White Space - Designing and Narrating the Story - by David Paul Mavia

Brief notes from a day with Jesse Soliel

Three weeks ago I (along with some very creative brains in Nairobi) met Jesse Soliel Founder of Multiverse
and former ‘Chief Involved’ with Scholastic an organization that was instrumental in the production of
Harry Porter US. Jesse from a young age was destined to be a person who would be a participator in
the big media space of kids. By fourth grade he was already on television and was already exposed
to film world (the creation side). He attended a school that was amongst the first in America to use
computers. Jesse delved into Logic and Philosophy in university with special interest in Artificial Intel-
ligence. Take all these background experiences and throw in Computer Gaming for Kids and you have
Jesse at 42 still watching cartoons and ‘growing’.

Intervention Products – these are supplemental materials
that are supplied outside of regular education text books. Jesse
is a big believer in education as fun and therefore games can
play a vital role in education. Children are often subjected to
the cruelty of exam answering and qualification. A smart child
is one considered to have passed exams. Most of them fail due
to the stringent legalistic echo that is attached to exam pass-
ing and cleverness. Intervention products have the capacity of
making learning informal and fun (check Read About a Scho-
lastic education online program - http://teacher.scholastic.com/
products/readabout/) it literary can work without teachers. In
order to exploit the learning curves of children then they need
to be gotten early.
Interface Linking – this is the method or philosophy behind
continuity. To the kids continuity is King. You have to have two
things in mind.
1. The Story – what is the story? The story is ‘the main rea-
son to get involved’. Without a story the child will not get in-
volved.
2. Interface linking – which is what connects the online ex-
perience to the offline experience. It can be done by something
as simple as trading cards, to create an engagement ecosys-
tem.
Narrative Modes – these are expressions which act as the
vehicle of both the story and interface linking. They produce
different Narrative Perspectives because the story is told in dif-
ferent modes – that is it could be the book, the web, the game
(play) or watching (TV, Film). It is these modes and perspec-
tives that determine from a business perspective which Busi-
ness Model to use, what forms or platforms of distribution and
what expected disruptions are likely to be anticipated.
White Space – when doing graphic and design or reading or
laying out a book, what enable an individual to concentrate on
the content in the book is the white space at the margins. In
business terms white space has become a method of focusing
and identifying forms business that can spin off from the core
business or that are linked but a far off from the core busi-
ness.
prepared by The Kairos - 2010
Some people call it white space mapping. It is a where a mech-
anism is designed to exploit external unserved markets. It can
also be a tool that can help look at the core business landscape
with new lenses. If we view the childrens’ learning world from
a business perspective, creative disruption can come from
observing and locating these white spaces. In fact in children
story telling ‘the narrative must be designed as much as it
must be narrated’.
The story begins from the book, moves to the web then to play
(games), then to watching – television or film. Each medium
should be exploited and each has its capacity to drive elements
of the story. If any of the mediums are highlighting a part of
the story and affecting its interest at web or game level may
be through a character or phenomenon in the story, then the
narration is adjusted at story level by designing it in the story
body in the next edition of the book - ‘the narrative must be
designed as much as it must be narrated’. What is told in the
story should be like an ice berg. Ten percent is narrated and
ninety percent should be discovered by the kids through inter-
action and engagement. That is what makes them involved. In
many cases a book starts the story because parent need to be
involved. They (parents) are traditional text people and trust
the ‘purity’ of the written word. But beyond that they are also
the ones that are paying for different experiences of the web,
games and watching for their children. They are the vital finan-
cial decision makers in the process. To get them to be involved,
a book will most likely be a sure way.

David Paul Mavia is a creative socio-cultural critic based in Nairobi Kenya. He runs The Kairos- a socio-cultural
creative media consultancy, and a public intellectual content creation Lab. He is currently learning how to be
a public commentator by writing essays and also at the seminal stage of becoming the resident curator of his
two unannounced websites - feel free to contact him on culturekiosk@gmail.com