The Cave #6
The Cave this week combines references to Scottish indie bands, the English football team, the new iPhone, battered old suitcases, Depop girlies, and a defence of being an idiot in a position of power.
All that and more, squeezed into piping hot takes on expectation management, the circular economy, and the benefits of messing up.
ALSO, from next week, we’ll be pausing the curiosities section to instead focus on the election campaign (still alliterative, thankfully). Check back for our take on the highlights and lowlights from the trail.
Comms
We were promised jetpacks, or the art of expectation management
Don’t get your hopes up for this section.
Expectation management is as old as human interaction (and entirely unnecessary here, The Cave is obviously always excellent).
We’ll hear plenty of it in the coming election campaign, as politicians of all stripes attempt to plot a path between conviction and hubris.
It’s a tricky balance at the best of times, and not just in politics.
Thomas Tuchel, the new England football manager (Allegory is 40% Brits, it will never be soccer), has responded to expectations that he’ll guide the country to a World Cup win next year by amping up how poor the team were before he arrived. It’s a tried and tested tactic, albeit one difficult to pull off when the side is ranked 4th in the world and were European runners up less than 12 months ago.
Companies face a similar problem, particularly when it comes to technology.
Slightly thinner, slightly faster devices packed with AI agents may be useful, but they’re hardly meeting the expectations of consumers with memories of the transformative power of the first iPhone. The old adage (and Scottish indie band) ‘we were promised jetpacks’ comes to mind on an increasingly regular basis.
The typical advice is to underpromise and overdeliver. But this is becoming increasingly difficult as societies and platforms reward greater histrionics in public pronouncements.
Being humble now often leads to being ignored. Conversely, big claims and subsequent stumbles are enough to put a premature end to an exciting innovation.
The answer, then, must lie in the middle - of aiming high, walking the talk, and educating the audience along a sometimes rocky journey. A new kind of expectation management.
Or just give us a jetpack.
Culture
Avoiding circular culture in the circular economy
This week, German luxury brand Rimowa quickly sold out its latest collection of vintage suitcases covered in dents, stickers, and tags.
It’s the latest step in the company’s commitment to treat wear and tear as a badge of honor and a reflection of a well-travelled life. They’re not the only ones. R. M. Williams’ repair service helps boots stay usable for decades, and has seen pairs passed down through generations.
It’s a sign that the circular economy is now so engrained in mass culture (see eBay supplying clothes for Love Island and Depop girlies creating an entire entertainment industry around reselling clothes) that it’s started to generate its own subcultures.
But it also raises an interesting question about the value of experience itself.
Creating new stories with pre-loved items is one thing. Co-opting someone else’s escapades is quite another.
This conundrum isn’t just present in the circular economy. AI large language models arguably do exactly this, taking existing content and ideas and creating something that feels new but just…isn’t.
The suitcases look cool, and buying one covered in tags and labels is undoubtedly quicker and cheaper than acquiring them yourself, even at a cost of between $1,000 and $1,500.
But in embracing the virtuous aspects of recycling and imperfection, we surely have to be wary of leaving space to add something new, to reinterpret and reimagine, not simply reiterate. To prevent the circular economy leading to a circular culture.
Let the Depop girlies show us the way.
Curiosities
The subtle art of f***ing up
As we said in the intro, this will be the last Curiosity for a few weeks. To send us off, editor-in-chief of The Atlantic, Jeffrey Goldberg, revealed he was added to a group chat about military strikes in Yemen that included information about weapons, targets, and timing.
The full piece is well worth reading, including the revelation that an apparently acceptable emoji response to bombing a country is 👊🇺🇲🔥.
It’s not the first government bungle to hit the news this year. A few weeks ago, it was revealed Health NZ was using a single Excel spreadsheet to track $28 billion of public money.
And honestly, this is all so relatable. Who hasn’t accidentally sent a message to the wrong person? Excel still helps run more companies than many would care to admit it.
These mistakes are potentially catastrophic, and definitely shouldn’t be encouraged.
But could a lesser degree of human fallibility begin restoring a sense of connection and trust between governments and citizens? Perhaps not to deliver public policy priorities, but at least to not become an administrative Death Star.
In an era of collapsing faith in institutions, that may not be the worst thing. Add it to the manifestos.