George Saunders doesn't conceive plots in advance. His short stories move from funny, interesting moment to funny, interesting moment. Storytelling as rhythmic dynamism.
Saunders defines a story as “a process for the transfer of energy.” Here's what he says about it:
"In a good story, the writer makes energy in a beat,
then transfers this energy cleanly to the next one
(the energy is 'conserved')."
"She does this by being aware of the nature of the energy she’s made. In a bad story (or an early draft), the writer doesn’t fully understand the nature of the energy she’s made, and ignores or misuses it, and it dissipates.
The preferred, most efficient, highest-order form of energy transfer (the premier way for a scene to advance the story in a non-trivial way) is for a beat to cause the next beat, especially if that next beat is felt as essential, i.e., as an escalation: a meaningful alteration in the terms of the story."
You could define it the art of escalation. And the energy transfer leaps off the page and into the readers' imagination. I love this image because it's what happens in some ways also through face to face conversation. Not Zoom, mind you. Zoom is the zoombification of face to face.
Like all writers, I'm in awe of the written word. How language can transfer so much from one being to another remains a fascinating mystery. Words are persistent and do matter. Mariangela Gualtieri comes from the theater, she loves words and is aware that the strength of words depends on our ability not to wear them out, to respect them, not to mistreat them by using them inappropriately.
Gualitieri thus doesn't tweet. Her opinions are not part of the news cycle—paper or TV. There's no controversy in her poems. 16 million people listened to Jovanotti's reading of her poetry live in San Remo, Italy's Festival of the Song. Suddenly her books are sold out. Funny how people discover what's been under their nose.
But I'm increasingly witnessing
a “humiliation of the word.”
Much of it through the unconscious consumption of media.
My years of research and work with child brain development confirm that the brain doesn't perceive brain damage as a problem. In similar ways as it doesn't tell negative from positive reinforcement.
Neil Postman suggested that language is the brain of a civilization. The social body may not perceive severe language damage as a problem. The communication theorist also called technology one-eyed, as it sees only what's directly front of it. These two observations can help us reflect on the cultural conversation we're having about platforms as media (below.)
Story is relevant to the reflection on infotainment and the terabytes of greatly structured TED talks that fail to change anything. Least of all, the format fails to capture the nature of change itself. Understanding change creates tremendous advantage, because it allows you to have a "soft touch" and to participate is what's already in play.
Talking about plays, I have some complaints about how we treat older professionals. Younger ones, too. (See industry and society.) I'd like to ground my complaints in recognizable human tradition.
What happened to the wisdom of the elders?
Why not be excited about new entrants in society?
I wish we could all be two year olds running around and asking all the good questions. Because that's what they do, two year olds.
But then again, we do come full circle as we mature. When some of the (mostly) self-imposed pressure of performing eases, our desire to lower the ladder down to future generations comes more into play. This is an untapped goldmine of knowledge, experience, and patience.
There are plenty of headlines about all the plastic in the ocean. Harder to spot the plastic around how we treat one another and cohabitate with nature.
I wrote about our conflicted relationship with narrative—present, past, and future. Plus, I never forget a face. It's Valentine's weekend. Spread the love!
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COHABITATION
Special mention to the silkworms from Veneto. The region has a thriving tradition dating back to the 12th Century. "Nature X Humanity, focuses on the present moment, a critical juncture when the anthropomass—the mass of humanity's built environment—has grown greater than the living biomass of our planet. Through the lens of five projects and their related material systems, we propose five tenets for a new Material Ecology: glass, polymers, fibers, pigments, and cellular solids. Motivated to unite the grown and the made, we demonstrate how each material system and the technology invented to shape it embodies and advances Nature’s way while continuing to promote human progress." Neri Oxman in Nature x Humanity.
++ It saddens me that we it would get to using composites for the trees we're not respecting today. As I type this, yet another home owner in my neighborhood is cutting down trees that took 50 years to expand.
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INSPIRESTING
"The story goes like this: there are problems in the world that make the future a scary prospect. Fortunately, though, there are solutions to each of these problems, and the solutions have been formulated by extremely smart, tech-adjacent people. For their ideas to become realities, they merely need to be articulated and spread as widely as possible. And the best way to spread ideas is through stories — hence Gates’s opening anecdote about the barrel. In other words, in the TED episteme, the function of a story isn’t to transform via metaphor or indirection, but to actually manifest a new world. Stories about the future create the future. Or as Chris Anderson, TED’s longtime curator, puts it, “We live in an era where the best way to make a dent on the world… may be simply to stand up and say something.” And yet, TED’s archive is a graveyard of ideas. It is a seemingly endless index of stories about the future — the future of science, the future of the environment, the future of work, the future of love and sex, the future of what it means to be human — that never materialized. By this measure alone, TED, and its attendant ways of thinking, should have been abandoned." And "TED’s influence on intellectual culture was 'taking something with value and substance and coring it out so that it can be swallowed without chewing.'" What Was the TED Talk? ( The Drift).
