Narratively: digital magazine about New York's stories

I am rooting for the folks behind Narratively, a digital publication about "New York's untold stories."

Narratively slows down the news cycle. Each week, we’ll explore a different theme about New York and publish a series of connected stories -- just one a day -- told in the most appropriate medium for each piece. We might feature a longform article with portrait photos on a Monday, followed by an animated documentary on Tuesday, then a photo essay, an audio piece or a short documentary film. Every story gets the space and time it needs to have an impact. We’ll bring you weeks devoted to New York’s waterways, hustlers, sexual subcultures, obscure pastimes and countless other themes. We’ll even get you involved in theme and story selection.

They need $50k on Kickstarter to launch

Mark Frauenfelder is the founder of Boing Boing and the editor-in-chief of MAKE and Cool Tools. Twitter: @frauenfelder. Come and hear Mark speak at the ALA conference in Chicago on July 1.

MORE: new york

More at Boing Boing

Ants and Stars: Bruce Sterling and Jasmina Tesanovic visit the Sardinia Radio Telescope in Italy

The Snowden Principle

BarBarSeven

I grew in New York City. Seen a lot of New York City. Know a lot about New York City. Really like to hear other people’s stories about New York City. But while this seems like a concept that I would most likely support, I need to ask a really simple question: Why do we need another outlet for “New York City’s untold stories?” What about the “untold stories” in other cities?

I lived in the midwest for 6 years, & I know there are facets of life *GASP* outside of New York City that are incredibly compelling & fascinating.

We live in an age where anyone can publish & comment about things based anywhere. So can someone explain to me why energies are not spent elsewhere to tell the stories of other regions & places?

I genuinely support efforts like this to uncover untold tales, but as a native New Yorker I beg of the world: You know what? We are over documented & even a tad boring. Please tell me stories of other places… And maybe don’t just share the background on a city or town if something horrible happens.
- pjk
  
  Exactly. Like, you know what the media doesn’t cover enough? New York. Kill me.
  - Antinous / Moderator
    
    What’s New York? Is that another Kardashian sister?
    - BarBarSeven
      
      I hear they sell artisanal Mayonnaise here. And all food is made with love. What a unique place!
http://www.facebook.com/NoahSRosenberg Noah Rosenberg

Hey BarBarSeven and pjk,
We completely understand where you’re coming from and even agree, which is why we’re focused on none of the stories that traditional media cover in New York. We’re leaving the breaking news, the “horrible” event coverage, to them. We’re launching in New York because all of our contributors live here (and because we think NYC media needs a change of pace…a slower pace), but we have designs on coming to a smaller city near you as soon as we possibly can. Thanks for your feedback, and we appreciate you giving us a look.

Noah Rosenberg
Narratively
- pjk
  
  Hi Noah! Your project will probably be successful because New York is full of cheap media people who do great work, as well as lots of other people who have lots money, consume digital media, and like reading about themselves. Hope it works out for you!
- penguinchris
  
  Hey,
  
  You say this, but speaking for people not from NYC, we have seen and heard these sorts of stories out of NYC. Lots of them. Endless films about them, TV about them, radio about them, articles about them. Not just NPR/New Yorker upper-middle-class white people stories – stories from all parts of NYC society.
  
  “Horrible” stuff doesn’t really happen in NYC more than elsewhere, particularly, and journalistic and media coverage of NYC does not focus primarily on that. What’s being suggested in the comments here is that what really needs more coverage is the small stories just like you’re describing (and which we’ve all seen before from NYC) out of places that you truly do only hear about when something horrible happens, like the midwest or wherever. We hear about NYC all the time, not just when something big happens.
  
  I don’t think there’s anything wrong with what you’re proposing and I’m sure it will be interesting, it’s just funny to anyone from outside of NYC because it fits so squarely into the stereotype of New Yorkers thinking they’re the center of the universe :)
  
  Look – I’m from NY state (Buffalo) and I love NYC. Spend as much time there as I can. Everything I’ve experienced in NYC – all small-scale stuff that isn’t newsworthy – I’ve seen or read about on film or in magazines or wherever. It’s different experiencing it yourself, of course, but there’s very little in NYC – no matter how obscure – that hasn’t been covered in media already.
GrueHunter

2.65 per cent of Americans live in New York! It’s about time they got 2.65 per cent of the attention.
EH

Hey Noah, since you are apparently reading this comments section: my backseat coaching advice is not to worry about other cities. Let journalists who live in those cities cover them. I think the complaints here are a little silly. As a New Yorker who probably very much matches your audience profile, I would like to strongly urge you to focus on another major problem I see with this initiative, which otherwise seems worthy: diversify your staff. How can an all-white reporting team hope to uncover really new truths about a city that is majority people of color? Hiring reporters and editors who experience New York with a real diversity of daily existence is the only way you can break out of the NPR/This American Life/New Yorker bubble. All of those are fine and worthy projects too, but we don’t really need more of them. We need storytelling that unites all New Yorkers and encourages elite media consumers to think about the problems of nonelites and allows nonelites to have a voice. Just my two cents.
- pjk
  
  But what about those long brunch lines I have to deal with? And this L-train is SO CROWDED! Tweeting!!
- BarBarSeven
  
  Hiring reporters and editors who experience New York with a real diversity of daily existence is the only way you can break out of the NPR/This American Life/New Yorker bubble.
  
  You think it’s just an “NPR/This American Life/New Yorker bubble?” Have you ever looked at the staff of many of the NYC-centric blogs? Incredibly homogenous across the board.
  
  What disheartens me more than anything about the power of new media in the Internet age is how there is potential for a greater diversity that doesn’t ever seem to show up. It’s like old guard has just transformed into the new guard. Has Jeff Jarvis ever touched on that? Not being sarcastic towards Jeff Jarvis, but seriously, why is the media world consistently filled with seemingly the same players no matter what the medium is?