Jim and I have a particular nostalgic reason for wanting to see Borders continue to exist and prosper. The Borders store on Michigan Avenue, across from Water Tower Place, provided most all of the books from which we learned about theatre, so great were its stacks on the subject. It just happened that we each had a number of (separate) trips to Chicago during the writing of The Experience Economy, and once Jim discovered the treasure trove of theatre tomes available there, he alerted me, and we made it a practice to seek out new ones every time we were there. Without that particular store, it is doubtful we could’ve written three chapters on the subject!

So, in honor of that contribution to our body of thought, let me make this suggestion for who should buy Borders: Amazon.com! Truth be told, these days almost all my books are bought via Amazon — even when I discover a book in Borders (or Barnes & Noble, more likely), I usually write down it’s name and author, and then buy it from Amazon.com for home delivery. (Most of my book browsing still happens when I travel, and it’s so nice not to have to carry the weight home.) That also enables Amazon to learn more about my book purchases, and better refine its mass customized recommendations, something I value highly.

But Amazon today has experience places only in the bottom half of our Placemaking Portfolio from Chapter 8 of Authenticity — virtual places, that is. While it is certainly a valid strategy to remain solely virtual, I think Amazon could, one, greatly enhance the Borders physical experience, and two, greatly benefit from having a physical presence, but one geared to selling its tremendous back-end warehousing and shipping capabilities. Many people (including me) still enjoy browsing physical books, feeling the touch of the paper while examining the flow of the thought, and Amazon could certainly make it a much better experience than it is today.

Plus, it would get over any qualms that the remaining remant of non-Internet buyers might have about Amazon.com, as it would render the company more real.

Many are asking that (now-cliched) question regarding the latest news: China faked the singing and some of the fireworks in its (wonderfully staged) opening ceremony to the 2008 Beijing Olympics.

Perhaps the wittiest take on it — courtesy of our gal-about-thinkAbout Edina Lessack, who pointed it out to us — comes from Chicago Tribune critic Julia Keller: The ‘Age of Fake’: Fireworks, singers, and beyond

Keller asserts we’re in the “Age of Fake” where “Fake doesn’t seem to bother us much anymore. Fake is an accepted part of life. Fake sells.”

Except, rather obviously, that it does seem to bother Ms. Keller and the host of other folks who are bringing it to everybody’s attention on Fox News, CNN, and all over the web (where Googling “Yang Peiyi” already yields over 45,000 hits at the time of this writing).

So, yes, we are in an Age of Fake — “the toxic levels of inauthenticity we’re forced to breathe” as we put it in Chapter 3 — and that all the more creates the desire for the real.

Do also note at the end of her essay this new book — not yet officially published (but already pre-ordered from Amazon here: Amazon.com: The Thing Itself: Richard Todd: Books) which looks to be taking a quite interesting look at the subject of authenticity from a personal and societal level.

Consider this:

versus this:

Then just this month, I was catching up on the past few issues of Make magazine and came across this article in Volume 11, “Router Aesthetics: Now that ‘Digital Carpentry’ has come to exist, how do you make it authentic?” by Bruce Sterling, and this passage: “A routered thing shouldn’t be a mere downmarket knockoff of some earlier method of carpentry. A router is a new thing in the world, so a clever designer should master it and use it expressively.”

It seems to me that this mindset holds the key to rendering authenticity, especially original authenticity, when using any new technology.

Axiom 1. If you are authentic, then you don’t have to say you’re authentic.

Axiom 2. If you say you’re authentic, then you’d better be authentic.

Axiom 3. It’s easier to be authentic if you don’t say you’re authentic.

Yet I’ve recently watched two companies quite convincingly self-proclaim the authenticity of their offerings:

• Import Brands Alliance defense of “The Authentic Black & Tan: Always made with Bass Pale Ale”; surf:
  www.bass.com (and then head to a local pub for a Black & Tan pour.)
• Denny’s offering of “Real Breakfast 24/7″ and its “Real Breakfast Club”; surf:
  www.dennys.com (and then head to a nearby Denny’s for a late-night/early-morning — or mid-afternoon! — breakfast.)

This leads me to think that it’s a viable option to take the more difficult path: to say you’re authentic in order to force yourself to be authentic. It’s certainly harder to be authentic if you say you’re authentic. But why not render the hard way? In a sense, the whole of one’s identity and full portfolio of one’s statements had better be, must be, better must be rendered more compellingly if you stop after Axiom 2 and get to work.

As long as you’re still fully aware of:

Axiom 4. It’s easier to render offerings authentic, if you acknowledge they’re inauthentic.

That acknowledgment need not be made publicly. Then with regard to:

Axiom 5. You don’t have to say your offerings are inauthentic, if you render them authentic. . . .

You don’t have to say your offerings are inauthentic, if you render them authentic. You can say they’re authentic, but only if you’ve really rendered them authentic.

