The Robot Army Doesn't "Get" The Youth

Shitharperdid released a great little video today talking about the Robot Army Vs. Young Voters.



They make the point that these pollsters rely heavily on calling land lines.

Guy 1: Landlines? You mean people unaware of the sea or sailing?
Guy 2: No. Those are land lovers.
Guy 3: Right. So...What's a landline?

It's hard to argue their logic. And it begs the question, are we in the middle of a complete revolution when it comes to assessing the pulse of citizens?

At the same time, we know that only a small majority of people are the ones actually posting. Listening can have it's own issues because the most vocal do not necessarily represent the mass majority. Case and point, if you only took your assessment of the last Toronto Mayoral election based on my Twitter feed you would have been shocked when Rob Ford won.

For the next time around i can think of a bunch of monitoring and research solutions but for now, the one thing i'm pretty sure of and can agree with our video friends with on, those polls we are seeing in traditional media channels are not representing the scary votes and opinions of Canada's Youth.

Why Greatness Fails In Research: The Case Of Pie vs. Cake

Jasmin flipped me a brilliant link today around an argument as to why pie beats cake. On first read, while not only being funny, I have to say, pie on paper seems better than cake. Why? The author presents the following research:

Pie enjoyment is more sustained over the eating experience:


Cake has uneven frosting distribution:



Flavour anatomy is better with a pie:




Pie has a role in powerpoint presentations and cake doesn't:



This list goes on and on.

At first blush it's hard, no maybe impossible to refute such a strong argument. Again, on paper. But see, that's the problem with some types of research. What they don't take into count is the things you CAN'T see. What's not on the piece of paper - what you can't see is the deeper cultural implications that drive our imperfect decisions on a daily basis.

When I was 6, did my mom make me a pie for my birthday? No. She make me a cake.

Marie Antoinette. Did she say 'let them eat pie?" I think not.

Is there a show called Pie Boss, The Ace of Pie or the great Pie bake off? No, no and no.

Pie has its place but that place is not the same space in our hearts and our minds that cake has.

All of this to say, just because the research tells you so, doesn't mean it's true. Greatness can and has failed in research and if you don't believe me, just look at the case of pie vs. cake.

Networked Research: The Power Of Comments

When I first starting to seriously use blogs as part of my research mix, I tended to focus in on the postings. When printing, I used to get annoyed that I ended up with sheets and sheets of user comments wasting a lot of paper.

Strange thing though, I started to notice a change. Great postings elicit great feedback and great comments that often network me to even more interesting research, blog posts and more great comments.

Now the only question is how to appropriately cite blog comments in the footnotes! ;-)

Ps. Before anyone chides me for my old school ways of printing my research, let me just say in my defense that while I know it’s very old school I also don't know many people who can go through the amount of research I can, in the same time period I can, so don't knock my methods until you have tried 'em!

If It Quacks Like a Duck: Lessons From M & S

Great quote from this months HBR from the ceo of Marks and Spencer. In his own words

"I was trying to shake up a culture of paralysis. Hiding behind data or precedents to avoid making a decision had to stop."

ok and here's the part I loved!

"If it looks like a duck and it quacks like a duck, you don't need to send it for DNA testing to find out six months later it's a duck. Take a risk, guys. It's a duck."

The Drill Vs. The Hole: Research vs. Insights Part Deux

Love when examples come so closely after I have a posting about something. I wrote about research departments needing to focus on insights and the whys the other day and here is a perfect example. Don Tapscott. Mark Evans had a post yesterday post talking about Don's 3.5 million dollar research project on Young People and The Web. Mark paraphrases Don's talk which had this research result:

"[young people] don’t see the Web as a great technology as much as a tool to be used - much like we never saw the remote control was nothing more complicated than a tool to change channels."

You gotta wonder how the research was crafted to come out with that completely sophomoric insight. Here's my guess:

do you see the Web as:
a. technology
b. network
c. portal
d. tool to do things

Personally, I would take someone who could be insightful based on a multitude of various research studies any day of the week.

Case and point, Chris Garrett . On Mark's blog he wrote what I thought was a very insightful comment (including the part where he agreed with me ;-)

"from the younger people I have contact with I have to conclude they don’t see technology as the rest of us older folk do. It’s transparent, every day, mundane, and non-compartmentalized. We think “I will get my phone and SMS so-and-so”, they are just doing what they do. They only notice the technology when it’s not there for some reason.

We see the drill, they see the hole in the wall"

update: Mike Dover from New Paradigm Research has clarified Don's research in the comments