Paul Wallbank – Brilliant Communications

Author: Paul Wallbank

  • Trapped in our own expertise

    Trapped in our own expertise

    It’s becoming harder to be an expert warns Entrepreneur and investor Paul Graham.

    What’s worse, Graham suggests being locked in the way things currently are is the biggest risk for today’s experts as change accelerates across society.

    This climate of change makes it tough for investors like Graham to identify the next big things for them to stake money on; when the experts are often wrong it’s hard to figure out whose right in picking what business or technology will be successful in a few years time.

    Graham suggests betting on people, particularly the “earnest, energetic, and independent-minded” is a better way of finding the next wave of successful businesses and his views are a useful reminder that   ultimately its people who find ways to implement and profit from technology.

    The paradox with the changes we’re facing is that the technology is the easy part, it’s the human and social consequences which will surprise us.

    Which is why Paul Graham is right about our having to think outside the boundaries of our own expertise.

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  • Yahoo! Directory comes to an early end

    Yahoo! Directory comes to an early end

    After twenty years the Yahoo! Directory closed down five days early reports Search Engine Land.

    The rise and and fall of Yahoo!’s core product illustrates both the volatility of the web and how the underlying dynamics of the internet has changed; at the time Yahoo! Directory was launched, we were struggling the task of keeping track of all the information being posted online.

    Even in those early days it was clear that task was becoming unmanageable and this was the problem Google set out to solve and its success destroyed the directory business along with a whole range of other industries.

    Yahoo! Directories’ demise needs to be noted by today’s web and social media giants; just as these technologies are disrupting old industries, new businesses aren’t immune to those changes.

     

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  • Kodak and the smartphone

    Kodak and the smartphone

    On reading the Verge’s story that UK tough smartphone company Bullitt would realease a Kodak branded phone in the new year my first though was “Aren’t Kodak out of business?”

    As it turns out Kodak are still in business having come out of Chapter 11 administration last year with the company focusing on commercial printing, cinematography and the odd bit of revenue from licensing out their name.

    Bullitt on the other hand does that licensing with their main product being a range of tough smartphones marketed under the Caterpillar name which doesn’t seem to be a bad niche given the importance of connectivity to farmers, miners and construction workers.

    It’s difficult though to see exactly what the Kodak name is going to bring to smartphones; the brand has long fallen out of favour and is irrelevant to today’s digital photographers, the only way conceivable way the Kodak name could be a selling point is if the devices offer something additional in the way of processing digital photographs or offers some advanced camera features.

    From the media release that doesn’t seem to the be the case, however in a marketplace increasingly dominated by cheap Android phones having an additional selling point is useful in locking in higher margins.

    Both Bullitt and Kodak though will both be happy for the publicity, in one way it’s good to know the brand is still around.

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  • The tension between creative and business

    The tension between creative and business

    One of the ongoing tensions in the new media landscape is that between the demands of advertisers and content creators.

    This isn’t a new thing as a 1959 interview between Mike Wallace and TV pioneer Rod Stering shows.

    Sterling describes how pressures from networks and advertisers created often weird compromises along with a fair degree of self censorship among TV writers and producers.

    Little that Sterling describes would surprise today’s online journalists, bloggers and social media influencers who find themselves subject to identical pressures today.

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  • Terry Gilliam’s Christmas Cards from before the Monty Python days

    Terry Gilliam’s Christmas Cards from before the Monty Python days

    In 1968 Terry Gilliam was some years off his Monty Python fame and eking out a living as a struggling American artist in London.

    Midway through the year he was commissioned by the producers of Do Not Adjust Your Set, the British TV comedy show that led to Monty Python’s Flying Circus, to contribute to their 1968 Christmas special.

    The results are marvellous as the Open Culture website describes.

    We ordinary people should be thankful we don’t have Terry Gilliam in our family.

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