“Once upon a time…” you have definitely heard that phrase once or twice. It is always the beginning of what seems to be an interesting and exciting story and just with that you have opened the doors of imagination to a story that only you have the power of deciding its fate. How interesting it […]
Read more "Once Upon a Time"Every story – no matter what the medium – needs the essentials: characters, a setting, a beginning, middle, end, plot line, etc. A good story is one where those essentials interact together seamlessly, playing together, to bring you into the story world. Depending on the medium, there are more essentials that may need to be incorporated into […]
Read more "What Makes a Good Story?"What if I told you there were only seven ways to write a story? That every thing you read, write, and watch can all fall under the same basic plot lines? Well it’s true, sorry to burst your bubble of creativity or rain on your next brilliant story of how a dog found his way […]
Read more "The Truth About Writing a Good Story"When I hear the term “good story” I do not think of just one specific news article that informed the public about an event really well. I think of a good story to be one told by the compilation of news articles, TV news coverage, and social media coverage (from news outlets and the public) […]
Read more "Experience the News"Anything can be news, but not everything is technically newsworthy. There are good stories, and then there are GOOD stories. As media consumers, we search for the GOOD and weed out the rest through identifying what makes a story something we identify with. How stories are told can be even more important than what a story […]
Read more "Finding “Greatness” in Storytelling"Freshman year in a class, the professor asked the question, “why do we go to the movies?”. Many students answered saying that the reason was voyeurism, escapism, or just to be entertained. While these answers were good, the real answer was “to find out what happens”. This question and answer sequence turned out to be one of […]
Read more "The New Art of Internet Storytelling"Writing is not an easy task to do. So here are 7 steps that I found useful. 1. First and foremost. Write with your heart. The reason you choose to write cannot be quantified in a math equation. Or solved by a computer with a large amount of stupid data (as some may try to […]
Read more "Stay Sharp. Stay Bright. 7 Steps to Improve Your Writing"Over the summer I came across a piece in The New Yorker about the story of Kalief Browder. The writer, Jennifer Gonnerman, had reported on the life of this young man– who spent three years on Rikers Island without any conviction of a crime– before his tragic suicide in July of 2015. Even without following Browder’s story prior […]
Read more "Storytelling in the Digital Age"With the increasing amount of information, news stories, and social media posts spewing out these days in milliseconds, finding a “good” story may seem physically impossible. For me, a college student used to reading hundreds of stories throughout my career at Syracuse, stories seem to all mesh together in my memory unless they have some […]
Read more "Elements of a Good Story in an Over-Cluttered Story World"Stories are not difficult to find. The real challenge is scouring the social landscape for good stories. While there is no shortage of content being produced and shared, the notion of storytelling has evolved to meet the consumer expectations for quality stories. Focusing on a clear beginning, middle and end, traditional storytelling structures to share […]
Read more "What Makes Stories Worth Reading (and Worth Sharing)"