We began today by talking about currency as something that we
You were quick to identify that, for most situations, the primary currency is money.
You were also quick to apply this concept to social media, identifying currency as attention. Especially on Twitter:
So how to use our Twitter Narrative in order to acheive this first goal of gaining as many Followers [positive attention] as possible?
I think the answer to this lies in story and character development and how to make these characters worthy of attention.
Many of us are using love stories in these narratives, which is great. Though I also worry that love stories--as in most real-life relationships--are only interesting to the people in them. Watching or reading about them is often less interesting.
So I asked each group to examine some successful love stories. Using the Google Doc Character Deveopment, you examined "Romeo and Juliet," "Warm Bodies," "Casablanca," "Atonement," and the Hermione-Ron relationship in the "Harry Potter" series.
We determined that each relationship not only had a personal story, but also a public story, a large, dark thing looming in the background. Often this dark thing was war, but there were variations: the zombie apocalypse, Voldemort's world domination, etc.
We talked about the ways that this public story affects the private story: primarily separating the characters, infiltrating their lives or causing them to take drastic action in order to avoid it. In the case of Romeo and Juliet, we blamed the heros' deaths on the public story, because it required them to take so many secretive actions that these secrets eventually separated them from each other.
So having this kind of public backstory can be really useful.
I'd like you to continue thinking about this backstory in your own Twitter Narratives. Please read the "War of the Worlds" and add your comments here in the comment section of this post (rather than your own blog).
Your infographic deadline has been pushed back to next Thursday: May 8.
- want to accrue as much as possible
- pay in exchange for goods
- invest in order to create more of the same thing
You were quick to identify that, for most situations, the primary currency is money.
You were also quick to apply this concept to social media, identifying currency as attention. Especially on Twitter:
- want as much positive attention as possible [the more Followers the better]
- pay in exchange for goods [we "Follow" someone in order to gain information]
- invest in order to create more of the same thing [as the Freakonomic blog suggests, Following lots of people is an investment, or a way to build your own Following.]
So how to use our Twitter Narrative in order to acheive this first goal of gaining as many Followers [positive attention] as possible?
I think the answer to this lies in story and character development and how to make these characters worthy of attention.
Many of us are using love stories in these narratives, which is great. Though I also worry that love stories--as in most real-life relationships--are only interesting to the people in them. Watching or reading about them is often less interesting.
So I asked each group to examine some successful love stories. Using the Google Doc Character Deveopment, you examined "Romeo and Juliet," "Warm Bodies," "Casablanca," "Atonement," and the Hermione-Ron relationship in the "Harry Potter" series.
We determined that each relationship not only had a personal story, but also a public story, a large, dark thing looming in the background. Often this dark thing was war, but there were variations: the zombie apocalypse, Voldemort's world domination, etc.
We talked about the ways that this public story affects the private story: primarily separating the characters, infiltrating their lives or causing them to take drastic action in order to avoid it. In the case of Romeo and Juliet, we blamed the heros' deaths on the public story, because it required them to take so many secretive actions that these secrets eventually separated them from each other.
So having this kind of public backstory can be really useful.
I'd like you to continue thinking about this backstory in your own Twitter Narratives. Please read the "War of the Worlds" and add your comments here in the comment section of this post (rather than your own blog).
Your infographic deadline has been pushed back to next Thursday: May 8.
The larger problem of the radio play in 1938 is that Hitler was threatening Europe and WWII was coming. In September, Murrow and his CBS producers did something with the news that was kind of novel: they broke in with new reports, eyewitness accounts, and never quite so much. In just one month, these bulletins were so numerous that bulletins were practically interrupting bulletins.
ReplyDeleteWe plan to put one larger problem on our love story now. Just as we said before, the girl has an argument with the son of the owner but suddenly she disappears. Since the son finds out his affection towards the girl, he wants her back. Now, we add the larger problem like this: the girl belongs to the competing company of Pottery Cabin, which the son belongs to. She is a spy to destroy the reputation of Pottery Cabin. But then the rival company finds out that she actually falls in love with the son, so the company forbids her to contact the son again through Twitter.
