I’m Faris. This is the new archive of my old blog. I hope you find it useful.

Hello there!  I don't blog anymore but the archive of about a decade's posts will remain here for the foreseeable future and you can search it with that Google custom search box on the right.  The best place to keep in touch is our newsletter – STRANDS OF STOLEN GENIUS – brief bursts of inspiration…

Eclectic Method is the world's premiere video remix DJ and producer – if you haven't seen his Chest Thump Remix of The Wolf of Wall Street go watch it now. He's also a collaborator of ours and made this lovely video with a bespoke jungle tune out of some of our filmed talks about creativity.…

  I spoke at the How Brands Grow [in a digital age] in The Netherlands and got to meet and chat to Byron Sharp, who was smart and funny. 

This is a short film I made for the launch of the IPA Excellence Diploma anthology book which collates all the top winning papers from the last ten years [including mine, from the very first year!]. A remarkable collection.  What is a 21st Century Brand?: New Thinking from the Next Generation of Agency Leaders –…

  A brief interview I did at Conversion Day in Belgium about digital media and trust and agencies. 

Talking CX: Episode 1 – Faris Yakob from The Works I spent a lovely day with some nice people from The Works, an agency in Sydney, discussing the concept of Customer Experience, as an emerging field, discipline, set of principles and integration layer.  Part One was inside a van.     

I've been listening to Steven Johnson's excellent Wonderland podcast. [Shout out to the Storythings crew and our dear friend Kristen Taylor who produced it [we miss you Kthread!]  It's a companion / prequel series to his new book Wonderland: How Play Made the Modern World. [And as content marketing – it worked – it's now…

zoom in on the syrup pic.twitter.com/omRBupjrXq — Denny's (@DennysDiner) March 1, 2017 //platform.twitter.com/widgets.js One of the Genius Steals creativity exercises is demystifying ideas as combinations by exploring the inspiration elements that informed an idea. We call it idea archeology. This is harder the further the idea takes the inspiration and easier the less far it has…

Because the universe speaks to us through coincidence, or because of the Baader-Meinhof phenomenon [also known as the frequency illusion] – whichever you prefer – I had a few Squishy encounters of late.  I just read DFW's brilliant, remarkably disturbing, short[ish] horror story and comment on corporate culture Mister Squishy, and lo and behold it was…