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Ok, so it's not an article about Red or the Red One (yet), but check this out.

In the April 2007 issue of Wired, called "Loud and Clear", the cover story is about new strategies by smart companies... or, why exposing your company's plans and secrets is the future of business. The cover reads:

"Get Naked and Rule the World. Smart companies are sharing secrets with rivals, blogging about products in their pipeline, even admitting to their failures. The name of this new game is Radical Transparency, and it's sweeping boardrooms across the nation. Even those Office drones at Dunder Mifflin get it. So strip down and learn how to have it all by baring it all."

When I saw this, I immediately thought of how Red Digital Cinema has decided to operate from the get go. The development of the Red One camera has been as open to the public as any technological device I can remember in recent years, with many plans and tech specs posted during the development process. In fact, many ideas getting included into the feature set have come from constant interaction with the early adopters.

By taking feedback from tradeshows, blogs, and forums, the overall product is improving and customers are getting the opportunity to let the manufacturer know which features are important to them before the 1.0 version has even shipped.

Also, through use of the internet, many of the designers themselves are actually communicating directly with the future customers... not through the use of a hired marketing company or outsourced tech support.

There has also been constant communication from the founder of Red himself, Jim Jannard, with several updates given in the tone of "we're exceeding our goals", "the design has changed", or even "we've got some bad news". It doesn't get more transparent than that.

I think that this can be a very successful way to operate in the early stages of forming a new company (and later on down the road as well, if done properly). It will be interesting to see how Red makes out with this strategy.

If you want to read the article, "The See-Through CEO", it's in the April Issue, but it is also currently online here:

http://www.wired.com/wired/archive/15.04/wired40_ceo.html

Hopefully, we'll be seeing a Wired cover story on Red soon!