[Gaia]

Hello Simple Sustainablites!

Here's the link to a great brochure produced by Bubblepedia about thew madness of unaffordable housing in Australia. I'm going to print a few out and give them to a few people I know.

http://www.bubbleped...s_parentId=3292

G.

[RumpledElf]

Bloody brilliant stuff

[Bernard L. Madoff]

Great Work.

Tho I fear it will go over many heads - we are fast becoming an 'idiocracy' coupled with life peonage beholden to the 4 pillars.

I show many people (outside my peers and friends whom are smart cookies in general) graphs etc and its often non or mis interpreted. Higher maths is studied by <15% of the population now.

If it sinks into 5% its a job done. Pats on the back all round etc

[RumpledElf]

Might not hurt to put a link to the brochure on the front page of this site too.

[Bernard L. Madoff]

RumpledElf, on 02 January 2010 - 04:09 AM, said:

Might not hurt to put a link to the brochure on the front page of this site too.

Good idea RE.

This is no longer an issue of buying a house at a reasonable price IMO its now an issue of stopping the train before the cliff.

I'm talking Argentina type stuff and generations of pain (Argentina was rich in resources and one of THE MOST prosperous nations in the late 19th and first half of the 20th century).

[Sean]

The only criticisms I have of the brochure content is that it is very much the work of a 'self interest' group, i.e. proposing that 'renting is cheaper' etc as a solution to a market problem.

It is harder to gain traction with any political parties when it appears to have a narrow focus of self-interest for a small group of people (apart from the small group of developers waving big donations of mortgagors money, of course, or offering cut-price apartments to MPs).

The fonts and italics etc look a little 'lunatic fringe' or Dan Denning hustler style as well, like those interminable emails for weight loss products or double your dating from the US.

It doesn't really have a catchy front page, not sure which way it is intended to be folded with which face sticking out as a front page.

There are no policy proposals in it except to advocate removing neg gearing from personal income or altogether.

But otherwise the material is quite good.

PS 'affect' should be 'effect' on p.2, col 3

PPS Another suggestion : should you rework the format as an HTML email and try to start a viral email campaign, where you request each recipient fwd it to other people if interested? Most people fwd the most incredible rubbish, this one is actually worthwhile.

[sydney3000]

Tinpusher, on 02 January 2010 - 04:08 AM, said:

I fear it will go over many heads - we are fast becoming an 'idiocracy'

I concur. Australians are not smart enough to understand this material. The market will self-correct when it needs to. I am 100% certain. I will be celebrating.

[savagegoose]

we're fatter, stuipider, and more indebted than Americans. wow things can only get better from here.

[xgjunkie]

You lot obviously work in govt agencies or universities and don't deal with real people with real budgets that have to make personal financial decisions every day of the week because I can tell you now that that brochure will have absolutely no impact at all. Infact you will just cop a lot of unwanted attention (mostly negative) on Bubblepedia if you send it out.

The design is terrible, it is far too complex and obviously written by someone with extremeist views.

If you want to reach the average Australian then it needs to be simplified. You need to provide a solution to the problem and a message. There isn't one in this brochure other than fanaticism.

The issue at stake is that the average Joe in the street believes that house prices are priced correctly as has been ingrained on their brains for decades. The average person believes absolutely everything they see on TV. Trying to tell everybody they have been duped or are stupid because they have paid to much for a house is just a bit too silly.

Good luck paying for the marketing and advertising, you will be pissing your money against the wall.

[Sean]

hmm, don't be so coy, xg, tell us what you really think.

I actually thought it would pay to engage advertising people who are good at convincing people to do the layout and content. like I said, it has no front or back or grab factor and reads like a tract from an obscure special interest group like the trotskyist leninites.

it does read as something by someone who has gotten too close to their subject, but who knows -- those graphs will be on a million kitchen benches by the end of the week!

[tom]

I don't think it will hurt that's for sure.

Looking at the development i.e. brochure development thread on bubblepedia it would seem it was quite a battle to get anything out at all and I commend homes4aussies for getting something across the line.

Remember this is not a one shot wonder. Whats to stop us doing one for every month with a one month housing market summary from a bears perspective. give an web address with only this information each monthy in case they miss a month, and preferably the main page has no kooky rantings of forumites. The seat of learning perhaps, but not for a first time housing bear.

