http://www.psfk.com Your Go-To Source For New Ideas And Inspiration Wed, 15 Feb 2012 19:00:27 +0000 en hourly 1 http://wordpress.org/?v=3.2.1 http://www.psfk.com/2012/01/grant-mccracken-are-big-companies-better-at-innovation-than-small-ones.html Tue, 03 Jan 2012 19:12:29 +0000 In the era of the start-up when seemingly the small business reigns, is it actually the larger brands (and their budgets) that are driving imaginative creation?]]> http://www.psfk.com/2011/12/grant-mccracken-kickstarting-kickstarter-new-models-of-meaning-and-value.html Mon, 12 Dec 2011 19:17:10 +0000 The thought leader brings us insights from his talk at the Future of Entertainment conference at MIT.]]> http://www.psfk.com/2011/08/grant-mccracken-spend-a-year-in-cambodia-doing-design-work-that-changes-lives.html Wed, 17 Aug 2011 20:07:52 +0000 The first Human-Centered Design Innovation Lab is launching in Cambodia, and they're looking for a fellow who is willing to spend a year in Phnom Penh, doing everything from research, field work and interviews to design.]]> http://www.psfk.com/2011/07/grant-mccracken-google-late-but-with-advantage-of-being-new.html Wed, 13 Jul 2011 14:42:46 +0000 During the Google+ frenzy, Facebook and Twitter take the back burner, and maybe rightly so.]]> http://www.psfk.com/2011/07/grant-mccracken-the-good-bad-and-wonderful-at-usa-network.html Wed, 13 Jul 2011 11:15:37 +0000 The expert on American culture and business stands by one of his favorite networks, but gives us an in-depth look at how programming has gotten too formulaic. ]]> http://www.psfk.com/2011/06/grant-mccracken-making-the-cut-a-review-of-digital-publishing.html Thu, 30 Jun 2011 18:04:45 +0000 A trained anthropologist believes that all books -- no matter how obscure -- should be digitized.]]> http://www.psfk.com/2011/05/grant-mccracken-douglas-adams-on-generational-rhythms-in-the-adoption-of-tech.html Mon, 16 May 2011 16:49:55 +0000 Thoughts from the late 'Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy' author about how technology is assimilated.]]> http://www.psfk.com/2011/05/grant-mccracken-the-most-interesting-men-in-the-world.html Tue, 10 May 2011 15:54:51 +0000 So where is this guy from, why are we using him, and why is he, in the Old Spice case, so spectacularly successful as a cultural artifact?]]> http://www.psfk.com/2011/05/brands-get-the-consumers-they-deserve.html Tue, 03 May 2011 15:22:12 +0000 Grant McCracken pits the AT&T iPhone ads against the Claritin Clear ads in what he describes as the "war for the soul of advertising."]]> http://www.psfk.com/2011/04/grant-mccracken-the-problem-with-brands-assuming-familiarity.html Tue, 26 Apr 2011 15:40:04 +0000 When pizza boxes act as Trojan horses, carrying a payload of asymmetrical brand communications.]]> http://www.psfk.com/2011/04/grant-mccracken-on-social-climbing-and-the-royal-wedding.html Tue, 19 Apr 2011 14:21:14 +0000 The English are very good at two things. Theatre and History. And they are particularly good at using the first to reinvent the second.]]> http://www.psfk.com/2011/03/grant-mccracken-lady-gaga-and-glenn-beck-struggle-to-establish-a-parent-child-dynamic.html Wed, 30 Mar 2011 15:56:20 +0000 The Culturematic machine could be used for making culture, specifically, casting movies and TV shows. Formally, it can be used for exploring our culture.]]> http://www.psfk.com/2011/03/are-you-old-enough-to-be-a-curator-of-pop-culture.html Tue, 08 Mar 2011 17:35:47 +0000 Grant McCracken explores Barbara Lippert's recent appointment as "curator of pop culture" at Goodby, Silverstein.]]> http://www.psfk.com/2011/01/grant-mccracken-will-new-york-city-go-the-way-of-the-newspaper.html Tue, 18 Jan 2011 18:01:09 +0000 However natural they seem to anyone born in the 20th century, cities are arbitrary constructions. They are predicated on the idea that humans must congregate and co-locate. But this idea is contingent. A "face to face" connection matters only when there is no digital alternative. ]]> http://www.psfk.com/2011/01/grant-mccracken-making-culture-provoking-culture.html Fri, 14 Jan 2011 16:22:35 +0000 Social worlds tend to settle. And once they settle, a fine coating of inevitability forms around them.]]