Obama talks the money talk!

With the state of Pennsylvania becoming one of the battleground states, Obama barack has just outlined some of his economic policies that he would be adopting if elected as the president. From what I had heard so far, I have to say that this candidate is a much better deal for us than McCain would ever be. The economic policies as outlined by Barack Obama are realistic,practical and ones that can be initiated easily.

The policies as outlined by McCain pale by comparison for they are weak, vague and more to do with election drama and bereft of any real content. McCain's policies seem to do more with short term gains than any long term benefits, reminding us all once again, that he is of the same cloth as the current president. When it comes to election rallies there are very few politicians who would come forward to outline policies with long term benefits as Obama has done.

Furthermore, McCain's policies are based primarily on slashing expenditure without any thought whatsoever to the consequences. Take for example McCain's idea of doing away with the gasoline tax, the impact of such a policy would only serve to make the oil companies richer than they already are and cause constriction in the availability of funds for community related infrastructure projects.
Everything considered, Obama is the way to go, no doubts about that.

Iowa under floods - 20,000 flee!

The floods have hit the state of Iowa hard, forcing some 24,000 to lose their homes and another 20,000 to literally run for their lives. The floods are on account of unprecedented rain in the Iowa area which generally sees about a few inches of rain per year. But this time around, due to heavy rains coupled with thunderstorms, the Cedar river has risen far above the record mark it set the last time in 1929. It managed to reach a height of 32 feet, higher than the old mark by nearly 12 feet.

The Cedar river has flooded the drinking wells as well, thus limiting the amount of drinking water available to the citizens there. The wells that supply this water has been flooded and it will be quite some time before they are rendered usable again. In the meantime, with only one well still in use, it is time for the rationing to begin.

The forecast for the Cedar river area is not all that good with more rains being forecast. With most of the major levees having broken down, any more rain would only serve to make this far worse, transforming the Cedar river into raging flood waters. The fact is that despite disasters like Katrina and others, the infrastructure is ill-equipped to handle a massive exodus leave alone provide food,water and shelter for the remainder of the time needed. The question is that is Iowa planning to do in order to manage this crisis?

The Obama change!

With the primaries on the last leg, Obama is sure to be the next democratic nominee, with the latest interview from Clinton hinting at a closure to this 'dirt road race'. To be honest, I have to say that the thought of another Clinton era sends shivers down my back. I am sure that there are quite a few people out there rooting for the Clinton's and likewise there are those rooting for the Obama camp.
But all politics aside, the time is ripe for change and who better than Barrack Obama to deliver the goods. I am sure that once the nominee has been declared, Hilary will lend her support to Obama all the way.

Creative professionals

The Bohemian Rhapsody!

Creative age
The ‘creative class’ is a section of the society that is going to herald the ‘new age’ and according to Dr.Richard Florida is going to be the key to economic development in many of the cities in this post industrial age. According to dr. Richard Florida’s theory, it is the group of creative people, who are going to be the essential ingredient in the development of the city. To further elaborate on this, it is the creative professionals of today who will become a major driving force in the economy, transforming it from the agricultural and industrial based economy to one that is more prevalent to the modern times, for this is the creative age.

The creative class basically consists of the creative people, who can be further segmented into the knowledge workers, including the likes of doctors, lawyers and so on. Then we have the core group, termed as the super creative core and this consists of the ‘creamy’ creative layer and consists of people from a whole swathe of occupations, e.g. Architecture, arts, media, computer programming and so on. One can even surmise that the freemasons, the society of freemasons, with alleged linkages to the knight’s templar, with its penchant for secrecy could well fall into this category.

The last few years has seen the creative class take to technology more than any other section of the society has done, with most of the creativeness being bought out in fields like nano technology, science, arts and so on. The creative class has been very much on the rise with a decided shift towards technology, research and other relevant fields of science. This is only natural given the high amount of intelligence and sophistication that one comes across in such fields.

It is only but natural to wonder how the creative class fares across the spectrum of the modern working class, both the blue collar types as well as those of the white collar. As we all know, the blue collar worker relates more to the physical kind of work, with hourly wages, unions and in some of the cases, the siren blast to indicate the end of the working day. The white collar workers relate more to the clerical type of work, with emphasis being on a fixed base salary and multitude of other benefits that they accrue as a result of working for a company, full time.

