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An Adventure in Live-Tweeting about Video Games

Photo by Michael Adeleye on Pexels

I would like to preface this post by saying that I am not a regular Twitter user nor am I a dedicated video game player so this blog in general is very outside my comfort zone. But, I do enjoy a good story and have been told by strangers on the internet that I can tell a pretty good one, so this assignment wasn’t all that bad.

I decided to live-tweet about something that happened while I was playing Animal Crossing: New Horizons on the Nintendo Switch this weekend. I realize I’m a little late to the game (sharing your game-play of ACNH is so 2020) but since I’m notoriously late to everything, it checks out. My sister got the game for Christmas and together we’ve been building up our island, Odyssea, for the past 7 months.

Not to brag, but Odyssea is pretty great (and yes, the name is a pun on the Odyssey. Both my sister and I really love Greek mythology). We’ve got a cool museum full of dinosaurs and art, a camping spot next to the orchard, an outdoor pool and basketball court, and a whole neighbourhood for our 9 villagers.

My Animal Crossing avatar outside the Odyssea Museum

During a normal evening on the island catching fish and bugs as I tried to pay off a massive loan to Tom Nook, I happened across the event that sparked my Twitter thread story time.

The story goes like this: my sister and I have been competing in a self-imposed pitfall seed battle for the past few months. We take turns burying the seed on our island in hopes that the other person walks over it and falls in. This time, instead of one of us falling in, one of our villagers was the unfortunate victim.

https://twitter.com/TheBookishNic/status/1414033967121010691
My Twitter Thread

This live-tweet thread was lots of fun to create and highlights some important storytelling techniques. Read on to see the 3 storytelling techniques I used to tell my Twitter story!

3 Storytelling Techniques to Use in Live-Tweet Stories

Start with a good hook

If your story isn’t interesting from the very beginning, people aren’t going to want to read it.

This is especially true with Twitter storytelling. People nowadays have very short attention spans so if your first tweet doesn’t catch their attention and make them stop scrolling, then they’re not going to read the rest of your story.

https://twitter.com/TheBookishNic/status/1414033967121010691

I decided to start my live-tweet thread with a bold statement: “OMG I JUST PUSHED MY NEIGHBOUR INTO A HOLE!?” It’s written in all caps to make people stop and take notice. And while it’s exciting, it doesn’t give away too many details – people will have to read the rest of the thread to see what happens. But I did include #acnh to let people know this happened on Animal Crossing.

Have a beginning, middle, and end

Remember that plot diagram from middle school? Those same principles still apply when you’re writing stories for social media.

In the beginning of my Twitter thread, I set the scene and introduce the characters. In the first few tweets its revealed this event takes place on my Animal Crossing island, and that Hornsby, a villager on the island, and I are the central characters.

In the rising action, I discover the potential pitfall seed danger and realize I have to save Hornsby before he falls in. I use suspense to draw this section out longer.

https://twitter.com/TheBookishNic/status/1414029402602565638?s=20

The climax is where, instead of saving Hornsby, I push him into the pitfall seed hole.

The falling action and conclusion is where I gave Hornsby an apology gift and decide to stop the pitfall seed battle I’ve been having with my sister.

https://twitter.com/TheBookishNic/status/1414037826794975235?s=20

Following this simple narrative pattern helps to organize your story and ensures you have all the elements of a good story (setting, characters, conflict, plot, etc.).

Use emotion

Social media is the perfect place to put emotion into your writing. If your story doesn’t evoke any emotion, people aren’t going to be interested in reading.

I chose to make my story humorous for obvious reasons (watching Hornsby fall into the hole was very funny). I express this emotion through the words I used, my use of capslock text, and the GIFs and hashtags I included in some of the tweets.

https://twitter.com/TheBookishNic/status/1414035045329768450

Part of the humor also comes from the dramatic nature of my story. I find stories, especially funny ones, are always better if they’re dramatized a bit. This event is something that happens normally in Animal Crossing and is much less dramatic that what I made it out to be. Villagers falling into pitfall seeds is just part of the game and really isn’t something all that interesting. But through my use of humor, I’ve made it interesting.

Plus, the pros at Buzzfeed say using humor is a surefire way to drive engagement so who am I to ignore their advice.

