Idea IS the format

Long time readers of Idea IS the format may remember an early post entitled The Scrabble Series Part 1: Playing the Board, from way back in January.  I talked about the possibility of a second in the series, but never really expected to write it.

This is the new Scrabble app on Facebook, replacing an unofficial version muscled out by Mattel and Hasbro once they were ready to usurp its substantial userbase with their own mediocre alternatives.  Hasbro have rolled theirs out in the States, and Mattel have launched this version for the rest of the world.

It’s not half as tactile or easy-to-use as Scrabulous was, and I’ve been tending to avoid online Scrabble anyway, being that it can end up being a very disruptive element in the context of my already undisciplined ways, so it’s taken me a while to get to trying it out.

I have settled down recently for a game or two though, and on both occasions we started and concluded the games in the same sitting.  The game shown above was played tonight between myself and the auld enemy, Walter Micklethwait, currently to be found tickling trout and building bothies in the Cairngorms.

Walter and I see each other far too rarely these days, given that we once enjoyed the spoils of living in the same building down Homerton way.  Between instant messenger and the Scrabble board it felt tonight as though we’d almost sat down together for a couple of hours, catching up on each others news, and matching each other very well on the board.

I’m of a mind to continue this trend, playing the occasional sit-down game in amiable company, rather than having any number of different matches on the go at any given time.  It allows you to develop a definite continuity, in terms of how you play the board and manage your hand.  It also forces you to play a faster game, which better equips you for playing my father-in-law.

This is the point at which, following the single-post precedent for my Scrabble series, I now relate this in some way to the work I do marketing movies on the web.  I could easily post-rationalise it into a look at the value of giving something and/or someone your full attention, but that would be boring.

What I will tell you is that the company and conversation is key.  When I’m stimulated and enjoying myself, I play better, win more often and lose more graciously.  I’m able to appreciate the other guy, and ready to play a little loose and try to find the moves to earn their respect.

A good creative company offers exactly that – good company. The conversations that guide and stimulate your progress should be compelling ones, even if you’re losing.

Click on this to enlarge. More info here. Thanks Sizemore.

This is the end result of one of the oddest games of Scrabble I’ve ever played. It’s one of a few dozen games I’ve enjoyed on Facebook, pitting myself against Walter, an old friend of mine, and a masterful opponent.

Neither of us set out to use only half of the board – it just happened that way. It didn’t limit our scoring either – 674 is a still a perfectly respectable combined total.

Scrabble has been Facebook’s killer app for me. It accounts for about 95% of my dwell time, the rest of which is spent trawling for curiosities in my news feed and messing with my status. I only started playing the game at all regularly a year or two ago, at the behest of my visiting father-in-law, Big Mike. In a series of encounters over a series of single malts he took me to pieces. It didn’t take long to work out why.

When I played, my first instinct for each new hand was to check my pieces in search of a seven-letter word. Nothing wrong with that, except that most of the time I wouldn’t find one, so I’d see if I could find a six-letter word, and failing that a five-letter word, and so on and so forth. Only once I’d found my longest word would I consult the board, looking for somewhere to place it. If I couldn’t find anywhere, I’d go back to the hand and resume the process. Taking this approach, I’d be happy to consistently score in double figures.

Big Mike saw things differently. He started by analysing the board, finding the opportunities; not just open letters leading to bonus squares, but what he could scrounge from high value pieces already played. Once he’d mapped the board’s potential he started looking for the strength in his hand. He played through a process of ongoing reconciliation, punctuated by flashes of inspiration.

You’d be forgiven for wondering where I’m going with this, beyond drafting a possible introduction for Scrabble for Dummies. Well, I spent friday afternoon going through one of our clients’ 2008 film release schedules. There were all sorts of different movies represented therein, from the tentpole summer blockbusters through to bread-and-butter spring and autumn thrillers, dramas and romcoms. Some promise high-value talent and expensive visual effects, others offer subtle and engaging narratives, and one or two even look as though they might manage to combine the two. I’ve seen what pretty much all the major distributors have to play with next year, and at first glance it looks like some have better hands than others, but in the end what’s going to separate them in 2008, more than ever before, is how well they play the board.

This analogy extends much further than you might imagine, certainly beyond a single post. Hence, The Scrabble Series. I’ll put together Part 2: What is the Board? in due course, if I receive the faintest indication that anybody would like to pursue this further.