Storify: Could it Have Been the End of Multitasking?
Pete Rorabaugh and Jesse Stommel's article, "How to Storify. Why to Storify." was a great introduction of a website which no longer exists:
I know, right? Rorabaugh and Stommel begin their article by stating what Storify is exactly. They state: "Storify allows the user to arrange pieces of conversations to construct a narrative... Currently, it allows users to bring order to ongoing conversations across multiple platforms — Twitter, Facebook, YouTube, Flickr, Instagram, and Google+." The article then goes on to show us how to use it and even gives us examples of Storify accounts (I'm sure they were wonderfully done). What struck me as interesting was when they were discussing what to include in our own accounts. In their first step, they wrote: "Curate. Don’t try to include every little piece of something in your Storify. Instead, make choices to collate or summarize a conversation without simply recreating it." I don't know about all of you, but this made me think about multitasking.
Remember the beginning of the semester when we were all a little less stressed? Think back to when we first encountered the definitions of play, judgment, etc in the introduction of Because Digital Writing Matters. The definition of multitasking is as follows: "The ability to scan one's environment and shift focus as needed to salient details" (DeVoss 12). Multitasking has been thought of as a great skill to learn and it can solve anyone in need of extra time. However, from what I have been getting this past couple of years is that multitasking doesn't seem to be the all great and powerful skill like it "used to be." In fact, it probably has never helped us out at all. According to the definition above, multitasking is a way to only focus on what is "the most important thing" about the task at hand. In order to do so much, we have to take away the small stuff and cut corners. We are then left with a sloppy piece of work that will never make it to mom's refrigerator.
So, with Storify, could we get rid of multitasking? The article uses twitter as an example to maybe break away from the mess that multitasking brings: "A conversation on Twitter, for example, is interactive, using distraction as a generative force, as participants bounce from one strand to another. By the end of a rousing twitter discussion, we usually have a dozen or more windows open on our screens, are following the feeds of all the involved twitterers, are reading several linked articles, and have gotten sidetracked by tangential conversations. Storify, on the other hand, happens in one static window." It seems too good to be true. Imagine you are doing your homework and you don't hear the ding of a text message. You don't get a pop-up of an ad. You don't even see the dreaded, right-wing news article. It is just you and your homework. Alone at last.
Oh wait, Storify doesn't exist anymore...
However, what does everyone think about this type of website or program? Do you think it could get rid of the temptation to "multitask" or is that idea of only picking the "important things" hindering? How could we see something like this used in the classroom or should we even suggest it to our students? What are some ways that you have dealt with multitasking or helped distracted students?
Can't wait to read all your comments while replying to emails, buying Christmas presents, texting my mom, eating lunch, listening to my "focusing" playlist, writing a paper, and reading the lastest thing Trump said on twitter!
I know, right? Rorabaugh and Stommel begin their article by stating what Storify is exactly. They state: "Storify allows the user to arrange pieces of conversations to construct a narrative... Currently, it allows users to bring order to ongoing conversations across multiple platforms — Twitter, Facebook, YouTube, Flickr, Instagram, and Google+." The article then goes on to show us how to use it and even gives us examples of Storify accounts (I'm sure they were wonderfully done). What struck me as interesting was when they were discussing what to include in our own accounts. In their first step, they wrote: "Curate. Don’t try to include every little piece of something in your Storify. Instead, make choices to collate or summarize a conversation without simply recreating it." I don't know about all of you, but this made me think about multitasking.
Remember the beginning of the semester when we were all a little less stressed? Think back to when we first encountered the definitions of play, judgment, etc in the introduction of Because Digital Writing Matters. The definition of multitasking is as follows: "The ability to scan one's environment and shift focus as needed to salient details" (DeVoss 12). Multitasking has been thought of as a great skill to learn and it can solve anyone in need of extra time. However, from what I have been getting this past couple of years is that multitasking doesn't seem to be the all great and powerful skill like it "used to be." In fact, it probably has never helped us out at all. According to the definition above, multitasking is a way to only focus on what is "the most important thing" about the task at hand. In order to do so much, we have to take away the small stuff and cut corners. We are then left with a sloppy piece of work that will never make it to mom's refrigerator.
