I just discovered the folks at Claytorial, and color me impressed. They’ve got the cuteness thing licked, and they’re off to a great start with their Tagga video. I’m looking forward to seeing more from them.

I was also struck by something they pointed out on their blog. It talks about an ongoing shift away from the messy world of search-based understanding towards professionalized, streamlined video presentations.

Interestingly enough, this is something that I touched on awhile back in my post about the “The Return of the Professionals”.

This video provides a general overview of the little apps and widgets that allow people to customize the Web, as well as their computer desktops and handheld devices. Wonder no more when you ask yourself, “What is a widget?”

The piece marks two firsts for Nutintuit Studio. First off, the video integrates “live action” screencasting, which is a fancy way of saying I recorded myself using my computer in real time. Second, and most importantly, it’s the first video that contains artistic elements designed from start to finish by Xavier Vinas, who you’ll be hearing more about soon.

The video was produced for Horizon Media, a New York-based marketing and brand strategy firm.

It’s hard to find fault with the effectiveness of this video:

By the way, the new MTV archive of every music video ever made is simply stunning.

Most people think there are just two ways to set up a home network: Wi-Fi or Ethernet. Netgear’s Powerline products offer a third option. The system piggybacks on the existing electrical wiring in your home to create a fast and secure network. Check out the latest Nutshell, which covers the basics of Powerline:

Netgear was great to work with on this one. I enjoyed learning about Powerline from top to bottom and creating some (I hope!) tidy funderstanding about it.

Here’s a lesson in how NOT to create funderstanding.

Thanks to Tom Asacker, I just discovered Kathy Sierra’s blog, Creating Passionate Users. For personal reasons, Kathy is no longer maintaining the blog, but I urge you to browse the posts there, which explore the intricacies of artificial intelligence, learning, productivity, marketing, and whole lot more. To be honest, I’ve just scratched the surface at this point.

While reading this post on a new, more ethical approach to marketing, I threw up my hands and proclaimed Hallelujah!.

The most important skill today is… teaching…

…you’re not interested in using deception and bulls*** to manipulate someone into buying a product, membership, or idea that you don’t believe in yourself. And that’s your big advantage over even the biggest and best-funded competitors: your belief.

Because what you believe in, you can teach. And teaching is the “killer app” for a newer, more ethical approach to marketing. While in the past, those who out-spent (on ads, and big promotions) would often win, that’s becoming less and less true today for a lot of things—especially the things designed for a younger, more-likely-to-be-online user community.

Kind of a markets-are-classrooms notion. Those who teach stand the best chance of getting people to become passionate. And those with the most passionate users don’t need an ad campaign when they’ve got user evangelists doing what evangelists do… talking about their passion.

Kathy’s assertion that teaching, and by extension, empowerment, is the key to making customers passionate about your products strikes me as a very good way to define what I’m doing with Nutintuit Studio.

It’s not enough anymore to throw money at fancy campaigns and high-dollar eye candy that try to convince people that your products rock. The better alternative is to get people to believe in your products, in their value and purpose for their lives.

It’s no accident that Apple has poured a lot of resources into their Genius Bar services, as well as their new personalized customer training programs. That’s right, customer training programs. And why? Because it creates belief, empowerment, and passion.

Recently there was news that Microsoft will stick with charging handset makers licensing fees for Windows Mobile. What a strange notion, I thought, especially in light of the totally open source, and totally free, operating system—Android—that will ship with the G1. Here’s what Steve Ballmer said about it:

‘It’s interesting to ask why would Google or Nokia, Google in particular, why would they invest a lot of money and try to do a really good job if they make no money. I think most operators and telecom companies are skeptical about Google,’ he said.

I think Ballmer is casting doubt on Google’s business model here — and is trying to make telecoms, operators, and us scared — because Google scares the hell out of him. In Microsoft-land customers pay for Microsoft software that’s installed on approved hardware. Full stop. That’s the model that made Microsoft richer than God.

But those days are coming to an end, and Ballmer knows it. But, like a lumbering oil tanker that’s headed for a rocky shoal, Microsoft doesn’t appear to be able to right itself before it runs aground.

That’s where the G1 comes in. It’s one of the first lighthouses along the shore that shows us where Google is taking the mobile platform — the same place they took the desktop: Into the cloud. Cloud computing is akin to off-shoring or outsourcing the role and resources of the traditional desktop computer. All that stuff is moved to some data center in a far off place that replaces your computer’s hard drive. Even some processing tasks are moved out of the pretty box on your desk, and onto the server.

Of course, cloud computing requires lots of bandwidth, which is increasingly available. Fast mobile data networks are just now coming into their own in North America, too. Meanwhile, Web browsers and Web technologies are just now maturing to handle the complexities of cloud computing.

We’re in the middle of a slow, but very significant shift away from the “desktop model” and towards a more mobile, more flexible way of getting, using, and sharing our stuff. The G1 will take the products that depend on cloud computing we’ve been using on our computers and make it easier to put all that stuff in our pockets.

Now, before you say this is all just a rah-rah for cloud computing and Google, it’s worth noting that Google quite obviously isn’t the only player. A great app that I’ve just started using is DropBox, which allows you to share files (with version control) with remote users. There are countless other examples, many of which take advantage of Amazon’s S3 service. And of course, all the old concerns about security and privacy hang in the background of this whole conversation. And it’s true that Google does intend to make money, as Ballmer warns, by selling ads in the white space around their services — a possible detractor from the user experience.

UPDATE: People seem to be psyched about the promise of the G1. T-Mobile is pre-selling them like mad.

I met Tom Asacker a couple of months ago, when he approached me to produce a fun little tie-in for his latest book; A Little Less Conversation: Connecting with Customers in a Noisy World.

Here’s the video:

Tom is the salt of the earth, and he was a joy to work with. If you read his book, you’ll see that he takes a very refreshing approach to marketing and branding, one that I really identified with. His belief is that to get people’s attention in a really competitive marketplace (how many times have we heard that phrase?), you have to be different. You have to provide the unexpected, you have to define yourself with enthusiasm and inventiveness.

Tom explains what this means:

Offer [customers] an experience that will demonstrate your passionate belief in your brand, in helping them. Articulate it with your innate and powerful, human voice and empower them to share it with others. Turn off the marketing noise (frankly, we’re all pretty sick of it), and turn up the volume of your childlike sense of wonder, compassion, and rampant enthusiasm.

What Tom is saying here made a big impact on me, because that’s really what Nutintuit Studio is all about; telling accessible, enthusiastic, and fun stories about products and ideas. I believe in making memorable experiences around the human need for understanding, or as I like to call it, funderstanding, and I believe in doing it with a “childlike sense of wonder” always close at hand.

Want to talk about how Nutintuit Studio can fit into your marketing strategy? Use the contact form at the bottom of this page to get in touch.

Learn more about the studio here. And be sure to check out the Clients Page.

Here’s a great use of animation (and live action) to build “funderstanding”. It starts out a bit preachy, and my concern is that it could be off-putting to those who aren’t already in the choir, but it builds to some great points. Bravo!