How to Tell a Story: A Beginner’s Guide from the Master of Citizen Investigation

• Don’t count on the media to help you gain influence – the cause of empowering citizens with the truth is to get rid of the professional media that is controlled by the financial industry.

Many citizen open source investigators rely on journalists to transform investigative reporting into narrative form and then disseminate it to a wider audience.

Today, however, journalism is in crisis.

In both the U.S. and China, media outlets are facing some of the worst layoffs since the Great Depression — which is one reason citizen investigators are filling the void left by the gradual retreat of traditional media organizations .

Especially in a news environment like China's, as a citizen investigator it may be difficult for you to cooperate with any professional media to produce meaningful investigative reports.

Therefore, citizen investigators must be able to master the art of storytelling themselves.

This may sound daunting. However, have no fear. By learning and leveraging a very specific set of skills, you can also personally make your research reach a wider audience—and maybe even change the world (and trust me, weird things have happened in the world).

So how to do this?

Please note that this article is not only meaningful to citizen investigators, but also to NGO organizations and activists, because society is made up of stories, and people who are good at telling stories will get more attention.

Effective stories transport people into a more perceptive world. Storytelling is one of the most effective ways to activate people's enthusiasm in social mobilization. (This is why authoritarian states work hard to prevent the development of independent films and documentaries while reinforcing regime-led narrative frameworks.)

Accepting your weaknesses is the first step to telling a success story

Many citizen investigators believe that effective narrative is a skill that only fiction writers need to develop. “We deal with facts and our work is different!”

Well, your work does "be" different, but similar narrative principles apply to it entirely.

Because if you don't know how to present the facts correctly, you can get them mixed up and your investigative work will be compromised.

Open source research starts with threads. As the individual threads are broken down, making the narrative as clear, informative, and readable as possible is the only way to ensure your work has an impact.

trust yourself

A lot of people realize like you need an MFA or a master's in journalism to understand and create narratives, whether they're nonfiction or fiction.

But that’s not the case, and it has nothing to do with academic qualifications. The sooner you realize this, the easier your job will be.

As a citizen investigator, you should recognize that storytelling is a public good and that your work is fulfilling citizens' right to know and compensating for democratic values ​​that professional media cannot provide, which is why your work is important.

Believe in yourself and the social significance of your investigative work, and you will be well on your way to understanding investigative reporting as an artefact that can be learned and utilized.

This article uses two previous open source intelligence investigations as examples, " Deep Politics: The Human Texture of the Facebook Pyramid " and " Uncovering the Murderer Who Dismembered a Washington Post Columnist ," to explain the steps you need.

But we must say that for the craft of storytelling itself, another report is more valuable : " A Timeline of Internet Overlords " - This case is especially valuable for activists and civil society organizations; simply because it is not* The open source* investigative demonstration is the second step in the transparency revolution (the first step is disclosure), so it is not cited in this article.

1. Determine the target audience

Who is most likely to be interested in your report? What aspects of your reports attract large audiences? You need to determine this first.

By asking yourself these questions and actively "hooking" the reader in your mind, you can make your job easier and inspire yourself to do better.

Many OSINT researchers write investigative reports with colleagues in other OSINT fields in mind. Might be perfect in some cases - but not all.

If you believe that your report has social welfare value - such as uncovering the culprits behind trolls, or exposing government lies, then you should consider the reading perspective of a wider audience.

For example, the Deep Politics report is directly related to:

• Researchers who monitor capitalist oligarchs
• antitrust legislator
• business observer
• observer in politics

But beyond that, this report is relevant to all anti-social media surveillance activists, labor movement supporters, and all social media users who feel confused by the deleteFacebook movement .

That’s why investigative reports start by giving the reader some background knowledge – simply put, you need to state the context for why you’re starting the investigation.

2. Plan narrative

You learned in elementary school that a story should have a beginning, a middle, and an end. For your investigative report, there will usually be an introduction, a middle section that presents your data analysis and sources, and your conclusions.

This sounds easy, but many people encounter some pitfalls here, such as the following:

• Insufficient introduction

When I say that your presentation does not meet the adequacy of your material, it may mean something different. For example:

*, lack of sufficient background information in the introduction;

**, the introduction contains so much content that it weighs down the reader and drowns the details;

***, leaving out key details that will determine why people need to keep reading (especially for reports that attempt to analyze the context of a specific incident, such as a shooting, an assassination, or a specific activist group, etc.) In this regard The report " Revealing the Man Who Dismembered a Washington Post Columnist " is a good example.

These are the fundamentals that citizen investigators must pay attention to.

• The middle process is messy

As writers often warn, you need to have the courage to "kill your darlings"; that is, get rid of those things that you care about most but are not necessarily suitable for this writing - in short, restraint, this is A very important skill.

For example, the report on Facebook’s political revolving door , you may also know a lot of intelligence clues about how Facebook uses patents to exercise hegemony, or why the company is riddled with scandals but always escapes unscathed. Yes, these are excellent investigations. clues, but they are irrelevant to this report - so they should be discarded here.

