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When the foundation cracks, the obvious starts sounding radical.
There, I’ve said it.
I keep hearing the same points at panels and festivals — and while I agree with most of them, I can’t shake the feeling we’re treating the obvious like revelation. Listen to people. Understand your brand. Tell real stories. Stop following “best practice.” Build communities. Stop propping up dying platforms. Respond to culture, not trends.
None of this is new. This is the f*cking job — the fundamentals.
And yet every time someone says something remotely thoughtful, the room reacts as if fire has been rediscovered. Maybe that’s the real problem. It’s not that the insights are groundbreaking — it’s that expectations have sunk so low the basics now sound profound.
And here’s the harder bit: even when brands know this, they still force everything through the same narrow pipe — social. Everything funnelled through one overstretched, underperforming, shit-show of a channel. As if a brand with depth, ambition, a point of view can meaningfully exist inside a square frame and a 15-second clip.
And to be clear — this isn’t about belittling anyone in social. They’re doing good work in a tight box. The issue is bigger. We need holistic thinking, not more funnels. And with today’s algorithms, we can’t control how work is served. We’re at the mercy of a system not built for nuance.
It’s too narrow a journey, too small a stage, far too flimsy a foundation for anything real. But the machine keeps spinning, and teams are left trying to do meaningful work inside a system that won’t support it.
Most brands don’t have the infrastructure to change. No alignment. No brand spine. Teams exhausted and reacting. And the people at the top — let’s call them the establishment — don’t know what to do next, or they’re too far removed to see what’s happening.
I see the same erosion in education: curiosity shrinking, critical thinking fading, resources cut to the bone, mentorship disappearing. A system built to expand minds now struggling to function.
That’s what happens when the basics collapse: the obvious suddenly sounds new.
And maybe that’s why those unedited AI posts we’re bombarded with grate so much. It’s not the tool — it’s the intent. Too much noise, not enough thought. I said it last week to Ed Bartlett: I’ll take quietness and consideredness over chaos any day.
And yes — I know the irony in adding my take to the teetering heap of “thoughts.” But sometimes frustration needs a shape, and this is mine.
This isn’t about individuals. It’s not about who said what. It’s about the environment we’ve built — one that dulls instinct, flattens thinking, and makes the fundamentals feel advanced.
We don’t need louder takes or more noise. We need to rebuild the structures that allow good work — and good ideas — to exist. Raise the bar. Do the simple things properly. Rebuild the foundations. Make space (and time) for thinking again.
The fundamentals still matter. Let’s start there.
JM
