Hey all,

Our very own Anjali Ramachandran has written a series on LinkedIn with her key takeaways from SXSW 2024. Read her latest post about the ethical dilemma around AI.

Have a great weekend.

Chloe

Level up: exploring the artistic side of video game design (9-min read)

The Palestinian Museum Digital Archive (archive)

When Women Fly (1-min read; photographs)

The Displaced: the forced migration of the Sami, and the aftermath (23-min read)

Blush: An Extraordinary Voyage (14-min watch)

The Fridge: The Curious History of Your Home (33-min listen)

A haunted Discord server is the last good place online (4-min read)

Loewe: Decades of Confusion (3-min watch)

How’d You Make That? Three masterpieces from glimmer through struggle to breakthrough (27-min read)

2024 Emerging Tech Trend Report (1-hour watch)

Teachers Voices: A podcast we make with the Jacobs FoundationEach episode features powerful stories about learning and development from teachers around the world.

How we can help you

Storythings is the content marketing agency of choice for some of the world’s most forward-thinking B2B brands and organisations. Here are 2 reasons to get in touch. 

1. “I don’t know what to do” – You’ve been creating content but it’s not having the impact you need. Talk to us about our Content Audit Workshop. 2. “I need something making” – You know what you want to make but need an agency to make it. We can help make your podcast, video, publication, animation and newsletter.We do other things too. Get in touch for a FREE 30 minute consultation. 

Level up: exploring the artistic side of video game design (9-min read)This piece speaks to designers at the forefront of video game design using illustration and painterly art as an alternative to hyperrealistic CGI.

The Palestinian Museum Digital Archive (archive)This archive was launched to collect and digitise items – official records, letters, photographs, audio recordings – under threat of loss, damage, or confiscation. These items have been made widely available through this process, in both Arabic and English, in order to shed light on different aspects of Palestinian life, history, and legacy – taking a history-from-below perspective to tell stories of average people. It’s an invaluable resource full of hope, culture, and resistance.

When Women Fly (1-min read; photographs)The Danza de los Voladores: five people dressed in traditional clothing dance around and then climb to the top of a 30m-high pole. Four of the five then launch themselves – tied by ropes – to descend to the ground. The fifth remains on top, playing a flute and drum. Participants in this ritual – created in Mexico at least 450 years ago to ask the gods to end a severe drought – have traditionally all been male. In this series, photographer Valeria Luongo celebrates the female flyers defying gender roles.

The Displaced: the forced migration of the Sami, and the aftermath (23-min read) The voices in this piece represent families from among the 300 Sámi people forcibly displaced from northern Norway between 1919 and 1932. Author Elin Anna Labba has recovered archival research and interviews from within her Sámi ancestral community.

Blush: An Extraordinary Voyage (14-min watch)Using a scifi setting and real-life dialogue to explore the queer experience, friendship, and overcoming, this stop-motion short film follows two friends on a trip to the grocery store via spacecraft. For Fatu, this simple trip feels as nerve-racking as a lunar expedition: for the first time in his life, he’s wearing makeup in public.

The Fridge: The Curious History of Your Home (33-min listen)Ever thought about the history of items you use at home everyday? This detail-packed podcast into the origins of everything from wallpaper to fridges is a delightful, narrative-based look at everything including the kitchen sink.

A haunted Discord server is the last good place online (4-min read)In a game called This Discord Has Ghosts in It, up to 15 participants at a time gather in a Discord server that has been reimagined as a haunted house. “Rather than encourage quick and pithy exchanges, the game asked me to take time to reach consensus, something that digital spaces don’t often reward.”

Loewe: Decades of Confusion (2-min watch)This is wonderful. Dan Levy and Aubrey Plaza star in this Loewe short. Wigs, iconic looks from the Loewe archive, and wrong answers – from 1971 to present day.

How’d You Make That? Three masterpieces from glimmer through struggle to breakthrough (27-min read)The story of how creators create is irresistible. How does anybody make art? Where do you begin, what do you do next, and when do you know you are finished? And more crucially: What do you do when you lose faith? Condensed and adapted, here are three conversations with Cheryl Pope, Kara Walker and Louise Glück.

2024 Emerging Tech Trend Report (1-hour watch)This is a long watch but if you want to really dig into what lies ahead in terms of AI, Biotech and the Connected Ecosystem of Things then it’s worth a watch.

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Thanks for reading. We’ll see you all next week.

Hugh, Matt, Anjali and the whole team at Storythings.