Why Pangea Day Should Matter to Marketers

Pangea Day is another fantastic effort coming out of TED.  Taking place on May 10th, it’s an ambitious effort to bring people and cultures together through the power of film.  The trailer at the site is definitely worth watching.  The following excerpt from an email Chris Anderson sent to the TED community last week also provides a nice overview of the effort:

…we invite you to gather around a screen with your family, friends and neighbors, preferably from more than one country. Pangea Day will be available on TV in many areas of the world. In the US, the full four-hour program is being carried live on Current TV, available in 41 million homes on the major cable and satellite systems. Current TV pioneered the vision of citizen-empowered media, and we’re delighted to be partnering with them. We have similar agreements with the massive satellite network Star TV in China/India/Asia, with MGM Networks in Latin America, with Sky in the UK, several partners in the Mid-East, not to mention Indonesia, Mexico, New Zealand and many more. Full details will be posted on our website next week.

And thanks to partnerships with Akamai and MSN, we will also be available on a live, full-screen web-stream everywhere with a broadband Internet connection.

The best way to watch Pangea Day is not just as a normal TV show or web-stream. It should be watched as a community event. We want the sense of the great global village gathering around a campfire. We already know of more than a thousand self-organized screenings taking place in homes, clubs, and movie theaters. We expect thousands more come May 10.

As many of you know, the day is the result of the combined efforts of countless TED supporters around the world, inspired by the TED Prize wish of film-maker Jehane Noujaim. She dreamed of a day when people around the world could share the the same film experience at the same time. The idea has grown into a giant global project… thanks to you. To get a sense of the scale of ambition, please take a minute to watch this beautiful trailer.

Here’s the state of play:
 - Out of thousands of submissions, we have assembled a fantastic line-up of films. There are about 20 in total, ranging in length from 2 to 15 minutes (most of them around 5). They all tell powerful stories, often without language, of what it is to be human. They are, by turns, funny, touching, dramatic, inspiring.
- But you won’t just be watching films. You’ll be watching the world watching. We’re bringing in live audience images from around the world. Watching a film about reconciliation is one thing. Watching it while simultaneously witnessing the reactions of people who are supposed to hate each other will be something else altogether.
- The day also features a dozen powerful three-minute talks from scientists, film-makers, story-tellers and global visionaries. Just as a session at TED takes us on a journey stimulating every part of our brains, so will Pangea Day. Don’t dismiss it as a warm & fuzzy peace-fest. The project builds on the latest ideas in anthropology, psychology and technology. We’ll be revealing how.
- The whole program is being broadcast in front of a live audience of 1,000 (from more than 50 countries) at a spectacular set being built at a Sony Studios soundstage in Los Angeles.
- It will look and feel like nothing you’ve seen before.

In that same email, Chris summarizes the day, saying:  May 10th won’t lead to an outbreak of world peace. But I do think it will reveal a sense of possibility: the possibility that there are incredible new ways of using technology as a force for good; that peoples’ minds are not locked in a dark place forever; that our global village can start the long journey from “us/them” to “we”.  I’m proud that my employer, Avenue A | Razorfish, played a small part in Pangea Day by designing the website. 

If you download our 2008 Digital Outlook report, you’ll find a section covering more ways that non-profits (including Oxfam, Appalachian Voices, Pangea Day, The Encyclopedia of Life, and the Red Cross) are using technology to build awareness and bring people and causes together.  I think the stories are interesting, but the larger trend is also very important for marketers (even putting aside, for a moment, the greater responsibility companies have to the global community).  If we seek to build closer relationships with customers- being a part of their networks, letting them influence our brands, having them be advocates for our businesses- then, as marketers, we need to know and understand those customers better than we ever have before.  They are not just consumers of our goods.  They have causes that inspire them and work that motivates them.  We will be judged not just on the quality of our products, but on how well our interests align with those of our customers.  As a marketer, does it change the way you behave if you know your customers support Appalachian Voices?  If they are organizing viewing parties for Pangea Day?  If they bought goats through Oxfam?  It should.