The creative class differs from the working class in the sense that the creative class has more to do with creativity and entrepreneurship than it have to do with hourly wages or monthly remuneration packages. The white collar jobs as a result of more sophistication than the blue collar ones, appeal more to the creative class when it comes to employment. The creative class seeks by and large have conformed themselves to the ways of the society and more often than not take up jobs in companies not because they have forsaken their creative attitudes but rather on account of adapting their creative character to the ways of the society at large.
Since the society as a whole does not leave much room for nebulous states of existence, the present creative classes may have to take up a salaried position and have done so many a times so as to fit in. Today, the white-collar jobs have evolved to become more creative in nature due to the large number of such creative people trying to fit into the society’s definition of work. There are a certain number of jobs/positions that are neither white-collar nor blue-collar and one such example of that is an artist. An artist prides himself or herself on nonconformity and an artist’s work is creative to the large extent but even this is constrained by deadlines and schedules, which the artist may have to follow strictly if he or she wants to sell their work. The creative class have well adapted to the changes that the modern era has imposed on all of us so that today, such creativity flows within the contours of the modern society and not without as it may have been in the past, e.g. Alchemists.

According to Florida, the cities that provide an infrastructure so as to attract the creative professional would be the ones on the fast track to ‘creative development’ This has already happened or would happen in the near future.. Florida surmises that such a city with the right infrastructure would prove to be attractive enough to most of the creative class, that they would want to settle there, short term or for the long haul. Once the creative professionals start to trickle in, the top companies would follow closely after and set up shop in the city. Once that happens, investment in the city would be on the rise, with economic development in the wings and this forms one of the keystones to Florida’s theory on the rise of the creative class. Some of the cities and regions that are already making the necessary changes so as to attract the creative professionals are Austin, Seattle, Bangalore, India, Dublin, Ireland and Sweden, to name a few.

On a deep level, we all strive to be the same and as such, anything that makes us inherently different does not rest easy with us. As a result, this in turn has often led to a kind of a secret life, where the secrets of this society are often buried; among such secrets was the existence of the gay life. The main problem that we as a society have is that we expect each and everything to conform to the rules of the society and this has often led people to hide their innovations and at times, even their very own lifestyle in secret. With some sections of the society not conforming to the society and its rules, such people were often perceived to be nothing less than a dreg on the resources of the society at large and were ignored by the mainstream of the society.

For quite a long while now, we as the human race have resisted change every now and then, so it is only natural to expect that at times, a creative person may not be all that forthcoming about his innovative spark if that is to cause him to stand out in the crowd. At some innate level we have understood that there is safety in numbers and that it is important to fit and mingle back into the background. This instinct of ours is a throwback to our cavemen era as Carl sagan had expounded in his book ‘The dragons of Eden’. The result being that at times when our creativity tends to make us stand out, we prefer to subdue that spark so that we can fit in this constrained society of ours.

The section of the society that seems to have mastered this art for melting into the background is the bohemians. To describe a bohemian would not be all that easy, with the meaning of the very word changing every now and then. The human society seems to have carried its penchant for categorizing items through the ages and as such, did so again with the creation of the moniker “bohemian” and the alterations thereafter.
The term today refers to include all those who do not conform to society at large as the meaning rather than the original intent of the word, which was to mean a beggar, in turn ameliorated this word. The Irony is that today it is this group of people, the Bohemians, in whom the creative juices seem to flow in the most.

This is truly the creative age, we had lived in the digital age and now we have come to the conceptual age, the age of creativity. Creativity is all about creating new ideas and services as well as adapting oneself to any changed circumstances. As a species, we do not adapt ourselves to change that easily and maybe as a result of this rigid non-conformist position on change, we are not able to be as creative as we could have been were the circumstances different. Bohemians as a rule do not conform to anything in general and although as a class, they vary amongst themselves, the one thing that holds true for them is that they are non conformist to society as a whole but conformist to change and thus can adapt themselves to it very easily. In simple words, your chances of finding a Bohemian trying out different ideas would be higher than a non-bohemian trying out the same.

The creative classes of today consist of the knowledge workers, the super core and last but not least the small but essential creative group, the bohemians. With technology leading the way with a huge number of creative classes working in this field, it is in here and in science that one can expect the ‘next leap’ to occur. There is a terminology that refers to a select few that have technological advantage as well as accrued networking skills, the term is ‘netocracy’ a play on both the ‘internet’ as well as the word ‘aristocracy’. With most of the creative people adopting technology as a sort of a second home, it may well be that the term netocracy refers to the creative group that is ‘net savvy’.

