http://bits.blogs.nytimes.com/2009/12/21/nerd-and-geek-should-be-banned-professor-says/?partner=rss&emc=rss

And well, David Anderegg thinks I have been damaged by this or my son will be damaged by it.  Well here is my response to Mr. Anderegg.

Mr Anderegg,

Many words can have a negative connotation and when I was a child, nerd could have been one of them.  But now Geek and Nerd are words of power to my culture.  You coming along saying that they are word of damage proves that you haven’t worked to really understand the culture of nerds or geeks.  I love being a Geek.  I work in the land of IT. I do amateur photography as a hobby.  I tear apart tech to make it do things it wasn’t meant to do.  I play video games.  I love to work with wood and build things.  I love knowledge.  I am married.  I do what I can to be the best father I can.  I am working to do what I can to instill the geek into my son.  I have a solid core of friends that I can trust with my life.  I live in Mid-Michigan, certainly not a geek mecca.  I am not perfect. I have flaws but damn it, it wasn’t being called a geek or nerd that built these flaws.

I am tired of this crap thinking that we need to protect people from hurtful words.  We need to instill and build our children with the power to identify hurtful words and know how to grow from them.  I remember as a child one day clearly someone from a class older than me called me a faggot.  Now, I know didn’t know the slang of it was meant to be a hurtful words for homosexuals.  Heck, I really doubt she knew what faggot meant at that time either.  It hurt to be called that.  But it was from tone of voice and actions that made that word hurtful not the word itself.  Because of that, any word can be harmful.  What is next in your mind are we to ban the words Grease Monkey because to often in the media Grease Monkeys are reflected to be simple people working on mechanical devices?  I respect my Grease Monkey/Mechanic because he has knowledge that I do not.

It seems that the only people that sling around Geek and Nerd (or even Dork) in a hurtful way anymore are people that are jealous of the Power of the Geek.  Are you jealous of us Geeks?  Are you wishing to remove the power from us that we have build for ourselves by accepting label but then remaking the label to be one of power and status?  Are you trying to attack us and what we want of our children to be proud of what we are?

I am a Geek, a Nerd, a Dork and I am proud.  I wear it on my sleeve without fear.

Over on Twitter I decided partly as an experiment and mostly just for fun to create a sub character to my already very decidedly caricature of myself.. I created Freelance Ad Guy and since his wisdom would be sporadic at best he became a sub character instead of having a whole new account. I like to think of my Twitter account as a sitcom with an ensemble cast. Why would there be a need for Freelance Ad Guy? Well he takes all that goes wrong behind the scenes not only in Advertising and Marketing but the whole creative workplace and then relates it in an entertaining manner. Now in doing this I have offended some people because he does hit a little too close to home for some and.. well… I get to see Freelance Ad Guy as an acronym.. some people are just not very nice. The more fun ones are when I get accused of giving out “trade secrets” sure sometimes Freelance Ad Guy gives acceptable wisdom but for the most part its a joke, not to be taken seriously. I wouldn’t hire Freelance Ad Guy and I would hope you wouldn’t either. Obviously people out there are because I would’ve ran out of material before I started if Freelance Ad Guy wasn’t getting work. I look at this little Twitter show of mine as an extension of what I try to do with my interns, I don’t so much focus on teaching them how to use particular software because they should already know that, I focus on trying to impart all the things I learned the hard way doing this for almost twenty plus years. Now if they listen I don’t know but I can at least say I tried…

Today I decided to start looking into some of the aspects of my life as a designer, I’m sure though the message is relevant elsewhere.. Please let me know what you think and if there are points you’d like to read about in more detail or even just ideas for topics you’d want me to explore.

The most critical aspect of the whole design process is communication, it is also disregarded the most often. While communicating should be a natural part of designer/client interaction it doesn’t seem to work out that way. I’ve had many meetings with clients where after they have left I go to my designers and ask “what is it they really want?” I’m guilty of not being clear myself and recently that point was driven home from my personal life and has me thinking about how can I more effectively communicate my intent where preconceived assumptions contradicts the words being said. Graphic design is all about selling the viewer, be it advertising or simply just a new company logo, you can’t just jump in knowing nothing of the product. More importantly you must know the client, what drives them. I’d say in my experience the rule has been clients rely too heavily on the creative team to read minds and know what to do, I’ll also go out on a limb by saying its due to them being afraid of the creative process. Just because in the past we designed something similar for that other company doesn’t mean “Just do something cool like you did for X” is going to mean you’ll see a finished ad campaign by 5 today. Every time a client came in and gave us total creative control without any direction and short deadlines the first draft has been completely rejected. It doesn’t stop with the rejection either, the deadlines are missed and the longer the project goes the more irritable the client and everyone becomes. Now when a client has a clear message, we have fewer redesigns and revisions and the project goes smoothly and on budget, the bonus being everybody is happier. Sure things are most typically a mix of the two extremes and thats where the knowing your client really helps because both parties are more relaxed and willing to discuss problems before they become major issues.

