  Feel the emotional void?  The artist’s supplied blurb doesn’t help generate an emotional connection; it succeeds only at revealing the creator’s intent.  Do artists keep the work’s significance obscure so they can dictate interpretation, or are they miserable failures at their craft?  Chances are good they’d claim to be ahead of their time or too insightful for mass consumption.

Creativity is an ingenious mix of the familiar with the unexpected.  Jeff Hawkins and Sandra Blakeslee, in their book, On Intelligence, describe remarkable creativity as using uncommon past analogies to make uncommon future predictions.  In other words, we combine previous experiences, knowledge, or thought patterns in imaginative ways to create new patterns that solve problems or shape artistic expression.  We solve new problems using what we know worked and combine life experience with our understanding of the current challenge.  Success creates new solutions that are pressed into service as past analogies the next time we’re challenged, hence skills are built.

With artistic endeavors, if too much “new” is introduced, it ceases to resonate with an audience.  It’s as if we pull our audience along with a delicate string.  Pull too hard and the connection breaks; too slack and attention is lost.  Proceeding with a broken string makes for self indulgent artistic expression.  True innovation breaks convention and violates predictions, but if shared unsuccessfully with fellow humans, otherwise significant creativity is either uniquely useless or massively self-indulgent. Craft is the connecting string.

To be skilled at a craft is not craftiness: i.e. adept in the use of subtlety and guile. The craftily skilled are not artistic fakers.  Craft is what we see, hear, read, taste and feel about creativity.  It’s the “Do” share of creativity.  Craft is the vehicle of personal expression and innovation. Craft is what we hone in order to push our imagination out to the masses.

From Kitsch to Avant-Guard, craft is what connects us to the artist; it’s the difference between satisfying a challenge and indecipherable theories.  High craftsmanship is rooted in human skill, expertise, dexterity, ability, and technique; machines can’t demonstrate craftsmanship.  If machines produce high quality objects, it’s the result of fine machining by the innovative humans who created the process.  Did you make an aesthetic decision in your crafting process?  Then the outcome is art, aka – human expression.  No decision?  Then you’re a machine or an exceptionally good plagiarist.

Craft gets polished through building on patterns of a skill pyramid: simple early skills topped by highly developed sophisticated abilities honed through repetition.  Once learned, the exceptionally gifted own the power to penetrate the sensations of others.  They inspire awe and excitement.  Their skill opens our emotional and intellectual receptors – we hunger and covet.   Our souls play emotional hosts to admiration, envy, and eagerness to take part in the fine art or creative innovation demonstrated through extraordinary craft: an enrichment of the human spirit.

With audience receptors unlocked, artists and innovators are released to share their creativity.  Creators at their skill peak report feeling emotion flow from each note of music played or every nuanced dance movement performed.  Each fine stroke of a brush or every architectural detail designed makes a meaningful human connection.  Remarkable craft is present in both the height of artistic expression and purposeful innovation.  Fine craftsmanship is the mouthpiece of creativity.

The objects we call Art or Craft are members of a continual spectrum under the creativity banner.  Odds-on, the most purposeful and predictable will be labeled “crafts”, while the most abstract and useless will not.  Where do we put the fulcrum in this teeter-totter?  Intuition may tell us, but it matters little unless you’re a government bureaucrat required to levy import duty, or an art dealer primed to cash in on the next Rembrandt.

It may also be a matter of context.  Display objects heretofore perceived as crafts in an art museum, they cease to be useful and therefore perceived as art by virtue of surroundings.  A rare Ming vase is no longer useful behind bulletproof glass.  New York’s Museum of Modern Art is a renowned venue for the exhibition of artworks that were – or are – mass produced and purposeful.  There seems to be no rule for which we can’t find an exception.

Why are “art objects” valued higher or fine artists held with greater esteem than those perceived as Crafts or Craftsmen?  Exclusivity and purity I suspect.  For the same reason art increases in value post mortem, objects perceived as crafts appear to be more easily reproducible.  They often have a product-like appearance such as an unlimited edition photograph or a Charles Eames Chair.

