This is not a toy. Only the young or the hopelessly commonsensical dip it into liquid soap, content with bubbles. Curl your fingers around the handle, lift it to your mouth, and flick the switch. Say what you long to say. The fan is small, but its aim is true. You will be heard.
This poetical story by Colson Whitehead was the main text in an auction entry on eBay for the bubble blowing gun in the picture. The gun was purchased for 50 cents and achieved a final bid price of $36.
The sale was part of a famous experiment titled Significant Objects, conducted by journalist Rob Walker and author Joshua Glenn to test the power of storytelling in the market. More precisely, the aim was to discover if an insignificant object can acquire not merely subjective but objective value when it is invested with new significance. All of the objects they sold were insignificant tat with virtually zero market value. They commissioned writers to pen short pieces about each item they auctioned. Some, like William Gibson, were well-known authors.
The proof was in the pudding. They sold $128.74 worth of thrift-store junk for $3,612.51. A profit of 2,706%.
Walker and Glenn were ethical enough to make it clear that the stories are fiction, but does this make the whole project more self-conscious? Are people really valuing the stories, or do they value the idea of joining in with a community project to create meaning?
This perspective makes the experiment even more resonant for people who operate within large organisations. Yes, we share stories but ideally not as top-down messages. Stories are better deployed as invitations to jointly create meaning. The way to change culture is to give people something to talk about, but don’t try to make it definitive or there will be nothing to discuss. Instead, use a story to set the agenda and then carefully nurture the discussion.
We do this with a video that poses difficult questions about an issue in a drama that stimulates viewers to ask what they would do in the situation on screen. Discussion is stimulated either in meetings or via internal social media. The discussion is the change.
On September 16th, 2031 at 2:35 am, a temporal rift – a “tear” in the very fabric of time and space – will appear 16.5 meters above the area currently occupied by Jeffrey’s Bistro, 123 E Ivinson Ave, Laramie, WY. Only the person wielding this mallet will be able to enter the rift unscathed. If this person then completes the 8 Labors of Worthiness, he or she will become the supreme ruler of the universe.
The auction for this Significant Object, with story by Colson Whitehead, has ended. Original price: 33 cents. Final price: $71.
There’s an unresolved story if I ever saw one. It is enough to get you talking?
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