++ My aim with reframing is not to inspire alone, but to light a torch under your chair while I shine a light on the things we take for granted and we should care more about.
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PLATFORM AS MEDIA
It's a complicated conversation with many points of views. Tech is not neutral. Media is not objective. There are societal moral and ethical issues that merit a deeper reflection. Including doing the work for opinionating (as the process of forming an opinion and updating it.) Nobody is off the hook. Because history teaches us where indifference ends up weighing.
+ All content is not equal: "We can also dispense with the premise that all content is equal, and that the only thing that matters is free market forces – who chooses to listen to (or read or watch) the content. This premise assumes that there are no facts, that all claims to truth are equal, and that there are no reasonable methods by which we can label one piece of information valid and responsible and another dangerous misinformation. At the same time we would not want popular media outlets to micromanage content, to prejudge ideas, or to chill open discussion or the free exchange of ideas. So there is a balance between openness and quality control. This balance also depends on the context." Steven Novella on Joe Rogan and the Media Algorithm.
+ Creators deserve better: "The Swedish streaming service has fostered a music-distribution model that is singularly hostile to the interests of working musicians. It pays out, on average, an estimated four-tenths of a cent per stream, meaning that a thousand streams nets around four dollars. That arrangement has reaped huge profits for major labels and for superstars while decimating smaller-scale musical incomes—as perfect an embodiment of the winner-takes-all neoliberal economy as has yet been devised." Reasons to Abandon Spotify That Have Nothing to Do with Joe Rogan ( New Yorker.)
+ Creator's responsibility: "I also believe that podcasters with platforms have a responsibility when it comes to vetting, preparing, and challenging guests. It doesn’t appear to me that The Joe Rogan Experience takes any responsibility for the health information that it puts out in the world, and I do believe that leads to people getting sick and even dying. Given the reach of the JRE, the bar for critical questioning should be high." Brené Brown on Podcast Update: February 8, 2022
+ Platform as media: "And the idea that they could make the right decision in all of those cases around really contentious issues, where the rules are blurry, that’s an unreasonable expectation. But that’s not what we’re talking about when it comes to Joe Rogan. He’s releasing a handful of episodes that they’re paying a hundred million for. They are playing the role of a publisher, a broadcaster." Spotify’s Joe Rogan mess is about more than just content moderation ( Slate).
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INDUSTRY AND SOCIETY
"The shift to more contract and gig work will require a new benefit structure for all workers who want to work independently by project but need benefits that are generally only available to full-time employees, says Kathleen E. Christensen, a social scientist and authority on the changing nature of work. Workers rights are still governed by the Fair Labor Standards Act, established in 1938 and set up for traditional full-time work. New laws and organizations will be needed to provide benefits for future contract workers perhaps by project or role." The New Post-60 Career Paths ( WSJ, may require signing in)
+ "In management consultancy, the students removed discriminatory language – such as ‘new grads’ or ‘young’ from job application descriptions and avoided age-related interview questions. They also created an environment where there is a strong support system in place, allowing workers to confidentially report any experience of ageism." Bayes’ Business Management students tackle ageism in the workplace ( Bayes Business School.)
++ Is it a question of safe selection and safe reporting? Or is it more a question of societal values and peer practices?
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NEVER FORGET A FACE
I never forget a face. There are others like me. "Seo too was unaware that others didn’t share her love of the private game she played, where she’d spot a person on a bus or the street and then flick through the vast catalogue of faces she kept in her head, trying to place where she’d seen them before. 'It’s always been quite fun for me,' she says. 'Especially as a child. I remember just really enjoying looking at different faces.' ‘I’d keep it on the down low’: the secret life of a super-recogniser (The Guardian.)
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BETTER BUSINESS PRACTICE
Narrative is a treatment of our relationship with reality. But it is a narrative. As you read semantically, you “reflect on the sense and truth of writing and reading to discover the underlying assumptions.” And it's useful to deconstruct it to find our humanity again. Our Conflicted Relationship with Narrative.
++ See if you're a good fit for working with me.
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