What’s more, Artists claim a purity that is unaffected by profit or committee approval.  Artistic “sell-outs” lose a piece of their soul [so I hear].  While profit motives can be problematic for artistic expression, I don’t believe it is the fulcrum of the creativity teeter-totter.  Countless great artists and innovators respond to commission, and the galleries are full of art for profit.

Those who spawn what we label “art” or “craft” use the same creative essentials.  Self designated artist or craftsman, approach personal expressions or innovations from different perspectives but achieve parallel results.  Intensity of emotion, imagination, function or intent dictates the resulting perception.  Uncommon creative passion is delivered through worthy craft; it’s the essential skill for successful transfer to an audience.

Anguish, frustration, I’m so blocked.  I’m not sure why writer’s block is so notorious.  Is the profession filled with vociferous whiners?  Do they get creative block more than others, more than musicians, artists, web designers, research scientists, strategic planners, or Fortune 500 Marketing Directors?

No one’s immune to losing their creative mojo.  What about those titanic talents that we all admire but occasionally sneer at under our breath in a jealous tremor?  Even they can sink; they’re just slightly more buoyant than the rest of us.  Talent rises to the surface, but everyone can learn to swim.  Although I have met some creative floaters who perform as asthmatics adorned with a 100 pound weight belt, but that’s rare enough to dismiss.

Imaginative creativity is an individual thing.  Everyone’s method for reaching creative “flow” is proprietary.  Without realizing it, companies that try to enforce creative processes can better succeed at fostering resentment than nurturing creativity.  Being in a room with a dozen co-workers standing in circumference while holding hands, as they play “pass the story line” in an attempt to carve out a creative “space”, can feel more like corporate Hokey Pokey.  I’ve never rushed to my office in a fit of imaginative ecstasy after compulsory creativity building sessions – have you?

Interview one hundred creative professionals [those who get paid to innovate for example] and methods will begin to distill to some invariant form.  This is where all those “creative techniques” are born.  Blocked? Go to the gym. Want to be creative? Meditate. Running dry on the ol’ inspiration? Start a journal.

Techniques can be highly effective. I have a tool box full of pattern breaking activities that where collected over a 25 year career. Yet, following prescribed techniques is similar to knowing a phone number for great take-out and being pleased with the food you serve; needs are filled, but what if they don’t like Italian?  Got another number I can call?

Let’s back up a step.  Creativity is the act of bringing something new into being.  That new thing has form. Before it had form it was imagined.  If I build a chair from a pile of mahogany, am I being imaginative?  It’s not a given is it?  I’m creative by putting my stylish spin on the chair idea, but it doesn’t guarantee an imaginative solution.  The pattern needs to be broken in the imagination.  When we say, “be creative”, we generally mean – be imaginative.

Being blocked is symptomatic of predictable patterns.  The brain remembers everything as a pattern; random thoughts are imaginary, only patterns survive.  In an odd twist, being blocked can hint at an ego that has been stroked by too much reverence.  That’s why being touted as a world-class master or reputing great accomplishments with your special “style” can solidify a pattern cast in marble.  You become a victim of your own brand, fearful of experimentation or disappointed with approval loss that often comes with new directions.

It takes courage to express imagination – as it takes courage to act out or walk naked onto a stage – and it takes skill to filter the imagination in a meaningful way.  Imagination is so deeply personal it’s easily ignored except in dreams like so many vestigial insights pushed down making room for life’s challenges.  It may not be a societal compliment to say, “he has an active imagination” but that is exactly from where true creativity stems.  We all know how to imagine but the creatively skilled know how to harness imagination; they give it space, practice filtering and create new patterns.

So am I saying that this creative stuff takes work?  You betcha. Maybe even a lifestyle change. Stress causes us to seek known patterns: bring your “A” game.  Our “A” game is what we know works well; it’s proven and, therefore, doesn’t stretch our imagination.  The trick is to combine your “A” game with your active imagination in just the right proportion to satisfy yourself and your challenge.  Still, the more permission you have to suck, the easier it is to express your imagination.  Here’s a rhetorical brain teaser: Is it possible for a talented musician to suck in an unimaginative way?