It is really unbelievable that a story which almost everyone gets familiar with can also cause such huge attention and responses. Reports describe this story in a distinctive way, so audience get different feelings and experience. Their funny and intelligent discussion makes this “old” story quite different. In addition, their interaction with listeners are active and interesting, which makes it much more real.
ReplyDeleteThis transcription provides me a new view to build our own Twitter Narritive. From my point of view, how to create a excellent story is the first step, while how to present it in a creative and interesting way is the essential step. The method and form to describe a story can be multiple. So if we want to attract more followers on Twitter, we need to try hard to figure out some creative way to tell this story. For example, a love story can be presented in multiple ways. Audiences may get bored about some silly stories with a happy ending, we can tell the story in different tones, such as satire, jealousness and so on. We can even present a lovely story in a really dark way to attract other’s attention. Thus, how to re-present a story and use it to inspire audience’s attention is what really matters.
Obviously, this is a radio play about the War of the Worlds and it is said at the very first beginning. However, at that time many people were not listening to this channel, and they tuned in by chance. Moreover, it imitated the form when news broadcast announced the Hitler’s words, which was interrupting the normal show and spoke seriously. People in 1938 were familiar with it and regarded it serious and official. That’s why one million people chose to believe the reality of this story. Basically, this story became more vivid under a big background which is WWII. Not only the love story works well under a big background, so does a fake fiction plot. Therefore, it reminds me that our twitter narrative is able to be more trustful if it is under a controversial big background. Even though I have not come up with the background yet, I believe that background is necessary. Our group will definitely continue finding the suitable background for our twitter narrative.
ReplyDeleteHow can this absurd story have such profound influence on listeners in 1938? This story once has been told as adventure fiction many times to children. Even the storyteller was so confused that why people were so panic. There are some reasons leading to this situation happen. At that period was at World War II, when Hitler’s words appear, people feel believe it is true because of the background. At that time, broadcast also makes audience feel that the play do not like a play, because the announcer take the special way to say some important news. “Let me interrupt the program…” In this way, people will believe what the announcer says.
ReplyDeleteAfter read this transcript, I also have more thinking about our own twitter narrative story. It is really important to think of a background of story, because this is an important factor which easily causes audience’s attention. According to this farce happened in 1938, we can know that the even the ridiculous thing also can make people believe in certain situation. For this reason, we should consider how we create a good story that is attractive but makes audience believe its authenticity.
The War of the Worlds was a successful radio dramatization, which persuaded so many listeners that a Martian invasion was actually happening. The success of this radio play is largely depended on backdrop of its time. During that time, World War II was just about to break out and there should have already been quite tensional between the US, EUR and Asian countries. People sensed the smell of war in fear of the World War I, which happened 2 decades earlier. Therefore, the theme of the play of Marian invasion would be so compelling to public that they thought it was true.
ReplyDeleteAs for my own Twitter narrative project, I think research on backdrop is helpful to draw the attention and get people to believe my narrative. Considering we are establishing a cosmetic boutique located in NYC, I have the idea that we can start a campaign featuring celebrities months before New York Fashion Week. Fashionistas and designers will be keeping an eye on this kind of information. Thus, the Twitter narrative can use the opportunity to make them believe our real existence.
It's difficult to hook other without some trick tips. Likewise, this hoax would not be so successful without the support of the prevaling background in that special period when this kind of announcements are familiar to the audience in some way. Rather than simply providing a story that people are familiar with, this hoax also added some convincible information, such as the conversation with famous profession or the reference to the authority. As we can see from the content, the kind of special buletin of the explosions on the mars has happened before when Hitler was threatening Europe, which added some convictions as this already had happened before. So when public stories are associated with the current society, with authority, the effects of them will greatly increase. In my opinion, if this hoax happens nowadays, the result will be different as we do not live in the same society as what those people lived.
