« November 16, 2003 - November 22, 2003 | Main | November 30, 2003 - December 6, 2003 »

November 26, 2003

Cool towns + 'hollywood model' = CoolTown Studios

CoolTown Studios and the content on this daily blog represent the growing trend of creatively entrepreneurial urban villages that are filling the emotional and financial holes in people's lives.

It's oftentimes difficult to explain this vision. While it's far easier to understand by people who have lived and worked in places like Greenwich Village, Cambridge and the West Bank of Paris, perhaps learning the meaning behind CoolTown studios will help.

'Cool' - as defined on Monday's blog, is taking the collective definitions of 'cool' by future tenants and residents and translating that into a...

'Town' - "any large, closely populated place; an urban area with a fixed boundary that is smaller than a city". We're not talking about building cities (that takes decades), or neighborhoods (usually just housing), but places you can live, work, shop, play and learn with an identifiable town center.

'Studios' - as defined on Tuesday's blog, is based on the increasingly popular and effective customization-oriented hollywood model of bringing the best people together with the best leadership to create the best product. Efficient, cost effective, inspiring, fun and often prolific.

Posted by Neil | Link to Article

November 25, 2003

Learning from Hollywood's movie studios

In a matter of a year or two, a handful of visionaries are able to initiate a business venture that generates $20-$200 million of profit within a few weeks of product introduction, gaining national recognition at the same time, and even changing people's lives.

This is the film-producing norm for Hollywood's movie studios, known as the Hollywood Model, a term popularized by Dr. Charles Grantham and his research on productive modern work trends. The movie studios act as a catalyst for, in Grantham's words, "executive producers who commit to turn a "story" idea (a business problem or a project concept) into reality. They then assemble the cast, crew, and other resources needed to make the "production" a reality and to create positive, cost-effective change."Then they disband, or exit stage left so to speak.

The need for a more flexible, project-focused, distributed work model became evident post Sept. 11, as described here. While it forced people to change work habits, it also allowed them to discover new opportunities for increasing both their quality of life and productivity.

The goal of CoolTown Studios is to build a community of diverse, prolific talent (a local Hollywood) that builds project-specific teams amongst themselves to produce award-winning 'movies' (ie new best-selling products, services and experiences).

Posted by Neil | Link to Article

November 24, 2003

So what is a 'CoolTown', really?

Here's one dictionary definition: Cool - (informal) very good.

Now, in no shape or form are we going to define cool for anyone, especially when building a community. No, that ain't too cool, though unfortunately that's the way it's been for decades now - 'we will build it and you will come'.

The CoolTown Studios methodology in developing communities is to involve the most innovative, entrepreneurial, active, creative, passionate people, the ones already most associated with the word cool. We're essentially seeking the responses to one question: "So, what kind of town do you think is cool?" Thus the name of this web site, and the content that you see.

Then again, we could have gone with hip, tight or sweet, but we know those words are temporary.

We do know the that the words associated with cooltowns are: ambition, desire, aspiration, romance, openness, diversity, energy, authenticity, creativity, dreams, and heart. How we get there exactly is up for interpretation.

What about the word 'Studios' in this web site's heading/company name? See the next entry.

Posted by Neil | Link to Article