Smerity (n):

Notes on Seth Godin's Your Job is to Make Art:

• The game of pinball would fail if the pins were an inch closer or an inch further apart - it's a deliberately constructed balance for maximum enjoyment
• Don't be the average - be the one with no replacement
• Ask of your product: Who is it for? What is it for? What is our best work for?
• Don't aim for the middle, aim for the edges, for those who already care and already want to hear more
• Rather than focusing on funnels focus on megaphones
• Break out of the habit of fearing being different, of fearing being the Icarus
• True artists don't ask what the client wants, they create the art with the purpose pulled from their heart and give clients the option of joining ("Full Cheetah")
• Of your customers and audience, "I see you, I hear you"
• Permission based marketing is a mailing list where the audience can unsubscribe if they decide they don't want it, that they've already bought in
• The power of tribes is the ability to convince a massive audience of fans to spend thousands to compete in an Ironman in Hawaii where they know they'll lose
• The Beatles didn't invent teens, they led them
• If you can't convince someone of your idea then you're likely convincing the wrong audience
• Be an artist, not a copyist (the first person to put an upside down urinal in a gallery is an artist, the second person a plumber)
• "If I gave you a map you would be a plumber"
• All innovation is is failing and failing and failing until you find the next thing that works
• "The person who invented the ship also invented the shipwreck"
• "There is no shipwreck free journey if you want to do art"
• "Purple cows eventually go gray"
• "When Gutenberg launched the printing press 94% of the people in Europe were illiterate. He should have waited until everyone knew how to read. There were no bookstores! He should have waited until Barnes & Noble got to Berlin!"
• "When Mercedes launched the car it was against the law to drive a car. He needed a letter from the king for his own invention. There were no roads. There were no gas stations. There were no all night drive through liquor stores!"
• "All of you are ready but none of you are prepared" / "All of you are prepared but none of you are ready"
• "There are no videos online of people successfully riding a bicycle as it's not that interesting" (whilst watching bike fail videos in the background)
• "Are you willing to own your story and own your failures?"
• "Will you choose to matter?"