The companies have all picked on the added value that a creative professional brings to their company and that by engaging the services of such people, the company hopes to cash in on their creative output over a course of time. The creative class as a whole is valued on account of the creative contributions that they render to the company; as a result, the modern companies of today prefer to give a certain ‘creative space’ to their employees. This is done so that the employee in question can give vent to his or her imagination, be as creative as possible and to be able to ‘think out of the box’. Furthermore, they have realized that by allowing such ‘creative space’ the employees have a higher degree of job satisfaction and therefore retention of valuable skilled professionals is on the rise.

It is only by conceptualizing ideas and services that these companies can hope to gain a march on their competitors. As the economy surges ahead and more new companies come into the fray, the need to be creative increases. The utilization of opportunities are increasing the number of positions in a company, this in turn leads to an increase in the job performance by the new executives thus leading to an overall increase in innovation, thus giving that company an edge. One can see that the creativity spark is being fed by the economy, which has been resurging of late as a result of the innovation in the company. In this day and age, every single company needs to be literally ‘on the ball’ and in order to do that it is essential that they embrace this creative age with open arms.

The Creative folk

The Human race has seen so much creativity first hand and as a result of that has evolved in ways the other species have not done so. For one, the invention of the wheel and the innovation of the Fire had started us on to a journey of self-discovery, one that is still on going. In spite of all the creativity that we have all seen, we are yet to describe this phenomena accurately, the closest that we can come up with is that ‘creativity is all about creating and innovating new products and services’. But in reality, creativity is not as simple as that.

Creativity has more in common with the mindset of a person than it does with the rules of the society which is supposed to govern its very creation. As a result, a person may subconsciously not feel ‘creative’ enough, if he or she were placed under rigid restrictions E.g. the factory worker with a strict schedule to follow on the supply chain.

Creativity, it seems, comes to a person in full flow when that person is not so much ‘conformed’ under the rigid rules of the society. The above example should highlight the fact that a conformist may find it harder to innovate than a non-conformist. The Bohemians are by and large non-conformists in the very sense of the word. To them, the society exists to serve as a gateway to a higher domain of pleasure and worthiness rather than have the society formulate as the main existence itself. Even today, in this modern day and age, we are still so much the conformist in the sense that we are continuously trying to re-modulate the ideas and thoughts, based on our society and our common knowledge. It is when we approach ideas and thoughts with a non-conformist approach and think ‘out of the box’ that the spark of creativity manifests itself.

As a term ‘Bohemian’ has stood for creativity not on account of the artists, writers, playwrights who were bohemian but it was more on account of their lifestyle than anything else. To be a bohemian meant to rebel against the society and its rules in one way or the other, but the modern bohemians have also evolved from the rebellious bohemians of the 18th century, the Absinthe swilling bohemians to the 21st century ones who could in turn be segmented into five different groups amongst themselves.
The Bohemians of today can be re classified as the nouveau bohemian, the Zen bohemian, the gypsy bohemian, the dandy bohemian and the beat bohemian. This classification is related more to the way of their lifestyle than any particular belief or any ideology. The bohemians are quite individualistic and as such, there are very few commonalities between one bohemian and the other, except for their creative output in one form or the other, e.g. music, art etc. and that of their notion that the self is all too important. One could even say that this attitude that most of the bohemians share prevents them from totally integrating into the society as a group.
By and large, the bohemians of today have amalgamated themselves in to the very society they deride from being a musician on a rock band who has to file an income tax record to a gypsy performer who has to pay rent. Bohemianism as a culture is fast evolving to include the EMO girls and the EMO boys of the new generation.
The creative spark in the Bohemians is very strong as a result of the non conformist nature, and furthermore, the freedom they enjoyed at so many levels allowed them to conceptualize this creative spark, thus giving them the label as the ‘creative folk’.

How is the time spent?

According to Richard Florida, the creative class refers to the group of Creative
Professionals, be they artists, musicians or IT professionals, the bands of multi thinkers have been labeled as the ‘creative group’. And Florida expounds further by saying that it is this ‘creative class’ that enables a city to surge ahead in development as well as its economy.

