Tips for using Storify in your reporting in digital storytelling
These are a collection of suggestions and tips for creating and populating a report in Storify. Have more suggestions, tricks or other goodness? Leave comments and I'll update accordingly.
Storify has really only been around about a year, but already the Web app for curating content has found a loyal following.
Using Storify requires more than just grabbing content and pasting it into a blog post. It allows for true editing, critical thinking and even content creation. If used properly, a story can be developed and told, using various forms of multimedia and on-scene content, with the sources fully aware of their inclusion in your reporting.When discussing the use of citizen journalist content, verification, validity and accuracy often crop up as potential concerns. By using Storify, it's possible to cite content from others who are part of or at the spot of the actual event while adding further reporting, clarifications and context from your end.For a quick overview on using Storify, check out the video below:- Get some sound in your report - tips and instructions on working audio into your report.
How To Build An Interactive Map For Your Storify Story In Minutes
Remember when including a map with a story was a long graphic arts process? By embedding a Google Map in a Storify story, you can do it all by yourself in minutes. And your map remains dynamic wherever you share your story online.- We'll cover mapping later in the quarter, but if you have some experience with Google Maps or want to take a stab, here's directions on getting that bad boy in your Storify.You will need a free Google Maps account. If you have gmail, you already have such a best.
Want To Build An Audio Clip Into Your Storify Story? You Can, With SoundCloud Storify is happy to announce another source partner, SoundCloud, bringing audio capability to Storify reporting.SnappyTV is a relatively new tool that allows for clipping live TV - in some cases - for Storify use.
Content partners, or lack thereof, are the Achilles heel so far, as Cory Bergman writes for Lost Remote:The challenge for SnappyTV, of course, is landing enough content partners. It currently has Fox shows like Family Guy, Bones and MasterChef. HDNET, CSPAN and NASA TV, too. And the PBS Newshour, which also uses SnappyTV internally to quickly grab and share moments from the broadcast, gaining precious minutes over YouTube upload time.For Twitter content you are curating in realtime - or as a situation develops - a simple search in the Storify Twitter tab should work fine. The problems start when you try to dig up older content - past about a week - which an apparently restrictive API keeps Storify from being able to access.
A solution? Topsy.Topsy, promising "real-time search on the social web," will gather tweets from as far back as 2008.
You can now Storify tweets from TopsyYou're no longer limited to the one week search. Happy Storifying!- And if you use Chrome, you can add the Storify extension to gather not only tweets, but most Web content right at the source. The Storify bookmarklet work well across platforms and browsers to similar effect. More on both in this video:
- That bookmarklet function offers access to other social media network use as well.
Just install it in your bookmarks bar and you can curate while you surf the biggest and most popular social media sites
Getting your Storify content to multiple platforms is built into the embed function. The Wordpress piece works with either the hosted .org version used in class or the free .com version many people use as a blogging platform.
Publish Storify stories to Wordpress.comYou can now publish from Storify to Wordpress.com, Drupal and Tumblr with posts that are SEO compatible.- And for hosted Wordpress - the .org variety - users, it's even easier. Storify released a plugin for the powerful CMS' dashboard that allows for creation Storify projects right in the dashboard. A very easy, very slick option.As with all plugins, you'll want to test out in a sandbox site environment first before installing on your working site.
Now you can create Storify stories from the WordPress dashboard ...1 day ago ... You asked for it. We heard you. Now you can now create Storify stories for self- hosted WordPress blogs from directly insi...- Storify is set up to have a deep presentation on your page. Sometimes, this isn't the best display. Follow these instructions to make your Storify report a slideshow:
Your stories can all now be slideshowsWe are launching our slideshow feature for all users, making it easy to create embeddable slideshows with your stories.- UPDATE - Feb. 22: Really a pretty huge tool - the ability to Storify content via the iPad.
Think tablets are just for consuming media? Not anymore. Now social storytelling is at your fingertips wherever you are, allowing you to create stories on the iPad as never before.
More tips on using Storify and social media for reporting and journalism:
- Storify's advice:
Wednesday night is the first of three debates between President Barack Obama and Governor Mitt Romney. Americans will be "social watching" with two screens, and taking part on social media. Here are ideas on how to cover the debates with Storify.
Stuart BerryGreat2013-03-23T20:13:27.052Z
