Category Archives: Spreadable Stories

Earn + Empower + Curate

Art of Storytelling, Co-Created Stories, Digital Storytelling, Spreadable Stories
From cave fire to Kindle Fire (Source: Geo Davis)
From cave fire to Kindle Fire (Source: Geo Davis)

Storytelling in the digital age is a bit like storytelling in the Stone Age and a whole lot unlike storytelling in the 1950s. (Or, for that matter, the latter half of the 20th century!) Storytelling today is more sincere, real, and interactive. Less sleazy, ersatz, and manipulative. Storytelling today is for and by the audience, not just for and by the storyteller(s).

Or so I like to believe.

The objective is rapidly shifting away from telling people our stories, to empowering our customers to tell the story for us.

Instead of talking at [emphasis mine] your audience, create experiences worth sharing. Earn the right to… [your audience’s] voice, then curate the story they tell. (Source: Jonny Mole via jeffbullas.com)

Earn your audience, empower your audience to co-create the story, to own the story, and to propagate the story. And then showcase and celebrate the best of the best. Adopt, appreciate, and reward your ambassadors. This is storytelling in the digital age.

Or so I like to believe!

Slow Storytelling

Slow Storytelling, Spreadable Stories

(null)Story is trending. Storytelling is trending. Old news, right?

Everyone’s talking about storytelling and storification and story-[add your favorite composite] as a business and marketing tool. Everything’s a story, a narrative, an elevator pitch…

Fair enough. I have no bone to pick with those who aim to storify anything and everything remotely monetizable. It works. It always has. It always will.

But this morning I’d like to remind you about the antithesis of the elevator pitch. It’s called “slow storytelling” and it’s not new or trendy, not even buzzwordy. It’s older than the campfire and probably a defining characteristic of our human DNA.

Slow Storytelling is Real

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Slow storytelling is organic and free range. No sophisticated genetic modifications, and no quarterly earnings reports. The hook (or hooks) may be different for each member of the audience. And the narrator may still be trying to sort out the plot, characters, and conclusion in real time with the audience. The emotion is real. The energy is U manufactured. The takeaway is sometimes whimsical, sometimes transformative, sometimes nonexistent. Sometimes laughter is enough. Other times slow storytelling is a lullaby or a lesson. Often it’s just a story, as human and vital as breath and nourishment and love and shelter.

Slow storytelling evolves. Sometimes it loses itself, degenerates. Other times it finds itself, discovers its reason. Blooms. Enchants. Looses its pollen…

Slow storytelling is our Holy Grail.

Have a great day!

Spreadable Media

Spreadable Stories, , ,

In short, Spreadable Media argues: If it doesn’t spread, it’s dead… this book challenges some of the prevailing metaphors and frameworks used to describe contemporary media, from biological metaphors like “memes” and “viral” to the concept of “Web 2.0” and the popular notion of “influencers.” Spreadable Media examines the nature of audience engagement, the environment of participation, the way appraisal creates value, and the transnational flows at the heart of these phenomena. It delineates the elements that make content more spreadable and highlights emerging media business models built for a world of participatory circulation… (Spreadable Media)

Spreadable Media Overview

Spreadable Media: Creating Value and Meaning in a Networked Culture

Spreadable Media provides an updated media map for the digital age replacing outdated broadcast age concepts like “stickiness” (roach hotels!), memes and “viral content”. Authors Henry Jenkins, Sam Ford, and Joshua Green define the nature and importance of content “spreadability” in a world of pervasive social media. Spreadable Media focuses on the conditions for global participatory circulation, the movement and evolution of co-created content (derived, mashup, remix, etc.) and the augmented relevance/value of audience enhanced content.

In many cases, the greatest marketing successes are not those that spread “virally” among a massive audience but instead those that have content that really resonates with a key audience and acts as cultural material for their own conversations. And, in those cases where a piece of content does become an Internet-wide sensation, it is always driven by allowing people to express themselves through your message rather than having something inherent within the video or story that people are somehow forced to send along. ~ Sam Ford (Fast Company)

Spreadable media is a theory of circulation. Distribution historically refered to a top down, industry controlled system which sought to control the movement of media content across the culture. Independent media makers have often been locked out of the most established systems of distribution by powerful gatekeepers who have worked to protect the interests of mainstream media. Circulation, on the other hand, refers to an emerging hybrid model, where a mix of top-down and bottom-up forces determine how material is shared across and among cultures in far more participatory (and messier) ways. Collective decisions people make about whether to pass along media texts are reshaping the media landscape. A system of circulation offers far more opportunities for independent media makers to enter the consciousness of their desired publics, to court relationships with fans and followers, and to engage with audiences beyond their national borders. ~ Henry Jenkins, Sam Ford, and Joshua Green (TribecaFilm.com)

Pre-order Spreadable Media

Spreadable Media: Creating Value and Meaning in a Networked Culture, by Henry Jenkins, Sam Ford, and Joshua Green will be released on January 21, 2013, but you can pre-order it now.

More Information

Book Website: spreadablemedia.org

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