Corporate “Hokey Pokey” creative exercises as support for profit driven deadlines and performance incentives aren’t the best creativity stimulants.  What’s needed is a culture change or – sans change – outsourcing.  I’m confident that’s one reason Volkswagen hired Crispin Porter + Bogusky as their advertising agency of record.  VW needs a company whose culture is steeped in imagination or at least one that is really great at leaching every last drop of creative blood from its stable of youngsters yet to hone their creative archetypes.  While I’m not an insider, I’m certain the culture at CP+B is far less about reactive judgments and far more about proactive risks.

What happens to those pre-marbleized young talents?  Do they get burned out and routinely patterned?  Some do, but the best learn how to stay curious and open while resisting reactive judgments even under the most unsympathetic pressure.  Nothing kills creativity quite like quick judgment – we fear it.  Our imagination shrinks like – well, you know – and “I was in the pool” is no excuse for this kind of shrinkage.  Taking an invulnerable stance is equivalent to moving away from imaginative solutions.

If you learn to endure fear, the imagination still needs fuel.  Creative curiosity is a passionate muse search without an agenda.  Vertical experience is helpful but broad horizontal experiences are crucial. Vertical knowledge is quickly assimilated; horizontal knowledge takes a lifetime of dedication. Without the open mind of a landscape thinker, companies are doomed to repeat what’s been done with little variation; the silo gets taller until it falls.

Want a technique? Try this: do.  Find your passion for doing, and then climb on for the ride. Passion gives you courage to suck.  Ever hear, “there’s no such thing as a bad question”? Of course you have. Yet, there are humiliating ones. A passionate question gets asked no matter how humiliating.  It can’t, not be asked, just like creative talent can’t not do.  Blocked?  Plunge forth with ghastly ideas, dreadful songs, appalling paintings or unspeakable prose.  Give yourself permission to suck. I’d be surprised if the great didn’t find its way out of that pitiful pile of poor.

“My 8 year old son is so creative he’s going to be an artist.”  How many times have you heard that?  Naïve art – young children are natural at it. It’s the first rain in the desert, new run-off paths are spontaneously created; the water forges streams where there were none.  An 8 year old discovers crayons uninhibited by life experience, ego, and deadlines.  Nearly every connection is a new one.  She hasn’t yet learned how not to be creative.

When we say that art is immature, what do we mean?  We don’t necessarily mean that the artist lacks originality; more likely, we mean that its originality is born by an artist who doesn’t yet know enough to be interesting, or deliver emotion in a compelling way. The moment a child realizes their art is immature, the crayons stand a good chance of being surrendered.

Information and experience are like food for the creative process.  It’s raw substance.  Information needs to be digested to brain-fat so it can re-immerge as mature creative energy.  It’s as if it needs to be inculcated into our souls before we are free to randomize it into original creative expression.  If we don’t digest it, a creative product – art, innovation, music, etc. – is sure to be more derivative that original.  Creativity is using our unique inner selves to rearrange the raw material.

Society teaches the creativity out of our students.  If X, then Y is easy to teach.  If X, then Y gets results.  It generates tangible and immediate ROI.  Do this and get that result. Take an alternative path and risk failure or – even worse – ridicule.  Research creative history and learn what got rewarded and what was ignored.  Teach high craft and call it high art.  Creativity is too soft and round; there is nothing to grab onto.  There are often no clean results to judge.  Creativity is messy but we all crave the rewards.

When do we begin to fear our own creativity?  I believe it is the point at which we began to market ourselves.  True creativity is deeply personal because we have to create new streams – new run-off paths in our souls.  Risking creative rejection is terrifying. It’s rejection that cuts so deep it’s worse than a High School crush laughing when you finally get the nerve to ask her to the movies (I digress, forgive me).  Creativity takes courage. Being vulnerable takes guts. Needed is a willingness to be rejected for what is among the most personal of expressions.  The stakes are high.

Taking a less risky path is more about fine craft than innovation.  I’m reminded of advice from an emerging professional as I left college: he told me, “On the outside, there is no room for ‘b” quality work.”  In other words: it is the end of experimentation without consequences.  Experiment all you want on your own, but come to work with your “A” game: bring what you know will meet approval.