ReplyDeleteIn the “War of world”, the host created a totally faked story which caused many persons in panic. And I believe he also list three major tools to convince people so successfully. The first one is to update the time. People will feel it is true or being threat when they know it is very close to them. If you just created a story based on 1938, people cannot feel the same way when they know it happened just now. The second one is to establish authority. The host said that people do not believe them until someone from government or some famous university show up and say something prove what host said before. Also, we discussed it when we find some bad TED talk. The first step of people to manipulate audiences is to establish their criteria with saying their education which is must related to Harvard or Princeton. The third way is to describe vivid and impressed scene, which make people feel they already in there. In the article, the host said he already saw the other true video over and over again, and he describes the same scene when he is talking the faked story.
ReplyDeleteOf course, we can use these three tools to create our own twitter narrative, which make the story more real and impressed.
It is so surprise that a broadcast which tells an “old” story can attract over 12 million people’s attention and respond. This radio play which was happened during war of world in 1830 was so attractive because of two reasons. The first is that the way of this broadcast playing. The story teller speaks in a specious way to make the story interesting. He also uses the Hitler’s words to make the story more real and believable. The second one is the background of this story help people to believe blindly. Happening under the background of war make the story have a strong force to change characters’ fate.
ReplyDeleteAs for our own twitter narrative, I think it’s a good idea to add an interesting background like war or specious event happen. The background can help my story to become more reliable and believable and get more attention of audience. Under the background, there are more opportunities to make conflict to increase the value of reading. In that case, our group will add an attractive background in our narrative story.
I am shocked that an old and ridiculous story can arouse panic in one-twelfth audiences. I really admire the broadcast makers who make that story real and powerful. Summarize the radio, I find three tools they use to make a fake news sounds really true. First of all, they update the story. The story is made to happen in 1938. In 1938, Hitler is threatening Europe, which makes many people in panic. They changes the year from 1839 to 1938, which really catches people’s attention and make people panic. Secondly, the broadcasters use very dread and depress voice, which also make audiences panic and easily believe. Thirdly, the broadcasters use another news to make audiences more afraid. In the news, England children are requested to bring gas masks to school. Under panic, audiences feel more afraid when they hear this news.
ReplyDeleteAfter listening to this radio, I learn something useful. Our group may be pay attention to some issues that catch the public’s attentions. It is a good way to attract more followers.
Orson Welles’s creation did make a radio play difference. There is no doubt that “Wall of the Worlds” had an great impact on audience’s reaction, which only only demonstrates that Welles has talent for gripping drama but also recovers people’s reflection to special moment in history. Generally specking, it is an effective way to attract more followers primarily focus on the content. When we listen to some serious news, sometimes we need to relax and change mood. And when the smoothy music was interrupted by some important news, we would become focused and concentrated on the event.
ReplyDeleteTherefore, it provides a good advice for our Twitter Narratives to mix funny and relaxing factors with our initial business goal. In this case, audience would be more likely to perceive the situation and have a better memory about our company.
The discussion in this podcast is about a radio play of “the War of the Worlds”. It is surprised and sounds comical that this radio play caused a kind of mass hysteria because many people who heard it thought it was true and they are panic. But also, form this broadcast, it is beneficial for us to learn some methods to make the even the fake stories or fictions look real. In the radio play, firstly it related to the World War II, which gives the story a real historical and cultural background. And also the broadcast inserts Hitler’s words during World War II that makes the play more believable. By looking at the transcript of this discussion, I find the example of this radio play is useful to our Twitter narrative. To make our own narrative story real, it is practicable to put the story into a real social situation or background or insert some real information to make audience believe it.
ReplyDeleteIt is amazing that about 1 million people trusted such a ridiculous joke at that time. However, when we analysis more content in this story, we can figure out some reasons that why people think this joke was true. First of all, the background plays an important role in this story. At that time, the word war two was soon to break out, and the relationships between several countries are strained. Therefore, people were nervous about the situation. Any serious information would have strong reflection. Secondly, radio was important way to get news at that time. Therefore, when the announcer introduced the news in serious way, a lot of people would believe even the news was very ridiculous. Therefore, as for our own twitter narrative, we should consider the background, and the way that we show our information. How to make our project become more reliable? According to this article, we can know that setting the background and choosing the time and way to show the information are very important.
