Category Archives: Future watch

Bernie and the Samurai: how to use chatGPT to make your own entertainment

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It’s 2025.

You and your spouse are sitting down to some serious education.

You ask, “So what do you feel like?”

Your spouse says “how about Bernie and the Samurai?”

This is a favorite. You and your spouse invented it. It features Bernie Sanders palling around Elizabethan London with a Japanese Samurai. 

It’s pretty fun. You invented it, sure, but chatGPT did most of the work.

After some programming preliminaries (as below), you ask chatGPT:

Please create a script and a setting for Bernie Sanders and a Japanese samurai as they find themselves negotiating life in 16th century London.

Here’s what chatGPT delivers.

  • Bernie Sanders: Dressed incongruously in a simple but clean tunic and breeches, trying to blend in but still noticeably foreign with his thick Brooklyn accent.
  • Takashi: A stoic Japanese Samurai, wearing a nondescript cloak over his armor to avoid drawing too much attention, his katana discreetly hidden.

Setting

Location: A bustling market square in 16th century London, filled with merchants, townsfolk, and the distant sound of carriages on cobblestone streets. The atmosphere is lively yet tense, with a mix of various cultures due to increased trade.

Time: Mid-afternoon, with a light drizzle adding to the mud and chaos of the market square.

[Scene opens with Bernie and Takashi walking through a market, observing the various stalls and goods.]

Bernie: (gesturing to the chaos around them) You know, Takashi, back in my time, this would be considered quite the regulatory nightmare. How are you finding London so far?

Takashi: (looking around cautiously) It is… different from Kyoto. More noisy, more dirty. But there is strength here, too. Different, but strong.

Bernie: Exactly! It’s the strength of the people. See, back where I come from, I always argue that the strength of a society lies in its fairness. Here, I think, we could do a lot of good.

[A commotion starts a few feet away from them, where a local thief has snatched a loaf of bread and is running away. A guard starts chasing him.]

Takashi: (nods) In Japan, honor is our way of life. Dishonor, like stealing, brings shame not just to the individual, but to the whole family.

Bernie: And that’s a good point! Here, people often steal out of necessity, not dishonor. If only they had enough to begin with… Ah, it’s all about economic justice, my friend.

…

[They reach the end of the market, facing the Thames, a view of ships loading and unloading goods.]

Takashi: (looking out over the river) So, Bernie, where to next in this vast city?

Bernie: I say we find ourselves a decent pub and talk about healthcare. I’ve got some ideas that might just work, even here.

[Both laugh as they walk off towards the river, the camera pulling away to show the sprawling city of London.]

Oh, yes, listening to Bernie talking about healthcare in the plague ridden, regulatory nightmare that is early modern London, that’s going to be a beaut. 

Let’s make that episode 2. Bound to be riveting. 

So where did this idea come from?

Yesterday I was listening to the A16Z podcast. 

The topic was next-gen gaming. 

The host was Steph Smith and the guests were Andrew Chen and Josh Lu. 

The theme was creating games that “integrate seamlessly with the digital age” and “move at the speed of culture.”

Last night, I asked myself “Hey what if chatGPT could work as a game grammar.”

So this morning I asked chatGPT:

Grant: 

If I gave you 3 paradigmatic classes each with 4 items, could you assemble 1 item from each class to create a series of syntagmatic chains?

chatGPT:

Certainly! Please provide the three paradigmatic classes along with their four items each, and I’ll help you assemble them into syntagmatic chains.

Grant:

Class one should include these items: Jerry Seinfeld, Margaret Atwood, Bernie Sanders, Stuart Brand; Class two should include these items: wild comedy, deep tragedy, dark noir, tender romance; Class three should include these items: 16th century London, pre-colonial Brazil, china before the emperors, imperial Japan. Please create 10 chains.

chatGPT: 

Here are ten syntagmatic chains, each combining one item from each of your provided classes:

  1. Jerry Seinfeld – Wild Comedy – 16th Century London
    • Imagine a sitcom scenario where Jerry Seinfeld’s comedic sensibilities clash with the Shakespearean actors of the time.
  2. Margaret Atwood – Deep Tragedy – Pre-Colonial Brazil
    • A narrative exploring deep human emotions and tragic events in the lush, unexplored forests of Brazil before colonization.
  3. Bernie Sanders – Dark Noir – China Before the Emperors
    • A film noir style story where Bernie Sanders is a detective uncovering corruption in ancient Chinese states.
  4. Stuart Brand – Tender Romance – Imperial Japan
    • A love story set in the courts of Imperial Japan, infused with themes of innovation and cultural preservation.
  5. Jerry Seinfeld – Tender Romance – Pre-Colonial Brazil
    • A romantic comedy where Jerry navigates the complexities of love in the vibrant and untouched landscapes of Brazil.
  6. Margaret Atwood – Dark Noir – 16th Century London
    • A dark, atmospheric tale penned by Atwood, set against the backdrop of plague-ridden London.
  7. Bernie Sanders – Wild Comedy – Imperial Japan
    • A humorous, yet insightful look at cultural exchange as Bernie navigates the intricacies of Japanese politics and society.
  8. Stuart Brand – Deep Tragedy – China Before the Emperors
    • A tragic story exploring the loss and legacy of ancient wisdom as civilizations rise and fall.
  9. Jerry Seinfeld – Dark Noir – Imperial Japan
    • Seinfeld as a cynical detective uncovering mysteries in the shadowy corners of samurai-era Japan.
  10. Margaret Atwood – Tender Romance – China Before the Emperors
    • An epic romance novel set in the mystic and historical landscapes of ancient China, crafted by Atwood’s masterful storytelling.

