Editing the Brand Image: Forgeries, Branding, and Network Theory in the Digital Playground
by anonymous
Abstract
Branding creates a sharply uneven cultural and economic landscape.
In the modern world, the realization of the brand towers over us all. This is unhealthy for competition, individuality, expression, and society as a whole. This essay proposes a method to devalue the brand image in the same way it is established, through the intentional deception of the general public using art - through construction of a forgery.
Examples are given of three different categories - content, technical, and social - and it is shown how they can be effective in the modern struggle against brands.
The importance of the digital stage is established, its characteristics, advantages, and problems are outlined. A model of influence and content spread is defined. Network theory is used to explain the dissemination of ideas, how to identify targets of strategic importance, and how to measure and track the progress, uptake, and success of injected content. Each category of network - content, technical and social - is broadly covered, with pointers to further research and required knowledge.
In conclusion, a general campaign checklist in targeting a brand is outlined. Using the understanding discussed in branding, modern concepts of forgery, network theory, and researching the network, a plan of action is formed.
"The essential feature of the art of forgery is not imitation, which may have many other motives, but the intention to deceive either the general public or an individual."
Concept: Hoaxes and Forgery
Forgery is a concept that has existed for thousands of years.
Famously, in art forgery, counterfeiters duplicate an artist's style, often for financial gain. I want to highlight some more modern methods, and uses, for forgery. As it becomes increasingly difficult to benefit financially from art in the modern age due to the ease of the digital copy, there is another motive for forgery that takes advantage of the speed of duplication.
Enter the "hoax."
A hoax is currently defined as "A deliberate attempt to deceive or trick an audience into believing, or accepting, that something is real, when the hoaxer knows it is not." This is the perfect definition for deception in a virtual world. The motives behind hoaxes widely vary: practical jokes, social change, attempts to expose the credulity of the public or media, in addition to financial gain or profit. Although it is possible to use the methods I outline for financial profit, this is not my focus.
I will concentrate on how we can use forgery for social change.
Brand as a Name
In this world of money and computers, the concept of the brand is king.
Modern industry has developed into establishing and promoting brands. The brand establishers make a huge amount of money. Their work is everywhere, from TV adverts and billboards to online adverts.
From the artist, small to corporate company, the concept of modern marketing, "bringing a product to market," is focused on establishing the artist, individual, company, or corporation's "brand name" on digital media.
Power of Names
By targeting the brand name, icon, or brand image, we can devalue the brand in the same way the brand is valued through creation and association of content - text, images, video, audio or a combination - to that brand.
Branding
Brand names are established by associating "values" - attractive aspects of life - to a name.
Modern branding works by establishing a link between attractive aspects to a brand through sensory communication, and in the case of TV and video-based advertising which is widely regarded to be the most effective form of advertising - it involves multiple senses at once.
Just as the branding industry works to associate attractive aspects of life to a brand name, we can play the game. By associating aspects to a brand name through our own content, we can move to define the brand name to be whatever we choose.
Increasingly, in modern TV advertising and branding, the attractive aspects of life described have absolutely nothing to do with the brand's real effect on the world.
They are becoming so separate that most do not even mention products, prices, or company information. This also gives us, the potential subversive brander, an increasing freedom to create content that will associate general concepts and aspects with the brand we target, as audiences are used to this dichotomy.
Satire and Spoof
A lot of modern attempts to tackle established brands, as seen from content on the world's largest video sharing site, focus on spoofing a "brand image"-defined as a collection of previous associations that brand establishers have formed through advertising.
They attempt to show how different the brand image is to the actual impact of the brand on the world - usually by exposing the real aspects of the creation and purchase of the brand's products.
These brand spoofs often involve satirical comedy.
Most of them get a few laughs, and are spread based on the clear humor of the conflict. These spoofs are important statements in their own right, and are effective in making a large group of people consider the falsity of modern advertising and branding. Certainly humor can be very effective in devaluing brands - the embarrassing exposure, or the comic deflation of the artificial fantasy.
