I'm not a designer, but I do have an affinity for design, and have taken some design classes by well-respected pros. They always taught that alignment is one of the keys to design, and that centering is (usually) the weakest alignment one can choose. your post here seems to support that notion.

Design by committee... that's like waterboarding, or death by a thousand paper cuts, eh? ha!

Vicstar: I think LeBron has some more, um — "magic" —in store for us. I hope the Cavs come back and take the series. I know Kobe will lead his team to the Finals. So must King James.

@Jan: I agree with you: don't change the rules; don't change the actual game. The beauty of baseball is that it truly is the same GAME today, that it was 100 years ago. What's changed is the business built around it, and the people who play it.

It's funny, on Friday A-Rod hit a home run on the very first pitch he saw in 2009, and for a minute, it was just a game again. And then this morning, I wake up to the release of the Roger Clemens book, which claims that Clemens' story is emblematic of all that's wrong with baseball.

They really need a fresh start.

@Norman: I agree with you 100%. How far can an intern take you, when their primary job is to learn basics of the business?

If you look at lots of companies who are not in the Internet or social media space, many of them assign stewardship of all online initiatives to junior (or lower-ranked) employees. While those folks may do a great job, they're not in a position to influence, shape, or drive online and social media strategy and policy for the organization. Amazon, Google, Netflix probably don't have these problems -- because their primary business exists online. At "traditional" businesses, until senior people -- or junior people in positions that have teeth and the ability to make decisions in a fast-moving space -- are given the responsibility for running these programs, you'll have companies that have brochure-ware Web sites, and who make stumble after stumble in social media.

Thanks for bringing your energy and passion to this discusson. You're sharp, obviously intelligent and well-versed in the business of branding. Let me just say, it is alright if you and I disagree, we're just having a discussion. I truly appreciated your commentary, it contained many fine points.

Now, the gist of my argument -- which was actually delivered with humor, but which you labeled 'arrogant' was this: the flu outbreak is NOT a problem that the pork industry can fix by rebranding their entire industry. When I said branding should be timeless, I meant that the core essence of your brand, the very phsyical, emotional, and psychological elements that will connect on a perceptual level with your customers should never change, especially not in the face of adversity. You are who you are, and you build your brand strategy around that essence.

Because there's this flu pandemic, which actually has very little to do with pork, if people are cooking the meat properly, should not, and does not, require the pork producers to capriciously alter their brand strategy. Once the swine flu outbreak is over, do they change their brand strategy again? See where I'm going? As I proposed in my blog post -- and remember, it's just the observations of one man -- rather than rebranding, the pork industry might be better served employing public relations techniques to address the flu, techniques which, by the way, would be influenced by the brand strategy they already have in place.

I'm sorry if you missed my point, and I'm troubled that you missed my humor, I'll have to work on that, but branding isn't the tool to solve every problem that a business faces. Use the right tool for the problem.

@Norman: thanks for the comments. I agree with you: Domino's will survive this, first of all they had the offending video pulled from YouTube in record time, so there's very little in the way of 'evidence.' Moreover, we're all so saturated with media these days, that it will soon be forgotten, until the next company stumbles in this space. Interestingly enough, just days after the incident, a competitor, Pizza Hut, began a nationwide search for a "Twitter Intern": http://bit.ly/38QqK

It's a small step, but at least it's in the right direction, as far as social media goes.

@KRISHJOHN: I'll have to respectfully disagree with your main premise here. I think you've taken the discussion far out of the scope of my initial post.The swine flu, H1N1 virus, Mexican flu, or whatever else you want to call it does not need a branding program. It needs a vaccine. That is the solution in this case.

@michelletripp: thanks kindly. you are right on the money! look, there are plenty of situations that truly call for rebranding: mergers and acquisitions are situations that come immediately to mind as perfect opportunities for rebrands. Situations where the core business is changing signficantly. But this notion of rebranding as a remedy for crisis management, well, it completely misses the point of what branding is all about in the first place. thanks again, for sharing your great insights.

Well, if you're going to take a book with you somewhere, you're still going to have to carry that with you too, right? The Kindle is far lighter. I agree with you: I love the touch and feel of books. I own so many books that some of them serve as furniture, literally. Yet, my biggest disappointment with them is I can't take 10 or 12 of them with me when I travel, or go to the laundromat for two hours. Now, I can with the Kindle, which has about a 3-week life on a single charge. I think it's a great ACCESSORY to books, not a replacement... assuming you're a book reader to begin with.