Rev Up Your Creativity with Seth Godin

I read a post a while back from a tweep who returned his iPad shortly after he got it, because there was so much to play with, he couldn't stay focussed enough to read an ebook.

Well, I can relate. Sure I've downloaded a few titles, but haven't done much more than play with the features of the iBook reader itself.

That changed over the last few days since I got pulled into Seth Godin's Unleashing the Super Ideavirus. It was a cheap read at only $4.99 from the iBook store. And to my delight, once I downloaded it, I found each one of the 18 chapters begins with a short video of Godin profiling people who've built their own successful ideaviruses.

The videos are downloaded not streamed, so they'll play even when you're away from wi-fi or in areas where your carrier doesn't reach.

The chapter on the "Decline of Interruption Marketing" begins with an engaging little vignette on Little Miss Matched, a company that sells tween girls not two socks to a set, but three - none of which match. No advertising, but hugely profitable.

The section on "The Ideavirus Formula" has a feature on Donorchoose.org, an American crowd-sourcing site that matches public school teachers looking to fund special classroom projects with a huge pool of small donors who each chip in a few dollars to get the project off the ground.

The point of all this is not so much to gush about the excellent content and tight writing everyone expects from Godin, but to highlight the inspiration that came my way from interacting with the book by tapping out a number of enotes in the margins.

I spent the three highly productive hours one night last week thinking of how I could apply some of the concepts to a new Ning I am creating. And the creativity just, kept, coming.

As always, I was left with my mind revved up and more questions than answers. But the answers I did generate were welcome. And the search for the others is going to be a blast.

If you've tired of flitting your way through 240,000 apps, looking for the novel and new, settle in with one of Godin's highly engaging iBooks. You never know just what you might incubate.