However, I do not think that these spoof videos are as effective as they could be in reducing the power of brands.
Some Examples
Here I will detail three different examples of forgery, based on the work of three famous forgers, and I will show how they can be applied to the modern struggle against the brand image.
Vermeer Forgery
Take the artist Han van Meegeren.
He is regarded as one of the most ingenious art forgers of the 20th Century. His forgeries of the famous artist Johannes Vermeer were characterized by a long and detailed study on the paintings and work of the artist.
His forgeries were so clever that he famously duped even the National Socialist leader Hermann Göring. When Hermann was told that his Vermeer painting was actually a forgery, "Göring looked as if for the first time he had discovered there was evil in the world."
From this story, we can see that there is a actually a much more subtle, and powerful, method of working against brands. From studying marketing, advertising, and branding, we can build up an accurate understanding of the process of value association and the creation of brand image.
If you create content that involves very similar themes and styling to the brand image that you are targeting, there is a much better chance of the content being accepted and spread by the media.
If you study the development of your targeted brand, you can use the brand's previous efforts to establish value associations to your advantage. If you develop your content to be based on previous established brand values and styling, you can create content which achieves a subtly different branding vision, and it is much more likely to be accepted and distributed.
In effect, you will be building on what has gone before, to achieve a different view of the brand in your audiences' perception.
If you are targeting a brand in this way, then the chances are you already have a message in mind that you wish to pass on. Once you have built up a convincing counterfeit of the brand image, you are free to alter it in a subtly different way, to get your message across.
You can work your message into the existing themes defined by the brand image, or you can create a deliberately slightly imperfect image. One that looks like it originated from the brand, but is of poor quality.
Maybe a typo in the most important persuasive statement. Maybe a visual artifact that casts doubt on the authenticity of the lifestyle fantasy. Make the brand image look less than fulfilling.
You should create for your audience.
Just like the marketers, you should have a very clear idea of your target audience before you start developing your content, and work on making your message appeal, so your content can spread. After studying your chosen brand image and previous advertising campaigns involving it, study marketing, the psychology of advertising, copywriting, and, in particular, the relatively modern technique of viral marketing.
If you create your content subtly, convincingly, and cleverly, you will be able to make content believable enough to pass most attempts at validating authenticity, while simultaneously achieving the goal of disseminating your message to a large number of your target audience.
This is a content focused forgery, and will require study of current advances in marketing, brand images, and a detailed artistic replication.
Bernhand Forgery
Another tactic is Bernhand forgery.
Named after a National Socialist plan to flood the English monetary system with counterfeit banknotes, it was the largest counterfeiting operation in history. The idea is if you flood a brand's audience with cheap copies of the brand image, the brand image will be devalued, and legitimate branding attempts will be hampered.
It is similar to the entertainment industry's attack on digital piracy - a huge number of imperfect duplications of content are spread across the piracy channels, so finding a complete copy of the content becomes as difficult as finding a needle in a haystack.
This type of method can take advantage of a common property of our technical age - the filtering of spam.
If you study common terms used in your brand's image establishment and communication, and create a sufficiently saturated forged distribution of these terms, you can "teach" the largest distributed spam filters to disregard content that is similar in nature to your target brand's communication.
Similar tactics such as "Google bombing" and "spamdexing" are relevant, and a combination of these can seriously hamper growth of a brand's online image and success.
A lot of work on distributed content flooding, spam, is public, and there is a lot of freely available information on spam filtering and aspects of machine-based language processing. It would be easy to quickly, and anonymously, test and refine your technique, as most filter systems are automatic and easily accessible. You should look into the technical side of online marketing - including search engine optimization - as these processes of establishing online brands can be used against them.
This is a technology focused forgery, and will require study of current advances in technology as well as a detailed technical implementation.
Bluewater Forgery
Taking advantage of the news media to disseminate your message is an example of a forgery recently made famous by a group of German filmmakers.
Sensationalist, rumorhungry, and trying to keep up with an increasingly fast-paced digital world, the modern press is vulnerable to manipulation.
