Last night, my wife and I nestled down to watch the season finale of the Celebrity Apprentice. Little did I know I was about to get schooled by The Donald.

What I liked about this show was that it showcased human ingenuity and creativity in the entrepreneurial arts. I’m a sucker for a good entrepreneurial tale, Celebrity Apprentice delivered. (I could have done without the celebration of the “hatred” between Joan Rivers and Annie Duke, though. FWIW, I think that “rivalry” was nearly 100% fabrication.)

The finale was live, although we were told in the beginning of the show that “some portions were pre-recorded.” Part of the brilliance of the finale was that they announced that some of the contestants on the show would be twittering live during the finale:

• Joan Rivers
• Melissa Rivers
• Annie Duke

Annie seemed to be the only one who kept up with regularity, but I thought it was a great way to make the whole experience interactive. It blended both “old” and “new” media and gave viewers who tuned in live an experience that people who DVR’d it wouldn’t get.

I don’t believe that long-established media like radio, TV, newspapers, etc. will vanish completely. They will have to incorporate the “new media” in order to thrive, even survive. Imagine:

• Watching the season finale of your favorite show and reading the twitter feed of your favorite actor on the show, reading their thoughts as they watch along with you.
• Getting a link to watch live “behind the scenes” footage of a radio show, streamed over UStream.tv, that’s only available to RSS feed subscribers of the show’s blog.
• Gaining access to articles that the rest of the public doesn’t get to read because you joined your local newspaper’s Facebook page.

Reimagination is a non-negotiable. Industries will have to incorporate new methods of communication into what they are doing or they won’t make it. As far as I can tell, the Internet isn’t a “fad” that is going away.

So thanks, The Donald, for teaching me something about social media.

Inspired by recent life events from Tony Morgan and Ben Arment, I want to ask you a question today:

If you could launch one of your biggest dreams right now, what would it be?

Me? I would develop Deviant Media Group (BeDeviant.com’s “mother” company) into a full-fledged communications-solution juggernaut. I’ve always wanted to help churches better communicate the most important message on earth in a culturally relevant way; a way that the normal, everyday world can understand. Workshops, blog and social media coaching, books (both e- and paper), graphic design, and of course continuing this beautiful blog–you name it, we’d do it.

That’s what I would do. What would you do?

I posted on the boundaries that creativity needs to flourish yesterday, but I still have some thoughts on the topic rumbling around, so we’ll tap this well until it dries out.

Brian commented yesterday asking, “when is it good to stay, ‘inside the lines’ and when is it good to go outside of them?”

That’s a really good question.

I think part of the answer comes when looking at what those “lines” provide for the individual or group that is using them. What kind of fruit do they produce? For instance:

• Frank Lloyd Wright produced some of the most brilliant, complex, and inspiring pieces of art-chitecture ever. He utilized lines, right angles, architecture, and geometry in ways that continue to stun and amaze. Boundaries for Wright were not only important, but essential to produce what he did.
• Contrast that with Jackson Pollock who disregarded all measure and form and to the casual observer, simply “splattered” paint over giant canvases to create works of art. Boundaries or “lines” were less important to Pollock, although he still used them as most of his works are all done on giant, rectangular canvases.

Pablo Picasso’s “blue period” was brilliant because he had the discipline to only use the color blue (and her many shades thereof).

Michael Phelps is the world’s best swimmer because, according to his mother, he likes the “order” that the lines on the bottom of the pool provide for him.

“Lines” produce the skeleton on which we form the body of our creativity.

So often, I make the mistake of thinking that creativity means being completely free of boundaries:

• Painting with any color you feel like.
• Coloring “outside the lines.”
• Making music that free-flows with no discernible tempo or rhythm.
• Creatively solving problems without using any tested methods that have worked before.

There are times and places to be “boundary-free”, but I am learning that some of the most creative, brilliant inspiring work that people do is created not in spite of boundaries, but because of them.

There’s a reason why music is set to a time signature, why canvases are traditionally rectangle and yes, why even coloring books have lines to color inside of. They provide the discipline that creativity needs to flourish.

I could not agree more with what Ben Arment is saying here:

We get a lot of requests at Catalyst to promote social justice causes. And most of them arrive in one of these forms:

• A lengthy e-mail with a link to a website
• A DVD with the whole thing explained if we’d only watch it
• A folder with tons of reading in it… and I mean tons of reading
• A challenge to buy “widgets” for a cause

Of course, they’re all very good causes. And deserve tons of recognition. But with so many organizations out there, we can get a little numb to them all. So here’s a PR tip for any future comers…

Find a strong symbol for the cause… and send the symbol.

A stack of papers makes very little impact. But a symbol… whether it’s a whistle, a bag of coffee or a pair of shoes… a symbol makes an unforgettable impression.

While I don’t work for the uber-cool Catalyst, I do work in ministry and can assert that we find the same things in the church world.

• So-and-so has a great ministry event coming up and they’d like to promote it.
• Organization XYZ is taking a missions trip and wants to announce it during the service.
• ACME Christian Business sends a page-short-of-a-phone-book length “pamphlet” explaining why they should be the ones to get your next order.

Simple is better. Ask Kem Meyer. If you get our attention with something simple, we’re more apt to seek you out and ask you to be a part of what God is doing in our organization.

Don’t “info barf” on me. Most of us have enough on our plates where we need to see something that “stands out” before we can even consider having you join us.

You’ve seen ‘em. You know you have. I have too.

Christianized products. They’re eveywhere:

• Abercrombie & Fitch t-shirt > “A-bread-crumb & Fish” t-shirt
• YouTube > GodTube (before the founders of the site had enough sense to rename their site to “Tangle”)
• KIIS-brand radio stations > KLOVE

We Christians love to take services, products, and slogans and twist them into a nice, neat, “Christianized” parody. It’s almost as if the creators of these parodies feel like they can legitimize whatever it is they’re interested in only if they can affix as many Bible verses to it as possible. I know the intentions are good, but sometimes the outcome of these well-intentions are particularly heinous:

I came across a blog post by Maurilio Amorim that I really enjoyed. It talks about the need for us Christians to create a “ghetto” in which we feel comfortable to hang out in. It’s almost like we need to create an alternate universe in which to exist to make life bearable. Is this the life that Christians have been called to?

The Christian Ghetto is a place where you go to hang out with your Christian friends, fill up a website with Christian pictures and Christian videos of lots of happy people, loud preaching and youth camp promos. There’s not much witnessing and shedding of light in the ghetto since everyone is already convinced and the place is way too bright as is.

I understand the need for closed networks within several difference facets of ministry. For example, in managing small groups who need to connect in privacy or resourcing ministries that deal with evangelistic strategies where an open discussion in Facebook, would undermine their effectives.

So should the Church abandon social media altogether? Absolutely not. The church should redeem it . Christians are already there in millions strong among their unchurched friends. Instead of trying to pull your people out of Facebook, Twitter, Myspace, Orkut or whatever the social media du jour is, your church should develop tools to engage, inspire and create dialog within these networks. We should resource our people with tools for integration and not segregation. We should take our Christian content into every part of the web we’re allowed to go. Go where the darkness is and shed light.

I say let’s break up the Christian Ghetto mindset we Christians tend to have and lets become more intentional in our social media outreach.

What do you think? Where do you see the “Christian Ghetto” mindset at work?