The Volokh Conspiracy

[Eugene Volokh, January 16, 2008 at 4:27pm] Trackbacks

Not This Blog:

A successful blog "kind of opens the kimono and from a brand point of view lets people know who you are," says Rob Frankel, a Los Angeles-based branding consultant who has advised clients ranging from Re/Max to Honda Motorcycles and Sea World.

For the sake of our readers, my kimono stays closed. (Hat tip: How Appealing.)

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OrinKerr:

From the story:

But it has to be done right, in the spirit of blogging and not of advertising, and you can't just task the intern with the job.

That's wrong, too. Many of our best posts are written by our intern; you just need to know how to hire the best interns for the job.

1.16.2008 4:32pm

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Virginian:

For the sake of our readers, my kimono stays closed.

Arigatou gozaimasu, Volokh-san.

1.16.2008 4:43pm

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alias:

I don't think Frankel would suggest that Tom Goldstein show us anything more than his iPhone.

1.16.2008 4:52pm

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Anderson (mail):

Obviously, it's the interns who are meant to keep their kimonos open.

1.16.2008 5:00pm

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Q the Enchanter (mail) (www):

Well, all I've got's this damn mawashi. What now?

1.16.2008 5:09pm

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Gary Anderson (mail):

Well if you never open your kimono, how do you -- you know -- wash yourself?

1.16.2008 5:11pm

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GeoffBro (mail):

Somewhat surprisingly, this is actually a pretty common business phrase. I've heard it used quite frequently over the past few years... I suspect it's got the zing that marketers look for.

1.16.2008 5:23pm

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WHOI Jacket:

I've got this weird mental image of the Conspirators as geisha.

Excuse me, I need to go find a grapefruit spoon.

1.16.2008 5:36pm

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pgepps (www):

Wow, what a bunch of waru no otaku you have here, friends! :-)

1.16.2008 5:47pm

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theobromophile (www):

Underneath their kimonos?

1.16.2008 5:57pm

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Mark Schuldenfrei (mail):

I first heard about the phrase "open kimono" when I interned at IBM in 1981. They had an IBM Jargon Book that defined many interesting phrases.

"Open Kimono" had two meanings, according to that dictionary (and my memory). One was "To be completely, unreservedly and openly honest with you". So, if I think that your proposal is going to end your career, but it is not polite to say so, I can ask "May I go open kimono with you about your proposal?"

The other meaningwas "to give you a glimpse of something that I am not permitted to tell you". For example, if you are about to take a job with another division working on a computing device that will be ready in a year, while I know that there is a confidential project that does the same thing, better and cheaper, that ships in a month, I might tell you, open kimono, about this secret project - even though I should not.

I found it fascinating to pretend to understand the etymology of that phrase, but, alas, it was not revealed in that dictionary. :-)

1.16.2008 6:54pm

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Anon Y. Mous:

For the sake of our readers, my kimono stays closed.

Come on! How 'bout just a quick peek?

1.16.2008 7:32pm

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MXE (mail):

I really hope this phrase has some innocent origin. Otherwise "opens the kimono" sounds a lot like "drops trou" to me.

Sigh...business jargon. Never say in two syllables what you can say with an obscure acronym.

1.16.2008 8:46pm

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Toby:

Well remember the fascination with Japanese management in the '70s and '80s

1.16.2008 9:31pm

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RainerK:

Mark Schuldenfrei's interesting explanation notwithstanding, wouldn't an open kimono only be meaningful on a video blog?

1.16.2008 9:59pm

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K Parker (mail):

But what if we need to perform an involuntary rectal exam?

Virtually, of course...