A fictitious news item stated that there had been a suicide bombing in the city of Bluewater, California. Targeting the German media, it was accepted by the German national news association, and from there, was spread to several news sources, and on to most of the German public.
The story involved an elaborate hoax, including a believable, but fictional, news video. The news item and video claimed to product of an independent news agency. A forged Wikipedia page was also involved, with several phone numbers.
The hoax began with a phone call to the Deutsche Presse-Agentur (DPA), the national association of German news agencies. A hysterical journalist, who said he belonged to a Californian news agency, passed on the news story of a suicide bombing. When the DPA attempted to verify the story, they contacted the phone numbers mentioned on the forged Wikipedia page. These phone numbers were the numbers of other members of the hoax group who, of course, confirmed the story for the DPA.
In reality, the city of Bluewater never even existed.
The forgery took advantage of networks of trust.
The way the news is reported, the type of news that is popular, the current fear of terrorism, the increasingly diminishing time that press reporters have to verify a breaking story - these were all exploited.
Although this did not specifically target a brand, it is an example of very successful modern news manipulation. A well-forged press release disseminated on the global newswire, some edited photos showing the public embarrassment of a representative of a large brand, or a believable rumor concerning a possible merger between the target brand and another company can be enough to cause significant problems for any brand.
This is a social-based forgery, and will require information about how the targeted type of news media works, knowledge of the web of trust of the target network, a detailed picture of public opinion on the brand, and some persuasive acting.
Modern Advantages
There are several advantages to creation and distribution of forged content in the online world.
The major advantages of forgery in the digital medium include ease of manipulation and duplication combined with the high anonymity and level of obscuration possible.
Content Manipulation
In this modern world, there are a huge number of ways for content to be digitally manipulated, subtly altered, or forged.
It is easier than ever before; the current crop of image manipulation software can work magic in skilled hands. To a lesser extent, the same is true with audio and, increasingly, video editing. Text is by far the easiest to manipulate. Combined, these options offer a vast realm of possibility to the creative individual.
Content Duplication
The ever increasing network of networks is the perfect stage for rapid duplication of content. Content is distributed in the blink of an eye.
You can quickly reach several hundred people at once who can then reach several hundred people each, if they choose. Potentially, the spread of your content can reach exponential levels if properly planned and delivered.
Anonymity and Masquerade
As you will be creating a forgery, you will want to disguise the origin of your content.
Again, the digital world offers far more chances to do this. Anonymity, building up a fictional identity, and identity impersonation can be achieved much easier than ever before. Technical knowledge on this is freely available.
Potential Problems: The Very Real Legal Issue
Brands are protected from subversion in this way by a number of different rules, which are established in several, highly relevant laws in many countries.
By attempting brand subversion through actual forgery, you may be breaking not just one law, but several.
However much of a rebel you might feel at the moment, weigh that up with the sobering thought of the consequences if you are caught. At the very least, you should be aware of your legal situation. I obviously can't advocate breaking the law in any way, so I highly recommend you research what is legal and what is not, and make sure you are definitely on the right side.
Don't doubt that what I am detailing here amounts to the brand establishers' worst nightmare.
Brands are very powerful in today's culture, and you can bet that the larger ones have a small army of public relations, online marketing people and, yes, lawyers who spend a significant amount of time trawling through the Internet looking for attempts to discredit the brand image, and dealing with them. To succeed, you will have to be smart.
Digital Signing and Cryptography
The concept of "public key" encryption on the Internet has been around for a long time.
It has made electronic commerce possible, and allows for a reliable method of encoding communication so that it cannot be tampered with. Related is the method of electronically "signing" content - for example, email - so that the origin and identification of the author can be mathematically "proved." Digital signing always works.
This probably will not cause as many problems for you as you might think.
As a forger motivated by social change, you will be working through public information channels. Digital signing and public key encryption are only heavily enforced in electronic transactions involving fund transfer. Although there was, and still is, a movement to encourage every netizen to use digital signing, this has not gained widespread acceptance.