Hugh MacLeod of Gaping Void fame uses the Sex and Cash theory to explain how creativity and business relate.  Re: Sex and Cash, “This tense duality will always play center stage.  It will never be transcended.”  Creativity is sexy.  The more you get paid for your creativity, the less sexy it is.  I believe there are laws governing sex and cash, are there not?  Do we dare go counter culture?

The occasional and often publicized young creative genius can lull us into the false impression that creativity is only for the immensely and naturally talented.  “I can’t do that, I’ve never been creative.”  The truth is creativity is hard work.  Creative people are talented because they put in the hours. There is a passion for the doing; they can’t not-do, and the results are secondary to the act but no less important than their original idea. Does this confuse you?

Whether you’re an artistic temperament seeking structure or a rational temperament seeking imagination, creativity is constructive only when related to others.  If you’ve heard improvisational abstract Jazz you know what I mean.  An artist’s passion can be intensely creative but the results can fail to inspire others – it’s self indulgent.

Ever try to talk through your raw creative ideas with another? Sounded dim, didn’t it?  People often reject another’s raw creativity; it’s simply too intimate until it takes a form prone to mutual acceptance. Raw creative ideas aren’t ready for prime time – they need at least minimal crafting.  Like a beautifully written song sung out of key – poor craft masks the emotion or defeats the function.

For those of you in need of concrete illustration, the DeBoer creativity equations will keep you busy:

Imagination x Craft x Emotion = Artistic Expression
Imagination x Craft x Function = Innovation

[This should help with the test at the end, so pay attention.]

However flawed you may find these equations; my point is that emotion and function are the human relational elements to art and innovation.  Without emotion, art appears dry and mechanical.  Without function, innovation is pure Rube Goldberg. Craft is the vehicle of creativity. Crafting the creativity allows the emotion and function to “sing”.

The good news: Creativity is portable.  The bad news: fine Craftsmanship is not.  When people say I’m a great photographer, most are telling me that I’ve honed the craft of photography beyond the ordinary.  I can’t move my honed skills from photography to writing, to music, to business, but I can take my creativity with me.  It’s fluid that way. We begin to recognize talent when an accomplishment tipping point is reached in the three elements of our creativity equation.

Talent doesn’t need a creative process per se.  Talent finds formulaic process stifling: a canvas and a deadline, however, is a different story.  Talent will surface no matter what; it won’t be denied.  Talent doesn’t need the best camera to make great imagery.  Just as money can’t buy contentment, the best guitar, camera, or paints can’t aid creativity, only help polish the craft.

Process helps companies hide their poor creative talent.  “We have a great creative process” that we use to get our accountants to think “out of the box”.  Ugh!  Isn’t that what Enron boasted? Remember what I said about putting in the hours?  Either a company hires those with creative passion and nurtures it with a catalytic culture or it doesn’t.  Usually it doesn’t.  Reflecting on the process undermines the ability, it takes us back to “if X then Y” and the crayons stay in the box.

Watching creativity is like watching a cow lactate – all day long nothing is witnessed, then, WHAM, milk.  Once you have your milk, only then should you send it through the process.  Make sure it solves the problem.  Make sure the Function and the Craft in the Innovation equation is honed to a fine edge.  Bad milk?  Keep moving.

Somewhere around puberty we accumulate enough junk in our minds that we need to organize it: make it linear.  Random thought is no longer an efficient way to make it through the day and stay sane.  Most of us lay down our crayons.  Those who don’t surrender, usually become artists, musicians, fashion designers or advertising art directors who wander through the desert waiting for rain.

Copyrights?  I don’t even think about it.  Consider me a renowned painter universally appreciated for technique and creative vision. Buyers pain themselves to authenticate originals.  Brush strokes and signatures are studied. Paints and canvas is analyzed.  Money flows. Duplicates are nearly worthless in comparison to originals.  In an odd turn, copies help originals sell at higher prices by increasing awareness and widening appeal.  Business is good – or at least it is now that I’m dead.