So, with Storify, could we get rid of multitasking? The article uses twitter as an example to maybe break away from the mess that multitasking brings: "A conversation on Twitter, for example, is interactive, using distraction as a generative force, as participants bounce from one strand to another. By the end of a rousing twitter discussion, we usually have a dozen or more windows open on our screens, are following the feeds of all the involved twitterers, are reading several linked articles, and have gotten sidetracked by tangential conversations. Storify, on the other hand, happens in one static window." It seems too good to be true. Imagine you are doing your homework and you don't hear the ding of a text message. You don't get a pop-up of an ad. You don't even see the dreaded, right-wing news article. It is just you and your homework. Alone at last.
Oh wait, Storify doesn't exist anymore...
However, what does everyone think about this type of website or program? Do you think it could get rid of the temptation to "multitask" or is that idea of only picking the "important things" hindering? How could we see something like this used in the classroom or should we even suggest it to our students? What are some ways that you have dealt with multitasking or helped distracted students?
Can't wait to read all your comments while replying to emails, buying Christmas presents, texting my mom, eating lunch, listening to my "focusing" playlist, writing a paper, and reading the lastest thing Trump said on twitter!
I wondered if anyone would notice that Storify doesn't exist anymore! As you point out, it's ironic that a site that creates a static narrative out of a dynamic platform has gone static itself. There are, however, new sites that do the same thing such as https://wakelet.com/home. Earlier this year, a Twitter chat I facilitated on open access publishing was curated there: https://wakelet.com/wake/1bf862dd-fa5e-4f88-8aec-abfa2f3b9bad. But all of this appropriately takes us back to your original challenge of multitasking as a a critical skill. To some degree, this is a kind of attention management. Is the point of multitasking to tune out all of the distractions to get the most important task done? Or is it to get multiple tasks done at once?
ReplyDeleteBased on what storify sounded like, it sounds like it being gone could almost be a metaphor...... eaten by the branching, multitasking world... or something haha.
ReplyDeleteTo respond to your questions, I think it is complicated as it so often is. While it would be great to be able to narrow your focus when working with information like with this sort of application, I think short of locking me in my room with that one webpage my attention will shift to multitasking at some point. Take my phone and I will get up and do laundry and cook dinner you know? If I'm not focused and engaged at that point I'm just not focused and my brain (and sometimes my entire self in the case of errands) will find somewhere else to go. I think the idea of only picking important things in the sense of twitter also troubles me? In the curated class discussions like we have or like the storify examples suggest then that is probably ok because really how much information is in there? It's probably pretty contained. But then what about when you try to Storify a major trending tag? I'm looking at my trending twitter tags right now (it still is convinced I reside in New York whether its because I set my hometown at some point or it has tracked how many hours my IP logged a new york location is unclear), and in NY Lena Dunham is the most useful trending example for this. So with 5000+ people discussing Lena Dunham we see people discussing her more recent news coverage about some extremely problematic things she has said and done once again and some people discussing the ways in which she is starting to learn and grow and these people critiquing and analyzing her, meanwhile her fans are standing up for her or engaging with the article in positive ways and news sources celebrating her and its all happening under the same tag. There is probably even more unique responses happening that I just didn't care enough to scroll down enough to see (I was multitasking again look at this. I definitely read too many to justify making this point). But the point of all this is how do you pick and choose in this more broad kind of case what to storify? This is a small tag with relatively few responses and it looks difficult, never mind if you tried to storify #mondaymotivation with its 128k tweets or #cybermonday which didnt even bother counting how many there were. Whose voices do you leave out of the originally dynamic conversation?? The deliberate choice is what troubles me. I think if you used this kind of tool for a school classes specific tag, maybe that would be ok. But in other situations, I would not want to ask students to do a thing like this because I think you do a otherwise more inclusive platform a disservice by trimming it down and "curating it" as storify suggests.
These days multitasking is one of the most desirable professional skills for one to have, so I don't think "get[ting] rid of multitasking" is the solution. I think that people need to work on their "attention management" by resisting the urge to multitask while doing tasks that require a great deal of mental energy such as doing homework, writing papers, reading dense texts &c. I have been sidetracked many times while working on something that required my sole attention, so I know how much of a struggle it can be to refocus on something that you were sidetracked from. I think programs like Storify could be beneficial in terms of maintaining prolonged focus on a task; that is to say, not being distracted from it. However, I do think multitasking does have its benefits as long as you're not losing the majority of your focus on whatever task you are doing. For example, a lot of times when I'm reading a book/essay and I come across a vocabulary word I'm not sure of, I look up the definition on my phone. While a lot of times I just read the definition, there are moments where I look into the etymology of the word or read examples of it used in other sentences. Sometimes this can take away several minutes from my reading, however, even so, I consider this to be a positive form of multitasking.
