Changethethought

I am currently at a 2 day workshop hosted by Boulder Digital Works. I have to thank the New Denver Ad Club profusely for allowing me the opportunity to be here. It means a lot to me. There are some very exciting people from within the advertising and creative industry here including the top creative minds from agencies like Modernista, Crispin Porter + Bogusky, Goodby Silverstein, etc. We are putting our heads together to try to figure out this new landscape and understand what exactly it means for the creative industry. Thus far and not surprisingly, there are no tried and true answers. Especially after the massive change in the last 18 months brought on by a technological windfall with gadgets like iPhones and iPads that are quite literally changing our lives minute-by-minute.

So far, I have met some really exciting people here. I feel like I am coming in at a weird angle where I have worked in the ad industry but also come from the creative-to-creative community side that a lot of people within the ad industry don’t consider. I spoke with a group this morning about tribalism and people moving into tribes within the digital landscape. I found that interesting. Currently I am about to listen to the head of UI at AKQA.

I will do a followup when the conference is done, but it should come as no surprise that this world we live and play in is changing dramatically and the agency/client model is struggling to keep up or even understand the changes. My question is and has been for a while, whether or not the agency model is even relevant anymore and if it can even find a way to sustain itself. Stay tuned.

written by Christopher | tags: BDW, Boulder Digital Works, Changethethought, Workshop

I have read about this program and expressed my interest in helping and/or contributing as it is here close to home. I was hoping to teach a class this fall for CU’s advertising program, but was unable to commit since I am taking a long vacation in Europe. Fall is also usually when things ramp up for me both at my job as an Art Director at Cactus and with my work for Changethethought. I am hoping maybe I can teach in the spring of this upcoming year.

Nevertheless, this looks like it could be a really good program and there are some really intelligent people involved in making it happen. I was asked to help spread the word since this is a great contribution to our advertising and design community here in Denver/Boulder. Here is what I received as a description in my inbox:

“Opening in Boulder, Colorado this August is Boulder Digital Works (bdw.colorado.edu), which is a digital program that will teach the integration of technology, business, and creative fields. This is a unique program that is the first of its kind in America. BDW has and is working with: Crispin Porter + Bogusky, Society of Digital Agencies (SoDA), Hyper Island, Modernista, IDEO, Goodby, AKQA, Google, Microsoft, EA, Facebook, Amazon, Hulu, R/GA, Twitter including FL2, The Foundry Group, Spiremedia, Effective UI-whom will recruit from BDW. At BDW business people will experiment with the technology side, creatives will embrace the business end and technologists will pitch ideas.”

written by Christopher | tags: Advertising, Boulder Digital Works, Colorado, Design