Narratively is a website devoted to human interest journalism, organized around weekly themes ranging from ghosts to farming to war. In today's nonstop news cycle, Narratively slows down the process, producing just five original pieces a week – one for each weekday. Narratively takes advantage of the internet publishing medium by producing in-depth stories, not limited by the physical constraints of the printed page. Much of the coverage is related to New York; however, more recent publications have included international perspectives and voices. Publications consist of video essays, audio stories, as well as long form written pieces. The written essays are often supplemented with photographs, graphics, illustrations, or cartoons.
Narratively's homepage is professional, user-friendly, and aesthetically appealing. A navigation bar spans the top of the page, providing links to the site's various collections, including a series of short pieces contributed by the site's readers. The week's five publications are represented by large tile graphics, which offer a brief text summary of the article's content underneath. The previous weeks' themes and most popular pieces appear below the fold. The presence of advertisements on the site is limited and unobtrusive; a single, small advertisement appears at the top of some articles, but is separated from the text by ample white space.
By design, Narratively's coverage is not comprehensive, yet it offers stories that may not be told anywhere else. The contributors to the site come from a variety of backgrounds, including writing, photography, filmmaking, and illustration. Contributors' credentials are succinctly provided at the end of their respective pieces. Many of the contributors have worked for top news outlets, including Noah Rosenberg, the site's founder, publisher, and editor-in-chief, who is a former New York Times freelancer. The guidelines for publication are unclear – Narratively provides no editorial or submission policy. Though the in-depth narratives on the site show an obvious effort and a passion for storytelling, Narratively takes no responsibility for the accuracy of the content it publishes and there are occasional typographical and spelling errors in the essays. There is also limited ability for engagement with the site. Unlike most other news sites, Narratively does not permit comments on any of its articles. Instead, a single comment form is provided for the website as a whole.
Narratively will likely appeal most to individuals involved in journalism, photojournalism, or filmmaking programs, either as an instructive example of human interest news coverage, or as a possible publishing venue. There are several options for browsing the site's content, including viewing the most popular stories, or just the audio or video portions. However, there is no search option available on the site. Instead, users can only see an archive of all previously published pieces, in reverse date order. Without the ability to search or filter by title or author, the user must browse the entire listing of past articles unless a specific publication date is known. Users may sign up for a weekly e-mail newsletter to keep informed about the site's current articles, but this is of little use for those users interested in the site's past publications. While Narratively succeeds in publishing local interest pieces with wide appeal, its utility as a research and reference tool is limited, especially as the content authors lack scholarly credentials.