ReplyDeleteI think tools like storify are really intriguing and would have been potentially useful, but the issue for me is getting started. There are many apps that can help you limit internet usage so you can focus on the tasks at hand; however, you need to put in that initiative. However, as a teacher/instructor, it could work well as an activity for you and your students to work together on. Perfecting your multitasking skills as a class, having each other as a support group, rather than going it alone. You would keep yourself accountable by being a good example to your students. Too bad I don't teach yet so I can keep putting it off!
ReplyDeleteJanelle, before I begin to answer your questions I want to just say I absolutely loved your conversational post. It was awesome. And to quickly talk about the no longer existing Storify, I feel like this class keeps reminding us of the fake doors aspect. Maybe it's symbolic in Storify being shut down because it represents the inability to not multitask, which is something Nicholas Carr vehemently stated in his article "Is Google Making us Stupid?" With using both the points brought up in his article, I don't think that the issue is multitasking. It's focus. Simply put, our brains have been rewired to constantly seek stimulation and distraction. I would like to believe that a website such as this would help students to remain focused on the task at hand, but as I sit here writing this I see my phone in my vicinity, and the four tabs surrounding the one I am currently on, and I realize that I myself don't know how to be focused either. It isn't that I am not focused on what I am doing, but rather that I am attempting to focus on too much at once. Since I am aware that I have to complete this in order to respond to this great post, I am doing my best to not pick up the said phone, or click on one of the other tabs. And I will admit it's hard.
ReplyDeleteSince I work with preschoolers who are constantly distracted and/or have difficulty in staying focused, my lead teacher and I sometimes have them do this thing called "make a quiet rock". They ball up on the rug and put their heads down in order to quiet their bodies and voices.
Although I doubt this would work for older students, perhaps having them return back to pen and paper, where there are no distractions except for the items in front of them, is a good way to teach focus.
Janelle:
ReplyDeleteGreat post! In response to your question, I don't necessarily see Storify or similar programs as an answer to the dangers of multitasking. In fact, I don't really view multitasking as dangerous. I feel like it is tempting to think that things like Twitter, Facebook, texting, and all the other immediate, demanding technologies we and our students engage with every day are hindering our ability to focus on "the task at hand." It seems the logical, intuitive conclusion. Given their nature, how could they not be distracting us?
I wonder though if this is really a new kind of distraction or simply distraction in its most recent iteration. Humanity has always day dreamed, for instance. We have highly associative minds, constantly bouncing from one idea to another. I am thinking about my paper and I see a dog with red fur down the street and I am immediately reminded of my own dog growing up. Thinking about my dog leads me to thoughts of my childhood home which we sold recently, which leads to thoughts of friends I haven't reached out to in a while etc. This is how human minds work. We have already discussed in this class the similarities of this associative structure to hyperlinked text, linking us to pertinent or "associated content." We are never sidetracked by irrelevant data or information. We are simply carrying out the imaginative act on the screen as well as in our minds. Can this lead to distraction from "the task at hand"? Certainly. But our tendency to do this kind of mental wandering anyway is so much a part of us that I don't think any program which encourages focus on a single thought or idea is going to prevent us from moving around the web or around our own minds.
I'm not a big fan of multi-tasking--I struggle to complete tasks if I don't focus on them one at a time. Like Ron Swanson, I prefer to "full-ass" one thing rather than half-ass a bunch of things. Unless it's simultaneously cleaning the dishes and cooking a meal, I find that, say, writing multiple things at once is overwhelming and usually unsuccessful. I need to do one thing at a time--which seems to be segmented mono-/solotasking, not multitasking. As a result, I'm often searching for tools that combine the various things I'm doing into one so I can move between tasks without having my attention break and become as segmented--some of these tools exist and are constantly improving, with the modern smart phone and laptop/tablets being the best examples of something that allows me to put many things into one--the modern notification systems on smart phones are sort of incredible in how they organize information for us. I think even social media has adapted a bit and allowed for the sorts of stories or blogs that Storify created: Twitter allows you to make a timeline for certain tweets, like Teju Cole did with "A Piece of the Wall": https://twitter.com/tejucole/timelines/444262126954110977?lang=en (of course, as I realized this morning, this timeline is actually incomplete--it cuts off some tweets at the end [not only that, but the cutting seems to be a mistake with the page's loading, because it happens differently almost every time I refresh]). Similarly, Facebook allows you to curate your news feed to show what you want it to show--I believe it even does this curating by itself, too, by prioritizing posts from people/groups you regularly look at/interact with. In terms of helping us multitask, these things and Storify seem to help us "scan" and pick out the most "salient details." Aren't these things that we teach students to with critical reading and note-taking? And aren't these things that a good lecture (PowerPoint or not) guides the students to do?
