The paradox of perfection

The Marketing Problem
Oscar Wilde wrote: “The play was a great success but the audience was a total failure.” Some people tell me their business is fine – the problem is the customers!

by David Parrish from T-Shirts and Suits: A Guide to the Business of Creativity

Scratch me where it itches

business (biz'nis), n. adj. - n. 1a a thing that one is busy at; occupation, profession, or trade; work: A carpenter's business is building. SYN: vocation, job. See syn. under occupation. b something to be done or attended to: the business of the day. Business comes before pleasure. 2 a matter; affair: Taking chances is sometimes risky business. I am tired of the whole business. 3 buying and selling; commercial dealings; trade: This hardware store does a big business in tools. 4 a store, factory, or other commercial enterprise: They sold the bakery business for a million dollars. SYN:concern. 5 the right to act; responsibility: Other people's business is not your business. 6 the action in a play as distinct from dialogue; things done to make a play seem realistic: Stage directions here call for the business of turning away and lighting a cigarette. 7 Obsolete. busyness.

from The World Book Dictionary edited by Clarence L. Barnhart and Robert K. Barnhart

Image can be anything

FB: Well, there are certain days when you start working and the work seems to flow out of you quite easily, but that doesn't often happen and doesn't last for long. And I don't know that it's necessarily any better than when something happens out of your frustration and despair. I think that, quite possibly, when things are going badly you will be freer with the way you mess up by just putting paint through the images that you've been making, and you do it with a greater abandon than if things have been working for you. And therefore I think, perhaps, that despair is more helpful because out of despair you may find yourself making the image in a more radical way by taking greater risks.

from David Sylvester's Interviews with Francis Bacon

Photo: Joe Bob's Auto Shop from www.projectseven.com/tutorials (Author: Uknown)

Walking around naked...not knowing how to walk

There are many ways to run a successful company. What works once may never work again. What everyone tells you never to do may just work, once. There are no rules. You don’t learn to walk by following rules. You learn by doing, and by falling over, and it’s because you fall over that you learn to save yourself from falling over. It’s the greatest thrill in the world and it runs away screaming at the first sight of bullet points.

by Richard Branson from Business Stripped Bare

Photo: Kontrapunkt, with courtesy of design studio Fiktiv

In the name of the Lady

In his heart, if such organ exists, Murdoch thinks we're boobs. That's why he publishes boob-mentality newspapers. He thinks that's all we can understand...So, if Murdoch is allowed to become a citizen while we're turning away people who are running from death squads or starvation, then we should make one small change in the plans to renovate the Statue of Liberty. Get rid of the torch. Just have the lady hold up her hand with the middle finger extended.

by William Shawcross from Murdoch: The Making of a Media Empire

Photo: The Dancing Cows, Snuff Puppets (Author: Ponch Hawkes)
This post has been included in the Politics Blog Carnival.

An introduction to effective management

One easy target was Vienna's tabloid newspapers, which had been mounting an abrasive publicity campaign to stop people stealing the paper. On Sunday's, when newsstands were closed, customers were supposed to place five Austrian schillings in an insecure vending unit, but since many didn't bother, the papers had begun pasting a warning: "Somebody's watching. Please pay the schillings." When this failed to significantly increase the revenue, the warnings had become harsher, first notifying potential Sunday swipers that "plain clothes controllers" were patrolling the area, and later adding "we hope you will be caught".

by Peter Hall from Sagmeister: Made You Look