I would suggest setting up a few "interest groups" who stand behind brochures all with there own style. The message will be clear to different people at different levels, and I think the more information out there the better.

I guess don't complain about it, lets do another one if we can do better or hit the people at a different angle.

The bubblepedia one from what I gather will mostly be printed off after hours in peoples workplaces and then hand delivered to as many homes as possible so not expensive.

[tor]

tom, on 03 January 2010 - 07:28 AM, said:

I don't think it will hurt that's for sure.

Looking at the development i.e. brochure development thread on bubblepedia it would seem it was quite a battle to get anything out at all and I commend homes4aussies for getting something across the line.

Remember this is not a one shot wonder. Whats to stop us doing one for every month with a one month housing market summary from a bears perspective. give an web address with only this information each monthy in case they miss a month, and preferably the main page has no kooky rantings of forumites. The seat of learning perhaps, but not for a first time housing bear.

I would suggest setting up a few "interest groups" who stand behind brochures all with there own style. The message will be clear to different people at different levels, and I think the more information out there the better.

I guess don't complain about it, lets do another one if we can do better or hit the people at a different angle.

The bubblepedia one from what I gather will mostly be printed off after hours in peoples workplaces and then hand delivered to as many homes as possible so not expensive.

Define hurt?

If people expect it to be a worthwhile investment of a couple hundred bucks so they get to buy a house sooner then they will probably be hurt.
If people expect with a couple hundred bucks to make the general populacerealise that the level of debt is silly then they will probably be hurt.

I am with xg on this, I doubt it will have any impact. Look at all the other flyers and crap being handed out to people. This one makes the socialist flyers at Sydney TAFE look reasonable (and I have never been to their things either).

Mind you, I remember the first day I saw a url on an ad (was a banner hung off a bridge over some motorway) and at the time I thought what a stupid thing to do, the internet is only fun for engineering types. So my advice might be somewhat less than reliable.

[tom]

tor, on 03 January 2010 - 07:49 AM, said:

Define hurt?

If people expect it to be a worthwhile investment of a couple hundred bucks so they get to buy a house sooner then they will probably be hurt.
If people expect with a couple hundred bucks to make the general populacerealise that the level of debt is silly then they will probably be hurt.

I am with xg on this, I doubt it will have any impact. Look at all the other flyers and crap being handed out to people. This one makes the socialist flyers at Sydney TAFE look reasonable (and I have never been to their things either).

Mind you, I remember the first day I saw a url on an ad (was a banner hung off a bridge over some motorway) and at the time I thought what a stupid thing to do, the internet is only fun for engineering types. So my advice might be somewhat less than reliable.

True enough that the cost is hurt.

I was more considering any potential outcome on the market, i.e. one of the goals of the advertising, apart from the more altruistic saving new home buyers from themselves... Nothing gets done when people go for perfection. That someone else puts money in and makes a brochure explaining the Australian property market from a contrarion angle should not in my view cause people to go, "finally I am convinced it's time to buy a house". A situation in which we made a brochure about the property market which convinced people to buy a house would in my view be hurt.

Just start getting something out there, thats the key. If its not quite right, do another and then another. This is how advertising works. It is unlikely that there is any silver bullet advertisement no matter how good you make it which will cause a massive housing correction on its own. Well maybe there is but, I sure can't think of one... Any ideas?

Thinking the other way about what you say above and hurt, maybe we should have made a parody one, real estate buy now! always doubles every 7 years etc. The stupid thing is the take the piss parody one would be difficult to discern from actual advertising as I have found when reading parodies I generally just end up thinking another lunatic property investment spruiker, whats new.

On the left movement generally re adve4rtising, they have always relied on people rather than money for advertising, i.e. they use committed cheap labour to hand out fliers, post up on billboards etc. When Sydney wanted to ban billboard posters guess who was opposed to it, and with good reason in my view?

[RumpledElf]

Its a new year and I'm working out the advertising spend for the business in the upcoming months. I'm not a big marketing person unfortunately so the best I can do is see what other successful businesses do and copy them. Its easier doing marketing for other people than yourself when you're not the trumpet-blowing type.

The trick is just to get the message out there all the time, as often as possible, and as simple as possible, so that when people think of X, they think of YOU. In this case, if they want to buy a house they might want to think about not overpaying for the damn thing.

