Big Idea: Madison
Rules? What Rules?
Maya Lin received a B+ for her Vietnam War Memorial concept while an undergraduate at Yale University. Her unconventional design stood in stark contrast to the other 1,400 entries in the competition. But controversy surrounded her until the monument’s completion in 1982. The prevailing attitude at the time was that monuments should rise heroically above the landscape like the Iwo Jima Memorial sculpture and the Jefferson Memorial, which is based on the Pantheon in Rome. The formula for monument design dictated that any typography on memorials should be a minimum of three inches in height. Maya Lin’s Vietnam wall violated[.....]
Without Passion, Social Media is just Noise.
What connects us? Social networking is taking over the world. I keep track of my kids who are scattered around the world on Facebook; the same with my brother and sisters and their kids; with old friends, too. Why are these people in my network? Because I have an emotional connection with them. We have shared experiences and, while our politics and walk of life may vary, we are emotionally attached. When one does something special, it gets passed around to all their friends and family. Recently one of my daughters participated in a protest in our state capitol. She[.....]
How Branding Can Position an Entire City in the Global Competition for Jobs.
This blog entry originally appeared at In Business on January 4th 2011. As a place to start and grow a business and family, Madison is a good place to be. The city’s many kudos are well deserved. But the community’s self-concept as exceptionally intelligent and creative is starting to raise significant questions in the minds of many: Is it making us averse to change out of fear we’ll lose the great quality of life we already have? Is it blinding us to how other communities are innovating faster, and more boldly than we are? Is it making us overconfident that[.....]