Throughout my professional life i’ve worked with the 3 M paradigm – message, medium, market. The paradigm is wide spectrum.

 I’ve performed post-production audio on over 14,000 tv and radio commercials, seen and heard by millions; I’ve also composed niche work viewed by just one person. Whatever the market or medium, how does the message come across? 

 It’s not a direct route. The message travels through a network which can acquire intrinsic value. Words written on a page or spoken through a microphone, images and visual works aren’t necessarily perceived as they were conceived. It’s always gratifying when a message I’m involved with comes across successfully; the intent is to transmit information accurately and effectively, so that it sticks like peanut butter to the roof of the subconscious. We all have at least a few of these memes bouncing around the brainsac, the term meme implying an idea or element of social behavior passed on through generations in a culture, especially by imitation. In their way memes transmit ideas and belief information in a manner similar to the way genes transmit biological information. Much like a virus, a meme can also mutate while spreading. A good example of this is students in a classroom gathered in a circle, playing ‘telephone‘. The original message, whispered one student to the next, tends to mutate dramatically. By the time it goes all the way around the room, the original message is often unrecognizable. Another definition is any viral phenomenon able to induce agents to replicate it, resulting in copies being produced and broadcast. Once while conversing with the clerk at a Trader Joe’s checkout counter, the subject of whining came up. I offered my definition of whining: ‘frustration being pushed through a very small hole’. Liking my definition, the clerk passed it along to two other clerks; they in turn passed it on to several customers. Instant viral meme. 

I’m fascinated with memes spanning generations. Marcel Duchamp created his artwork ‘The Bride Stripped Bare By Her Bachelors, Even‘ over 8 years, 1915-1923. A complex, humorous piece enclosed by glass panes, ‘The Bride’ achieved minor notoriety in the years after its completion. In 1979 Bryan Ferry resurrected the meme with his solo album ‘The Bride Stripped Bare‘, exploring the mysteries of romance. Thirty years later Richard Branson’s excellent treatise on commerce and trade was playfully titled ‘Business Stripped Bare‘.  The Bride meme transcended time, accrued equity and mutated creatively.

The ANEW memes of ‘doing what’s right with what’s left®’ and ‘ANEW Alchemy: transforming corporate surplus into community service™’ feature sustainability, repurposing, green building and living practices. They exist and thrive by doing through our work, films & media, demonstrating meme as mission, paradigm as intent.