ReplyDeleteAbove all, as a radio play, “The War of the Worlds” is successful. However, when I thought deeply I found some questions. “The War of the Worlds” is a story about alien invasion. When people hear alien invasion, even small children will regard it as a joke. Why, at that time, so many people believed? Here is a larger problem in 1938 that WWII was coming. People was in panic. They were sensitive.
ReplyDeleteWe plan to put a larger problem in our love story. We add a new identity to our heroine. She used to be a common customer. But now, she has another identity. She is the heir of a rival firm. And she pretend to be a customer to steal business secret. However, she does not expect that she will fall in love with her competitor.
So through this article, I can see a lot of intelligent ideas. And in my opinion, I think living in post-apocalyptic world is cool. There will be no limit for human being. Every one can do whatever they like and no one will not be allowed to do anything, except something that is illegal, such as rob a bank. You can literally set anything on fire which I believe is a very awesome thing. And the most important thing is that your belief that you are better than any one else actually exists.
ReplyDeleteAs you can see, through one topic, indeed there are a lot of unexpected discussion contents. So as our twitter project. If we can no longer limit our perspectives on the literal meaning of one topic, and imagine its potential effects and influences with different ideas, we can do the best narrative project.
The War of the Worlds is a really good sample for our own narrative story. It's polular in the world because it used the backdrop skillfully to tell a story. In this broadcast, it used the vivid story based on World War II to narrative. As for our own narrative, it's essential to add a specific backgroud to increase the authenticity of our company and story. In that case, we can attract more audience to read our story and become our followers, even buy our product if we are really company. There is no doubt that twitter is a good platform for us to do the advertisements so that the biggest problem is how to become the most popular one. Most of time we do not have enough money to invite stars like Justin Bieber or Britney Spears to advertise, it's time to use our brian to create value and epidemicity.
ReplyDeleteIt is really interesting. The "War of the World" combined three media---reader, radio, and broadcast together. Even though, the whole talk includes three types of media, It is not confused by audience. The author uses that amazing idea to create a narrative story. As far as I am concerned, there are some advice which I learned from this story, can be used in our own narrative.
ReplyDeleteFirst, I think the frame of the story is the most important. For example, this story about invasion catch audience's eye. It is important to create a story which is amazing. Second, it is the format of the story. What I means is how to express the story. For example, the story about "War of the World" includes three media. In our story should be creative in format usage.
That is just my individual thought.
“The war of the world” was a big fake story but there were still most people got the joke and cause a panic when they were listening to the broadcast. The broadcast was so strong that he made the broadcast real and powerful. One broadcast would have cause different impacts in different periods among a group of people. In 1938, the broadcast knew that the audiences were anxiety and concerned about the world. In that condition, they made this broadcast seemed authentic and obviously there were a lot of people think it was true. However, when in 2001, the environment and the background were totally changed. Less people would believe it was true. Many things can influence one broadcast such as current environment, social situation and even music which were mentioned in the article. We can connect it with our own Twitter narrative.
ReplyDeleteI am shocked that such a ridiculous joke caused a big panic. But what I am interested is why almost 1 million people will believe that story. I think there are two reasons. First, this story was told under a big background: World War II. It caught what audiences concern about. Second, the way the host telling the story. The host told the story in a vivid way. He used suitable background music and he also use the identities of government and famous university. Those elements will all make people believe in this story.
ReplyDeleteIn our own twitter project. We could also use those tools to catch audiences' attention and convince them. We can find out a background which is fit our story and add some details which could make our story more real.
In this transcription, we see that a very ridiculous joke cause a huge panic. In many people's views, it's incredible. But I understand this phenomenon. When a story meets the hot points in the current society, it can attract people's attention. So if we want our story to be popular, we must be creative in writing this story.
ReplyDeleteIn addition, I was inspired by this transcription. It told me how to write our Twitter narrative. At the beginning, we want to create a love story. As you can see, love stories are just like a flood. If all the companies use a love story, who will pay attention to our company? I think if we add some elements that look crazy, we can reach to our goal. For example, if we add jealousy, revenge, mistress and so on, we can make our narrative interesting. Also, I don't think a happy ending is able to gain popularity. Life is not always happy. We are trying our best to make this narrative as much related to the daily life as possible. Meanwhile, we will give the realistic meaning to it.