Sequential Storytweeting

Twitter could be an intriguing method for storytelling. Think of it as an Information Age, ADD-version of Charles Dickens monthly novel serialization. The size and format of content bursts are up to the creator. Whether your work is straight text in short story format or chapters in a novel, creators have the freedom to update and release their content at will. There are some drawbacks that I'll address later but let's focus on the possibilities first.

The idea originate from my experience with web comics. The rule of thumb is the more content updates, the more readers frequently visit. Yeah, obvious, I know. The web is driven by immediacy and a voracious appetite for news. Entertainment content without time expiration (something not driven by today's headlines) is different although the update frequency rule still holds. Your audience is divided into separate categories. Some readers loyally return to the site everyday while some wait for a chunk of story to reach a satisfying finish. Trying to build a readership for a comic that flirts with longform storytelling while incorporating a punchline into every post is difficult as some readers forget to check for updates or wait for the story to reach completion.

We already use Twitter to announce a new strip on the site to our followers. While trying to brainstorm extra value for following us on Twitter, I imagined a Twitter-structured comic strip. The idea would be to tell a story in 8 panels tweeted on the hour for 8 hours daily. Each new tweet would link to the latest panel. The effect being new content spread throughout the day for readers to follow.

There are two huge problems with this method. First, is one panel really satisfying to a reader or just extremely annoying? The novelty would wear off quickly for each individual. But you might attract as many new readers as the old ones burn off. Second, presentation is key. The panels can't be displayed in a vacuum or on different pages. The format requires a type of easing scrolling viewer for readers to start at the latest panel but also have easy access to previous panels for that day's strips.

Ultimately, Storytweeting is probably a great ancillary idea to a larger project. If used in moderation or as special event, creators might generate buzz about their content while using the storytweeting medium to direct readers to other, more traditional content.

Twitter

I'm more open to Swine Flu (sorry, H1N1) than I am social networking tools and sites. Maybe that makes me the crotchety old guy with the cane spewing curse words at the younger generation from his yard but what can I say. Privacy is important to me...like oxygen important. If I had time machine, I'd travel back to the constiutional congress, lobby for a privacy amendment by wowing the delegates with some futuristic toys (imagine their reaction to the iPhone) and return home to a place where privacy is as protected as religion.

With my rant aside, I'm ready to crack the door just a sliver. Would I be doing this without the MIT provocation? No. Twitter always seemed to me as the perfect application for two people that really, really wanted you to know they were having a conversation. You know, the internet's version of obnoxious people trapped on the elevator with you.

But here we are anyways. Follow me at http://twitter.com/FatAsteroid

Reading the Twitter homepage, I see the service isn't entirely evil, which is a distinction shared with cable companies, Taco Bell and Zach Snyder's Watchmen. There are some cool features:

1. You can find all of your friends or people with your friends' names. If I'm using the service, dive in right?

2.  Search for tweeted about topics. Now...this feature is something to get excited about. I'll expound on why in another post.

3. Twitter commands. The brevity is refreshing.

4. Privacy Control. After my statements above, you might expect me to turn on the privacy control. No. I'm going to ride this Twitter thing out. As abhorrent as social networking might be, I can see a few uses too, which are neutralized behind a privacy fence.

Hitting the Right Note?

My experience with the Opera browser is limited to two devices not usually associated with web browsing: the Nintendo Wii and a Motorolla Razor. The browser performed well on both devices but my overall usage was limited to checking sports scores or watching You Tube videos on TV. I lacked data for a good, fair comparison to other web browsers.

Opera's been pioneering web surfing innovation since 1996 according to the Wikipedia. With more than a decade of experience, strong investment and smart technology, I'd expect Opera to be a market leader. Instead, the browser maxes out at 2 percent share of the browsing market, which leads to the question: "Why?"

Why has the browser failed to gain traction as a desktop app like Firefox, Safari or IE? This blogger offers various reasons but I think #5 might be the strongest argument. What is the compelling reason to switch to Opera? I have no idea. The brand is well known but I don't know much about it. The growth catalysts behind Safari and IE are obvious. And Firefox, knighted by IT nerds, is an alternative for powers users that customize their browsers and want a higher level of security (maybe the security part isn't even true, I don't know,  but Firefox embraces the public assumption regardless). Even a hood-open comparison revealed Opera performs as well or better than Firefox.

I'm interested to hear our speaker address this issue. Does Opera need better programmers or better marketers? I suspect the latter.

Wiki Ethics

My intial idea for a Wikipedia entry was to document Registered Weapon, my buddy-cop web comic published 4 times a week. As I reviewed the editing and entry process of the site, the conflict of interest issues became apparent. My journalism background (second reference in two posts!) is built around neutral reporting and preserving the unbiased state of information. Sure, I believe I could write an entirely unbiased synopsis on Registered Weapon's history, characters and current adventures but that goes against my own personal reporting ethics. And there's also that must be relevant clause too, which is humbling after searching Wikipedia and realizing no one cared enough to write an unsolicited entry on your web comic. So hey...if someone still needs a wiki entry to write, I can school you in RW lore super quick.

