Move over, solar, there’s a new power source in town.

Most of us feel naked if we don’t have our cell phones, PDAs, laptops, mp3 players, and cameras. We can’t stand being without them for a second—even when they need to be charged.

Thanks to the Fraunhofer Institute for Integrated Circuits in Germany, those charge-up delays may be a thing of the past. Forget looking for a plug. A new power supply—our own body heat—could be all we need to keep our gear going. Give your portable devices some love from your warm hands and they’ll be charged and ready to go. As detailed in the Discovery article:

The technology has already been shown to work on a wireless sensor that could be used to constantly monitor a patient’s temperature and send the information to a nurse’s station. It could also be used to power a hearing aid or to supplement the battery power on larger electronic devices, such as a sports watch or a mobile phone.

And because the circuit essentially converts waste heat into energy, it could have applications outside the body. For example, it could be used to convert the heat from radiators, refrigerators, or air conditioning systems into energy that can be reused by a building.

How does it work? The difference between the body’s surface temperature and the surrounding environment is typically only a few degrees. According to electrical engineer Peter Spies, this can produce 250 millivolts. A typical electronic device needs one to two volts in order to operate, so a charge pump stores our body-heat millivolts until they build up enough potential energy to activate a transistor and provide power!

So, an ultra-efficient way to create energy, or another reason for us to sit on our butts?

Wife of the future: “Honey, will you please walk the dog?”
Husband of the future: “Can’t, babe, I’m storing energy!”

You decide.

Somebody at city-centric website LAist spotted this rotten example of display-ad deception:

Seems like a decent deal, until you get closer.

In LA, a rose by any other name just stinks.

Six years ago today, many of us at Mind & Media stood on the rooftop deck of our Alexandria office and watched the smoke rise from the Pentagon. Our thoughts remain with the families and friends of those who perished in New York, Pennsylvania, and our home state of Virginia.

Neologisms are cool.

They really are. At least to word-nerd types like me. Nothing proves that the English language is alive and kickin’ more than the dozens of new words that are added to the lexicon seemingly daily. Some of them can be classified buzzwords (mumblecore, anyone?) but some are really useful, and we wonder what we’ve done without them (I could have used frenemy in middle school).

So naturally my word-nerdiness was piqued by Comcast’s ads for its Triple Play package—TV, phone, and Internet combo—which feature neologisms describing the people who happily enjoy Triple Play, as well as the product itself. This collection of [mostly] portmanteau words even has a portmanteau name: TripleSlanguage. See what they did there? Good stuff.

TripleSlanguage’s website features an interactive flash card for each word and a short animation illustrating its usage. I don’t know about you, but I telebinge weekly. There’s a short quiz that will declare you a Triple Slangfessor if you pass. That’s Mrs. Slangfessor to you.

The site also includes a call for new vocabulary submissions. At press time it didn’t seem as if any had been submitted—or at least not greenlighted by Comcast. Personally, I’m too busy televisiphonernetting to submit one right now, but I encourage you to try it out.

“The risk of insult is the price of clarity, and it is a price few are willing to pay.”

So wrote Roy H. Williams in his 1998 book The Wizard of Ads. That quote had formative impact when I was a tenderfoot copywriter. Almost ten years later, the words haunt me as I try to decipher ways to wield Web 2.0 influence. And that’s good; we can’t make new media all things to all people when, in fact, it requires more specificity than I ever had to sweat for a print ad or 30-second radio spot. If we try too hard to appeal to the largest possible audience, messages become murky and incoherent—but that doesn’t stop some people from trying.

Call it Silver Bullet Syndrome—a gut-wrenching affliction that’s regrettably common. Most of us have faced the indecisive decision maker who is “not quite sure what they want, but knows what they don’t want” (words that cause creeping dread), or someone who is positive there’s a perfect concept, ideal theme, or flawless sequence of words and images that will magically appeal to everyone, every time. They torture themselves, and everyone around them, looking for that silver bullet.

What a waste of talent and energy. Hoping for that kind of breakthrough and that kind of result consistently produces watered-down, ineffective messaging that does much more harm than good.

