
The Internet is killing storytelling - slater
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/comment/columnists/ben_macintyre/article6903537.ece
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christopherolah
The Internet is killing storytelling? What?

<http://www.fanfiction.net/> <http://www.fictionpress.com/>
<http://www.scribd.com/> (And lots of others...)

I rest my case.

~~~
JCThoughtscream
Though, to be fair, fanfiction.net is its own argument against internet
literacy.

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stcredzero
It's the 21st century. Just because the mainstream isn't actively engaged in
your favorite form of it doesn't meant it's _dead_.

Heck, even if every native-born English speaker stopped writing and reading
novels, there's a good chance that some community of Japanese Otaku would
arise to lovingly curate it forever.

The 3 minute pop tune didn't kill the symphony. Just because it's not what the
_mainstream_ is doing, doesn't mean it's _dead_. Note that classical music has
found a new home, appreciated by the mainstream in movie soundtracks. Your
community might be waning, but it won't die. Sometimes, a downturn can even be
a blessing!

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mattlanger
I can't help but be reminded of when Merlin Mann said "little stories are the
internet's native and ideal art form... little dumb stories that I never
expected."

Read it all--it's worth it. Plus, that this was even written (not to mention
well-received) poses a fine counterpoint to any argument stating that
storytelling on the internet is dead:
<http://www.kungfugrippe.com/post/169873399/clackity-noise>

~~~
jurjenh
That's an awesome counterpoint! Thanks for sharing! Also brings to mind
<http://paulgraham.com/essay.html> \- writing as a way to discover just
exactly what's rattling around in there at the current moment...

What I believe is a more appropriate angle to take is that the nature of
reading itself is changing. Reading tends to be one-way, whereas human nature
tends to crave communication more - hence the shorter stories / tweets /
facebook popularity.

But this in itself tends to build a longer narrative - I've been reading HN
now for well over a year (much longer than I've spent on a novel) and though
the items themselves are short snippets, due to my interest they tend to form
chapters of narratives in general directions: programming, hacking the body,
start-up life and culture.

And one of the amazing things is that _I_ get to contribute and write part of
the story as it is unfolding - often with unexpected results! That is
something that you just can't get from a book - the interaction is of an
entirely different nature, yet can still very much be 'consumed' in the same
way _if you choose to_

[my two cents worth, and maybe a little rambling - but then it was kinda
inspired by the parent link...]

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JCThoughtscream
The author's point is lacking, despite his heavy-handed rhetorical flourish.
The sales of books may be down, but the number of writers are up and climbing
- and the downturn of the sales of books originated far before Twitter came to
light. Arguably, even before the Blackberry. And I question as to how many
"viral" narratives the author even knows about - maybe my online social net's
unique in this, but when a good story is found, it's usually something with an
extensive archive and requires a few hours to fully absorb.

Not to mention that, in the defense of Twitter and other short-burst mediums,
treating them with the same standards as a long-form narrative Misses The Dang
Point by a rather large margin. The rising popularity of burst mediums is
because they're /dialogue enablers/, not because they offer an alternative to
a good novel. Lamenting Twitter's effect on storytelling is like blaming cell
phones for the decline of Broadway.

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fhars
The wire telegraph and the rotary printing press killed storytelling some time
in the 19th century with these newfangled "papers" that everybody is still
moaning about. No, wait, that moaning now is about these papers disappearing
again because a new, stronger narrative medium has come along.

<http://portal.acm.org/citation.cfm?id=572887>

In other news, culture is in a process of steady decline at least since the
invention of the written word.

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DanielBMarkham
good stuff.

No seriously, the long narrative is dying. I just finished "Anna Karenina" and
am seriously thinking about "War and Peace" for the holidays (perhaps all the
holidays to come, based on it's length) and I can say it was more of a
struggle for me to engage the long-form narrative now than it was 10 years
ago. And being a techie, one of my key competitive advantages is being able to
consume big, sometimes really boring, books.

After all, what's the first reply to any technical question on the web? Have
you RTFM? Or on a aggregator like here? Have you RTFA?

Most of the time the answer is "no"

Too bad we Ashton Kutchner can't teach us physics via tweets. We've have a
freaking nation of rocket scientists.

(Having said all of that, I understand we have a large contingent of people
going through college. Hopefully since you're supposed to be working those
reading muscles out a lot this won't apply as much to you guys as it does to
the rest of us)

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albertsun
This kind of article is just as annoying as the opposite extreme, the claim
that the mainstream media is dead and good riddance.

There's such a culture clash right now between people raised in traditional
media and publishing cultures and those who come from technology backgrounds,
and neither side seems to appreciate the other.

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blasdel
TIME FOR SOME STORIES: <http://www.storylog.com/time-for-some-stories-
davesecretary/>

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10ren
Parables were short. Novels are the aberration.