I don’t pretend to know how to be the greatest communicator on the planet nor do I have the answers on how to become better. What I do know though is it is something we all need to be aware of when we meet with clients and ask ourselves “Am I doing all I can to put the client at ease and allowing him to express concerns and explaining the process clearly?”

In a way its like what our parents would tell us when we were children “Those bears are more scared of you than you are of them”

Go the fuck outside and play or something people, or use email, IM, SMS, or cripes the phone people.

The internet is computers…..they fails.

That is All

Organizing your workday based on tasks instead of time is a huge part in living a better personal life.  Life at least to me is about celebrating your victories, doubly so on the small ones.  When your workday is task based it’s so easy to say “I got that project done so tonight I’m going to celebrate by grilling a steak and opening that bottle of wine I bought last week for a special occasion”.  When your office is time based, well every evening is “whew! I made it through another day, let’s hope tomorrow doesn’t suck as bad”.  It can make all the difference between how successful you feel which in turn actually helps you be more successful and we all know people like to be on the winning team and when your winning you work better so you’ll keep winning.   The second part of the puzzle is to not run off promising things to your customers that even under optimal conditions would be difficult.  Yes you want to be the hero and deliver what everyone said can’t be done, but you need to honestly accept your limitations.  The surefire way to destroy your productivity is if your spending all your time cleaning up the mess because you could not make a deadline or shipped a shoddy product.  All too often making a promise that wasn’t followed through on is the biggest killer in a company I’ve seen it first hand damage customer confidence which then destroyed employee morale and with it productivity.  When your task based it becomes easier to know what you can do and allows you to set realistic goals and deliver the quality product your customers want.

It’s a hard sell but the accepted practice of working a 40 hour work week is a bad idea.  Even harder is selling the point that letting employees set their own hours gets better results and makes for a happier employee.  When I have to punch the time clock, I lose incentive to work on problems after 5 because of the delineation between “my time” and “company time”  I’ve found that if one can do their work anywhere and are allowed to do so they will complete more tasks than if they are coming into the office everyday.  It’s where things need to go if people want to have happy full lives.

There is a sickness in the land, I don’t know what it is called and the signs are both elusive and right in your face.  I don’t know how far beyond mid Michigan its dangerous grip extends but I can assure you that here its roots have taken hold deep into our culture.  The disease I’m speaking of is this notion that as an adult one must work tremendous hours for another receiving little in satisfaction and usually also in wages.  Yes the world does need these hard dirty jobs but what I’m talking about is the whole culture of mental abuse found in some workplaces.  While it’s normal to tell an individual they need to be present at their job from 8 to 5 all week, it’s not normal to then make them feel guilty and less of a person because they aren’t coming in earlier and staying later every day.  Somehow people have bought into believing that the you can only measure their worth to a company by how many hours they are seen sitting behind the desk in the office, that if they are not there they obvious are not caring about the company’s well being. Employees are believing this and employers are exploiting it.  Beyond the mental stresses this is causing for our workforce it is even worse for our economy. These same employees who feel they must been seen “giving a shit” about the company are also becoming more resentful and less productive. Having less time outside of their working hours each day they do an ever increasing amount of their  personal business at their desk, sure it starts out with scheduling appointments and making holiday purchases online but it doesn’t stay at that for long. The more you tell your employees “just be thankful you have a job in this economy” and the more “reasons” you give them to give more of their limited time to you the greater they’ll resent where they work.  Sure many of these workers will still love what they do, they’ll just dislike who they are doing it for because just getting an ever decreasing paycheck has never been proper investment in a company.  I’ve seen a lot of companies both large and small act this way I’ve also seen companies who’ve treated their employees well and not only allowed for personal growth but encouraged it, guess which type of companies are hurting or gone?

You know what I want to know really….what happened to the computer hackers, like the white hat freaks in the garage or at workbenches making stuff doing wacky tasks?  Where are the people that just want to do something for doing sake?

I don’t know if it is an age thing, something with society or what, but it seems as time is moving on, there are less people wanting to break and remake things.  I pick on the iPhone as it is one of the most popular things at the moment that is perfect to explain this.  I understand people wanting technology to just work and I understand that some do not want to hassle with things.  But to mindlessly drone forward about things seems a bit dumb too.  I know there are groups out there that have jailbreak’ed the iPhone, but in the end, that is quasi-legal/illegal.  Why?  Why are we so willing to be told how to use a piece of tech?  Why are we ok with the idea of Apple choosing what apps and functions the iPhone can do?  I understand that is just how Apple is, but why are we taking it so easily?  Why are we sheep simply obeying?

