One Story at a Time: Humans of New York

By Lisa JoDean Crawford
In 2010, Brandon Stanton started a photography project with the goal of capturing 10,000 portraits of random individuals in the largest city in the United States: New York.

Brandon Stanton

His project began with a single photograph of two children and their mothers on a subway in New York City. He posted the image online, and it received just one comment and zero likes. But Stanton didn’t let that deter him from reaching his goal.

Eight years later, his Humans of New York project has approximately 20 million social media followers, two New York Times bestselling books (Humans of New York and Humans of New York: Stories), and a worldwide presence.

“I’ve lived here my whole life. I’m ready to leave. I just graduated college and I’d love to experience a new city. But I’m stuck. My dad is trying to become a citizen, and I need to stay in the city because I’m the one petitioning on his behalf. We’ve been waiting for..." pic.twitter.com/XIpbrDEDGk

— Brandon Stanton (@humansofny) August 14, 2018

Stanton’s humble blog grew, thanks in part to the sharing power of social media. He has now traveled to and photographed people in more than 20 countries, often bringing awareness to victims of unfortunate circumstance or wrong-doing, or to good deeds and random acts of kindness. 

His most current images out of Africa feature Lagos and Rwanda, and included sharing the story of Nyanja Brodin, the founder of the Little Hills nonprofit organization. As an example of the impact Stanton’s project can have, after sharing Brodin’s story, the nonprofit created a GoFundMe account, (which Stanton shared with the posts on his social media) that has already raised more than $50,000 in just seven days, with many donors simply writing “HONY” as a note with their donation.

She’s created a small fundraiser, which I’ve kicked off with a $5,000 donation from the HONY Patreon.  If you’d like to empower Nyanja in the next phase of her life, and help improve healthcare for children in Rwanda, you may do so here: https://t.co/rB0SINu2EA

— Brandon Stanton (@humansofny) October 23, 2018

Stanton’s project “evolved into a storytelling blog of photos with captions and quotes from hour-long in-depth interviews of ‘intimate confessions’ and never-before-told personal stories of everyday people,” reported Deseret News.

The article quoted Stanton as stating, “Notice that the idea that I risked everything for, the idea I committed myself 100 percent to, looks nothing like the idea that later became successful. If you want to do something big, if you want to make a big change in your life, you cannot wait for the perfect idea because that will never come.”

This was similar to the advice he gives journalists and entrepreneurs every day. Refinement is key, and "each story is a call to action." Stanton's work has redefined digital storytelling, but it took time to evolve, and that evolution was driven and evaluated by data, by looking at the number of likes, shares, followers, etc., and learning how to balance what they wanted with what he wanted to share. His best advice? "Experiment more."

Stanton’s project is a shining example of how – with the right subject matter and personal drive – you can leverage technology, social media and human goodwill to not only successfully move from blogging to a published book, but to also make an impact in the world.