> http://www.psfk.com/2011/01/grant-mccracken-making-culture-mapping-culture.html Mon, 10 Jan 2011 16:08:19 +0000 Remapping takes a world we know, and reworks how we see it. It's one way to make culture.]]> http://www.psfk.com/2011/01/grant-mccracken-cracking-the-pomplamoose-%e2%80%93-hyundai-case.html Tue, 04 Jan 2011 16:52:00 +0000 The Hyundai-Pomplamoose campaign looped the loop. It went from odd to charming to familiar to contemptible to irritating in about 3 weeks.]]> http://www.psfk.com/2010/12/grant-mccracken-sublime-rise-and-fall-of-an-indispensable-idea.html Tue, 28 Dec 2010 14:57:23 +0000 Google’s Ngram is out. Everyone is plugging in words.]]> http://www.psfk.com/2010/12/grant-mccracken-square-inch-anthropology.html Mon, 20 Dec 2010 17:03:23 +0000 American culture is vast, endlessly various and changing all the time. We can't know it top to bottom. We can't map it end to end. The best we can hope for is to establish small pieces or pockets of clarity.]]> http://www.psfk.com/2010/12/grant-mccracken-harnessing-the-innovation-paradox.html Wed, 15 Dec 2010 13:06:33 +0000 For some reason, it is when we are free to stop thinking about the problem that we sometimes manage our best work on the problem. ]]> http://www.psfk.com/2010/12/grant-mccracken-the-reclocking-of-america-and-the-death-of-the-mall.html Fri, 10 Dec 2010 15:47:06 +0000 Historian E.P. Thompson suggested that as industrial capitalism took hold in the West, we began to organize time in new ways. A ritual cycle was replaced by a model in which leisure days were fewer and more concentrated. The West was being, in effect, reclocked. ]]> http://www.psfk.com/2010/12/five-insights-from-respect-the-internet.html Wed, 08 Dec 2010 18:31:44 +0000 Ketchum PR brought together a handful of thinkers and doers to talk about the ever-evolving nature of web culture and social media's influence on consumer-brand relations.]]> http://www.psfk.com/2010/12/grant-mccracken-will-time-travelers-please-announce-themselves-at-the-front-desk.html Fri, 03 Dec 2010 16:51:36 +0000 It's time to start training time travelers.]]> http://www.psfk.com/2010/11/grant-mccracken-what-business-are-we-in-just-business-actually.html Mon, 01 Nov 2010 17:07:24 +0000 Nimble business are learning to abandon the existing business model before someone rips it out from under them.]]> http://www.psfk.com/2010/10/grant-mccracken-a-%e2%80%9cspecial-teams%e2%80%9d-unit-for-the-corporation.html Wed, 27 Oct 2010 15:06:14 +0000 The corporation is very good at problem solving. Next to getting things done, this is what it does best. The trouble is, the problems are getting tougher.]]> http://www.psfk.com/2010/10/grant-mccracken-fantasy-football-as-cultural-alchemy.html Tue, 19 Oct 2010 14:28:39 +0000 Fantasy Football now entertains 27 million people, playing an average of 9 hours a week, in an industry valued at around $800 million.]]> http://www.psfk.com/2010/10/grant-mccracken-cultural-intelligence-the-boomer-report-card.html Thu, 14 Oct 2010 19:39:44 +0000 "I believe boomers have broken out of orbit. They know less and less about our culture."]]> http://www.psfk.com/2010/10/grant-mccracken-kanye-west-anthropologically.html Tue, 12 Oct 2010 17:30:21 +0000 An investigation into the cultural frames and metaphors found in a recent interview with the artist.]]> http://www.psfk.com/2010/10/grant-mccracken-mikal-built-a-magical-box.html Thu, 07 Oct 2010 12:18:03 +0000 What is the strange appeal of Mikal Hart's creation, and what can we learn from it?]]> http://www.psfk.com/2010/10/grant-mccracken-how-do-we-make-culture.html Mon, 04 Oct 2010 10:30:00 +0000 Observations on culture creation, world building and meaning.]]>