You will need to be of a technical mind to know where encryption might be a problem.
If you visualize problems, then study cryptography. There are several social-based attacks on the math "public key" concept that you can use to your advantage. You can map out the social and trust web of public-key exchange using network theory, and subvert the hubs, as explained below.
Anonymity is Essential
Anonymity is essential for any forgery, and digital anonymity is vital for your safety and success in any online forgery.
Look up the concept of "crypto-anarchism" on Wikipedia. Although you might not be doing anything more than making an important social statement, a large number of people will not see it that way, and so you have to be prepared to cover your tracks. The more daring the forgery, the more important this becomes, and the more worried you have to be.
The basic elements:
1.) Hide your physical location. Online, your physical location is defined by your IP address. This digital post code allows you to be traced back to your Internet provider, who has details of your real address. There are a number of ways of forging this.
2.) Don't ever use names that can be connected back to you. I've already discussed the power of names. It applies to you, too. Common false names or handles can still be used to link everything you create back to you, they are a description of your identity of yourself, they can be used to catch you out.
3.) When creating content, hide common characteristics - i.e. your personal style or language - which can be used to tie together your content output and help establish your identity. The language and common characteristics of content you create can be reduced to an identifiable style or a signature under analysis. This is dangerous if you create risky content and it is high profile. Modern pattern recognition software is very advanced, and can be used to highlight similarities in your work. Linguistic, behavioral and cultural analysis can be used to identify your country of origin, level of education, political views, social class, and so on.
4.) Keep all content clean of technical watermarks. A very easy mistake to make, if you are not technically inclined, is neglecting to strip out the software application watermarks in content creation. The modern word processor document, for example, contains a lot of information on your computer, the version of the software you are using, sometimes even the name of the user you log on as. I would always use plain ASCII text. Similar watermark traps exist when you create other content using mainstream software: videos, audio, all types of content. You should know enough about the content filetype you are creating to remove these watermarks.
5.) Be aware of your permanent digital trail. Every move you make online will be recorded, permanently, in some database. When injecting content onto websites, forums or discussion groups, be aware that several major search engines are likely to index its emergence, with a reliable timestamp. Several other web archiving projects routinely archive huge numbers of websites for various purposes. Even innocent online research can be traced back to you. Stay away from major search engines which require you to establish an account and especially major social networking sites. Any organization that collects information on your online behavior and habits, even if their intention is to build up a marketing profile of you, is dangerous. There are plenty of anonymous browsing methods that you can use, if you will be doing something risky, look them up and take advantage.
6.) Keep the number of people you trust with information that might be dangerous to you - your web of trust - as small as possible. For each person you trust with information that may be dangerous to you, your risk is magnified. You'll have to make sure that they follow all the above requirements for anonymity, you'll have to make sure they give it as much significance as you, and you'll have to make sure they continue to do this as long as the risk is still present. This is a major headache which doubles with every person you trust. Every controversial community that you are a member of, is an association that identifies you and increases your risk, even if only slightly. Many digital renegades have been caught out through not being aware of their own network of trust, and not realizing that, given enough motivation, agents from other organizations will try and infiltrate it, using the same methods as I outline in network theory below. If the risk is great, often it may be best to work in isolation.
Your Risk
You need to be able to accurately determine the risk of your actions to yourself.
Always consider risk before acting. If you can't accept full responsibility for the risk you take in any implementation of these ideas, then I wouldn't read any further. The major theme behind this essay is that you can make your own destiny, and if you can't see that, then you're obviously not a person that these hypothetical musings were intended for.
Use your intelligence.
Network Models: What is Network Theory?
There is an emerging idea in academia that notes a similar, connected model of group organization.
These models are present across science, from the anatomy of complex cellular structures and the structure of neurons in the brain through to the organization of social communities and the properties of computer networks.
The one area where the new science of network theory irrefutably dominates is online. The common structure of computer networks is a fact.