But humor isn’t the only emotion I evoke in my story. I also build sympathy for Hornsby be describing him as an innocent bystander in the pitfall seed battle my sister and I were having.

https://twitter.com/TheBookishNic/status/1414030021048430592?s=20

And there you have it folks, 3 easy ways to tell good stories on social media. Now you’re ready to harness those 280-characters and tell the best story you can.

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How pho can teach valuable life lessons

Beef pho, Food Network

My live tweet contains a recurring dream of mine. As I recalled the dream, I in real-time tweeted upon awaking from my nap. Following along with the tweet, you can see how the story begins to unfold. 

My dream is about my grandma who passed away when I was 5 years old. Although I was young when she passed, she and I were inseparable. This is the story of her teaching my sister and I life lessons, like she would in real-life. 

Through learning to cook pho, 3 life lessons are told. With each layer of pho that is prepared, we follow the cohesion of the story. It is laid out in an easy to follow format and leads into one another. 

The story begins with the journey of anticipation of learning to cook pho, then the conflict of a sassy granddaughter asking for, and wanting more, therefore leading into being taught her valuable life lessons. I enjoyed writing this piece in a live tweet because of the suspense that could be manipulated. With each tweet, the reader is given information, but is made to wait for any new information. Since it was laid out that there were 3 life lessons, the reader knows and waits in anticipation of what these are. 

Each tweet could be made into a cliffhanger and then a resolution in the next. It plays on the reader’s interest, and continues to feed to the story spine outline. 

The story spine, Sketchplanations by Kenn Adams

They continue to make pho, and then conflict arises, and from that a lesson is learned. It uses this format 3 times until the resolution of a completed bowl of pho, and the end of the dream. The story is used to convey symbolism with the bowl of pho representing life. It’s is a simple tale, as well as a dream that comes back to me because of its simplistic, but significant nature. It reminds me of a combination of proverbs or universal truths, and truly represents the importance of life for me. Because it is summed up fully in 3 lessons, it is an easy read that still holds the readers attention, and stays present even after the story is finished. 

The relatability of the characters is another part of why I love this story. Even though it is very specifically Vietnamese because of my background, it can relate to anyone. The grandma can be substituted for any mentor figure, and the precocious child displays aspects of everyone. The child continuously asks what the reader is thinking, which can be applied to all parts of life. “The WHYs of life.” 

Luckily, the grandma soothes the child, and the reader. Every single time I dream this story and recall it, the meaning changes for me. It guides me through different journeys in my life.

Although I’ve written this down once before, documenting it on Twitter is short snippets, help me edit and sum up that parts that came back to me naturally, instead of adding in parts that I’m forcing myself to recall or fill in gaps.

I like that the reader is able to take this journey with me, and recollect the story as I do. It creates an intimacy with the reader, and the writer. The snippets feel interactive and casual, as well as less intimidating for novice writers, like myself.

Twitter, The Verge

All in all, I enjoyed writing out the snippet story, and weaving a fun and widely accessible adventure for myself, and the audience. 

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Happy Life

For the Live-Tweet Storytelling assignment, I decided to talk about our (my) garden, because it is a big part of my life. That is true in the past and in the present, but for different reasons. I used suggestions from Gary Vaynerchuk’s article “How to Tell a Story on Social Media”, which is available online.

Elements of a story

Following the Elements of a Story, I focused on the following:

Setting

I explained how the garden first appeared in my life and what its importance was in the beginning.

Character

This was harder from a personal perspective. I was not trying to sell anyone on anything. I took the approach of explaining how life before and after retirement from the military involves both compromise and opportunity.

Plot

Part of the formula for success being a military wife and a gardener is being spontaneous and not having a long memory. I love my garden. I remember spending a full two years liberating it from the thistles that had taken over before we moved in. I read books on square foot gardening, planting small groups of plants over time for a continuous crop:

He always plants in rows between sticks.

Conflict

Then he officially retired and moved home. I started to hear a lot of stories about how he “always plants in a row between two sticks” and he “always waters the garden by holding a spray nozzle and standing out there”, instead of using the sprinkler. Change is constant in military life, before and after retirement. Again, spontaneity is necessary. Any long-term military wife understands the power of those two words. Don’t take my word for it. Here’s a Facebook post from a private community of military wives that resonated with a lot of members:

Arc

Beginning, middle and end. I closed my story by sharing a solution for the current challenges in gardening, giving him a quick tool that he can use without asking me. Have a look for yourself:

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Life’s a Beach

Being a parent of a toddler, never mind twins, can run the gamut of entertainment levels: sometimes it’s incredibly boring and repetitive, other times, it feels like you’re watching a train wreck on YouTube. So, when I decided to live-tweet a day at the beach with my son and daughter in 30+ degree weather, I didn’t know what to expect.