The value of expressed creativity is seldom so utterly intrinsic.  It gets used up. Wouldn’t it be magnificent if I could write a novel only to watch it unavoidably increase in value each time it was copied, distributed, and read; once universally consumed, my words would reach their appraisal peak.  Realistically however, if everyone read it, there’d be no more buyers; plus, copies would be so ubiquitous they’d be nearly worthless.

Emotionally at least, “Dead Heads” – the fervent fanatics of the band The Grateful Dead – owned the music.  In a pre-digital demonstration of relaxed Copyright restrictions, Dead Heads were allowed (encouraged is more like it) to record the band in concert using portable devices.  Recording “zones” were set up for bootleggers during concerts.  The honor contract: bootleg recordings are for personal use only; don’t even think about making money from them. Profit is the sole dominion of the band.

The result of this grass roots distribution is a wider fan base.  The recordings were second rate so sales of studio recordings increased. Concert attendance was steadily substantial.  Fan loyalty is legendary. It was a shrewd marketing strategy for the pre-digital age, but what about now?

In the digital age, a “copy” no longer means a “copy”.  A digital-to-digital copy is, in fact, a clone.  Prior to digital content, a copy was a lower grade replica of the original.  Listen to a copied music CD or view a copied Digital Photo – for example – and it’s indistinguishable from the original. Analog copies result in quality loss, or if you’re clever, added value.  Either way it was different.

Today, once you express yourself digitally, you are not only producing an original, but the capacity for limitless originals.  The workable definition of being an original has changed.  The ability to clone and distribute content spawned a more lucrative model for piracy: steal, sell or trade clones and get away with it.  Distribution is fast, easy and often under the radar.

As a result, copyright protections swell in consequence on both ends of the scale.  On one balance, there is a hyper necessity to protect intellectual property now that originals are so easily stolen.  It’s as if the door to the vault has been left open or – more accurately – demolished.  Effortless anonymous pillaging is still pillaging.  Damage to legacy business models is massive. Traditionally, easy crimes, that result in big injury, carry stiff penalties.

Among the more draconian copyright legislators, Orin Hatch, while serving on the Senate Judiciary committee, showed his distain for digital piracy by suggesting:

“If we can find some way to do this without destroying their machines, we’d be interested in hearing about that.  [However] If that’s the only way, then I’m all for destroying their machines. If you have a few hundred thousand of those, I think people would realize the seriousness of their actions”

Don’t mess with Orin.  Unfortunately for him, unlicensed software was discovered on his computer days later, but that story is for another article.

On the other balance sits inspiration caused by mass distribution of original creative expression. Creativity begets creativity. One can argue that all creative expression is derivative; it’s just a matter of where the line is drawn.  The new global reach allows a boost up for higher innovation.  Copyright legislation can inhibit distribution when owners disallow digital publication of out of print books, or when powerful interests lock out the use of past creative products that are well beyond commercial viability.  Strictly govern access to past creativity, and valuable derivative works that would potentially benefit our culture are simultaneously limited.

Dissenters eagerly point out that this is neither the first nor last time change will cause businesses to collapse. Railroads ignored progress at their virtual demise, so how far should we carry our remorse for the likes of major music labels? Where there is change there is opportunity.  Eliminate one viable business model and another is born.

The Internet and digitization has increased competition in the business of intellectual property just has it has in other businesses.  Duplication and distribution is no longer a strong value-add for digitized intellectual property such as music, photography, or the written word.

By way of digital copy and distribution, protagonists direct us to new opportunities that deliver increased compensation to those who deserve it most: the creators.  Musicians can produce and distribute their original compositions with nominal investment by embracing digital recording and Internet distribution.  “Dead Head” marketing schemes with a digital spin are sprinkled throughout the Web.  Music piracy drops when artists make song access simple and cheap [see Apple iTunes].  Times are exciting if you’re an artist with more passion than money.

Copyright laws protect the monetary incentive for creative expression, also referred to as intellectual property.  Practically speaking, copyright protection makes it possible to build a profit model based on creative manifestation. Creativity wouldn’t end without protection, but no doubt it would be less profitable to be an artist – if that’s even possible – and society would be less culturally vibrant.

