Something different...

You never hear a client say they want "the same" or "the familiar". It's always, "I want something different," "Can we get something more... creative," "I don't want the usual political spots." If everyone one is pushing for "different," "creative," "not the usual spot," then why do we get so many spots that look alike? Because different is hard. It's so damned different. We like the familiar, it's hard-wired into our brains. Before people were people, different was bad, different got you killed. That's why today, different gets our attention.

Back in 2000, I saw these videos by Spike Jonze. He was supposed to make a campaign video for Al Gore for the convention.  In the end, the powers that be ended up making the same old video we've seen 1000 times before, and the Spike Jonze one was never seen (or at least not promoted). Take a look, tell me in the comments what you think. Personally, I think it's brilliant -- I see Gore as a person -- goofy, yes, but with a family that loves him and that he loves intensely. It's real and honest, too; funny, people thought he was the liar... if we could only show him as authentic... oh.

Look, the video quality sucks, the shots aren't perfect, but it doesn't matter -- the story, the honesty, the emotion is there so we (or I) go with it and don't care about those other things. Is it different?  Hell yes.

The video is in two parts. Take a look, would you have shown it at your convention? I would have.

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QDhv15EKJNo]

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iO-SxPnzspQ]

Look, you can go too far with different, sure -- mostly it's because you're trying so hard to be different, you're not trying hard enough to be good. But there is a happy middle ground where different gets our attention and shows us something new, we just have to get used it. I guess the moral of the story is you have to be ready for different if you want it.