In May 2012 the American Red Cross sent hundreds of video cameras to people whose lives were impacted by services from the Red Cross. The Red Cross Stories website shows the results of this project. Each video trailer is original and created by individuals and families expressing how the Red Cross impacted them. The first videos are dated July 9, 2012, with the most recent videos from January 22, 2013. The website provides a prominent link to “Tell Your Story,” so it appears this project is ongoing.
The Red Cross Stories website is suggestive of the One Day in the Life book series in that it provides a medium for individuals throughout the United States to tell their story. However, instead of photographs encompassing a single day, the Red Cross website shows short, high‐quality videos of events over time. Another comparison is to the NPR StoryCorps programme (www.npr.org/series/4516989/storycorps). One major difference between these initiatives is that the Red Cross Stories website has limited depth and scope.
The website is visually appealing with an abundance of white space loaned primarily from a sparse use of text. At the top of the page is a two‐minute video explaining the project – which closes aptly with the following words, “This is the story of the American Red Cross”. After the video introduces the project, the 25 videos created by Americans across the country loop from one to the next, and below the full video, there are thumbnails of the twenty‐five video trailers. Each trailer is categorized and tagged: disaster relief, lifesaving blood, health and safety, international services, or support for military families. Additionally, each thumbnail identifies the creator of the video.
Each video is a unique personal interest story describing the event that affected the family or individuals and how the Red Cross was instrumental in helping them – uniquely, as each is only 32 seconds long. Each short video concludes with a message and request from the Red Cross. For example, a video from a family whose home was destroyed during a tornado ends with the message, “In the face of disaster, your donation gives help and hope”, and the subsequent scene includes text about donating to the Red Cross. Each story concludes by identifying the individuals who created the video.
Other than the videos and a box to Tell Your Story, there is a box providing a link to Make a Donation. Because this project is hosted on a webpage within the main redcross.org site, the header and footer are pulled from the main website.
With the recent interest in video ethnography, this website is a model of how to design a web presence which promotes personal narratives. The clean interface and easy to understand display should be a model for other organizations who want to share what they do without direct self‐promotion.
