nerdconstories - Tumblr blog

[nerdconstories]

Come join us on Twitter for a Q&A with Patrick Rothfuss later today!

[nerdconstories]

Check it! The entire NerdCon: Stories agenda is now online for your viewing pleasure. Panels, workshops, performances, discussions, and LOTS MORE will be happening.

View the agenda here!

[nerdconstories]

Pictured above: A small selection of the dozens of super rad guests attending NerdCon: Stories this year.

So. NerdCon: Stories is LESS THAN 3 MONTHS AWAY. Which is super exciting.

We are continuing to announce Featured Guests over on our twitter.

Some of the peeps we’ve added to our roster lately: 

John Darnielle (of the Mountain Goats)

Blue Delliquanti (super cool comic artist & illustrator)

Max Temkin (creator of games & countless other weird, fantastic projects)

Rachel Kann (writer and badass spoken word poet)

Phil Plait (Bad Astronomer science guy)

Cindy Pon (author, Diversity in YA champ, and artist)

You can see the full current lineup here!

PROGRAMMING & STUFF

We are hard at work putting together panels, workshops, and all that jazz. Here’s a little preview of the kinds of things you’ll be seeing at NerdCon: Stories 2016:

Panels, workshops, discussions & more

Signings with Featured Guests

Interactive storytelling art projects

Live podcasts (including Improvised Star Trek & Unattended Consequences)

Story Circle

Live Superfight

Lots of music (including Paul & Storm and Dessa)

An expo hall with vendors & activities

A board game zone

Opportunities for live attendee storytelling

A live performance by Rives

Featured Guest Kaffeeklatsches (Featured Guests will hang out with small groups of attendees and have a grand old time chatting about anything & everything)

NerdCon: Stories 2016 is happening October 14-15, 2016, and tickets are still available! Get them here!

[nerdconstories]

This year, for the first time, we are opening up NerdCon: Stories programming to YOU! 

If you’re attending NerdCon: Stories 2016 and want to host a panel, session, discussion, activity, workshop, presentation, or whatever else, send us a proposal of what you’d like to do!

The deadline to submit a proposal is August 7, so get those brains working & planning! We’re super excited to see what you have to bring to the table.

[nerdconstories]

Come work for us!

We are looking to hire a Communications Manager! Are you good at the internet? Do you have experience dealing with press & media? Apply!

This is a full time position located in Missoula, Montana.

[nerdconstories]

NERDCON: STORIES 2016 TICKETS ARE ON SALE NOW!

Join us in Minneapolis, MN on October 14 & 15, 2016.

From the moment we could speak, we’ve been telling each other stories. And since then, our stories have defined and created us. Every human society that wants to behave different first has to change the stories they tell. The story was — and remains — the key to the marvel of human progress. Stories in songs, in books, on the stage, around the campfire. Stories drove the evolution of human language and fostered the massive burst of creation that accompanied it. We celebrate our culture all the time, but we don’t do a great job of just praising the institution of the story.

Last year, with the help of 40 special guests, and a few thousand adventurous lovers of narrative, we created NerdCon: Stories, a two day conference of connection, content, instruction, and hilarity. The feel of the event was electric, the consensus was that it was maybe the best thing ever.

Now we would like to do it again, and even cooler. This time we’ll have a larger room for booths, activities, and signings. Two new ballrooms for panels and Q&As, and a bunch of small rooms for workshops and more intimate conversations. And to reflect the diversity of ways humans tell stories this year, we’ll have over 60 special guests including authors, actors, artists, narrators, podcasters, puppeteers, comedians, dancers, directors, screenwriters, game designers, radio hosts, musicians, comic writers, and cartoonists. All of these people will come together to discuss and celebrate the institution of the story. This simple human thing that creates us and defines us.

We are made of stories. Come celebrate them at NerdCon: Stories 2016.

[nerdconstories]

Episode 2 of our podcast is out!

Hearing Is Believing: Stories You Consume with Your Ears

Podcasts and radio have skyrocketed back to popularity recently, so let's check in on the current state of these formats. What are the benefits or strengths of audio-only format? In some ways, it's an old school art form, so how has the high-def, technology-driven world changed it? Where is this medium going next?

This episode, recorded at NerdCon: Stories 2015, features Mara Wilson, Ana Adlerstein, Ben Lillie, John Moe, David Nadelberg, and Kate Rudd.

Subscribe on iTunes

[nerdconstories]

Introducing... NerdCon: Stories - The Podcast!

Did you miss a panel at NerdCon: Stories that you really wish you could have seen? Or miss Stories all together? Never fear! We're releasing a large handful of the panels from NerdCon: Stories 2015 in audio podcast form.

We’ll be releasing one episode per week until we run out of panels!

Up first is a recording of the panel So You Wanna Change the World: Activism and Narrative, featuring Desiree Burch, Jackson Bird, Maria Davis, Rosianna Halse Rojas, and Mara Wilson.

Subscribe on: SoundCloud iTunes

[nerdconstories]

Live Superfight - NerdCon: Stories 2015

Darin Ross, creator of the excellent storytelling game Superfight, pits Sarah Mackey, Lev Grossman, M.T. Anderson, and Desiree Burch against each other as they battle to create the ultimate warrior. #guacanati

[nerdconstories]

Why Stories Matter - Dylan Marron

Dylan Marron presents the @everysinglewordspoken project, which documents every word spoken by a person of color in popular films.

[nerdconstories]

Do you put your footwear on sock-sock-shoe-shoe or sock-shoe-sock-shoe?

Team Awesome (Jackson Bird, Dessa Darling, Rainbow Rowell, John Scalzi) and Team Badass (Storm DiCostanzo, Kevin R. Free, Sarah Mackey, Mara Wilson) go head to head, mock debate style!

[nerdconstories]

Why Stories Matter - Ana Adlerstein 

Ana Adlerstein shares a story about a catcaller she encountered on the street and concludes, "Everybody has their reasons."

Listen to the full piece about Jerome and catcalling on Love + Radio

[nerdconstories]

Desiree Burch gives a talk on how stories influence and determine identity. More stories give us more options on who and how to be. Better stories can make us better people.

[nerdconstories]

Why Stories Matter - John Green

John Green explains why he is thankful for the power that stories have to release us from the prison of ourselves, to broaded our perspective, and to let us break out of our default viewpoints.

[nerdconstories]

Sarah Mackey (Director of Community Engagement at @nanowrimo) gives a talk on  the transformative experience of telling your story and how believing in your story gives you confidence elsewhere in your life. Your story matters.

[nerdconstories]

Storm of Paul & Storm leads you through a scientific exploration of why stories matter and presents a "Narrative Value Scale" ...using Candy Crush? And then he makes you cry, probably.

[nerdconstories]

The inimitable Paul of Paul & Storm guides you through The Complete 200,000 Year History of Human Stories in 6 minutes flat.