New to the scene: Creative Commons helps balance the copyright scales of public vs. private interests.  I hope CC won’t disapprove of this direct copy from their Web site: “Creative Commons defines the spectrum of possibilities between full copyright — all rights reserved — and the public domain — no rights reserved. Our licenses help you keep your copyright while inviting certain uses of your work — a “some rights reserved” copyright.”

Frequently, there is no avenue for contacting copyright holders regarding permissions.  Life plus 70 years is the current copy protection granted to every intellectual property creator with need to neither register nor be aware of copyright protection.  How do you find owners?  Often, you can’t, effectively removing any legal opportunity for building on the past.  No derivation allowed.  For the property holder, this could mean a loss of beneficial exposure – reference: Grateful Dead.

Creative Commons enables co-creativity: a valuable tool in the digital age.  Wikipedia proves just how valuable co-creation can be:

“Wikipedia is a Web-based, free-content encyclopedia written collaboratively by volunteers and sponsored by the non-profit Wikimedia Foundation. It has editions in roughly 200 different languages (about 100 of which are active) and contains entries both on traditional encyclopedic topics and on almanac, gazetteer, and current events topics. Its purpose is to create and distribute a free international encyclopedia in as many languages as possible. Wikipedia is one of the most popular reference sites on the internet receiving around 60 million hits per day.”

Likewise, Open source program code is what our Synthesis product, Synapse, is based on: PHP for you code geeks.  To borrow from Wikipedia: Something is open source when it includes everything needed to make improvements to it, and is licensed under terms that allow a person to legally sell it or give it away to others, without any fee or royalty.

From this time is born the “Copyright law of sacrifice”: give and gain; bend, don’t break.  Whatever the name, no longer strategically obvious, and occasionally counter intuitive, granting rights to use digital originals is a new strategic challenge.

Anyone who’s worked at an advertising agency knows that “creatives” and “suits” are customarily confined to separate spaces – often on separate floors. Living dangerously is walking your client through the creative offices unannounced – account people typically avoid it. Suits know that unless their client would eagerly cheer Copywriters or Art Directors to victory in a game of Foosball, it’s safer to arrange the creative tour in advance. This is a clear separation of marketing art and science but it’s not often a controversial one. The – at times – litigious argument occurs between the “show me the money” number crunchers and the “marketing is an art” obfuscators – however – either conflict can probably be portrayed as a left vs. right brain.

Marketing – still an investment in future sales – remains the sum of activities that keeps a company customer focused; nothing new to report. However, internet metrics, ever increasing competition, stockholder butt-kissing CEO’s, and that old John Wanamaker quote about the enigmatic half of advertising that’s a waste of money, have all helped birth the latest boardroom fixation with ROI Marketing or MPM [marketing performance measures].

No business goes through trends quite like the marketing biz, but presenting ROI marketing as something new is like wearing your hottest leisure suite and expecting Baby Boomers to marvel at your fashion forward savoir-faire. Back in the ‘60’s, Bill Bernbach warned us against believing that advertising is a measured science: “Advertising is fundamentally persuasion and persuasion happens to be not a science, but an art.” Still, one might argue that the degree to which persuasion is successful can and should be measured.

While advertising is just a portion of a marketing mix, it’s often one of the most expensive and thus receives its due scrutiny. A generation removed from Bill Bernach, ad guru Jack Trout writes: “It’s (ROI Marketing) a no-win deal. Too many variables can kill you, and the competition mucks things up. The only game you should play is return on perception—call that ROP. It’s a real problem to bet your program on those [ROI] numbers.” This may be true, yet, I’m sure Jack would accept that persuasion alters perception, and that brand owners need to measure perception; faith only goes so far.

Obsessive measurement can turn any visionary business leader into a reactionary follower. Consider Albert Einstein’s statement: “Not everything that can be counted counts and not everything that counts can be counted.” Marketing has always been tough to measure; it’s like measuring who won a Presidential debate. Who’d want to bet their careers on getting that right? Yet, in about ½ hour it’s not too tough to gauge the time needed to move Mt. Fuji 10 miles with a fleet of dump trucks, as long as you don’t expect results to be accurate to within a day, a decade, or two, or ten. Do you think Mr. Einstein would support the notion that order of magnitude is what really matters when dealing with large variables? I do.

