Creating Lin-sane content

If you had submitted a script about the Jeremy Lin story before the last two weeks, I guarantee you that every publisher and movie company would tell you it could never happen. For those anthropologists in the future who are reading this to learn about early 21st century culture, I'll recap. Lin, a Harvard graduate, is the first Asian-American to play in the NBA. He languished at the end of the bench of a couple of teams before the New York Knicks picked him up in December, 2011 to sit on the end of their bench. Injuries to Knick guards forced the team to play Lin, and in his first eight starts he scored more points than any point guard in NBA history in their first 8 starts. The Knicks, who despite having two of the highest paid players on their team, won 7 of 8 games where Lin played, and now have a winning record for the season. Jeremy Lin is more than a basketball story -- he's been covered by the major news organizations, magazines, blogs and you tube. Mark Twain once said, "Truth is stranger than fiction because fiction is obligated to stick to possibilities; truth isn't." It's true that the stories we create need to establish a plausible reality for our readers. In addition to that, a successful story will connect with our readers or viewers. That's why the Jeremy Lin story is so popular. Who doesn't feel unjustly neglected at some time? Many times we feel that we're on the end of the bench at work, or in life. We believe that we can become stars like Lin, when we get the chance. Jeremy Lin's story resonates because it taps into this universal yearning for a chance to shine. Lin-sanity is also a positive story. Jeremy Lin is a nice young man, who gives his faith and his teammates credit for his success. Most people prefer a positive story to a negative story. We want to believe that hard work will be rewarded, that good behavior is rewarded, and happy endings are real. Even in a horror story, where the monster kills a lot of characters, our hero eventually kills the monster. If the stories you create end happily, you have a much better chance of their being popular. So to create Lin-sane content, follow these three principles: 1. Tap into your audience's deepest desires 2. Stay positive 3. Stay original -- tell us a story we haven't heard before.