In the case of social networking - the new online grouping of communities that come together to connect, write comments to each other, post pictures, and other such newly discovered necessities - network theory also is clearly apparent.
When you map out the friendship and communication connections between each person in an online community, you come across a similarity to the organization of computer networks. Again, if you map out the basic attributes of the World Wide Web - the connection between web pages and links between web pages - it's another type of the same network.
Discovered by mathematicians trying to develop a connected theory of everything, it is still very much an early science, but offers huge promise. If you investigate the concept on Wikipedia and a certain video-sharing site, you will find some useful information.
By far the best way to explain network theory is visually and, although I am not going to include an image in this essay, you should find many diagrams on the Internet, and I encourage you to search for them. In case you're not already familiar with network theory, the next few paragraphs will explain the basic concepts.
Why Network Theory?
Network theory has been used by many different intelligence organizations.
Marketers, digital researchers, social anthropologists, sociologists, military think-tanks, computer virus writers, communication analysts, government agencies... they all have heavily used this model of mapping out the topology of influence and the spread of effect of an idea.
Nodes, Links and Hubs
The basic general features behind network theory are the concepts of the node, the link, and the hub.
Take the web.
Every web site is a "node." Most web sites have a number of "links" to other web sites. If you click on them, you will be transported to another web site. Some web sites have a huge number of links pointing to them.
Take the world's most prominent videosharing site.
If you chose to count the number of links you see pointing to that web site, you would be there for a very long time.
On the opposite end of the scale, a dusty, old personal website of a professor in academia may not have very many links pointing to it. Especially if it hasn't been updated very recently. We can say that the major video-sharing site is a "hub" because, just like a major transport hub, there are many "links" leading to it.
Chain Letters and Memes
There is an important concept on the Internet, known as a "meme."
It's the definition of an idea that is spread quickly through the "nodes" - in this case, users of the Internet - such as you and me. You know those chain letters that you forward on to your friends? That's an example of a meme. Huge numbers of people receive those chain letters.
Let's go into why.
As a very simplified example, let's suppose that the length of the "chain" is six. That means that, on average, the chain letter gets passed on six separate times from the originator. Their different stages are not important, but we will refer to each stage by a letter, A-F.
Let's assume everyone in Group A passes it to Group B who passes it to Group C, and so on.
These groups are part of a chain. Look at the equation below. If you imagine replacing groups A-F with the average number of people in each group, i.e. instead of "A" you write "30" and instead of "B" you write "50," it adds up to the number of letters sent in the chain.
Even assuming the rather small group sizes, this a very large number. Probably larger than the number of people you'll meet in your lifetime.
Now let's say that you wrote this chain letter. Congratulations! You've just created an letter that more people will read than you ever imagined possible.
That is the way networks work, and also why network theory is important in spreading digital content.
A Spider Web
If you want to better visualize the spread of an idea on a network map, instead of a chain, imagine a large web of a spider.
A spider's web is formed of several stages of circles.
At the centre of the web, the circle is very small, at the edges of the web, the circle is at the widest. Your idea starts at the centre and, as it increases in spread, it reaches each new stage, achieving a larger circle of influence, until it reaches the biggest circle of the web, at the edges. It can be compared to the ripple effect of a single drop in a bowl of water - as the idea gains momentum, the spread becomes quicker.
Target the Hubs
On a any network map, hubs are of great strategic importance to spreading your idea.
On your favorite social networking site, for example, hubs are those friends of yours that talk to everyone, have 500+ friends added, and whom lots of people comment on everything they write. The popular kids.
If you can convince several of these "hub" friends of the merit of your idea, enough so they post it up on their profile, then your idea will instantly spread very quickly. If you pass it on to just three of your friends with 500 friends each, and convince them to post it, that's a massive number of people you have reached with your idea already, even after assuming that several of them have shared friends.
In social groups, these hubs are known as "connectors." They know many more people than you could reach individually and if you convince them, then your idea will spread like wildfire.
