Word on the Street

In the continued pursuit of empire building opportunities, two or three trends collide beautifully in my inbox this month. The first from the uber-reliable Trendwatching.com showing a whole host of revenue generating ideas. The intro to their featured trend Sellsumers, reads as " A recession-induced need for cash... enabling individuals to act as (part-time) entrepreneurs, fueling concepts that help ordinary consumers make money instead of just spending it." Proof that Africa is always ahead of global trends, with the rest of the world only now catching on to what we've been doing out of necessity for decades.

For example from the mailing list of the irrepressible Zayd Minty, comes this invite to the delightfully entitled Group Soup exhibit in Woodstock next Tuesday.

Where you will be able to witness the coming of age of the South African commercial arts - in this case listed as animation/illustration/painting/photography - beautifully demonstrating how to use the experience we have gained as "recession-induced entrepreneurs" on wall near you and at http://word-of-art.withtank.com/what/. The sublime talent of Faith47 and Mzwandile Buthelezi a.k.a. Hac1, for example are overdue for recognition as valuable commercial resources. Proving as with trends throughout the ages, today's subversive is tomorrow's cash cow.

Faith47

RASTY

Trying to show how to darn those holes in the shredded global economy, the Japanese have identified their equity in cute (!) as a revenue stream. This sees them sending out "cute amabassadors" to capitalise on their status as one of (if not the) cutest countries in the world. Looking at the goods on offer at http://www.neatorama.com/2009/03/13/japanese-cute-ambassadors/ I'd wager that if we play our cards right, we're very much in a position of strength to take them on in the cute race and probably an array of other cool categories as well.

Ambassadors of Cute attend a news conference at Japan's Foreign Ministry in Tokyo. (Neatorama)

Perhaps we are only now starting to see the glimmer of what it means to live in a Creative Economy, where the reality is, that if you are not able to make it, bake it, or shake it, it is unlikely that for much longer you will be able to fake it.