I have never liked this attitude.  I have sucked it up for 10 years now as it is really SOP of mobile phone companies.  If you didn’t know SOP is Standard Operating Procedure and if you didn’t, you have been a very lucky soul never to work in the likes of Best Buy or similar.  This SOP shit has been the main reason that I see my cell phone as just a phone, nothing else.  I cannot allow it to contain data or processes that I may truly depend on one day.  As I may need that data for something the mobile companies do not “allow.”  But now, I am wanting a smart phone of some sort and you know what, that iPhone sure is purdy.  But do I really want to have to play by more and more rules?  Seeing how Apple seems to be pulling apps or denying apps on what feels to be whims.  Why are accepting to be locked into only one carrier to only have one bit of tech?  When coverage sucks for some carriers, I should give up coverage for that bit of Shiny?

It seems that I am down to one choice in the land of phones, some sort of Blackberry, as it seems to be the most open of the lot with decent coverage but that isn’t saying much in the end.  Still, Blackberry is in the traps of only certain hardware on certain carriers.

Dammit it all, people give me a piece of tech that I can move around with and carriers make it worth while to me to be with you for allowing different tech on your system but giving me coverage.  Coverage to me is the key to the worth of a carrier.

When the idea came to write about the quality of life in Michigan I have to admit I was leaning towards believing that things were worse than the already bad it has been for some time.  Thankfully I’m surprised this is not the case. Sure, to the casual observer, my hometown seems to be in decline, which I’d wager would be the report from other small Michigan towns.  The auto industry is in decline and along with it the scores of manufacturing jobs. For those who haven’t been able to adapt to the change, they have been feeling their lifestyle slipping away for the past decade or two. For others though, Michigan has plenty to offer for great quality life experiences, with the added bonus of it being rather economical to take part in because it’s pretty much in our backyards.

This past weekend a decision was made to get away on a day trip. The rules were simple, one tank of gas and just go.  We choose to head south down highway 52 from home and that shortly found us stopping in Chelsea Home of Jiffy Mix and possibly one of the cutest towns in southeast Michigan. With a downtown full of history and art not forgetting the friendly people, we enjoyed a peaceful walk around, checked out the Purple Rose Theater and all the little shops. Unknown at the time, our stop at the New Chelsea Market set the rest of the days adventure.  I’m can’t claim to be any sort of expert on wine, in fact I’m as close to a newbie as they come, but the staff was so pleasant in helping us select a few bottles the whole experience is one we’ll be repeating again.  After saying goodbye to Chelsea we found ourselves over in Saline and ready for lunch.  The Brecon Grille, modeled after an English pub was the perfect choice for a quiet relaxed lunch for two, with the bonus of serving local, naturally raised beef and buffalo from TMZ Farms that made for some tasty burgers.  After lunch we walked on over to Spotted Dog Winery where we enjoyed tasting some delicious wines. While chatting with the owner and purchasing a few bottles to take home, we knew what the rest of the day was to be.  We decided to back track down US-12 to Tecumseh where we visited the Boulevard Market for some artisan cheeses before heading to the Pentamere Winery.  At Pentamere we tasted more wonderful Michigan wines, my personal favorite being their wonderful Harvest Apple.  Also we received further education on wine tasting and the range of wines Michigan has to offer along with a suggestion to visit the Cherry Creek Winery down the road in Brooklyn, which, of course, we did.  By now it was getting late in the afternoon and when we arrived at the old schoolhouse it was nearly closing time. Hoping for the best we went in and asked if it was alright for us to take a quick look around, not expecting to repeat the experiences we’ve been having throughout the day. We couldn’t have been more wrong, they we super friendly and allowed us all the time we wanted to look around and even asked us if we wanted to taste the wines.  After purchasing a few bottles of the most enjoyable wines we thanked the woman at Cherry Creek for her time and wonderful help, said our goodbyes and headed for home.

Without having any ideas or plans laid out before leaving home we managed to stumble upon one of our most enjoyable, relaxing days in a long time.  We learned about a region of Michigan, more about local wines and the great people producing them.  Even if we had set out at the beginning of the day to do a tour we couldn’t have visited each of the eight wineries found in the southeastern part of Michigan in a single day.  Touring wineries is not about how many you visit in one day, according to http://www.michiganwines.com there are over 60 in the state all together. No, touring is about the time you spend at each one in a relaxed atmosphere and the good people you meet.

Outside of the cost for all the wines we purchased, the expense was nothing more than lunch and a tank of gas, but the quality of the experience just as well could have cost so much more.  It’s obvious to me now that not only are there people in Michigan living a quality life but they are thriving and sharing the best this state has to offer.
This is just a small taste of all that Michigan has to offer someone looking to “live the good life” without the advantage of an investment banker’s salary.  Summer is almost here and I’m already planning future stories about other hidden (or not so hidden) gems our state has for those of us looking for something more than the gloom and doom of a bad economy.  Some links of interest if your wanting to explore the places we visited and Michigan’s wine culture on your own..

http://www.purplerosetheatre.org
http://www.newchelseamarket.com
http://spotteddogwinery.com
http://www.boulevardmarket.com
http://www.pentamerewinery.com
http://www.cherrycreekwine.com
http://www.michiganwines.com