Script

(tribal sounds with chants)

Announcer: They say language was developed so people could pass on their history from one generation another. First spoken…

 (sounds of pencil scribbles on paper, then old fashioned typewriter)

Announcer: then written…

(sounds of industrial construction, busy chatter of workplaces, computer typing sounds)

Announcer: And now corporations and universities employ researchers, writers and historians to document the general story of our civilization.

(slience)

Announcer: But what about your story? How will you convey your uncle’s struggle to leave Manhattan on 9-11 to your children, grandchildren and beyond? How will future generations in your lineage know how your hands helped re-build a school in Haiti or traveled around the world on a cruise ship as you sent to high school?  How will they know?

(music bed)

Announcer: Make sure they know with LivingHistory.com. It’s more than an online family tree, it’s a way to document in the written and spoken word the specifics of your family’s history for future generations to learn and enjoy. Connect your history with other families and show how your family fits into the community through friends, employers, and neighbors. Everyone has a story, and as a people we knew from the dawn of time that sharing it is important. Learn out you can keep the history alive for your future generations at livinghistory.com.

 

Final

Fear, when fueled by grief, is a powerful emotion. That fear can turn a manageable case of self-doubt into a crippling disease that causes a complete shutdown. That shutdown is a part of the human experience. But for a communicator trying to find a voice and discover a true self, it is a fear and shutdown that can be the precursor to near madness.

I’m sure there is a lesson to be learned in here somewhere. As I’ve struggled to determine what kind of voice that I want to have, my external voice of reason was taken. That voice had two sides. My grandfather has always been and will always be my rock. He was a preacher of knowledge and a life-long teacher. He instilled in everyone he knew that education was the salvation- the power to lift any person from their environment to a higher place. It was his voice that motivated me to begin this educational journey. That voice was silenced by throat cancer more than two weeks ago. Immediately following his departure from this earthly world, my already weakened voice of reason took on a different and difficult tone. It was easy to ignore my grandmother’s escalating dementia as she watched her life partner lose a long fought battle with an ugly disease. But when that spotlight found her as the new subject, there was no place for anyone to hide. There is no gratification in taking on the responsibility of making decisions for the people that have been the authority and voice of reason since the beginning of your very existence. Fear fueled by grief driving self-doubt. The mind shuts down. For the last two weeks, I’ve been sitting in front of a blank screen waiting for something to happen.

I will start over in order to find success beyond the grief and fear. I owe it to my voices.

I can say that I have learned that writing is hard. I have never doubted that statement, but now it has new meaning. This exercise has been a reminder of the fundamentals that I knew but had forgotten. The truer struggle has been (and I guess will always be) defining what I should do with it. I have no focus because I’ve never been challenged to find one. Everything I do is a hodge-podge of anything at any moment with just enough information to sound intelligent for two minutes. I have learned that while a 2-minute drill as an end result is fine, the entire game of research, focus, and intent is more important. I have learned that good writing is timeless no matter the stage. I have learned that as the genre gets smaller, the focus and intent has to become sharper. I don’t like to Tweet and probably never will.

One question that I have that I don’t think I found an answer to is if there is any difference between interactive writing and “traditional” writing. In my workplace, the rule of thumb has been that writing news stories as web copy is different than writing newspaper copy, or radio/TV copy. Radio/TV copy I understand because the sound bite or video footage from a source is the story. The writing around it is glue to make it stick together. But, does written news on the web differ from written news on paper? Or is bad lazy writing being glorified in the name of a new genre? Those are questions I will continue to strive to answer.

Executive Summary

The desire to capture an on-going record of history is an elemental need of humankind. Anthropologists attribute the evolution of both the spoken and written word to this rooted desire in society. The modern world of digital technology creates the ability to record history as its happening in the present. This proposal details how a website designed to collect the stories of the individual today will build an encyclopedia and recorded living history of a civilization for tomorrow.

The beginning is simple - a record of one’s existence. That record is added to other records to build a family tree. While there are other software programs and websites that create family trees and link them to others, this website would expand on the idea on a new and unexplored level. Each identity has memory to store written documents and audio files detailing moments in that life. Each record would have a content label featuring key words and phrases indicating the topic within the record. The entries would collectively create a database of real time history that could be researched and cross-referenced by year, geographic location, event, demographic, etc. Families would be able to research, read and hear the stories of their forefathers directly from the source.

This living recorded history would have larger function than just serving the individual family. The database would be used by a multitude of researchers looking for specific information.  The same principles of the collective intelligence that keep Wikipedia honest and accurate would apply. Writers and historians would then have an unlimited source of materials to track how the world was changed one person at a time. The medical community could start with one person’s disease, illness, or questionable health issue and track it through a family or a community. The personal and professional possibilities of usage are without limit.

The facts and details of historical events will always be documented by those who make it their job to do so. But so often what is missing is the individual story that gives every historical moment its humanity. People remember where they were and what they were doing when John F. Kennedy was shot, the space shuttle Challenger exploded, and when the planes hit the twin towers in New York. Everyone has a story and the majority of those stories are missed. The proposal seeks to capture all of the stories from the people who lived them and are willing to share.