The creative class that Florida has highlighted to us is a group that values its individuality more than anything else, thus giving rise to the unique forms of expression that this group as a whole partakes in. For example, an IT professional may develop a code that is unique in almost every single way just as a painter may paint a mural that is equally unique. One could say that this group, that is both bourgeois and bohemian at the same time, strives hard to find their niche in this staid society with its various constraints. The society, as it is, always contains various groups, each having its own culture and ethos. This has been the way since time immemorial but the one group that lacks any of this is the ‘creative class’ as they do not see themselves as a part of any group but rather consider themselves to be individuals in almost all aspects. But even such individuals, no matter how creative they are, would have to adapt themselves to the constraints of the society, one of the main ones being time.

It is time, which holds sway over all of society, with all segments of society, industrialist or farmer, all coming under it. There is no part of society that is immune from this, for it is this time that defines us all in the end. But when it comes to the creative class, they have decided to adapt themselves to this constraint but have also decided to warp it at the same time as well. Normally, we would plan our tasks for the day according to the time, but the creative class, as much as they hate to be defined by time, in the sense that they do not want to be creative according to the deadlines and deliverables. But that is the way of this society so as a way of adapting to this time factor, the neo-bohemians or the creative class, have taken to warping this time, by either not letting time matter at all or by undertaking a multitude of tasks at the same time.

The later is naturally called ‘multi- tasking’ one that seeks to optimize ones time to the maxima and accomplishes more than what any other normal person may do in the same amount of time. A creative person may not pay heed to the time at all as in the case of the painter painting the mural, he or she may well forget that it is time to eat dinner or go to sleep and continue painting, letting their creative juices flow. Or an IT professional may prefer to load his dishwasher, sauté the onions while attending to his mobile phone and feed his cat, all at more or less the same time, thereby optimizing his time to the maximum and accomplishing more. Today, most of the creative class undertakes multi tasking to one extent or the other, from the day-to-day mundane tasks to working on many projects at the same time. As the creative class seeks out different ways to exercise their minds, multitasking offers them one venue to do so. The creative folk may have abhorred the watches at a time but not any more. The bohemian professionals of today are quite aware of the importance of time and in that aspect, are quite keen to exercise their creative ‘freedom’. Naturally being a bohemian, it is only natural they would want to exercise it by acting in a play or being a part of a music group.

An open society encourages freedom of thought and fosters a belief in one that creativity would be appreciated and not shunned. Such an open policy would in turn help the various sections of the society to be more tolerant as well as supportive of any creativity shown by others. There have been numerous cases in the past where a creative person had been shunned on account of his innovativeness, e.g. Copernicus. The modern society, although more tolerant than before is still a bit reclusive when it comes to change, especially one that may well tend to change our very outlook.

Creativity has intensified over time to such an extent that it has started to give one the impression of being ‘crunched for time’. With creativity evolving our lifestyles, time has gained a new premium in the last few years with the impression that ‘there is never enough time’ pervading to almost all the walks of life. This is a direct result of time optimization, doing a lot within a short time frame, that it is now expected of us all the time, no pun intended. The way that we relate to time has also changed, by trying to do more within less time, thus leading to the feeling that there is never enough time.
The netocrats of today experience this feeling more than anybody else in the sense, that their workdays constantly keep on extending, their schedules relate more to work than anything else, social life is minimal and trying to pack in as much as possible within the short amount of time.

For example, while we used to go to the movies and have an enjoyable time with our family and friends and then head out to dinner, the new time warp has changed all that. We are constantly aware of our work and what we can do in the free time that we seek to multi task, trying to always be on the move, preferring to watch a DVD at home while eating diner to that of heading to the multiplex.

As technology advances, so does our anticipation of what each and every moment of time should be like for us. That is, we are all trying to get the ultimate experience, by packing in as much as we possibly could within each moment. Florida has stated that amongst some of the reasons contributing to this ‘time warp’ is the flexibility of the creative class regarding their workday; this is especially all too true with regard to the neo-entrepreneurs. The creative professionals are all quite taken in by the concept of the flexible day so much so, that some of the companies have already adopted this flexible model, especially where their developers are concerned. One may have thought that with flexible workdays, the creative professional would work less hours, but the opposite is the truth, with many employees working twice as hard under such a model. Again, this is all in the quest of loading as much experience as one can achieve within the given time frame. As a result, multi tasking, is used by many a creative professional to enhance their experiences and abilities as well.

It is only logical to believe that creative folk would prefer to enhance their creative abilities be it music or art or anything else in what ever free time that they may have. Time may be the ultimate master but where the creative class is concerned, this time gets warped and optimized by them so as to accomplish more.

How do they spend their money?