In a harsh economy, predictable boardroom pressure will demand justification for marketing activities and programs rather than calling to optimize them based on faith in marketing talent. So – we need to measure, but what will improve your marketing, satisfy a bottom line prone upper management, and not send the company into a quagmire of useless eye glazing metrics? Sure – any CEO who questions the importance of marketing should fall on his sword, yet, progress is still vital even if the company’s marketing budget is controlled by a reactive financial chief with no sword in sight.

Marketing performance measures can be helpful when executed well but they are rarely executed well. Retailers are remarkable at optimizing store level marketing by determining why we buy. But then, they know what to measure: customer behavior. If 1000 people pass by that tie rack in men’s fashion without so much as a browse: change it, move it, paint it red.

Don’t over measure; reread Occam’s Razor, keep metrics simple and customer focused, not product focused. Successful measuring and change execution will vary with your company’s profit model, nevertheless, consider tracking these numbers:

* Customer acquisition cost (sales + marketing)
* Lifetime worth of a consumer (revenue)
* Expandability of annual consumption (wallet share)
* Customer churn rate (loyalty)

Perhaps the most important appraisal of marketing achievement – Brand Equity – is also one of the hardest to quantify. To this end, Young and Rubicam established a proprietary brand measurement tool in 1991: The Brand Asset Valuator. BAV is big. Conducted in 40 countries, it covers nearly 20,000 brands and questions 2 million consumers.

BAV successfully divides brand equity into two segments: Brand Strength [differentiation and relevance] and brand stature [esteem and knowledge]. Through these leading and lagging indicators [respectively], marketers and stake holders get a high level view of how their brand is perceived in the market place and, over time, how well their persuasion is affecting brand equity. More than an executive security blanket, the type of information amassed through BAV is essential when distributing millions in marketing dollars. Similar anecdotal and customer survey evidence can help those who have smaller scale budgets and brands not included in BAV.

Consider David Oglvy’s statement from decades ago: “I notice increasing reluctance on the part of marketing executives to use judgment; they are coming to rely too much on research, and they use it as a drunkard uses a lamp post for support, rather than for illumination.” Decades later we are in the same discussion and the best advice is comparable: use metrics in the hunt for enlighten business decisions but avoid waiting for justification.

Everything can be raised to the “art” level. Artists need a medium, a palate, a canvas – something that offers boundaries; a stage in which to perform or a frame in which to compose. Artists need resistance against which to push. In marketing we push against metrics framed by profit. Unmeasured metrics exist in latent form so there should be no controversy – we all desire the same outcome. Clamor amplifies when we use the wrong measures, forcing marketing artists to push against meaningless resistance. Use marketing ROI responsibly – if you find the need to hold onto something, it’s best to use a lamp post and seek help.

If you’re like me, there are times when you enjoy a greeting as you enter a store. No – not Wal-Mart, that’s too much like the bu-by of airplane egress, I’m talking about an always remember your name type welcoming. Hearing “hey Bruce” when I visit Harry’s Guitar shop makes me a loyal boy; using Web lingo, it’s sticky. After a couple visits, a guitar superstore just feels wrong.

On the other hand, being stalked by a vacuum cleaner salesman, on a day of appliance shopping is beyond creepy. “I know you were at Sears, what’s up with that? Here, let me show you that Electrolux. No? How ‘bout some bags?” We’d all be quick to dial 911.

It’s not peculiar to take in stride a deluge of mailbox catalogs exclusive to credit card use. Buy a sweater at the Gap, use your VISA card, and get 10 sweater catalogs at Christmas. Our purchasing habits have been on sale for decades. Consumers pay for their products with more than money; information is valuable to marketers.

Grocery stores are info-farming experts with their preferred buyer cards. Card carriers are privileged with discounts. When we buy a can of pet food, kitty litter coupons are thrust at us by checkout machines. Ever wonder what they do with all that data collected about what we buy, when, and how much we paid? Information drives strategy decisions.

