Buy the Guardian today if only for a complete list of Robert Thirkell’s list of the Hundred Rules of Television. Included in the excellent Sheffield Doc/Fest ‘The Truth is out there’ free magazine this is s terrific list, part storytelling, part business and part life, which of course is just what good television aspires to be.
[Just discovered that they are already all published on his excellent website ]
My particular favourites of the hundred rules are:
5. NEVER SUBJECTS, ALWAYS STORIES.
6. GOOD STORIES OFTEN FOLLOW PEOPLE UNDER PRESSURE THROUGH TRANSFORMATION, IDEALLY TO REDEMPTION.
The next one I find particularly intriguing in the way that it encompasses complexity theory (ie small interactions delivering much greater than the sum of their parts) and hints at the essence of SenseMaker (with its sensemaking narrative patterns lighting up the bigger picture).
39. NARRATIVE IS SMALL QUESTIONS AND SMALL ANSWERS WHICH ALL CONTRIBUTE TO THE BIG QUESTION AND BIG ANSWER.
64. FIND SOMETHING NO_ONE ELSE IS DOING, AND DIFFERENTIATE IT.
73. APPEAR CONFUSED WHILE BEING ORDERED AND IN CONTROL.
All in all a brilliant list from a brilliant mind and definitely one to add to my kindle file of ‘Lessons for life’.
Ecology of Knowledge 