Creativity has always required a certain amount of financial input so as to flourish and this; history has proved again and again. Many a ‘creative work’ in the past including the ‘Mona Lisa’, had all taken a certain amount of financial contribution by way of sponsorships or outright purchases to come to fruition. Money has always been a part of creativity, whether it is in the beginning or in the later stages, it has always been an essential part of it. The statement that creativity has nothing to do with gaining financial advantage, would not be accurate, to say the least.

The creative professionals of today are not all that different from the creative professionals of yesteryear in the sense that they all expect to be rewarded commensurate with their skills. But the creative professionals of today, in addition to being rewarded, also expect to be on the fast rack to the top. Of course, this does raise the argument, that creativity in a person often trends to impatience with others but then again, such an argument could be easily countered as what may seem as impatience to others may just be a manifestation of the creative professional’s frustration at being ‘constrained’. The creative class of today have a higher sense of self and as such, they tend to value themselves quite highly, even to the extent of enacting a ‘primma donna’, to get their way. As a result, most of the creative professionals, in the technology sector as well as those in managerial positions, get fat pay packages.

The creative class is not just a class of inventors and innovators but also of one that is able to visualize the business opportunities in life and take advantage of it. Creative class is not just about the creative professionals but also of the entrepreneurs who are able to take advantage of opportunities that come their way. This utilization of different opportunities and providing a various host of services is one of the things that led to the explosion of the dot com market.

To further explore the issue of the creative class and money, one must think back to Ancient Rome and the Modern Rome. The ancient Rome was not built in a day and its society too consisted of a certain segment of people, the senators, who did not face any hardship, who did not serve in the army and one who were born into the privilege and rank of nobility. As such, these people shaped Rome to be what is was then, an economic powerhouse and an empire with vast boundaries. Some of the senatorial positions were even given as a reward to those who showed an aptitude for development of the state. The end result being that with most of the creative class in power, especially during the time of Emperor Augustus and Hadrian, the architectural wonders of Rome rose from the ashes to blaze on to glory. They transformed Rome into an engine of development, one that would not be halted for many centuries to come. With its coffers overflowing with the spoils of many conquered lands, Rome was rebuilt many times; its aqueducts extended to many a roman city and designed to bring running water into it and the army was modernized to form the war machine, the implacable Roman army. The later years saw the decline of ancient Rome, with many of its colonies rebelling against it and fresh invasions on all fronts, the once implacable war machine being conquered, as a result of over diversification.

Where money is concerned, it is, the creative class earns more today than any other segment of the society, they expect to get remunerated more, with the end result being that they have more to spend. While the workforce of the yesteryear would stay with their families, the creative class of today has different aspirations to that. They prefer to have their own space and as a result, desire to seek out their own lodgings. They are more self – centered and on account of such self-centric motivations, they are able to express themselves in a more individualistic way than otherwise. The creative class of today is seeking to augment their individuality by attempting to ‘personalize’ any purchases. Even the places that they stay in should stand out in one way or the other and they would most definitely prefer not to stay in any urban areas or flats as such.
Where the creative classes are concerned, brands may well be the flavor of the day, with creative professionals often opting to buy the best and the most expensive, all in search of their individuality. Often some of them even resort to purchasing designer dresses as well, so that they can appear to be different in spite of the human instinct to appear the same and blend in. With this desire to be different even showing up in the most mundane of items, like ordering ones lunch. The creative professional would be extremely fussy and very particular over what he or she wants, so that in the end, the image that is presented to the world at large is one that is not one among the many but rather one that is unique.
The creative professional, being adept at technology, would have definitely purchased all the very latest from systems to ipods. Besides technology, ‘hot branding’ would definitely be the in thing with the creative professionals, that is wearing the latest trendy wear but one that is customized at the same time or if one can afford it, a designer wear. From the Plasma screen to the latest pair of shoes, more and more creative professionals have a tendency to shop online and utilize the tools of ecommerce. This is only to be expected given that they are quite comfortable with technology as a result of its sophistication.


How much are they spending?