I did know that my story would a simple beginning, middle, and end. Toddlers thrive on routine, so I knew the beginning would generally be quite predictable. No sleeping in around here!

The quest to sleep in created some suspense – would this be the DAY THEY LET MOM AND DAD SLEEP IN TO A SOMEWHAT NORMAL TIME? [Spoiler: No. Never.]

I knew that depending on mood, weather and hunger level (or, triggers), the story had a million different directions it could take.

Surprise number one – a somewhat successful craft attempt!

This was a big deal. But, an even better surprise for mom and dad was the special appearance of a food truck that showed up just in time for lunch. After lugging all this gear to the beach, the chance to enjoy some tasty street food was an oasis on a hot day.

A pro tip is just let your kids eat your food as they won’t touch the food you buy for them. We’re still learning that one.

However, we knew the food, sun and swimming would do the trick. The climax was achieved, resolution was nearing – nap time was approaching.

A beautiful site to end a beautiful day. I knew the story would be relatable, would provide some rising and falling action, and most importantly, some sort of surprise.

It wasn’t our craziest day with twins by far, but still a memorable one.

Enjoy the full Twitter thread!

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Thunderous Adventure?

For my live-tweet, I chose to tell the story of a city-trail walk I took with friends.

As we arrived at the trailhead, the sky turned angry, so the stakes became whether we would we get soaked or not. (Spoiler alert: we did not.) Throughout the walk, I included photos of the scenery around me, a bit of my search for beavers, and updates on whether we were being rained on.

For the whole thread in order, please read it in a “Moment” here. (Also please ignore the typo!)

I had a beginning, middle, and end, and included stakes in the story, but I found that a lot of storytelling techniques are very difficult to do without pre-planning, and any structure I ended up with was largely coincidental.

Wins

A few things I did well:

  1. The stake I chose is relatable (the threat of being caught in a thunderstorm) and universal (the conflict of “man vs nature”).
  2. I included characters (me, nature, the vilainous storm)
  3. It’s pretty simple. Just a walk through the woods.
  4. This story was written as I talk, so it’s authentic.
  5. Bringing in the recurring themes (beavers, ducks, rain updates) created intrigue (although see below, because it could have been done better!)

Fails

Unfortunately, in reading through the thread, there were more things I could have improved than I did right! Here are a few of the things I would try to do if I were to do it over:

  1. Including more character and emotion. I was the main character, and I didn’t include much in the way of getting to know the me so that you could root for me. (A few details I might have included: I hate the heat wave we’ve been having, I’m not much for nature, and I love watching a good thunderstorm from the other side of a pane of glass.) I did include the explanation of Pooh Sticks, at least!
  2. Including more flow. If I were re-doing this story with the benefit of hindsight, I would have posted more explanatory tweets to tie the story together, and maybe even re-ordered. For example, I would have expanded upon the beaver thread throughout. My family and I used to visit the beavers in this park before the city exterminated them. A few years ago, the city started reintroducing the beavers because exterminating them screwed something up with the ecosystem (I also would have researched whether this was actually a thing or memories of a child!) and so looking for beavers was exciting for me.
  3. Including more context. Many of the tweets were very short, caption-like tweets, and upon review, they could have used more explanation. Besides the lack of beaver context, I would have liked to have expanded those like “Babies! So cute!” to something like “We’re in full-blown nature, folks. Ducks (and babies, at that!), squirrels, beavers, oh my!”
  4. Including more variety of media. I should have included a video or two, maybe showing the beaver dam, or the wind blowing instead of only photos. Also for some of the photos, I should have either taken them in landscape, edited them, or re-positioned their preview section as I posted them.

Next Time

Live-tweeting as you walk without tripping, slowing down your group too much, or missing anything — especially in an attempt to tell a story — turned out to be more difficult than live-tweeting an event where I post to capture the highlights and/or insights (and also where I’m frequently posting on a computer!). However, the experience did teach me a lot about storytelling, and I think I will be able to do a better job next time.

