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Meet the human behind Humans of New York

Dubai - Brandon Stanton, the photographer and writer behind Humans of New York (HONY), has become an Internet sensation

If you're ever approached on the streets by a six-feet-tall white man with a New York accent who randomly asks you "Do you mind if I take your photo?", know that you are about to become a story on the popular blog - 'Humans of New York'.

With his charisma and story-telling skills, Brandon Stanton, the photographer and writer behind Humans of New York (HONY), has become an Internet sensation, attracting 10,000 strangers in New York over the past six years to ?share their life's deepest secrets and struggles.

With over 22.5 million followers on Facebook and Instagram, what had started as randomly stopping people for a photograph in the city has become a journey for Stanton to document people's stories from around the world.

He has interviewed everyone from refugees to cancer patients to the US president, using a photograph and a short quote he extracts from his 30 or 45-minute interviews with them.

"A lot of people reject, but that's part of it. And it's hard to walk up to people and get rejected but I have done it often enough to become good at making them feel comfortable in telling their stories," he told Khaleej Times during his visit to Dubai to speak at the recently-concluded Knowledge Summit.

The key of a successful storyteller, he pointed out, is showing people your curiosity and interest in them.

"During an interview, I'm not thinking about myself or the next question I will ask, I am listening directly to what that person is saying. You have to be genuinely interested."

But Stanton never planned to ?become one of today's most influential storytellers. After losing his job as a bond trader in Chicago in 2010, his goal was to sell pictures to make enough money to support himself. "I was thinking of becoming an artist who takes and sells pictures. So I stopped random people on the streets everyday, making hundreds of small evolutions into what eventually became HONY. I started adding little quotes and the quotes became interviews, until it grew organically."

(clockwise from above) one of Brandon stanton's images from Pakistan; and photos from his 'microfashion' series showing interestingly dressed children around the world.

The book

From a photography blog, Stanton's first book Humans of New York, released in 2013, catapulted to the top of The New York Times bestseller list where it stayed for 45 weeks. His new book, HONY: Stories, which released in October 2015, was number one on the NYT's bestseller list within two weeks.

What helped in his growth, he said, is choosing to look outward when everyone was using technology to tell their own stories.

"I used social media to document stories of people other than myself on a platform where everyone was photographing their food and concerts. And the more I rem-oved myself from the story, the faster it has grown."

He urged social media users to quit telling their own stories and develop curiosity and ask questions about others.

"If there is one good thing among all the negative things that social media has given us, it's the power to tell stories. And the beautiful part is there are fascinating stories everywhere; you just have to go find them. So pick something you're curious about and start asking questions, then have faith in your ability to unravel it until you learn how to do it well, and the audiences will come," said Stanton.

sherouk@khaleejtimes.com

The craft of ?storytelling

While the saying goes that a picture is worth a thousand words, Brandon Stanton said the story is far more important than the photograph.

"I could take a bad, out-of-focus picture, but if the accompanying story is compelling, it will be shared over 100,000 times. If the photo was perfect, but the story isn't good or complex - it will fail."

But how did the journey of telling stories of citizens all around the world impact him? With everything that happens in his life, Brandon said, there always seems to be a HONY story that reminds him of it.

"Sometimes, I hear stories that might not have spoken to me at the time, but then, years later I experience it and stories come back to me in that context," he said, contributing to the idea that regardless of our differences, people experience similar things in life. Can we expect Dubai experiences to be documented soon? Probably yes! "I'm planning to travel a lot in the coming year so I'll definitely do one in Dubai."

Failing ideals of social media

During his stay in Dubai, Brandon Stanton expressed concerns that social media was failing to live up to his earlier utopian ideals.

"I grew up when Facebook was just getting big and I thought it was going to connect us and that our empathy would finally spread through these wires and bring everyone close together.

"It's been sad that this dream I had is now in question. As opposed to helping us break barriers, social media has been used to spread the worst of ourselves. Ten years from now, I don't think morality will keep pace. The revolution in consciousness won't keep pace with the revolution in technology."

According to him, social media should be used to overcome that fear of the other and push back the tribalism tide, and that's why his blog succeeded.

"Tribalism is entrenched within us far more than I thought. We have a fear of strangers and people who look different, and it's very hard, for even the most enlightened of us, to unwind it."

HONY, however, has helped audiences feed off their curiosity about "the other."

"Everyone has curiosity about people around them. I think what many people get out of HONY is learning about people around them without having to go through the discomfort of approaching them."

He referred to his trip to Pakistan - his favourite country so far - where people thanked him for showing a positive ?image of the country. "HONY makes the biggest difference in places which get the most negative media narratives. The media mostly targets Pakistan's radicalism or terrorism... my random stories in contrast to that seems positive," he said.