103 Bits of Advice From Kevin Kelly, Adam Buxton + Tim Key plus the Secret Code of Beauty Spots

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10 stories we've enjoyed this week

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Hi All,
Hope you've all had a great week. Do you have exciting plans for a long bank holiday weekend? If you're looking for something to read, watch or listen to, this week's newsletter has plenty for you to get stuck in to. If you're looking for a bit more inspiration you can check out our newsletter archive.

Just a reminder, we're just about to kick off a big piece of audience research around how people find and share stories now. We want to find out how people's behaviours have changed since the pandemic and what this means for organisation's content strategies. We're looking for commercial and non-profit partners. Find out more about the project and how you can get involved.

OK. Have a fabulous long weekend.
Hugh

The Short Story

Kevin Kelly: 103 Bits of Advice I Wish I Had Known
(List)

How to Find a Strong Audience For Your Narrative Project
(6 min read)

Adam Buxton Chats to Tim Key
(80 min listen)

Michael Beruit's 13 Reasons For Choosing a Typeface
(8 min read)

Formats Unpacked: Axios
(5 min read)

Why Hotels Are Perfect Story Vehicles For Nations
(4 min read)

How We Make Ethical Decisions About The Work We Do
(6 min read)

Clever Cutout Portraits
(1 min read)

4 Questions to Help You Avoid Cultural Appropriation
(5 min read)

The Secret Code of Beauty Spots
(7 min read)

The image is a hand holding a piece of paper with a the face of the artist Prince on it. The hair is a cut out. Through the hair you can see purple, pink and orange flowers which are behind the paper.

How can we help you?

Storythings is a strategy and content company based in Brighton and London. We'd love to help you with some creative and bold ideas.

Here's 3 reasons to get in touch.

1. You want to talk to us about content production: podcasts, videos, animations, illustrations, editorial.

2. You want to talk to us about content strategy or format development.

3. You want to create a brand or an identity that makes it easier to communicate your message.

We do other things too. We're very friendly and always enjoy meeting people, so get in touch.

The Full Story

Kevin Kelly: 103 Bits of Advice I Wish I Had Known
The former Wired editor, Kevin Kelly makes of list of things he has learned each year. You may have seen them here in the past. For his 70th birthday, he compiled them all in this fantastic list.
(List)

How to Find a Strong Audience For Your Narrative Project
This guide for finding your audience comes with some useful resources at the bottom of the page. It was written by an organisation called Narrative Initiative which provides really interesting tools and writing to support anyone looking to create change through story. Check out this fantastic reading list of narrative change in action.
(6 min read)

Adam Buxton Chats to Tim Key
It's always good to see Adam Buxton pop up in my pod player. Adam returns from a break with the wonderful poet and comedian Tim Key. This episode features Tim talking about recovering from a serious illness in 2019 and a rather awks-but-hilarious moment when he asks Adam to read from a page from his journal. For me, the best thing about this episode was being introduced to Tim's Late Night Poetry Programme which I'm rather late to but delighted to have found.
(80 min listen)

Michael Beruit's 13 Reasons For Choosing a Typeface
Whether we're making a keynote or writing a letter, we all at some point have to choose a font. If you don't want to go with the standards, here is some great advice from a graphic designer whose work can be found in modern art museums around the world.
(8 min read)

Formats Unpacked: Axios
We're big fans of the news publication so were delighted that Eliz Mizon unpacked it for us: "America is screwed if we don’t restore fast a common connection, a common truth and a common reality...You do this with smart, clinical news and information — devoid of opinion and needless noise — pushed to consumers in an efficient, quick, respectful way."
(5 min read)

Why Hotels Are Perfect Story Vehicles For Nations
I enjoyed this from WITI on hotels and 'nation branding': "These elements—down to the acoustics of running water and the interplay of red walls and verdant greenery—form one of the most powerful statements of intent for a country I’ve experienced. It is doing and not telling. And the marketing and word-of-mouth that has come as a result of the hotel has been impressive. By making hospitality space a proxy for the best parts of national culture, you make things more tangible, more sensory, and create a deeper emotional bond between the guest and the country."
(4 min read)

How We Make Ethical Decisions About The Work We Do
This guide from the team at Public Digital would have been really useful to have in 2019 when we set up our own ethical screening process for new clients. As expected with Public Ditial, it's really clear and given the complexity of the job at hand relatively straightforward. If you're thinking about developing your own process for ethically screening clients, bookmark this.
(6 min read)

Clever Cutout Portraits
Artist Rudy Willingham photographs paper cutouts of people against well-chosen backgrounds and the results are gorgeous. Check out his website to see how he creates moments of delight with cutouts in all sorts of ways.
(1 min read)

4 Questions to Help You Avoid Cultural Appropriation
Last week I shared a Kirby Ferguson video about cultural appropriation. In hindsight, I shouldn't. Whilst Kirby does have interesting things to say about the importance of remixing ideas, in this video, his "everybody needs to calm down" schtick about cultural appropriation is insensitive and wrong. It's a message I shouldn't be amplifying. Conversations about cultural appropriation are important. This piece shares four questions you can ask to help guide you in your decision making. Also, this video from PBS has a great metaphor for cultural appropriation and an example of how a NY game studio went about telling Inuit stories in games. And this is good on the negative impacts of cultural appropriation to.
(5 min read)

The Secret Code of Beauty Spots
Fascinating. Fake beauty spots were the emoji of the 17th century. They came in many shapes and conveyed all kinds of messages.
(7 min read)

We hope you've enjoyed this week's newsletter. I'm sure some of your friends would love to read it. Sharing it would be really appreciated. If you've received this from a friend you can subscribe here and get it direct to your inbox every Friday.

Thanks for reading and see you all next week,

Hugh, Matt, Anjali and the team at Storythings

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