I must say this approach may only work if, after rigorous self-examination, you deem your offering Real-real — and then vigilantly transcend your inauthenticity (see pages 102-103 of Authenticity). And note: It may be harder to stay
authentic, once you’ve said you’re authentic. Hmm. . . . an Axiom 6?

Then I found out only offering Provençal goods was not a true story. While visiting the site to re-order some shaving cream (the cream is nice, but it’s shaving lotion is to die for), I was very surprised to discover that it was now offering products from Brazil! My immediate thought was “This is not authentic!”. Wouldn’t you know it, though, but L’Occitane pulls it off magnificently - almost as if they had been reading Chapters 7 and 9 of Authenticity where we address such concerns of expanding beyond the essence of the enterprise.

Read what it has to say here on its website:

L’OCCITANE en Provence is always in search of natural and authentic products. From the beginning, we have been guided toward new horizons and by the visionary spirit of our founder Olivier Bussan.

L’OCCITANE continues along this path by extending the story to another continent, South America. We are proud to present the creation of L’OCCITANE do Brasil - a brand that expresses the authenticity of a natural sun care line made exclusively in Brazil. Experience the culture, values and traditions of Brazil - a culture enriched in potent, natural ingredients to protect the skin from the sun.

L’OCCITANE do Brasil’s story begins in the North of Brazil, in the state of Para, where abundant ingredients are harvested, and ends in the South, in the Sao Paolo region, where all our products are processed. Each product has gone through a rigorous certification process by the Brazilian government.

At least for this customer, this is one extension that works, and works authentically.

Page one:
We’re anti-shoe.
We’re anti-boot. We’re anti-sandal.
And we’re definitely anti-flip flop.
In fact, we’re anti anything that doesn’t
defend your back against the corrosive power
of hard, flat surfaces. We’re anti anything that
doesn’t improve your posture. We’re anti anything
that doesn’t protect your knees or tone your muscles just
by standing there. Actually, we’re anti anything that doesn’t
change your life for the better. But something you can wear
on your feet that can do all that? Now that we can get behind.

Page two:
www.theantishoe.com

MBT®
The Anti-shoe.

So I checked out the web-site.

The Anti-shoe of Masai Barefoot Technology (MBT) obviously appeals to the Original Authenticity principle of Anti-up. But if you spend some time on the Anti-shoe website, you’ll note that the MBT offering makes an appeal to all five genres of authenticity via a specific principle that we outline in the book:

Natural Authenticity principle – Be bare: What should be stripped down, left naked, or left bare?
MBT: “walking barefoot on the ground”

Original Authenticity principle — Anti-up: What move could you make against conventional norms?
MBT: “new sole construction”

Exceptional Authenticity principle — Be foreign: What foreignness could be emphasized with uninitiated customers?
MBT: “African Masai tribes”

Referential Authenticity principle – Pick a place: What particular place could inspire your offerings?
MBT: “paddy fields in Korea”

Influential Authenticity principle — Promote a cause: What greater social cause can you passionately promote, helping to effect its ends?
MBT: “healthier, more active, and happier life…[through]…physiologically correct walking”

I particularly like that the Anti-shoe promotes a cause via the offering itself — and not just by donating a percentage of revenue or profits to some foot health charity. The latter will usually ring hollow and fake without real cause-infused value embedded in the former.

brought to mind the mix-and-mashed NBA commercial that launched just this past April:
www.youtube.com/watch?v=j3vmpM2FGzU

What might these two NBA stars do to render their celebrity status more real?
One suggestion: a mix-and-mash rap song/album/video of the two “being
themselves” together!

For background on the commercial, see USA Today article:

“NBA deliberately sending mixed messages“

What made the biggest impression on me, however, was the speaker gift from GDI — “The Original” 1.0l screw(top) SIGG bottle (www.sigg.com). On the speaking circuit one constantly encounters promotional products of the most fake kind. (Whoopee, another plastic conference bag!) These giveaways are the business conference counterpart to Dave & Buster’s redemption center of phony prizes; most come off as most fake. Not my SIGG! (Thanks GDI.)

Here is how I now plan to use my SIGG bottle to render greater authenticity in my conference presentations: Instead of taking an occasional drink from a plastic bottle (or from a spill-able glass, which I try to avoid), I’ll sport my SIGG bottle on-stage — taking time to unscrew the top, oh so subtlety drawing attention to the bottle, whenever I take a sip. Some in the audience will surely see it as an effort to avoid adding another plastic water-bottle to our landfills — helping to render both natural and influential authenticity. Of course, I may have filled the SIGG from a plastic water-bottle back-stage — as a Fake-real beverage prop for my talk! And maybe I’ll reveal what I did at the end of the talk, as a means to highlight the different between the perception of authenticity and the actual truth of (any) matter!