Manipulating Content Networks: Viral Marketing
The world of online marketing has, of course, discovered the power of chain letters at reaching a large number of people.
They attempt to use the findings of network theory to reach as many people as possible, by devising content that they think will be attractive to a large number of people, and by making it easy to pass that content on to friends.
An example is the number of applications and seemingly trivial little games that you can play with your friends, and are attached to your profile on your favorite social networking site.
Those games are fun, aren't they? Yes, but they also have a less amusing purpose.
They read your personal profile, and store the information on you, and your friends, in a large database somewhere on the Internet. If you find this difficult to believe, I apologize, but it is true.
What do the marketers do with this collected information? Sell it. To companies who specialize in matching up your interests with an appropriate advert that, delivered to you personally, is going to make you buy more stuff.
If you were looking for reason to target brands, and beat the marketers at their own game of spreading content and building up brands, that is a good reason on its own. By all means, do some independent research if it's difficult to accept.
Difficult Content? Tone it Down
Your idea, or content, should be easy to swallow for the community you are targeting.
Don't be controversial, as you will be struggling against the aggregate total of all the "reserve" in your network. That is why, if you are taking a content-centric approach like the Vermeer forgery above, I suggest subtle messages.
For example, a content-centric forgery when you want to impersonate a famous person, through a social network, should:
- Match closely with the views of the famous person you are trying to forge.
- Be written in the style of the famous person.
- Play on general public opinion on what he would say next.
- Make people believe that it has originated from an official source.
Don't make the mistake of content forgery on a social network under your own name because, although it is probably the widest existing connection that you might have online to at lot of people, it is difficult to pretend that the originator is someone else, and it is easy to trace back to yourself.
Of course, whether content is difficult to digest by each participant will very much depend on the network itself. An academic network consisting of mathematicians will prefer vastly different content than an online forum of chefs.
Manipulating Technical Networks: It's a Binary World
If you are not familiar with the technical foundations of your network, and you are attempting a technology-based forgery or spread, in this technical world you are a zero.
You will need to accumulate sufficient technical knowledge, which will likely be very difficult if you don't have a technical leaning or you need to find someone with the sufficient technical knowledge you require.
Specialization
Unfortunately, most technical people in this complex age specialize in a certain type of technology.
So it can be difficult to find and convince someone who will be willing and able to help you. That is a general problem that is up to you to solve. I have deliberately spent very little time on technical network knowledge because there is a vast amount to know, it's all quite specialized to the network type, and I assume you are already at least somewhat familiar with technology if you are reading this.
The good news is, if you are of a technical persuasion, you will know that everything you need to know is freely available online for you to study.
Manipulating Social Networks
If you are working towards a social-based forgery, then you will need to build up a network of trust.
This is particularly true if your idea is controversial or your forgery difficult to believe. The more controversial, the more work you will have to put into establishing trust.
Networks of Trust
You can model the spread of information through an social organization on a network theory model of trust.
Certain individuals have a large amount of authority in an organization - the hubs. If you can persuade enough of them of your idea, then you have effectively conquered the organization and won the collective trust of the organization as a whole. When sales people call up businesses, they try and target these decision makers - the hubs of authority - as they know that they will convince the rest of the idea, and sell the product.
Selling ideas to an organization works on a contact basis.
It is a gradual process of convincing the little guy of the merits of your idea, who may then give you an audience with his manager and, if you convince him, then he might put you in contact with his friend in finance, who will land you the deal.
To successfully infiltrate an organization with a controversial idea, you will need to get them to trust you. You will need to build up a network of trust. From the initial chance encounter with the guy at the coffee shop, up to the important meeting with the CEO, each step taken must be a step of obtaining trust.
Set Objectives
You need to establish your target decision maker - the person who is in a position to convince the entire organization.
Make sure you target the right people to get to him.
This requires an understanding of whom is the most influential in the organization. If you spend two weeks chatting up the receptionist, as much as you enjoyed it, that time might have been better spent talking to Barry in IT who knows Sam in management, and so on. It's important to note that the structure of social influence can be quite different to the hierarchical structure of the organization!