After abandoning that idea, I fell into the wiki blackhole of information trying to find a new topic. Growing up a comic nerd, my mind is packed with useless, 4-color tidbits about decades worth of superhero legacies. Most of the well-known characters and events are expertly documented so I started looking for information gaps on the B-List...C-List...and...finally...the D-List (from an unintiated macroscopic perspective as D-list is too subjective for snarky comics nerds) characters. I settled on The Ray, a DC hero that I doubt anyone in MIT has ever heard of before (except for the dude who commented on my Green Lantern laptop background).

Golden and Modern Age versions of The Ray

The current entry provided a nice synopsis of The Ray history. But it lacked detail. Before I graduated college into the real and started worrying about bills, deadlines and other depressingly frustrating adult stuff, I could've given an oral history of The Ray per issue of his own series and all his guest appearances. The recent decade has eroded those memories (which is likely for the best). Instead, I decided to enter a few lines about The Ray's (II), my personal favorite, recent activities in Final Crisis.

When you start typing in the live wiki entry, suddenly, the pressure is one to be 100 percent accurate. The WYSIWYG interface is pesky at first as you try to insert internal and external hyperlinks, references and other text formatting. The experience showed me that the majority of information is entered by people focused on accuracy. The Wikipedia learning curve, however slight, is a great deterrent against lazy updaters.

Before I update anymore of The Ray's page, I'll need to dig through some dusty comic boxes in the basement for a referesher on his adventures. I don't want to upset the guy who started the entry.

Guy Who (probably) Started The Entry

He looks like a stickler for deatils. Check out those buttons.

The Fastest Flip Alive

Coming from a journalism background, I 'm fascinated by traditional print companies arduous and, often, antagonistic transition to the web. Magazine and newspaper publishers view themselves as producers of a product when they should be applying a modern view. Print publishers are keepers, traffickers and recorders of information. They are content companies plain and simple. The industry has been slow to embrace that ideology and, subsequently, the web, like their music counterparts, because the new business model is far less lucrative than the print model, but the reasons behind the economics is another topic entirely.

News sites endure a love/hate relationship with Google. The search engine is the great reader gateway to their content if the company successfully navigates the SEO labrynith, which raises the hits and visitor counts tremendously. But Google also is accused of stealing content on the guise of news aggregation and collection, which hurts the traffic and content exclusivity of sites. In what appears to be a handshake in the direction of a happy medium, Google Labs has introduced Fast Flip. And like all Google products, feels like a hit out of the box.

The idea behind Fast Flip is for viewers to scroll through a horizontal line of articles like flipping through an issue of Time magazine. Various screen grabs of articles are displayed left-to-right on a horizontal rail. Readers use the navigation tools to slide the images in either direction for a visual sampling of that site's contents. Instead of a list of headlines, readers can judge the article on a combination of headline, site design, images and any other bell or whistle the site includes. Also, users can't read the full story in the Fast Flip frame. They must click on the page to trackback to the originating site for the full story.

I'm not sure if Fast Flip will catch on but a number of major media companies are participating. Some more enthusiastically than others. But you can already see the possibilities with the slick design. The side-scrolling is perfect for finger walking on the iPhone for example. Once you can customize a page for the sites and content you browse on daily basis, there will be another viable alternative technique for web browsing.

Give it a try.

HyperCool

After the class scavenger hunt last week, I was interested in researching Tim Berners-Lee to see what became of the man who is credited with inventing the World Wide Web. The professor, who also is a knight, was inspired to connect TCP and the domain naming system ideas with an earlier program he created based on hypertext. Once I realized hypertext didn't originate with Berners-Lee, I was distracted enough to change my blog topic after more research on hypertext.

The idea of Hypertext can be traced back to notational methods in early books that let readers know the word or phrase or person is previously referenced or defined somewhere else in the text. In 1945 Vannevar Bush wrote an article in The Atlantic Monthly that envisioned a machine called The Memex, which used layers of microfilm to link stored, compressed information together for users. The machine used trails of branched pages to connect the information together. While The Memex never came into existence, Vannevar's vision of the machine's capabilities heavily influenced the thinking of two developers.

 

The Memex      

Douglas Engelbart and his team at the Stanford Research Institute developed the NLS, which stands for oN-Line System. The systems also included the first mouse and other now-standard technologies. The NLS is important to this discussion because it included the first use of hypertext in the 1960s. Simultaneously, Ted Nelson and Andries Van Damme helped develop the Hypertext Editing System (HES) for Brown University. Implemented in 1968, the system organized data into links and branching text (like The Memex) that could be manipulated by menus and labels.

These two systems, along with some other advanced programming at the time, are a major step in the hypertext evolution to the world wide web of today.

In full disclosure, I initially assumed Vannevar's story to be science fiction along the lines of H.G. Wells or Philip K. Dick. Fictional technology featured in stories decades or centuries ahead of its times always fascinates me, especially technology that is assimilated into everyday life (still waiting on that hoverboard!). While Vannevar's essay was a theory on the pacification powers of information and not a paranoid, post-war sci-fi cautionary tale, the essay's real world implications are no less significant.