BEA Ignite: Kimberly Spencer

STORYTELLERS' MATING RITUAL 2012

How to ignite romance between broadcast and print media to conceive brilliant buzz on the web

Teaching objectives

Facilitate convergent media, good storytelling Help students critically assess methods to

convey information: What’s the best mode to communicate a concept?

Illustrate complementary use of media; dispel silo mindset of past

Encourage students to think across platforms Allow students to practice summary idea through

Tweet

Silo method: print vs. broadcast

Newspaper story Broadcast story

http://www.kdvr.com/news/kdvr-angry-family-member-places-fake-obituary-on-greeley-man-20120204,0,664213.story

What’s the main point?

Obituary is fake; man reads about his own death

What other information do we need/want? Where and when did it happen? How did he discover it? Who was affected? How could this happen? How did he feel? What will be done to avoid this error in future? Why would someone do this?

What’s missing in each?

Newspaper Broadcast

Feelings of Edgar Balderrama

Wife’s reaction/emotion

Photos

How he discovered he was “dead.”

Response from paper’s editor

Which pieces from each?

Newspaper Broadcast

Facts of the event Perhaps add a

timeline of events Names, dates, portion

of actual obituary

Clip of Edgar Baldarama talking about his feelings when he read it.

Wife explaining family reaction

What’s the lead for print?A Greeley man overcame the shock of seeing his own obituary Friday and says he learned how much his family loves him.

Identify him Quote from him Interview family Reaction from newspaper/how, why

Multimedia elements to add Video of Balderrama expressing weird feeling of

reading his own obit Timeline of events PDF of actual obituary Photo of Balderrama

What’s the Tweet?

Tweets

Greeley man has “Final Destination” moment when he reads of his own death in local paper

Colorado newspaper to change obituary policy after publishing false death of local man

Colorado man joins celebs in false death reporting incident

Other teaching opportunitiesExamine recent trend of false death reporting

Editorial about accuracy/verifying information Poynter story on Paterno’s early death

That’s a wrap

Good storytelling keeps reader/viewer in forefront

Use the method/mode that best suits the purpose

The more elements of media, the more likely to reach a variety of consumers

Remember accuracy above all