Expedient MEANS

Notes on Film, Art, Writing, Technology and other things by Steve A Furman

  • Social Media: It’s Déjà vu All Over Again

    From about 1995 to 2003 the departments inside firms who were responsible for establishing and maintaining the enterprise online presence had to do most everything themselves. Jack of all trades if you will. IT of course helped, and eventually agency partners were hired, but for the most part it was a one area show. Those Read more

  • Navigation and the Power of Purity

    In the early days of the web we were so excited. Hyper-links were sexy and we would spend the day blanketing our pages with them. Those wonderful blue symbols underlined (also in blue). Spectacular. The job was to find offline content and convert it into HTML and connect it to one of these little blue Read more

  • The “One List” Myth

    All over the corporate world there’s a cry for “one list.” Keeping track of projects and progress made against them is a universal problem. No matter how many hours are spent on list making and sending them out across the org, people still feel they’re out of the loop. Marketing has a list (or several lists). Read more

  • Political Celluloid: What to Watch when Decision 2012 is Unwatchable

    It’s a presidential election year once again. Democracy is an amazing process, despite some of the gridlock we have experienced lately. I’ve never missed a chance to vote and look forward to being able to cast another one this coming November. I do get annoyed with all the mudslinging and attack ads, but that seems Read more

  • The Printed Word: Why Books Will Survive the Digital Age

    I’ve always been a book person. No, I mean a BOOK person. Collector, curator, lover of the dust jacket, size, shape and smell of the printed word on paper. I know how books are paginated, printed, bound, packed, shipped, and how to write a publishing contract. My first career was the general manager of an Read more

  • The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo – Film Review

    It took me until about the third reel to fully appreciate Rooney Mara’s acidic portrayal of Lisbeth Salander. Ms. Mara inhabits the character with fearsome angst, throwing herself into the darkness of Lisbeth’s world. Literally, she has peered into the precipice to manifest this character. I hope she comes back. Mara has mastered the physical Read more