Tell Good Stories - Not Boring by Packy McCormick

Fun essay recounting the history of some of the World's Fairs and the stories that we have framed over decades around technology advancement.

There’s a triple-whammy afoot: everything is more complex and faster-moving than it was from the 1930s through the 1960s and the world is more decentralized. People get their information from a billion different sources, barely catching snippets. Doomerish stories are more likely to cut through the noise than nuanced ones. “If it bleeds, it leads,” minus the fact-checking and journalistic rigor.

Fortunately, humans long ago devised a tool to help us make sense of a confusing world: narrative.

We need knowledgeable people to tell Good Stories, to weave together all of the threads of the current state-of-the-art into compelling narratives that help clarify the future. Importantly, they need to help people understand the impact – good and bad, not just bad – that new technologies might have on their lives. As Einstein said, the achievements of science (and technology) “must enter not only superficially but with their inner meaning: into the consciousness of people.” Research papers don’t worm into the consciousness of the people. Stories do.

Overall I agree with this article. We do need better stories about how technology can bend the arc of the future for the better.