People are only human, and many do not have the best relationship with their hierarchical superior.
Building Trust
Each person you talk to, you have to get them to trust you and your idea. This can take time.
The important thing to remember is that every contact is different. They each have very different, personal objectives for being in the organization and so they will have different motivations for furthering your idea. The sooner you get to know them, and take an interest in their lives, the easier it will be to set forth an argument that is likely to persuade them of your idea.
Tip of the Iceberg
This is just the beginning - the tip of the iceberg.
There are so many things you need to know about building up networks of trust. Being amiable, taking an interest, and developing trust is a very real skill, and there is a reason why top sales consultants are paid so much money - because they're very good at what they do.
If you are looking at this document and have a very technical background, it may be worth spending some time researching sales and this building of trust. It will be very relevant to what you are doing and, although I am not the best teacher of the subject, I very much understand its importance.
Further Research
It is essential that you select appropriately, and study, the network on which you are planning to further your idea. Each network has its own aspects. Although in abstract it is true that most networks adhere to network theory, each also has very different and unique properties.
If you study examples of content on your target network - the language, structure, themes, and ideas that are common in popular content - and make a point to avoid the mistakes of existing unpopular content, you will be better placed to create influential content.
If you study the common properties of the nodes and, if they are significantly different, the differences and motivations behind each position that you want to influence, you will be able to engineer spread more easily. Consider making a numbered list of the most important nodes in your network and describing a method of influencing each.
A general knowledge of the different categories of network, which I've started to provide here, is a good idea, particularly as several modern networks fall into more than one classification. I would suggest that you study recent advances in network theory in general. There is a lot of very interesting and relevant academic work available to help you, particularly on the spread of content.
Here are some general themes for further research, sorted into the broad type of network:
- Content-based network? Study the image you are trying to forge, memes, and viral marketing.
- Technical-based network? Study the technology that defines the nodes in your network, and how information passes between those nodes.
- Social-based network? Study sales, the art of persuasion and the building up trust. In terms of literature, I would define the following as very important for any casual observer:
- Naomi Klein - No Logo - A book you must read. Explains the current state of branding.
- Albert-László Barabási - Linked: The New Science of Networks - A good introduction to network theory.
- Niccolò Machiavelli - The Prince - Still highly conceptually appropriate.
A General Methodology
Once you think you have enough basic knowledge on general network theory and branding, and you have made absolutely sure that you are not about to break any laws relevant to you, here is a general action plan for brand subversion, based on digital brand establishment models:
1.) Establish achievable, realistic goal.
- What can you achieve?
- What do you want to achieve?
- How will you measure success?
2.) Pick your brand.
- Have morals and reasons. If you don't, you are far worse than a viral marketer.
- That said, don't take on any targets that you cannot overcome.
- Be very aware of the risks.
3.) Discover the best network to spread your message.
- What would be the most important in realistically achieving your goals?
4.) Learn all you can about the characteristics of the network.
- Identify hubs.
- Find and study examples of existing content: what is popular and what is not.
- What makes this network different than others?
- How will you track spread? Develop a metric.
5.) Develop appropriate counterfeit content.
- Study in detail who or what you are trying to impersonate.
- Identify the most powerful message you can get away with.
- Develop an artistic statement.
6.) Target appropriate hubs.
- Weigh up the ratio of the realistic chance of influencing that hub with the potential spread improvement that success will mean.
7.) Inject your content.
- Make sure you remain anonymous if there is any risk to you at all.
- Use the appropriate technical methods of obfuscation to realize the required masquerade.
- Use technical methods of fast contentduplication and distribution.
8.) Spread tracking.
- Use your chosen metric to measure spread and effectiveness of the campaign.
- Learn as much as you can from the success or failure of the campaign, and use that to inform future campaigns.
"Ads and logos are our shared global culture and language, and people are insisting on the right to use that language, to reformulate it in the way that artists and writers always do with cultural material."