Menlo MediaScape

• The Project

The Project:

In Spring 2007, initial planning and production began on "Menlo MediaScape," a multi-media project that tells stories from the history of the Menlo College. There are two outlets for these stories:

One venue uses a mobile GPS hand-held device or Windows Mobile-based "smart phone" to tell the stories as you walk around the campus. The stories are triggered when you walk into the zone of a particular GPS coordinate -- say, as you pass by the student union.

The second venue is web-based. Clicking markers on the campus map brings up the story. The first phase of this web portion of the project is available now as a work in progress.

An analysis of the project -- including discussion of why the GPS portion did not work as smoothly as desired -- can be found in the "Creating Menlo MediaScape" page.

The Development Team:

The initial project team included students drawn from MCM 130: New Communication Technologies,
MCM 128: Advanced Video Production, and MCM 199: Independent Directed Research

Menlo MediaScape is based on expanded notions of digital storytelling that focus on neighborhoods and locations in which the stories occur.

(What is digital storytelling?  See the section describing digital storytelling, view Menlo College student projects, and explore other digital storytelling sites.)

Digital storytelling involves everyday people telling their stories of significance -- transcendence, transformation -- using basic media tools.

Basing these stories in specific geographic locations goes by a variety of terms:
"media scaping"
“story mapping”
“place-based storytelling”
“situated storytelling”
"location-based storytelling"

Resources:

Center for Digital Storytelling, Berkeley

Center for what has become known as "digital storytelling"

StoryMapping

A project of the Center for Digital Storytelling focusing on
neighborhood-based, geographically located stories.
Note "projects" and "resources

 

Mobile Bristol

Project involving University of Bristol (UK) and Hewlett-Packard that developed GPS-based software for “situated storytelling” on hand-held device (HP iPaq), 2002-2005

KQED TV's  Digital Storytelling Initiative

Pulling together the digital storytelling community in San Francisco;  neighborhood location for "Scape the Hood" -- using HP's Ipaq pocket PC and GPS to create an audio walking tour of the Mission neighborhood near KQED in San Francisco.
(HP Labs report on "Scape the Hood")

Creating Menlo MediaScape
photos, video, description and analysis -- including why the GPS portion did not work in this phase