Note: Apologies also for the technical difficulty: I didn’t realize I was threading on the first tweet only! (Therefore Twitter is not showing the tweets in chronological order, but in some random order.) In any case, I made a Twitter Moment of the live-tweet so you can read it more easily.

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A Day in Stöpsel’s Life

My Twitter thread follows my Chihuahua Stöpsel for one day. He was rescued from a kill shelter in LA in 2016 (at that point he was app. 6 years old), transported to Calgary and put up for adoption while staying with foster pawrents. He stole my heart shorty after and has been getting spoiled and loved on ever since.

This was my first encounter with Twitter and I wasn’t prepared for the struggles of creating a thread (only after several attempts and linking two tweets at the same time would it allow me to add additional tweets to an existing story). I guess ‘Dr. Google’ has become my best friend while taking online courses.

Dealing with technical issues was not the only hurdle. I also had to figure out a writing style. Generally, I prefer to use punctuation and to spell out words, abbreviations are more of an exception. At first, I tried to mimic what I have seen on Twitter: short words, removed vowels, simple to none sentence structure. But that only made me feel as if I was a nerd trying to sound like a cool kid.

After reading the paragraph on “Write the way you talk” (“The Non-Writers’ Guide To Writing Better Social Media Copy“), I decided to stay true to myself and write on social media the way I compose my text messages. It might result is less likes, but it lets me be me. And who knows, perhaps people my generation might appreciate it (after all, social media is not just for people born in the 21st century).

In regards to the content, I soon decided on a funny approach. I wanted the readers to react with a smile or a chuckle. I’m sarcastic by nature, but had to ‘soften’ it after coming to Canada. Sharing my humour on social media allows me to write it down and to revise my draft if I feel that I could be misunderstood.

The storyline is in chronological order with a beginning, a middle, and an end by showing my dog’s activities in the morning, during the day, and in the evening. However, it doesn’t really have much suspense or tension. My dog leads a rather mundane life – if I’d let him, he’d simply eat and sleep all day long and get some belly rubs in between.

To keep the tweets interesting and the readers engaged, I focused on an entertaining element within each post. I created a juxtaposition between the written text and the accompanied visual representation (at least I tried to). My goal was to have the text describe how my dog sees himself (smart, witty, brave, and adventurous), while the pictures/videos show him from my perspective (timid, shy to the outside but yet comfortable and a bit brave towards me, but foremost: the sweetest and cutest companion).

I added one little suspense into my thread by incorporating a question at the beginning and answering it in the end. The name of my Chihuahua is unique (a nickname that inadvertently turned into a name) and I asked if anyone knows its meaning. In my last post I solved that mystery (Stöpsel literally translated means ‘plug’ or ‘peg’, but in some southern parts of Germany it is colloquially an endearing term for a tiny boy). While I’m not really leaving viewers hanging in anticipation with this one question, I still hope the answer gives them a sense of conclusion similar to the end of a chapter or a book.

While the overall narrative might not draw in countless views as is it isn’t very climatic, the content still seems relatable. Many people are introverts and might prefer to eat and sleep all day as well. And, during a global pandemic many might have done just that within the last year.

My hope is, that everyone reading the thread smiles or smirks at least once (at least I did while making the posts).

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To storm or not to storm…

I was struggling with something to tweet about and mother nature decided to grace us with a mid-afternoon storm. Realized about halfway through that I wasn’t doing the twitter thread properly, but fixed it eventually.

This storm was not sure what it wanted to do… thunder. Rain. Not rain. Windy. Not windy. Eventually the heaveans opened, and… now I don’t have to water my plants. I told the story with photo and video as it happened, something I’ve not done much of. You can view my thread below!

https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js

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First Live-Tweet

For this assignment we were tasked with using a live-tweet to tell an engaging story.

This summer I’m single and loving it. And so, I decided to highlight a hilarious Tinder experience that just so happened to be yesterday…

I used the thread to highlight the events of my day. It began with me hanging at the pool before receiving a notification on Tinder asking if I was interested in a par 3.

Note, I am not a strong golfer.

I was terrible. It was awkward. But still awesome.

I used the tools in Twitter via GIFs and hashtags to add humour and relatability to the story.

