Dispatches From Tomorrowland

Thanks for stopping by. I'd like to say this site is currently under construction, but that would imply some kind of activity

I'm trying to figure out how to simplify the JPO site so I can blog, post, swap out books and info etc. without having to learn flash technology.

Until then, I'm writing about ADLAND: Searching for the Meaning of Life on a Branded Planet (Doubleday, Sept. '09) and my next novel, HOLY WATER (Doubleday, May 2010) as well as a lot of other nonsense over here:

http://brandedbyjamespothmer.blogspot.com/

Sorry for the inconvenience. The contact here james@jamespothmer.com still works, but you can also reach me at jpothmer@yahoo.com, on facebook and on twitter at jamespothmer.

Cheers,
JPO

TIME-RELEASED BLISS is when a company, government or individual tells you that great things are coming in the future in order to distract you from the mess they've created today.

Take the much maligned 2008-9 NY Knicks. No one talks about the earnest yet hapless team presently on the court at MSG. Instead, it’s all about the year 2010, when they will finally have some salary cap room and which is also the year that LeBron James and Dewayne Wade will be free agents and might possibly accept their gazillions.

Why dwell on present tense mediocrity when we can envision a dream hypothetical two years out?

That's TIME-RELEASED BLISS.

Exhibit B: Chevy. What's the best way to diffuse talk of bankruptcy and bailouts and gas-guzzlers? Spend tens of millions running Super Bowl and other ads for the Volt, an electric car that may or may not be available in limited numbers until late 2010.

TIME-RELEASED BLISS.

By the way, maybe the Volt should be the Official Car of the Knicks in 2010.

When will combat troops be out of Iraq? Mid to late 2010.

TIME-RELEASED BLISS.

Have you noticed the promos NBC has been running during its increasingly weak prime time broadcasts telling us to get ready for the Vancouver Winter Olympics in 2010?

It’s not about 2010. It’s about distracting us from the mess they’re in, and the mediocrity they’re selling us today.

What happens to a nation being encouraged to live in the future because living in the moment is apparently such a bummer?

Beats me. But my second novel is coming out in late 2010 and I expect nothing less that a Nobel.

"Othmer captures the authentic, raw and visceral feel of the advertising world, and actually makes it wildly entertaining. He never forgets it's not science, it's all about the people. Bravo." --Mark Dowley, Partner, Endeavor

Two Things I Learned About the Economy Last Week
1. People are really pissed. Angry in a public stoning kind of way. Of course I sensed it but it really hit home when I did this Room for Debate piece about executive bonuses for the Times:

http://roomfordebate.blogs.nytimes.com/2009/01/29/bonuses-for-bad-performance/#othmer

The so-called expert debate was interesting, but it's the comments section that really blew me away. So far, 806 angry people have weighed in, most posting responses significantly longer than the 300 word limit my editor imposed upon us. For context, 806 is about four times the response they got for previous topics, including the stimulus package, Iraq, etc. Most of the responders wanted blood, and quite a few wondered what the Times was doing asking a novelist, talking about semantics of all things (note to self: don't use irony when writing about the financial sector), what he thought. I did, too.

2. People are dying for some good news. The most recent evidence of this is Media is Thriving, the blog-like thing Rick Webb at The Barbarian Group has been posting on Twitter.

http://twitter.com/mediaisthriving

The premise: only positive news about the media. The result: only positive, if not world-changing news about the media, but most interesting is that more than 2500 Twitterers already following.

The New York Times asked me to write about corporate bonuses for an online discussion with others who knew what they were talking about.

Rewarding Bad Behavior
by James P. Othmer

The problem isn’t with corporate bonuses; it’s with corporate semantics.

By definition, a bonus is “something in addition to what is expected or strictly due.” Perhaps, pre-Enron, pre-Madoff, pre-collapse of the financial, real estate and automotive industries, executives got away with receiving their annual seven figure bonuses because we were willing to believe that they truly were surprised by them. Or we were so comfortable with our own financial situation that we didn’t care.

After all, it was a bonus! Super-sized versions of the token gestures we were occasionally given even in our own jobs. The holiday turkey. The extra week’s paycheck. Or, if you happened to work in my field of advertising during the 1990s, the window pane envelope filled with soon to be worthless stock options.

The primary reason we could call them bonuses is because some years we got one, but for so many others we got an explanation. A key account was lost. The global network had an off year. Something to do with the price of something.

Any true bonus has the thrill of uncertainty about it. And the knowledge that when you finally get a good one all of your vocational stars are in alignment.

However, when a bonus is not only expected but mandated under any circumstance, it ceases to be a bonus. It becomes an outrage. Same goes for perks.

All of which is why I’m convinced if the Wall Street executives who this year raked in the sixth-highest haul in the history of bonuses, despite being responsible for the worst performing market of our lifetime, simply had the foresight to call their windfall anything but a bonus, we’d be cool with them.

We don’t need to reform corporate bonuses. We just need to rephrase them. Too bad bailout is taken.

Praise for ADLAND: Searching for Life on a Branded Planet, which will be published by Doubleday this September, is starting to roll in. Okay, trickle. But this is good stuff from great people, and it's early.