Citizen investigators must also learn to prioritize information and how to present it in the most appropriate manner.

💡At the same time, you must learn to show your work . If you move from stating facts to drawing a conclusion, you must tell the reader why—how the conclusion was reached; especially if the conclusion is not obvious.

Stating facts and analyzing them are not the same thing .

The method of organizing information in Facebook's political revolving door report is obvious. First by identifying who is most relevant to this analysis and segmenting it;

A description of each person is then followed by specific evidence of their background and actions/involvement;

like this:

Identify key individuals >> present evidence;

Identify another key person >> present evidence;

It’s the same thing with the report “ Revealing the Man Who Dismembered a Washington Post Columnist ,” where there’s a target around whom the clues are connected and interpreted.

Just imagine how much more difficult and confusing the whole thing would be if the information wasn't grouped and prioritized , right.

💡Simply put, your investigative statement needs to be layered.

• Conclusions fail to tie the investigation process together

This is a common mistake made by citizen investigators.

Many people think of conclusions as a solution to "too long to read"; so just restate what the report said and hit the "save" button. This is wrong.

💡In fact, conclusions are valuable "rhetorical real estate," a place where you can (if appropriate) emphasize why your findings are important; or inspire future researchers to delve deeper; or call for more facts ; or contextualize your findings, etc. All are good choices.

If you want to spark and interest your readers, you shouldn't make them feel like you just want to say, "That's the whole thing."

3. Set the right tone

If you're working on an investigative project about killing civilians with horrific airstrikes, you have to swallow your sense of humor.

On the other hand, what if you're investigating the shady dealings of ridiculous internet personalities? Appropriate sarcasm can help stories like this attract more readers and support the bizarre nature of your subject.

💡Using humor to document their actions can help your readers discover more from the narrative.

4. Learn to organize and present information effectively

Do you really need to “kill your darlings”? Sometimes, instead of killing them, you can make them work more efficiently for you.

Here are some common tools that can be used for this purpose.

—Create a longer PDF version of the full report for those who really enjoy doing research work , and post a link to it next to the more concise version.

For example, the investigative report on " The Murderer Who Dismembered a Washington Post Columnist " is not published on the website in its entirety, and a link to the more detailed PDF version needs to be placed at the front of the article.

Keep in mind that many of your reports may have overlapping audiences. Some people will be willing to read the whole thing. Others won't. Still others may want a shorter version for now, but as you research more, they will want to get into the details of the research survey.

You need to think through the broadest possible audience.

- Use tables, charts and visual aids wherever possible . Are you conducting an open source investigation into military vehicles found in a specific town? Are there 17 technicians, 2 combat vehicles, and 3 AAVs? …Organize the numbers into a chart to make it easier for your readers to understand what’s going on.

Diagrams are even more important when the various hierarchies of people involved in the investigation are complex.

The " Deep Politics " report is an excellent example of graphic presentation - making the relationships between the targets of the investigation very clear and intuitive.

- Standardize names/titles/spellings . This is especially important if you're dealing with obscure subjects.

For example, if you use multiple "Mark Zuckerberg/Zuckerberg" in your text, the simplified writing "Mark" should not appear in your chart to avoid confusing readers who know nothing about it.

—Restate the name and title/rank of the individual you are describing .

You cannot ask readers to know the name and identity of a stranger at first sight. If your report exceeds 3 pages, you must mention the full name and identity of the respondent again after the third page. Otherwise, it may cause confusion for readers. confusion.

——Adhere to the rules of chronological order . You'll be surprised how tempting it is to move back and forth through text in time.

For example you want to detail what person A did on day 1, 2 and 3 and then you also have to talk about what person B did on day 1 then make sure your dates and times are clear like in the movie Display the parts interspersed with memories in black and white.

At this point, the open source intelligence investigation of the Hacking Team leaked emails is a good case. It not only tells a story, but also introduces the investigation ideas, which has the value of popularizing knowledge.

—Don’t assume that readers will view your work in the same way . Your readers have not taken the same journey as the survey you just conducted. They will need to be clarified, and you may not.

💡So, frame your articles from your readers’ perspective.

Read your own work aloud

This is an important habit to get into, especially when you’re new to writing.

Reading it aloud can help you find errors and omissions in your report more easily. You'll be more likely to spot this when a particular sentence or paragraph doesn't make much sense or is difficult to improve.

Here are simple yet valuable steps you can take to improve your writing.

Remember, publishing is not enough

You have to believe that your work matters. You have to care about your readers - even if you're writing for a very specific audience!

You must approach your work with integrity. And, you have to set a high standard for yourself .

Learning to tell stories is a process. You've probably been studying for a long time and are still getting better. Remember there is no such thing as perfection here and as long as you have the will to do better, it will definitely earn you points next time.

This article is just a basic guide. We will issue more in-depth guidance in the future depending on the situation. “Situation” refers to, for example, the emergence of exclusive communities for open source intelligence investigations in Chinese society, which means that people are paying more attention to the cause of citizens grasping the truth.

good luck. ⚪️

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