The ‘creative class’ according to Richard Florida is a group that is constantly seeking out more open, tolerant societies, ones that would allow them to integrate in without any issues of any kind. This class of people generally consists of inventors, innovators, artists and more of the same; as such it is this creative class that is earning more remuneration more than any other segment of the society at large.
As the creative class struggle to give form to individuality in a society that still continues to believe in ‘one size fits all’ policy, they are increasingly spending on material purchases that emphasize the individual streak rather than spend on something bought at a department store.
The creative class tends to live more for today rather than for tomorrow, in the sense they are seeking a rich and a multi cultural experience. They live increasingly rich lifestyles with most of their desires taken care of. Such a lifestyle is bound to be expensive but where the creative classes are concerned, this is much preferable than living a drab lifestyle, just like one of the many and planning for a future many years away.
The expenditure clause is one where any expenditure is acceptable as long as it is able to deliver the rich experience that they seek, and this alone should describe their spending nature more than anything else.

Where do they spend their money?

The creative class as a whole of late has impressed their individuality on the society in a variety of ways, be it from that unique necklace to the one of a kind Cartier watch. They have sought to stand out from the crowd in their mode of dress, their way of speech, their entertainment requirements as well as many other things. These classes of people seek open and tolerant societies as well as tolerant work places, so that such places can adapt to their uniqueness and they do not have to compromise on their individual self.
Since the origin of the Internet, the ways of expressing oneself has increased manifold, with one of the main ones being websites and blogs. This is the age of technology, one that has been readily adapted by the creative class to express their self in, as such, it should not come as a surprise that many belonging to this group, tend to have the very latest in technology, from mobile phones, personal computer, DVD players to entertainment sets. Technology, of late has become one of the easiest ways for any of the creative class to get ‘creative’ by utilizing many of the online tools that are either readily available or can be obtained for free. The creative class has a very sublime relationship with technology that they constantly seek to harness something that is common yet the end result being unique in nature.
The creative class values its self and any thing that could lead to the development of one self. As such, many belonging to the creative class have taken part in spiritual education especially in that of yoga; as such they seek to attain a higher form of individuality. The stereotypes are disliked, as there is no ‘I’ in ‘we’. It is this very thought that often leads to the creative class shopping in select centers that provide unique merchandise.
The one thing that the creative class often seek to do is to customize their merchandises so that they are unique and not a part of anything. As such, they often purchase customized T- shirts, unique watches, tea bags made from a unique blend, anything and everything that sets them apart from the rest.
The creative class tends to gravitate more towards ethnicity than anything urban, as they are more acceptable of the differences than the commonalities. The people belonging to the creative class often pay a lot so as to customize even their colognes; this should tell anyone of their need to emphasize their difference. As it is, the creative class, often seek out entertainments which tend to appeal to both a sophisticated and an intelligent audience, as such they often visit the art galleries and museums. The creative class prefers to spend their money with the purpose of creating a preferable ambience, as is the case with art galleries or to seek out and purchase items that highlight their uniqueness like the customization of products. One is bound to run into more of the creative class in any one of the specialist shops that provide unique items for their customers.


How do they work?

The creative class stands for self, individuality, expression and development, whether it is self-development or the development of the corporate that they are working for. The companies have all realized the true potential of the individual self over that of the collective self in the sense that more or less, almost all the top companies impart training of some kind or the other to their employees.
These training sessions are generally termed as ‘soft skill’ session and their goal is two fold, one to develop the cooperativeness of the team as a whole but more importantly to encourage each and every employee to develop their individuality and thereby give full rein to that creative spark. The companies understand that the creative class forms an essential workforce that is key to the development of the company as a whole, there fore, it is imperative that the company encourages this creativity so as to retain their services for the company.
The creative class as a whole prefers to work in ambiences that are easygoing with fewer constraints placed on them. In addition, they would like to work in a challenging environment and would prefer to work on projects that are equally challenging if not more. The companies have realized that remuneration, although an important issue is not the main issue as far as the creative class goes. The people belonging to this particular group are more prone to leave their job because they felt bored on account of the various constraints at the workplace stifling their creativity. So in order to retain the creative professional, many a company may have to re-evaluate their work environment if they are to maintain that edge over their rival. In addition, by encouraging creativity, the company can expect to increase its output as well as develop host of new products/services on account of this. It is the companies that are able to adapt to the ‘creative professional’ that are bound to develop more than the ones that do nothing but complain about them.
The old image of the workforce especially during the industrial era is of the ‘9 to 5’ with the siren blasting off at 5 pm and that was the end of the workday. As the creative professionals have taken to utilizing the technology as one of their main tools of expression, it is through this very same technology that many of them are seeking mobile platforms to work on. As a result, many of the creative folk have started freelancing their talents to other companies situated elsewhere and with the ability to work round the clock from any place, any time and any where, the creative folk are able to be their own boss. In addition, this form of freelancing provides many of them with a valuable training in that particular area so that in a matter of time, many of them have a start-up company of their own.
As a result of this, many of the top companies are fast changing their work ethics so as to meet the needs of the creative professionals. This is to ensure that they do not leave the company and transform into their rivals, and all for a lack of expression at that. In the near future, with technology pervading every essence of society to one level or the other, it is inevitable that most of the creative folks would prefer freelancing as an option to working for the company and with their talents for multi tasking and time utilization, they should be able to do this quite effectively.