Most folks free of criminal records don’t avoid stores with surveillance cameras. Why then might we suffer paranoia when recognized upon entering a website? Perhaps it’s the operational transparency or the mystery of on-line information harvesting. We’ve also heard of abuses and don’t want to be fooled. All reasonable if you ask me. There is a benefit-privacy conflict in business [and life] but it just seems more obvious on the web.

Like Oreos, your basic Internet cookie is harmless. Also like a chocolate cream filled wafer, some people like them and some don’t. Similarly, you are free to decide if you want them hanging around. Internet cookies do no more than give you a recognizable face as you enter a Web site. On-line businesses want to say hello and tailor their offerings just like conventional businesses. Without the means to recognize a returning customer, the relationship remains sterile.

If you want to remain anonymous, routinely delete cookies by using your browser tools, but keep in mind, your access to “wish lists” and personal preferences on favorite sites will be deleted too.

Cookies are very small text files dropped in a folder on your computer. An advanced cookie using merchant, like Amazon, may install this much information:

session-id-time 9543457356587242000 amazon.com/
session-id 002-4135465256-7625846 amazon.com/
x-main eKQIfwnxfghsghsghVWAXh@Ih6Uo5H amazon.com/
ubid-main 077-9263437-96356869678786 amazon.com/

A less sophisticated cookie may looks like this:

WEBTRENDS_ID
68.213.146.9-2736511040.29684135::746E8219C9485E9986k6280C8C0BA551D
www.tiftmerritt.com/1536466274944768657564415052833629684134*

As you can see there is no personal information in the cookie. Also, since it’s not a program [executable file], it has no ability to gather any. As they say in the medical profession: it’s benign. However, it’s always a good idea to check a company’s privacy policy to be sure they aren’t planning to sell the information you volunteer.

Your basic cookie is recognized by the originator and no others; Amazon can’t read Eddie Bauer cookies and vice versa. Arriving at the Web site, your ID number is read and your historical information from their database is displayed. Site owners keep what you volunteer along with any action you take on the site; similar to a brick and mortar store. However, once cookies can be shared by groups, things get a little dicey, even sleazy.

Third party cookies like those from DoubleClick feel a little slippery to most people. DoubleClick capitalizes on the idea of a networked cookie database. While still anonymous, DoubleClick’s cookies can be read by all subscribing Web sites. When read, your cookie ID is sent to Double-Click. In turn, they make available all information they have on your behavior (or whomever uses your computer) through other DoubleClick enabled sites. If you buy stuff on-line there is a very good chance you’ll be greeted with banner ads for similar stuff. As you are recognized, DoubleClick (and companies like them) deliver ads that contain messages they hope will interest you; better targeting through technology.

Often referred to as Behavioral Marketing, this is still harmless even though privacy violation is in question. DoubleClick allows you to opt out by going to where they deposit a cookie on your machine that blocks their service. The trick is that most people have no idea this process is taking place – using Web lingo: it’s transparent. Opting out won’t stop ads, but it will stop ads that target your behavior.

Cookies are different from adware and spyware. The latter two are programs [executable files] not simply text. Adware is additional code attached to software that causes banners or pop-ups to display when running the program; adware delivers ads. Shareware (free software available for download) is often financed using adware.

Spyware – on the other hand – collects and distributes information without your knowledge. It also uses your internet connection and other computer resources without your permission. The good news: There are a few good remedies out there. A cocktail of Sypbot and Yahoo makes me feel fairly clean.

Spybot Search and Destroy

Yahoo Toolbar

Probably the best suggestion is to maintain a level head. Our privacy is important but in real life we aren’t free from those stalking vacuum cleaner sales people. I personally don’t mind a DoubleClick style cookie but shutter at the possibility of tracking software counting my keystrokes.

Carry a Branded Department Store bag with you in the mall and everyone knows where you’ve been. Keep it anonymous and I’m fine. Yet, transparency is still an issue. Trust – how much can there be with new technology arriving faster than we can think. Make yourself comfortable, participate at your own speed, and take steps to avoid dialing 911.