I mean, who hasn’t been on a bad date?

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Receiving Developed Film Live Tweeting

Shooting film is one of the most unique experiences and I have so grateful to have been introduced to it. I received my first film camera from my grandpa roughly 2 years ago, it was his old camera, a Mamiya 1000 dtl which is a 35mm film camera from 1969. For those who don’t know what a 35mm film camera is, basically it is a camera that allows you to shoot 35 photos on one roll of film. Enough camera nerd talk though…

In my live tweet, I shared my my initial reaction of seeing the film for the first time. The past week and a bit, I went out on two different occasions with friends and decided to document it all with my camera. Here in Sønderborg, Southern Denmark, we experience some very beautiful sunsets so I could not put down my camera. I am sucker for documenting people in thought and in their own element, not artificial moments. Luckily I was able to do so. I shared one photo in my last tweet, which I really love, due to the colours!

I hope you enjoy my live tweets and the photo, it was such a thrill going through them.

Live Tweet Link

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The Shawshank Redemption (1994)

While I never read the novella from Stephen King that this movie is based on, I have read his other works including the Dark Tower series, The Stand, Duma Key, and a few others. This story isn’t otherworldly, or horror inducing like most of his works are. 

This movie in particular has always stood out to me for making me invested in everything about it, from its characters to the storyline. If it is ever on in the background during a family gathering, inevitably me and most of my siblings tend to just sit down and watch. The story follows themes of friendship, injustice, among others that really resonate with me.

Unjust imprisonment

The Shawshank Redemption is a story about Andy Dufresne, a banker who is sentenced to life in prison at Shawshank State Penitentiary for the murder of his wife and her lover, though he is innocent. Here, he meets and makes friends with other prisoners, some of whom have been there almost all of their lives. 

Friendship

The story is narrated by “Red”, a contraband smuggler who befriends Andy and helps him get items, like a rock hammer, which Andy ends up using to dig through his cell wall over the years, unbeknownst to anyone else. Andy and Red develop a close friendship that spans over decades in (and eventually out) of prison, with Andy helping Red change his pessimistic views and showing him the light that is hope.

The power of hope

The prisoners that Andy befriends are shown to be more than just criminals — they are people like anyone else. They are relatable and sympathetic. More than that, Andy himself is determined, loyal, and has integrity. He is victimized throughout the movie, subjected to some of the worst things imaginable, and yet he keeps his hope alive and inspires other convicts to find the good in the bad, and to be hopeful.  

Storytelling practices

This story, while certainly not a Pixar one, does follow one of the rules of storytelling, according to the list storyboard artist Emma Coats shared. 

Rule #16: What are the stakes? Give us reason to root for the character. What happens if they don’t succeed? Stack the odds against.

The stakes for Andy is that he spends the rest of his life in Shawshank, a prison full of corrupt guards, and an even more sinister warden. If he doesn’t succeed, the rest of his life will pass him by, and he will continue to be brutalized by rapists, sequestered in solitary confinement, forced to do taxes for the guards as well as “fixing” the book for the warden of the prison, who at most, sees him as a tool to be used. We want to root for Andy because he shows an unshakeable confidence that he will get out somehow. 

Besides that rule, Ashley Fell’s 4 I’s  – Interest, Involve, Instruct, and Inspire work with The Shawshank Redemption, too. 

Interest

We are interested in what Andy does now that he is in prison for a crime he did not commit.

Involve

The problems that arise from being inside a prison, being victimized, as well having no one believe you are issues that most in the audience can sympathize with. Anyone watching will be invested in seeing what Andy does next.

Instruct

While the movie is focused on Andy with Red narrating, we are taught about integrity, hope, and determination. While there may be moments where Andy despairs?, he always carries a respect for himself, and the hope that he will see the outside world again. His determination to make life better for himself and others inside the prison is always present.

Inspire

Andy’s unending determination to become a free man, and the honest goodness in his heart for his fellow inmates and friends is what makes Andy so likeable and memorable. He is clever, kind, and always has a plan. Those who watch the film would be moved to be both more sympathetic to others, and to have hope in the face of adversity.

Closing

This is a movie that I highly recommend, as it is one of the most engaging and heartfelt I have seen. It’s easy to forget that even in difficult times, hope is one of the most powerful emotions to help see you through your journey. 

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