Good performance vs good story

From September 6 memos:

But Joyce kind of wanted those polished stories that you hear on The Moth. She even described them as “transcending.” She talked about how having a true open mic, that’s not always what you get:

We just said

the hat's there.

People will just show up and they'll tell stories

and they'll be amazing [laughs]

like they do in The Moth.

We realized

that was a little

naive because

people do show up

and they do put their names in the hat

and they do tell great stories.

It takes a little bit of time and effort before those stories

transcend and become the thing that you associate The Moth with.

She said, though, that there are people who tell a really good story (and do a good job of performing?) without preparation, and indicates that these performances are better for not being overly polished:

What has been surprising about it?

It happens

a good bit

where people will show up and do an amazing job.

The polished version pales in comparison.

A performance can be really good. But when a story is really good, polished performance can get in the way.