I once sat in a conference room brainstorming with a client for three hours on taglines for his Web startup. After 180 minutes, we had a list of three- and five-word phrases a mile long, any one of which would have been adequate, and a few that were quite good. But he couldn’t commit. He finally decided that he didn’t need a tagline, that visitors would figure out what his site did on their own. He was out of business in three months. Granted, that’s because his business problems were deeper than marketing, but if he had concentrated on creating an honest explanation of what his company did rather than making some ham-fisted attempt at universal appeal, perhaps he’d still be in business.

Remember that your largest possible audience isn’t that “known quantity” you’ve already identified. The largest possible audience is one you never captured in the first place because you weren’t clear enough. You owe it to yourself to be honest with your identity, and then tell the world in straightforward terms. Offend or confuse a few folks? So what? You’ll more than make it up in new adherents who get what you’re about without having to wade through obtuse explanation. And here’s the kicker: On the Web, we won’t give you that chance anyway. If we don’t know who you are and what you’re about in an instant, we’ll kill you with a click.

Stop trying to find universal communications cure-alls, messaging panaceas that appeal to everyone. Instead, concentrate on what you do well. Convey it with all the precision and clarity you can muster. Don’t waste your time and money searching for silver bullets.

This outstanding animated montage by Dan Meth and Micah Frank honors the pantheon of online pseudo-celebrities and viral vid characters. It was a little sobering to watch; so many clips with which I felt a personal connection obviously have the same widespread appeal as an episode of Grey’s Anatomy.

I felt a bit betrayed. Now I know how Weezer fans feel.

Now treat yourself to some Sly and the Family to get the annoying song out of your head (you’ll thank me).

A blog post from makeuseof.com ran up digg yesterday and got me wondering about all the lists we create. You see them posted all the time: ”My list of favorite X.” This one is pretty typical: 40 Unusual Websites You Should Bookmark.

What compels someone to construct a list like that? Considering the many companies and services mentioned, I’m hopeful makeuseof.com has not become a PR shill. So why? And why would those 40 make this list? Call it coincidence, but Seth Godin wrote a short post yesterday that hits on the topic. Is makeuseof.com an Official Influencer? Were they targeted by marketers? Likely not. With the barrage of Web applications that seem to pour onto the Internet every day, one magical thing still makes them boom or not…and it’s called “do I give a crap about what it does?” As Seth wrote:

…the most effective technique [for viral campaigns] is making stuff worth talking about in the first place. True viral marketing happens not when the marketer plans for it or targets bloggers or skateboarders or pirates with goatees, but when the item/service/event is worth talking about.

Customers, users, visitors, chumps. Call us what you will, but it’s we humans that matter, not what the application does. Make a product worth using, worth talking about, and you just may be on to something. You can try all day to make it viral, to be on as many lists as you can worm your way onto, but if Your Thing does nothing I need, ciao, baby.

The indomitable Ben Yoskovitz, the tech-savvy entrepreneurial gadfly who authors Instigator Blog, has a quick, insightful post on what he sees as the single most defining characteristic of a good leader. I’ll let him explain:

Great leaders are brave and honest. They know when they need to say, “I don’t know.” More importantly, they follow it up appropriately…

Not knowing something isn’t a problem. It’s OK to say, “I don’t know.” And in fact, it can work to your advantage as a leader by demonstrating your honesty, openness and willingness to seek the help of others.

While Ben’s advice would benefit any bigwig, it’s counsel that professionals at every level can embrace.

In a multi-team creative environment such as ours, we have clusters of experts who are used to having the last word within their skill area—the kind of smarts any client should expect to pay for.

Just as important, however, is their knowing when to lean on coworkers, checking the impact of their ideas on other phases of a concept: the writer who gets input from the producer before starting a script; the designer who talks to the writer as he or she roughs out animation; the strategist who checks in with the programmer to make sure certain functionality is appropriate.

The best professionals at any level won’t short-circuit projects by pretending they have all the answers. Just as they’ll always take the time to listen to clients, they’ll always be able to learn from one another.