How to Have Better Ideas, the Queue and the Enduring Allure of Choose Your Own Adventure Books

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10 stories we've enjoyed this week

Illustration by Matthias Kinnigkeit – Work with Matthias

Hi All,
This week saw the release of the new Bellagio Bulletin, a newsletter we produce with The Rockefeller Foundation all about past residents – academics, activists and practitioners – of the Bellagio Center on Lake Como and what they're doing now. We'd love for you to take a look.

Today (Friday!) is also the deadline for applications for our Operations and People Manager role. We're looking for someone that can help us shape and consolidate our operational strategy, systems and processes. If that's you, we'd love to hear from you.

Have a fantastic weekend and enjoy this week's stories. Hugh will be back next week.
Chloe

The Short Story

How to Have Better Ideas
(6 minutes)

The Approaching Tsunami of Addictive AI-Created Content
(8 minutes)

How Korean Culture Went Global
(48 minutes; podcast)

The Enduring Allure of Choose Your Own Adventure Books
(29 minutes)

The Follower
(series of images)

Caught in the Study Web
(24 minutes)

Why We're Obsessed With Productivity
(7 minutes)

The Queue is the Only Thing That Matters Now
(8 minutes)

The Faces That Look Back at Us When We Come Out, Again and Again
(4 minutes)

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

How to Have Better Ideas
In this piece, Ben Follington explores two very different models for exploring our ideas: the engineered ideaspace and the evolving ideaspace. It's a sprawling piece that ends with more questions than it answers, taking into account social media, technology and art.
(6 minutes)

The Approaching Tsunami of Addictive AI-Created Content
Charles Arthur, former technology editor at The Guardian, argues that we're not ready for the coming deluge of video, audio and even text generated by machine learning to grab and hold our attention, providing examples of these emerging technologies and their powers.
(8 minutes)

How Korean Culture Went Global
South Korea is a top global exporter of pop culture and entertainment – from BTS to Squid Game. This NPR podcast explores the journey from war-decimated state to major driver of global soft power. (48 minutes; podcast)

The Enduring Allure of Choose Your Own Adventure Books
This detailed piece in the New Yorker tells the fascinating story of the Choose Your Own Adventure books that emerged in the 1970s, exploring what makes the format so special. "You didn't necessarily identify with the unnamed "you" who starred in each book. It was more that each protagonist offered you an alternative to yourself, or forty alternatives to yourself. The second person was less like a mirror and more like a costume. Reading these books wasn't about the pleasure of "relatability" but about something opposite – the pleasures of distortion, recklessness, and multiplicity."
(29 minutes)

The Follower
This unsettling new project from Belgian artist Dries Depoorter combines AI, open access cameras and unsuspecting influencers to highlight how entrenched surveillance technology is in our everyday lives, raising a whole host of ethical questions.
(series of images)

Caught in the Study Web
According to Fadeke Adegbuyi, the Study Web is a vast constellation of digital spaces and online communities – across YouTube, TikTok, Reddit, Discord, and Twitter – largely built by students for students. In this in-depth piece from 2021, Adegbuyi finds out how it works, analysing how an emphasis on "winning" the game of exams and assignments comes with an undercurrent of anxiety as well as a providing Gen Z with a sense of fellowship.
(24 minutes)

Why We're Obsessed With Productivity
Why are we so drawn to morning routine content? "They're aspirational. They give a sense of order. They're a little voyeuristic. But there's another reason, too: We love to hate them."
(7 minutes)

The Queue is the Only Thing That Matters Now
With the queue to see the Queen now 14 hours long, Joel Golby delves into the very British penchant and pride for queuing. "The shape of The Queue is always changing – it kinks and curves, it stretches then springs, it grows longer then shorter [...] We have monitoring stations that keep tabs on The Queue but we can never quite pin down where it starts. It is just there, a many-legged creature that is grieving."
(8 minutes)

The Faces That Look Back at Us When We Come Out, Again and Again
This simple-yet-striking visual piece from the NYT considers the history of LGBTQ representation on television – by focusing on the reaction shots captured during coming-out conversations. "These reaction shots have been evolving for more than 50 years, and though it's impossible to ignore the focus shifting from the person coming out to the person being told, it does mimic life, where coming out is almost always an exchange."
(4 minutes)

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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How to Have Better Ideas, the Queue and the Enduring Allure of Choose Your Own Adventure Books

10 stories we've enjoyed this week

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