Thursday, December 19, 2013

Things that suck.

Conference calls when you're at a mix or an edit session. They're assurance that you won't do either job well, the call or the session you're in..."Free" things like Facebook, Google, et all. Their market valuation is based in part on the value of your data. Which they sell for billions of dollars to maintain the illusion of free....Meetings that run from 12-2, thus obviating lunch....People who bludgeon you with their kids' girl scout cookies....Agencies that don't close between Christmas and New Year....Account people who call you for "urgent" meetings, then show up 11 minutes late....Creatives more concerned with the hours they're scoped for than the quality of work....The charade of 'working from home'....Corporate expense systems that make US Government Health Exchange websites look as simple as an A-B-C reading primer....To that end, spending a billable hour at $400/hr. trying to get reimbursed for $24....Senior people who speak before listening....All people who speak before listening....Agency Christmas videos. They're invariably un-funny and too long and say nothing good about the agency that produces them....The "insight-ization" of every asinine blurt....People who use the word "bucket." It's an ugly word...2% raises after 2 years when you can read in the trade press that the holding company chieftains upped their pay 26%....Likewise crappy bonuses alongside new cars in the agency lot....Our lack of memory. Remember when Facebook 'likes,' Google +, Second Life and scads of other new new things were going to change everything....wool caps in the summer....neck tattoos....the idea of paper-less-ness. You need paper to write things on....conference call hold music....people who have 'hard stops' and soft brains....office moves where you get one box....the idea that producing decks is equivalent to producing work....briefs that take four weeks to write leaving four days to create work....jargon. A list too long to enumerate....Bad spelling....103-page decks....People who call themselves 'story-tellers' who can't put four coherent words together....People who can't get in before 11 and then are too busy to help out when you need it....theory....Open-plan work spaces....Management who pretend open-plan work spaces are 'efficient,' though they keep their private offices...Open-plan work spaces where people have fish for lunch...stock photography....social media strategy....best practices....calls to action as a substitute for compelling reasons why....jargon in all its Orwellian forms...

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