In reading "Driven" and "Made to Stick" I stumbled across an incredibly interesting idea. It's called Information Gap Theory. Dr. George Lowenstien wrote a paper about it in 1994 and it works like this: when we come across something new that is not explained by our previous knowledge or experiences, an information gap is formed. If you are a designer, creator or communicator, understanding how to use this gap will have great rewards.
Transcript: In our last post we promised a follow up for making your contribution social media ready. We have a few basic principles that if followed can help your content avoid being ignored and capture the attention of your second and third circles.
The first of these principles is to lead with passion. Find something you are passionate about and pursue it. We see so many people using social media just for the sake of using the technology or for shameless self promotion. If you aren't passionate about your work it will show in the quality. If you want your contribution to capture attention, put your heart and time into it, there are no shortcuts.
Social media and networking have fooled a lot of people and companies into thinking they are rockstars. Unfortunately the ease of access and near zero cost of distribution have created an internet that sounds a lot like this. (bad music playing) The abundance of fake rockstars have created an audience that is willing to be your friend, but not willing to listen to what you have to say, buy your product, or help you get a job.
A question I get a lot is- why dots? At first the question was tough for me to answer, but after a little introspection I came to a simple conclusion: a dot is such a basic representation that it can be anything.
Dots can be part of larger organizations, or they can go off on their own. Like you and me they have to climb social, political and workforce ladders. And like in the real world, when a dot at the top is angry the news rolls down hill. There are even some dots that you wouldn't want to see when they get angry.
While I think the simple explanation that a dot can be anything is good, I think there is a deeper and better reason.
It was put most elegantly in one of my favorite books, Understanding Comics, Understanding Comics: The Invisible Art, by Scott McCloud. Scott states "that by de-emphasizing the appearance of the physical world in favor of the idea of form, the cartoon (or in this instance the dot) places itself in the world of concepts." A good expalanation of this statement is found by looking at this set of images (see video above). In this context, all of the images are representations of me. As you progress from left to right the representations get less and less detailed until eventually I am represented by a dot. My picture is the most physical representation of me and the dot is the most conceptual.
While both represent me; they are not equal substitutes for building models, and it is this difference that explains why dots are the best tools for modeling. Imagine if I tried to model a hierarchical organization using my picture to represent each position. First this would be one scary organization and second it is difficult for someone besides me to identify with.
Moving towards a more conceptual representation makes it easier for some people to identify and possibly see themselves somewhere in this organization. This representation also makes it more difficult to judge race, gender, ethnicity, and form prejudices about the individuals.
Yet if we move to a representation of dots, it becomes almost impossible to form any prejudices against the dots; you can only judge that they are round and grey and that there are some dots lower in the organization than others. This is what explains why dots are the perfect way to model complex problems, ideas, and solutions. Because if you can't judge the dot as something that is different from you, it makes it that much easier for you to see yourself, your boss, your employee, your car, your autocompany, your president, your family, your organization, your country in the same situation as the dot or dots; which means the model will be easier for you to understand and apply to your life. This is why I use mondaydots and why I think you should too.
Thank you for watching
Scott states "that by de-emphasizing the appearance of the physical world in favor of the idea of form, the cartoon (or in this instance the dot) places itself in the world of concepts." A good expalanation of this statement is found by looking at this set of images (see video above). In this context, all of the images are representations of me. As you progress from left to right the representations get less and less detailed until eventually I am represented by a dot. My picture is the most physical representation of me and the dot is the most conceptual.
