Credit: Joe York/ESPN
Paradise Lost
This is one helluva’ story.
“The greatest tarpon fisherman who ever lived sits in a house on the side of a forgotten bayou, stuck in a blue recliner, watching his world die on live television. Oil gushes out of the well, every lost barrel another line in his obituary.
Though he’s only 55, Lance “Coon” Schouest is about to become obsolete. Everything’s being taken from him, in living color with a network logo and theme music. His way of life, his job, the marshes he grew up in and possibly even an entire breed of fish that has survived since dinosaurs walked the earth. The tarpon has taken every disaster man and nature could throw at it.
Until now.”
“We know that compelling presentations and insights which can create genuine business changes are based on new emotional connections. Why is this, and why is it that qualitative research so often has greater impact and acceptance than more rigorous quantitative validation? The answer lies in stories.
The obvious answer is to look at the emotional resonance of individual testimony versus the empirical validity, but low empathic value, of quantitative data. Numbers just do not have the same emotional resonance as a real consumer story, and the answer may lie in the way in which our brain developed.”
“In corporate storytelling, a core idea is that the stories be “true”, as opposed to the arbitrary made-up advertisement slogans. But the claim on authenticity is of course as elusive as the alleged truths that all identity-building is built upon –not least the national narratives that still very much determine the public spheres. In the West, we are accustomed to believing that we are enlightened and somehow stand above the conflicting particular interests in the world. We believe that the media give us an “objective” and non-partial view of what is going on. Not every single medium, of course, but the public sphere as a whole.”
FINALLY, SOMEBODY HATES STORYTELLING!
This is a great read. Not sure anyone other than Doug Lipman could have written it.
“At last, someone hates us!
Of all the books written on storytelling so far (4,469 hits on Amazon.com), can you think of a single one that opposes storytelling?
But now we have Christian Salmon’s “Storytelling: Bewitching the Modern Mind,” published in March, 2010.
Salmon doesn’t just hate storytelling. He thinks storytelling is dangerous and disruptive to modern civilization.”
Not shilling for Amazon (we can’t do that in NC) but this is a pretty neat game.
“Think-ets Deluxe Pack contains a fun and unique assortment of 30 miniature trinkets from around the world specially selected for storytelling and imaginative play.”
I’ve mentioned this before. It’s worth mentioning again.
“Rakontu is a free and open source web application that small groups of people can use together to share and work with stories. It’s for people in neighborhoods, families, interest groups, support groups, work groups: any group of people with stories to share. Rakontu members build shared “story museums” that they can draw upon to achieve common goals.”
101 Reasons Social Media Will Destroy Everything We Know About Marketing…EVER!
Since I’m in the location based camp, storytelling and otherwise so to speak, here’s a look at the other side of the coin.
“There seems to be this grand idea amongst some in social media circles that in order to prove the efficacy of the medium they must show how it completely abolishes everything about marketing and advertising that’s every been taught, practiced, and written about.”
Why so little success with corporate storytelling? Here’s what to do instead.
Interesting take.
“With little success, I’ve been trying for 10 years to teach storytelling principles to PR practitioners. Workshop and class attendees understand it and enjoy it, but the few who try to apply a narrative structure to their work get bogged down in the approval process.
I rarely recommend it these days as a workshop component or class. My own PPTs and handouts are dusty.
The only time I teach it now is within the context of a class on writing award submissions. This seems to be the one type of document where the marketing department is willing to let go.
I wonder if this will change.”
Online Distributed Story – Workshop Template
This is very nice!
Keep them in mind this 4th of July weekend.
“Some 30,000 American soldiers are taking part in the Afghanistan surge. Here are the stories of the men and women of First Battalion, 87th Infantry of the 10th Mountain Division. Over the next year, The New York Times will follow their journey.”
Conflicts, storytelling and design thinking
“The dramatic conflict is an absolute necessity on any form of narration. He puts the challenges and obstacles that the main characters have to face and details the way in which these characters will overcome them, or not!
Without conflict, no story!
The conflict does not contribute to good stories, but it helps the stories as a mirror of the human condition by which we all grow and change as we move forward in life.“
“Touching Stories is a film that was produced entirely for the iPad. They’ve built user interaction into the production, so that the viewer can actually impact scenes in the film by touching, shaking and using the iPad for everything it was meant to do.
Welcome to the first wave of genius productions that will change the way we consume media. Expect even more brilliance over the next months, as developers really get a handle and fully realize what’s possible with this magical device.”
Cardiff storytelling project launches
Nice!
“We Are Cardiff is a digital storytelling project, exploring the relationship between the city and its inhabitants. Cardiff is a busy, vibrant and exciting city with so many incredible people who live here – this is an opportunity for us to record some of that in words and pictures, and present it on the internet for anyone with a connection to see.”
