There are 6 principles of sticky ideas, and folks, Canoe Man has all 6. It’s no wonder why this bizarro tale has captivated the UK public.
Robert M brought it to our attention with this introduction: “Man vanishes at sea in 2002, only his battered kayak is found. Wife and two sons mourn, then wife claims life […]
Archive for the 'Story' Category
“Canoe Man”
Published by December 20th, 2007 in General, Simplicity, Concreteness, Credibility, Emotion and Story. 0 CommentsThe Partition of Africa
Published by November 1st, 2007 in General, Unexpectedness, Concreteness, Emotion, Story and Teachers. 2 CommentsHere’s a story we received from Peri Chinoda, an AP & Honors World History Teacher at Hume Fogg Magnet High School in Nashville:
Background Information: In 1885 the Chancellor of Germany, Otto Bismarck, convened a meeting attended by 13 European colonial powers including the USA and the Ottoman Empire. The Africans whose land was to be […]
Research: Stories make your brand stronger
Published by November 1st, 2007 in General, Emotion and Story. 1 CommentReaders of Made to Stick could have predicted this outcome, but it’s interesting nonetheless: Brandweek reports on a research study that concludes stories work better than product positioning in advertisements. [Thanks to Francois at Zoommedia for the link!]
From the article:
One such pattern was that a campaign like Bud’s iconic “Wassup” registered more powerfully with consumers […]
Tammy Is a Quitter
Published by October 23rd, 2007 in General, Simplicity, Concreteness, Credibility, Story, Curse of Knowledge and Teachers. 3 CommentsHere’s a story from Dave Rendall, who has a blog called the Freak Factor. (I love his post that argues that if you’re getting rejected, you’re doing something right.)
I hadn’t seen Tammy in almost a year, when she approached me in the hallway. I was there to teach an evening class for non-traditional students. She told me […]
Digital signal processing, made to stick
Published by October 17th, 2007 in General, Simplicity, Concreteness, Story, Curse of Knowledge and Teachers. 4 Comments[Preamble] If you ask someone to think of a sticky idea, a lot of times they’ll blurt out a slogan. ”Wassssup!” ”Just do it.” And, no question, these are sticky ideas. But because people tend to associate the notion of “stickiness” with things like slogans — i.e., short, punchy, cleverisms — they have a hard time imagining […]
The Screaming Man in the Four Stroke Engine
Published by October 12th, 2007 in General, Unexpectedness, Concreteness, Emotion, Story and Teachers. 2 CommentsHere’s one of our favorite stories so far from the “100 books for 100 stories” contest. There are still plenty of books to giveaway, so make sure to tell your teacher friends: Email us — heaths@fastcompany.com — a story of a lesson that stuck and we’ll ship you a free signed copy of our book. […]
Oceanography, amplified
Published by October 3rd, 2007 in General, Unexpectedness, Concreteness, Credibility, Story and Teachers. 3 CommentsI conducted a workshop recently for high school science and math teachers. We were working together to find ways to make their lesson plans stickier. My favorite example came from a couple of teachers who were trying to revamp the oceanography unit. Below is my own paraphrasing of what they said:
“We weren’t happy with how our unit on oceanography went last year. […]
Tanzania post-mortem
Published by August 20th, 2007 in General, Simplicity, Unexpectedness, Concreteness, Credibility, Emotion and Story. 8 CommentsChip and I had an incredible time in Tanzania. So, let me start by saying this: You know that feeling you get when a full explanation would take 25,000 words, but you’ve only got 500, and you’re afraid to oversimplify, but you’re also afraid to give a vague “neat experience” summary, and this causes a […]
A tale of two bottled-water stories
Published by July 19th, 2007 in General, Simplicity, Unexpectedness, Concreteness, Credibility, Emotion and Story. 7 CommentsI previously blogged about Charles Fishman’s insightful and thoroughly sticky piece on the bottled water industry. His main point: Our embrace of bottled water “is not a benign indulgence.”
Then I got this note from Mojo Mom, who I’m a big fan of:
Today I heard NY Times reporter Julia Moskin interviewed [about bottled water] on NPR’s The Splendid Table and I […]
PowerPoint inventors on the suckiness of PowerPoint
Published by June 22nd, 2007 in General, Simplicity, Concreteness, Emotion, Story and Curse of Knowledge. 10 CommentsI am strangely fascinated by the philosophical debates about PowerPoint. Edward Tufte, who’s a hero of ours, is virulently opposed to PowerPoint. I’m someone who uses it constantly, so it would be a bit hypocritical for me to rant against it. True, I think it enables a lot of our worst tendencies (being verbose, summarizing rather than […]
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