[gibber_blot]

xgjunkie, on 02 January 2010 - 09:35 AM, said:

You lot obviously work in govt agencies or universities and don't deal with real people with real budgets that have to make personal financial decisions every day of the week because I can tell you now that that brochure will have absolutely no impact at all. Infact you will just cop a lot of unwanted attention (mostly negative) on Bubblepedia if you send it out.

The design is terrible, it is far too complex and obviously written by someone with extremeist views.

If you want to reach the average Australian then it needs to be simplified. You need to provide a solution to the problem and a message. There isn't one in this brochure other than fanaticism.

The issue at stake is that the average Joe in the street believes that house prices are priced correctly as has been ingrained on their brains for decades. The average person believes absolutely everything they see on TV. Trying to tell everybody they have been duped or are stupid because they have paid to much for a house is just a bit too silly.

Good luck paying for the marketing and advertising, you will be pissing your money against the wall.

xg -- it appears you have experience in this area. Any chance you can give the bubblepedia people some help on this?

I applaud their efforts to educate people, and I would like to see more of this.

[tor]

gibber_blot, on 05 January 2010 - 10:34 PM, said:

xg -- it appears you have experience in this area. Any chance you can give the bubblepedia people some help on this?

I applaud their efforts to educate people, and I would like to see more of this.

Hire a decent advertising guy. Budget accordingly.

Remember what you are really saying is that you want to brainwash people the other way. You can dress it up in noble sounding phrases and all but that is what advertising is all about.

So you need someone with experience at the job. Not wanting to put words in xg's mouth but I suspect that he is not a successful advertising type (neither am I). He may be aware of what crap looks like, most of us are able to see crap, but that doesn't necessarily mean he (or I) can do the good stuff in that field.

Keep in mind that if you successfully get the message across you will have made big changes to the political climate of this country. Remember all those things people keep saying about vested interests and how they are the government and everything? Yeah, if you succeed in this campaign you will probably either cause the government to lose the next election or change their position wildly.

All which sounds cool until you think how much money and skills other people throw at trying to achieve exactly the same thing. They don't even want to cause a 180 in people thinking they just want a small change from one party to another.

I am not sure a couple of hundred dollar campaign is going to have any measurable effect.

[gibber_blot]

tor, on 05 January 2010 - 10:44 PM, said:

Hire a decent advertising guy. Budget accordingly.

Hopefully they can find one who cares enough about the cause to volunteer their work. Hence, why I asked xg.

tor, on 05 January 2010 - 10:44 PM, said:

I am not sure a couple of hundred dollar campaign is going to have any measurable effect.

So best to give up and not try at all?

I'd wager that many successful campaigns grass roots campaigns were criticised for the same reasons.

[tom]

gibber_blot, on 06 January 2010 - 02:24 AM, said:

So best to give up and not try at all?

I'd wager that many successful campaigns grass roots campaigns were criticised for the same reasons.

Would it help if the ad material actually had information about the group putting out the advertisement, i.e. funded by average Australians who just want a fair go?

You know something like; This pamphlet was funded by ordinary Australians and is intended to be delivered to every home in Australia by September 2010, all this by volunteers who also want a fair go.

If you would like to volunteer to deliver to an area please register your interest at bubblepedia. Maybe we should have a simplesustainable campaign along the same lines. I imagine if one group seemed a bit kooky and the other even more kooky, people would still be thinking what is going on all of a sudden with house prices? Never had this before maybe change is in the wind...

(Suggest the brochure needs more editing before this should happen)

[tor]

gibber_blot, on 06 January 2010 - 02:24 AM, said:

...So best to give up and not try at all?

I'd wager that many successful campaigns grass roots campaigns were criticised for the same reasons.

Yes that's what I said. Give up. It is in my nature to say that kind of shit. Oh wait no, the other one, it is in the nature of a lot of people to jump to a stupid fucking statement based on a simple piece of logic.

Maybe I meant it is better to think of a method where you aren't competing in a known arena against heavy hitters.

Probably not though, I mean that would be sensible and rational.

[sydney3000]

I am with tor. Instead of this campaign each one who supports this view should contact the AEC, put $250 down, get the required signatures and make himself an independent choice at the next state or federal election. You have to be in the system to change the system and even then it is bloody difficult to achieve.