"I've been in advertising more than twenty years and spent countless hours trying to tell people how insane and hilarious and exciting and pointless and fascinating it all is. Now all I have to do is hand them this book." -Jamie Barrett, Creative Director/Partner Goodby Silverstein & Partners, San Francisco

"Othmer tells it like it plays out every day and how it's probably going to play out tomorrow. And he does it with a sweet blend of sarcasm, sincerity and biting humor that makes you think "Is advertising really that bad? And if it is, how can I get in?" --Desmond Hall, SVP, Executive Creative Director, Global Hue

"I loved it...required reading for my team. Not only is James Othmer a truly fresh engaging writer, he is digging at the truth in his own career with crisp intensity and coming to insight after insight in a way that helps all of us as we go forward as well."
-Pip Coburn, author of The Change Function, founder of Coburn Ventures, and former Global Technology Strategist, UBS

"A wry and insightful look at the insanity that is the world of advertising...and a peek 'behind the curtain' of the new world of advertising as seen through the eyes of an advertising veteran who has seen it all and lived to tell about it. A must read for anyone who has ever wondered what really goes into creating an ad." --David Griffith, Creative Director, Team Digital

This just in from insights guru Pip Coburn, founder of Coburn Ventures and author of THE CHANGE FUNCTION: Why Some Technologies Take Off and Others Crash and Burn. Pip is also a former Managing Director and Global Technology Strategist at UBS.

"I loved it. Of the hundreds of great books I have been fortunate to have read over the years this qualifies among the very few as required reading for my team. Not only is James Othmer a truly fresh engaging writer, he is digging at the truth in his own career with crisp intensity and coming to insight after insight in a way that helps all of us as we go forward as well.

"Othmer is one of the most interesting authors I have come across in the past ten years. While everyone and their brother aspires to be a refreshing change, Othmer is one. More important than his world class skill as a writer is his intention. In ADLAND he is neither playing an angry "blame game" or seeking the attention of a tell-all "Jose Conseco knows steroids" melodrama. It is far more interesting, notable and worthwhile than that. He seeks the truth of his own twenty year life in advertising to find his next steps in life and hopes to share anything he might know so the reader might also find their own truth. James Othmer is just getting started. I am glad I am here at the beginning.

"I found this incredibly entertaining lean-in' book a vehicle as well for my own personal growth as I wrestled with each abstract that Othmer unearthed. Though the content of my life and work are different, the lessons from his introspection assisted my own."

Disturbing trend watch: ads that use phrases such as "for these troubled times" or "because now more than ever we need to count every penny" or...well, you get the idea.

You know we're in a recession. I know we're in a recession. Every media outlet in the country covers its downward spiral by the nanosecond.

Which is exactly why we don't need a car ad or a fast food commercial to constantly remind us of this fact. Obviously, advertisers are making the crude mistake of giving a literal interpretation to aspects of briefs (ie, "our target market has less and less disposable income") which are meant to inform the creative, not become it.

Telling us that you're reducing prices or offering a better value is all we really need to know. We can connect the dots and somehow retain a shred of dignity and peace of mind. But telling us that you're giving us a free coke and an extra side of cole slaw with our bucket of fowl because you feel our economic pain is not only unnecessary. It's inexcusable, offensive and a bailout-sized bummer.

I've been a fan of David Fincher since he did AT&T's "You Will" campaign for my old agency NW Ayer back in the early 1990's. I never got to shoot with him, but I've closely followed his films, including the recent Brad Pitt reverse biopic "The Curious Case of Benjamin Button".

I enjoyed the film. In fact, while I had my quibbles with the story (which is only remotely, conceptually related to F. Scott Fitzgerald's similarly titled and not exactly classic short story) and aspects of Pitt's performance, I thought it was a visual tour de force.

It's fairly well known that big brand, :30 second TV spots, especially those done during the Internet boom of the 1990s, have about twenty times more money and attention per second lavished upon them than any feature film. But somehow Fincher has been able to compose, light and film his big screen productions ("Seven", "Fight Club") with a similar sensibility.

In fact, at least three times during the film -- most notably during the character summary at the end and the story of how Daisy hurt her leg -- I could have sworn that a 1990's multi-million dollar branding spot had broken out. In a good way. Really.

I'm rarely dazzled by the visuals in a feature that's not an epic CGI extravaganza and it was refreshing to see someone have some fun with the conventional approach.

Other than Fincher, the only directors I can think of who have managed to bring his or her impressive and daring visual commercial approach to (successful) features are, perhaps, Michel Gondry and Spike Jones.

I wonder if this is because of budgets, conservative studios, or fear of failure on the director's part.

I finally finished my next book. ADLAND: SEARCHING FOR THE MEANING OF LIFE ON A BRANDED PLANET. It's a non-fiction title, coming from Doubleday late summer of 2009. Part quirky memoir, part consideration of modern work, it's about life then and now in the advertising industry.

Here's an advance blurb from one of my favorite creative people at one of my favorite agencies:

"I've been in advertising more than twenty years and spent countless hours trying to tell people how insane and hilarious and exciting and pointless and fascinating it all is. Now all I have to do is hand them this book."
-Jamie Barrett, Creative Director/Partner Goodby Silverstein & Partners, San Francisco



I'll post more on it in the weeks ahead.

Also, I've just about finished with my second novel, tentatively titled SNIPPED, and I'm hoping that it's available as soon as possible after ADLAND.

Finally, there's finally been some real progress on the film front for THE FUTURIST. An A-level writer/director is working on a screenplay as I write this and I'm hoping that the muse is treating him well.