Where do they spend their time online?

The creative classes in their quest for individuality seek out self-help sites, networks, and social networking, to the end anything and everything that accrues to their creativity at large. To start off with, more than half the creative folk are bound to have a blog at the minimum and it is through such blogs that they tend to express themselves online most of the time.
In addition to blogs, the creative folk have taken to e-commerce in a huge way in the sense that they shop for the rare and the unusual through this method. The creative class as a whole considers itself to be both modern and progressive and it should not come as a surprise that they have adapted technology to such a huge extent.
One of the main reasons that one would find most of the creative folk online is that this technology creates a sense of openness, where the old social barriers matter no more. With options such as pc to phone talk and all done in the anonymous mode, the old labels no longer matter. As a result, on account of the openness of this technology, most of the old social barriers have disappeared and no subject is taboo online. With people from various walks of like, with many a different predilection; it is literally the gathering of all the variety of life in a box. This has resulted in the creative class being more informed on the day to day events and ironically being more in touch with what is happening around them.

Where they live?


According to Richard Florida, the cities that are hip, trendy, open and more tolerant of the various life choices of a person, generally as a tendency attract more of the creative class than the cities that are not. As a result, the engine of growth in each and every one of these cities is more dependent on the creative professionals who want to live there than on the companies themselves. Furthermore, the cities may not become an economic powerhouse by offering various incentives to the companies to open shop there but could well achieve this objective by developing various infrastructure projects that tend to portray an open and a secular face of the city for the general public.
As a result of such a make over, the city would seem a whole lot more attractive to the creative folk who by the way are on the look out for tolerant and open cities to settle in. Naturally it follows that with the creative folk as a part of the city, the top companies would only soon follow. Such cities which already have an image of being open to creativity and open to any idea, such progressive cities are the ones that would tend to grow in leaps and bounds, that said, one can say with a certain amount of certainty that Boston is definitely cooler than Florida, therefore Boston is a ‘creative city’. Some of the other so called creative cities are Austin, Minneapolis-St. Paul, Denver, and Portland to name a few and there are the not so cool cities that are literally racing against time to perpetuate a change in their cities like Buffalo, so as to meet the challenge posed by the other cities.

This is the 21st century and the age of technology, as it is competition is severe and in order to get a march, the cities would have to adopt a more open and trendy look so as to encourage creativity in all its forms.
As ‘being different’ is what most of the creative class is concerned, the trend of urbanization relative to the creative class is on a decline. The creative class prefers to lodge in buildings, which are special in one way or the other, from being a part of an antique building to one where an incident or two had taken place. These are some of the ways that the creative class communicates its signature, from lodging at a unique place to wearing cologne that has been customized specifically for that person.
As a result of the creative workforce being more mobile, they tend to travel more and as a result, do not form long lasting relationships. The single unit family is fast disappearing as far as the creative class goes by, for the people belonging to this group, tend to disassociate from the rest of the society by immersing them selves in work. The creative folk of today are more apt to form impermanent relationships and this too, over the net than in real life.
There are various communities all over the world, which stress more on openness, individuality and creativity. One such community is none other than Auroville, a community that has now grown into an almost self-sufficient city in southern India. This place emphasizes creativity more than anything else with the modern aurovillians all taking part in this unique venture called ‘auroville’. Today, auroville, produces its own crops, harnesses its own form of electricity as well as fresh water and in addition produces a series of unique products that it markets worldwide. To be creative to the fullest one must experience a certain amount of freedom and it is this very freedom that has since time immemorial, helped the Human race as a whole patter along from the discovery of the wheel to the WWW phenomena that it is today. The creative class is bound to cause more changes in all the various strata of the society and when the creative class realizes its potential as a group, come together; then they would be powerful enough to cause great things to happen.
Dr. Richard Florida is available for a certain number of executive workshop sessions, the duration of the workshop themselves are only for a day or two at the most. These workshop sessions are to enable the small business executives to understand and come to terms with the creative economic theory. These sessions with Dr. Florida are quite small in size so as to enable more of an in-depth learning and a one to one dialogue. These sessions are aimed to empower the executives so that they would be able to optimize better and be more creative as a result of these workshops.