ReplyDeleteThanks for your post, Janelle! I think that the issues of multitasking and distractions are a bit conflated here, as I don't really see turning to social media, etc. as a form of "multitasking." Rorabaugh's and Stommel's point that Storify offers a single window rather than a mess of windows might serve to eliminate distractions (for me, at least), but I think that the kind of flipping between windows in the Twitter conversation that they point to can actually lead to productive multitasking, even if the "main point" is lost as they flip through many windows. So, I think it depends on how we characterize each distraction--does it have the potential to be ultimately illuminating for your project / task? That said, there's probably a good point to call enough enough, and for that reason sites like Storify might be helpful. Personally, I like to flip between lots of sources and sites as I work on a single project, but it isn't productive for me to try to accomplish two or more projects / tasks at the same time.
ReplyDeleteGreat post! I find my self drawn to the "task" part of multi-tasking. A task would imply that this is some kind of activity that one needs to accomplish. Yet, in the world of social media what do we consider a task? I understand the point the authors are making about finding the most salient details but what we are talking about in the parsing of information to what is most pertinent to the user. If your task is to write a blog post on the most recent White House fuck up, sure I see why efficiently moving through and evaluating sources could be a necessary process. I think something like Storify likely fails because it puts too much emphasis on the need to have our information parsed. Innovators attempted to do this with the RSS feed regarding news stories but the same thing can be accomplished in the realm of social media by subscribing to someone's Twitter or Instagram feed that is salient information or entertainment for the user. Society bemoans the notion that our digital footprint is dictating the kind of advertisement and information we are exposed to through complex algorithms. I wonder how the authors of the Storify piece would feel about this. We don't need a website to have pertinent information pushed at us, the sites we interact with are doing it for us. Did Storify give us a greater autonomy over what we were fed? Maybe. But was it really worth our time to curate such information or even set up an account, when there are a myriad of other things we could be up to... (semi-colon, close parenthesis)
ReplyDeleteHmm.. this is an interesting question! Multitasking has become somethng that we do to get through every single day! Everytime we turn on our computers, we multitask! We have facebook in the background while listening to music AND writing our essays!
ReplyDeleteWithout multitasking how are we going to meet the requirements of the 21st century? In a world that has progressed much faster than humanly possible, is there any other way to keep up with the pace other than multitasking?
Bringing this back to education, schools these days are requiring students to multi task and work between having extra currculars and getting A's in all classes. Isn't that another form of multitasking ?
As much as we would like to say that multitasking is bad, it ;lloks like it is whatwe have to do to get through!
I don’t think multitasking is actually possible, we’re just giving small amounts of time to little things, moving our focus back and forth. It’s also important to parce out the most useful parts of a source to use it effectively. I think some sort of program like sotrify is helpful for teaching good research skills. When you read an article from a journal to use for an argumentative essay, you only pick and choose quotes that pertain to that argument, or create an interesting counterpoint, of course not changing the context of the writer’s argument, but in some sort of conversation with yours. It seems like a great way for students to learn how to narrow down the use of supporting sources in their research, rather than getting bogged down in having to constantly flip through sources again and again to find what they’re looking for.
ReplyDeleteGreat post! I can very much relate to working while listening to a "focus!" playlist - I will often stop to add some new songs, too.
ReplyDeleteTo answer your question about the use of this kind of site in classrooms: Obviously Storify is gone, but as Alex mentioned, there are alternatives. I am intrigued by the description of one of the (now unavailable) projects in the article. One of Jesses's Storify projects focused on the question, "What is the pedagogical benefit of having students doing public work?"
I am very much interested in this question. It seems to have come up a few times in this class. I think there is great potential for students to feel that their work is meaningful when it is public. It no longer exists only in the classroom, between student and teacher - the stakes are higher! They are also genuinely contributing to the vast collection of knowledge and content online. I've never used one of these curatorial sites, so I can only imagine exactly how we could use them, but maybe if you had a semester or year-long project that included tweets or facebook quotes, students could be assigned to compile them into a linear story, each making their own choices about which posts are most important and when to make their own interjections. Alternatively, they could create one of these "stories" around a research topic they're working on.