by: John Caddell
I’ve been struggling through the new book “Authenticity” by Joseph Pine and James Gilmore,
and I’ve been wondering why I’ve struggled. It’s not a badly-written
book, and I remember reading and liking some articles adapted from
their earlier book, “The Experience Economy.”
I’m also interested in the idea of authenticity (link to prior post).
But nonetheless, I’ve read the book in fits and starts. It’s been a
chore.
As I was reading it this week, an idea hit: It’s not just this book. I
would have trouble reading any book that tells companies how to “render
authenticity” through their products and services. (You can find a
dictionary definition of the word authentic here. The third and fifth definitions most closely match what we’re talking about in this post.)
The term “render” brings to mind soap factories–heavy processing, reformulation.
Authenticity
is or should be natural, intrinsic, emerging from the essence of the
thing. It’s also, to some extent, in the eye of the beholder. Facebook
has squandered some of its authenticity by its recent attempts to
monetize. MySpace’s is long gone. This is probably true of many
internet startups. In growing out of hobbies or cult experiences to
real businesses, they surrender authenticity. This is natural and maybe
not a bad thing.
Large companies trying to conjure authenticity
is a fool’s errand, in my mind. One example of “perceived authenticity”
cited by the authors is the HOK-designed baseball park,
such as Camden Yards in Baltimore and its brethren. Camden Yards, when
built, was authentic—a one-of-a-kind, new “old-style” ballpark. But
when similar HOK designs emerged in Texas, San Francisco, Cincinnati,
etc., it became merely a template. A good experience? Yes. Authentic?
No. If you want baseball authenticity, go to Fenway or Wrigley.
I recall a Jay Leno comedy routine that he performed on David Letterman many years ago. It went something like this:
“Have
you seen the new item they have in the supermarket? Soft cookies in a
package. Now, this is interesting. Fresh cookies are soft. Stale
cookies are hard. Now the food companies have discovered a technology
that allows them to make stale, soft cookies.” Spoken this way,
packaged soft cookies are not only funny, they’re unappetizing.
Authenticity is a fresh cookie. “Rendered authenticity” is a stale, soft cookie.
(Bonus: the Jay Leno routine mentioned above. The way the food
company discusses the soft-cookie idea seems like how a meeting on
rendering authenticity would go.)
Original post: http://shoptalkmarketing.blogspot.com/2007/12/rendering-authenticity.html