REFERENCES / CITATIONS: This article was based partly on the information collated from a variety of sources, which are all listed below.

http://www.city-journal.org/html/14_1_the_curse.html

http://everything2.com/e2node/creative%20class

http://sohodojo.com/mt-creative-enterprise-cluster.html

http://www.smartgrowthamerica.org/economy.html

http://www.ushistory.org/lovepark/news/cp091202.htm

http://www.opinionjournal.com/extra/?id=110004573

http://www.blackwell-synergy.com/doi/abs/10.1111/j.1468-2427.2005.00620.x
JAMIE PECK (2005) Struggling with the Creative Class
International Journal of Urban and Regional Research 29 (4) , 740–770 doi:10.1111/j.1468-2427.2005.00620.x

http://creativeclass.typepad.com/thecreativityexchange/talent/index.html

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Working_class

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Creative_class

http://www.creativeclass.com/workshops/

http://www.creativeclass.com/richard_florida/video/index.php?video=02_CreativeEconomy

http://www.creativeclass.com/richard_florida/video/index.php?video=03_EconomicImpact

The card help, anytime, any day, anywhere!

Most of us have credit cards and as such, we must have all required urgent credit card assistance at one time or the other. And when we did require such assistance, just how often did we get the help that we needed in time? Not that many times at all, actually the number of times I managed to get the assistance that I needed in the nick of time, could be counted with just two of my fingers. Most of the times when we require quick help or emergency assistance there are not that many people around to help us out or for that matter not that many online sites either.
But now, the site that I had recently come across fits the bill to the T as far as 'emergency assistance' and 'quick answers' go by. For example, be any problem, any issue regarding credit cards, you should be able to raise it here in this site and you should be able to get the answers that you seek with no problems whatsoever. This site also provides links to check out the variety of offers many of the card companies seem to be intent on offering us all the time. We can also use this site to check out the various cards, compare their interest rates as well as the local credit cards. This is the site to give us the qualified credit card assistance that we all so badly need. So if in need of urgent credit card assistance, you can always check this site out for your answer to that urgent query you may have regarding your credit cards.

Zimbabwe heads to Kangaroo district!

We all have been aware of the shenanigans of Mugabe and his coterie, manipulating the law of the land to suit their own ends. With the inflation reaching the stratosphere of common sense, the country and the common man suffered for long under Mugabe. With the current elections, they had decided more or less, to show Mugabe the door and that would have happened had the election commission released the results.
But with the court refusing to get into the mess and ordering the commission to release the results, it seems that Mugabe may just well manipulate the results and try to continue as the head of the government pushing Zimbabwe further into decline. It is high time that Mugabe realised that he cannot do what ever he wants to do and expect everyone else to stick it up. The whole world is watching the Zimbabwe crisis unfold with dismay and Mugabe should realise that they would be only too happy to step into the fray. One of the most common reasons for declaring a war these days is to enforce democracy. Some of the Zimbabweans may be with Mugabe but most of them are not and this may well be the premise for any nation to attack Mugabe and install the popular leader as the head of the government!

Reservations on the call!

We all love to travel and most of us have specific needs and requirements that we need to be taken care of, especially when we travel. Generally we try to book the Hotel rooms by ourselves and while doing that we tend to explain our needs to the concierge at the other end.Let's face it, in spite of the large amount of international visitors who travel overseas, language is still a huge problem and as a result of that, most of our requirements go through one ear and out through the other.
I had come across this site recently and I have to say that from a travelers perspective this is one great site. Not only was I able to book my hotel rooms according to my specifications but I was able to get all of my requirements filled up exactly. One can book anything here from Hotel rooms to motel rooms and the best part is they all come with these fantastic offers that anyone would have a very hard time saying no to.
With the communication barrier being down at this site, I would have to say that we as travelers should take full advantage of this and utilize this site to the fullest. It is often the communication barrier that prevents us from having a relaxing holiday and with the help of this site, even that problem is all taken care of. We no longer have to worry whether we are going to get the rooms that we had booked or a closet dressed up as a room. With this site, we can truly have an enriching holiday experience!
The other neat thing about this site is the rates, they are some of the lowest rates that I have seen so far. To go to this site, just click on the links above!