An additional new tech creative writing tool, to complement your Tweetories or student-created joined-up writing on Twitter, emerged last month on Facebook and I've been enjoying writing with friends, creating some weird stories. The "Just Three Words" application invites you and your friends to create whole stories, but each person can only contribute three words at any one time.
Just to give a flavour, here's one rated a 'ribtickler' by Facebookers in which I have had a dubious hand:
...supercharged bowel gurgled ominously and he was forced to ask Sarah for an alka-seltzer. Sarah knew the mistake was her's not to give, but to command! " My Lord, you must ratify Kyoto II (This Time without Fart-Clause-33b-A67) for the alka-seltzer to be established as a cure-all". Methane gas and undiluted CO2 emissions, plus excessive sulphate leaked from under Lord Underpant's kilt scorching the purple tarmac. The crowd could barely contain their chicken vindaloos, some didn't, the stench mingling with the foetid air, forming a cocktail of nausea inducing gas, which brought more chicken korma...
How would you continue it?
Both Twittories and the Just Three Words application could be used 'offline' in any language classroom. I wonder how many, though, would prefer to use their mobile or social network than a postit note in the 21st century classroom?
Not a bad bit of fun but I far prefer the old pub game of telling a story round the table and each person has to come up with a sentence with a well-known song title in it: "I woke up beside the lady in red as her husband came into the room", "I got out of there like a bat out of hell." This can get quite creative and end up with things like "He told me to leave and I said where? The streets have no name..."
Posted by: Craig McGill | December 16, 2007 at 12:03 AM
Thanks for the mention! And I agree - JTW would be great in a classroom environment. We're planning on getting a version of it into classrooms somehow in 2008.
Posted by: Jason Rubenstein | December 28, 2007 at 12:05 AM
Yes ... thanks much for the "plug" - we really appreciate it.
The application as it stands has been (and continues to be) developed specifically for the Facebook platform where certain constraints and social parameters requires us to present the application as a "game". However, we have some grand plans to build variants of the "game" for two markets; collaborative writing for authors and the education sector. In both these environments, various aspects of the application will be changed to provide much tighter control over the story building whilst retaining much of the fun that has made the application so successful today.
Anyway, thanks again for the mention and be sure to keep working with us to make the application a success - both in Facebook and beyond.
Posted by: Paul Thiel | December 29, 2007 at 12:39 AM