chatGPT concludes: These chains creatively merge each item from your classes into compelling and imaginative scenarios across different genres and settings.

No, it’s not perfect. But it’s a first try, provoked by simple questions and dispatched in 20 seconds. 

A next stage beckons. We want to give chatGPT access to our blog posts and social media, and anything else it can find, to craft a character called “Grant.” And then it will insinuate him into the story. Personally, I would love to see what happens to me as I tag along behind Bernie and the Samurai. You know, in the mid-afternoon, with light drizzle adding to the mud and chaos of 16th century London. 

And there is a ton of creative tinkering to be done here. (Why should chatGPT have to do all the work?) What happens when we take these too predictable terms, wild comedy, deep tragedy, dark noir, tender romance and stir them a little: wild tragedy, dark comedy, deep romance and tender noir. The script begins to breathe a little. 

And that’s the end of entertainment as we know it. Who will want to sit down to watch a story written by someone else about someone else? It will all seem so very “silent picture.

[this post originally posted on Substack.]

Color is culture (disruption watch)

Watching for the future feels optional.

Watching for disruption, that’s more urgent.

One way to look for disruption is to watch our color palette.

Cause color is culture. And that means it can tell us that culture is changing.

I was reminded of this when I went to an artisanal fair in Hudson, New York. Everyone around me was dressed in autumnal hues. I had turned out in a bright yellow that can only be called nautical. (I wear this coat not because I sail, but because I am very much hoping I will not get run over when walking at night.)

Autumnal colors, good. Nautical yellow, bad. Color matters because color is culture. (Thank you, Peter Spear, for your patience with a tone-deaf visitor.)

So last night, watching TV, I couldn’t help notice this new ad for Cadillac.  Notice the riotous use of color.

This struck me especially because Cadillac recently used a very different palette, showing new models drifting through the moody, monochromatic, streets of Soho. Very quiet, very hip, very dialed down.

So what gives with all the colors? No, I’m asking. What gives?  Is this an indication of a change in culture? Is this the future whispering in our ear?

But of course, this could well be an eccentric choice on the part of the brand or the agency. That’s always possible. But let’s assume that the people at the brand and the agency is listening to culture as hard as we are…and possibly, just possibly, they think they’ve heard something, they’ve spotted a future, they have seen a disruption in the works.

As I was suggesting in the last post (How to read a t-shirt) we cannot follow everything happening “out there” in culture. We have to rely on other listeners. We have to divide the labor of our disruption watch.

The question now: Are big, extravagant colors coming? And does this suggest something in culture that might be big and extravagant too? Is the new prosperity going to change our palette, our messaging, and the messages that matter in brand building? Is the economy going to drive culture in new directions?

No, I’m asking. Is it?

Postscript.

You know who might have an answer to these questions is Ingrid Fetell Lee who, as it happens, has just published a book called The Aesthetics of Joy. For more details, see  Ingrid’s website here.

Peter Spear has a great newsletter called That Business of Meaning. I think you can subscribe here. Otherwise visit Peter’s website here.

 

How to read a t-shirt (and the future)

Listening for the future is a tricky thing.

If we listen far enough out into the future, we are dealing with very weak signals. Or, better, we are dealing with noise that may or may not be signal.

One way to solve this problem is to enlist the aid of others. To let them listen for us. We need listening stations. Where ever they present themselves. (And they are likely to present themselves in the most unlikely places.)

One example caught my attention recently.

The first came from an essay by Lauren Sherman. Sherman is an impressive journalist. She examines the fashion world broadly defined and has a gift for seeing the pattern in the whirlwind of data that comes spinning up out of this world almost daily. (She writes for Fashion of Business.)

Recently, Sherman wrote about t-shirts.

Traditionally, the t-shirt is a perfect example of a commodity market. It may begin with robust margins but it’s not very long before people are slugging it out for tiny increments barely above cost.

But Sherman noticed a company called Everybody.World was doing very nicely indeed. Everybody.World had discovered that it can sell wholesale in the very teeth of the commodity market.

There was margin here. And lots of customers. The Trash Tee was a hit with streetwear brands including Noah NYC and No Vacancy Inn. It sold to to Shake Shack, Standard Hotel, Google, Airbnb and Dropbox. It was a feature of music festivals like Coachella.

This is a god send for someone who cares about the future. The t-shirt is a message from the future, a glimpse of the world in the works.

Case study learnings (from the ground up)

1. We can’t monitor everything.

2. We enlist the help of others, listening to the listeners, so to speak.

3. In this case, the journalist Lauren Sherman surveys the fashion business and spots something.

4. Everybody.world is making a success of t-shirts (of all things).

5. This is a big and unlikely change: The lowly t-shirt, once the unloved and unlovely child of the clothing biz, and almost the classic case of a commodity market, is undergoing its own little apotheosis. It has escaped the status of an undergarment, night shirt, softball team uniform and college wear. It is now punching above it’s weight and is now the medium for some very interesting messages. There is something to learn here.

This is where the culture watching really begins.

For starters we are looking at the expression of a couple of new sensitivities. These are, or should be, familiar territory, specifically:

6. People prefer things that are recycled.

7. And they prefer things that are manufactured in America.

Let’s treat these as “so noted.”

But the rest is new to me. How about you?

8. These t-shirts reveal something astounding about music festivals. They work there because they help festival organizers speak to 20 different segments. 20! (And the t-shirts work here because these groups are not going to signify their difference with a cheap and flimsy piece of polyester.) We are put on notice that festivals, once monolithic and a little repetitive, are now various. Very various. Certainly we have absorbed the “diversity” lesson from other sources…but this kind of cultural diversity tells us something about consumer taste and preference that our economic models were never designed to content with. Are we ready?

9. These t-shirts sell as street ware. The world of fashion is changing. Design and branding comes not just from on high from the great fashion houses and god-like designers. It comes also from the fearless, endlessly provocative efforts of people who routinely break the rules of the fashion moment. (In the current world of fashion, the insurgent designer, as Scott Miller would call him, is powerful and rising.) Let’s contemplate what this means for branding and PR. If we think we can speak to the world in the big booming voice of corporate self assurance…well maybe it’s time to think again. Everyone in the marketing and innovation biz is taking a risk on new voices. (Consider Nike as a recent case in point.)

10. These t-shirts work for companies like AirBnb and Google precisely because these companies are working hard to get away from that big booming voice of corporate assurance. Nothing says playful and propositional like a t-shirt. Especially when compared to the official bumpf issued by PR at HQ.

11. The t-shirt are also a calculated effort, as expert Sophie Wade tells us, to send a message to the Millennial employee for whom all companies must now compete. A t-shirt says, “look how much fun it must be to work here! We’re, like, super casual! And also totally awesome.”

12. Perhaps the biggest take-away is the evidence these observations give us of a world in which the basic rules and regs are changing. Three worlds, to be specific. That of the Music Festival. That of the street. And that of the organization. All of them have embraced the t-shirt for their own, revealing, reasons. All of them are primed for change. Are we monitoring these changes? Have we read the t-shirt? Have we grasped its message?

The Bill Belichick disruption (and what we can learn from it)

(This post was originally published on Medium two days ago. It is reproduced here with light editing only.)

How do they do it? How do the New England Patriots win so much?

Yes, Belichick is a genius. Yes, this system is the beneficiary of continuities at owner, coach, quarterback and players other teams can only dream of.

There are lots of answers. Every football fan has pondered them.

But here’s one I hadn’t heard of.

On Get Up (ESPN), Dan Orlovsky said this about the Pats offense.

“I don’t really believe that they have wide receivers or running backs.
They just take a bunch of guys [who are] football players and they move them all over the place to get match ups. Their running backs, sometimes they look like wide receivers. Their wide receivers, sometimes they look like running backs. Edelman, Wes Welker, James White, they all kind of look the same, playing different positions.”

This Belichick innovation is something more than a clever adaptation. It’s exactly the kind of thinking we prize these days. It rises above the architecture of thought and solves a problem in a new way. This is a classic disruption, a veritable black swan. The opposition can’t see it coming until there it is on the field.

Other coaches are prisoners of convention. They start with the positions specified by the age-old architecture of football. They find the players that fit these slots. And only then do they begin the work of strategy and execution.

Belichick’s innovation says, in effect,

“We don’t have positions to fill. We have problems to solve. We have plays to run. We will ask our players to conform to the play…instead of asking the play to conform to conventional thinking. Luckily, we have players so talented they can change their stripes from play to play.”

Has Belichick been reading Complexity theory? It’s possible.

What does the Belichick disruption mean to the rest of us?

Most organizations are slaves to convention. There’s the hierarchy that distributes power. There’s the division of labor that tells people what to do. We ask our personnel to conform to these conventions. Instead of turning them loose to solve the problem at hand.

Why can’t we be more like the Pats?

Attributions

The photo is public domain.