I enjoy a story that depends on a contrarian bent.

If someone revealed that Steve Jobs prefers Bad Religion on vinyl or that Michael Arrington leads a Bible study group, I would read those stories.

So naturally, I gravitated to the piece “A hammer — yes, that low-tech tool — helps mold noses of Japan’s bullet trains” in The Washington Post.

Is there any image that screams high-tech more than the Japanese bullet train?

As The Post points out, “Decades of computer-aided engineering have gone into those curvaceous snouts.”

Which leads to the entertaining payoff:

It is a shock, then, to learn that they are banged out — one piece at a time — with a hammer you can buy at the Home Depot.

The banging happens here in Kudamatsu, a small factory town at the southern end of Japan’s main island. Eight craftsmen use hammers to bend and twist thin sheets of aluminum, which are then welded together to create the graceful swoops of metal that cover the front of a bullet train.

The next time I’m at Home Depot, I’m asking for one of those.

The narrative then takes us to Kiyoto Yamashita who, 56 years ago at the age of 17, started the only company in the world that hammers out bullet train noses.

Here, we encounter the first of several anecdotes.

How do you think Mr. Yamashita earned a living before train schnozes came calling?

Listen up, Hollywood. He worked for an auto body shop applying his magic on Hondas, Toyotas and the occassional Beemer to rid them of unsightly dents.

There’s also a prodigal-son-returns dimension to the story.

After being told he couldn’t cut it in the family business, Master Yamashita left Kudamatsu for Tokyo to attend business school and then took jobs in Australia and Europe.

But three years ago, the parents had a change of heart, asking him back to run the operation.

Since taking over, his greatest challenge has been dealing with an aging workforce, a genuine quandary given that it takes a good 10 years for a newcomer to be anointed “bullet train nose jedi.”

As Master Yamashita puts it:

“It is not easy to find people to do this work because most Japanese have never even heard of this skill.”

I suspect most Americans, Italians and Slavakians, etc. haven’t heard of this skill either.

Global issues aside, I don’t think this YouTube video is the answer to attracting the youth of Japan:

Another recruitment idea implemented under Master Yamashita involves creating cellos and violins out of hammered aluminum to create awareness for the company and its unique craft.

I don’t know.

Do 17-year-old kids who favor string instruments have the right demeanor for this gig? Before jumping on me for stereotyping, take a look at how these disparate areas are linked at Kids Web Japan.

I rest my case.

But here’s an idea -

Create a new line of aluminum baseball bats.

Now there’s a connection to Japanese youngsters that would trigger buzz.

I can see The Washington Post revisiting this story in 10-15 years with the feel-good angle, baseball players who can’t achieve Pro Yakyu find satisfying career in the bullet train biz.

When we last addressed Mr. Jobs he was taking a pass on Macworld.

More recently, unless you’ve spent the last week in the proverbial cave, you’ve seen the cavalcade of stories on Steve Jobs taking a leave of absence from Apple.

The common denominator in the stories revolves around understanding his replacement, Tim Cook.

It’s revealing to contrast a blog posting from The Wall Street Journal by Nick Wingfield with a story in the San Jose Mercury News penned by Brandon Bailey ”Iron Reporter”-style (further proof that I’m spending way too much time on the Food Network).

Let’s start with the headlines.

“When Steve Jobs Met Tim Cook” (Journal) versus “Tim Cook – Jobs’ temporary replacement at Apple – seen as strong manger” (Merc).

No contest.

The Journal story promises to put me in the room for the first Jobs-Cook interaction, with instant drama coming from the question “what happened?”  

Was it “like” at first sight?  

Did Cook wear a “Vote for Ike” button as an icebreaker?  

On the other hand, the Merc header indicates that we’re likely going to read a rehash of what’s already known by even pedestrian Apple watchers. 

And that’s about how it plays out. 

Wingfield deserves credit for tracking down the recruiter at Heidrick & Struggles who served as the matchmaker back in 1998. (The fact that the recruiter no longer works for Heidrick tells me that Heidrick PR did not pitch the story angle.) While the walk down memory lane won’t evoke foreshadowing like F. Scott Fitzgerald, at least it’s different from the thousands of Cook-knows-how-to-make-the-trains-run-on-time stories. The anecdote that Steve isn’t big on collecting barber chairs adds some levity. 

The Merc story kicks off with the premise that Cook is the right man for the short-term gig, supported by “scintillating” quotes from two sources: 

“He’s the guy that makes sure everything gets executed properly. He’s excellent at getting things done.” (Tim Bajarin from Creative Strategies) 

The 48-year-old Cook is “not a product innovator. But he runs a very tight ship.” (Brian Marshall from Broadpoint AmTech) 

Needless to say, we won’t be adding these quotes to our art of storytelling curriculum … which isn’t to diss the two sources. We know Bajarin, who is absolutely clued into Apple and often communicates with a compelling bent. But what shows up in this particular article from the sources interviewed doesn’t make for an enlightening read. 

It turns out that the best color in the Merc piece gets borrowed from Fortune’s profile on Cook last year: 

A recent article in Fortune magazine described a management meeting in which Cook was discussing a problem with Apple’s Asian operations. “This is really a problem,” Cook reportedly said. “Someone should be in China driving this.” Thirty minutes later, Cook turned to a subordinate and calmly inquired: “Why are you still here?” The man immediately left the meeting, the magazine said; he drove straight to the airport and flew to China without a change of clothes.

Even with the limitations of a 24-hour news cycle, you would think the paper in Apple’s backyard could do a little better on the original reporting front (although finding a tidbit in the Cook family’s hometown paper, the Robertsdale Independent was a nice touch).

I do recognize that both the Journal and the Merc have published multiple stories on this topic. It’s plausible that with a little more initiative on my part, I could have found a dull Journal piece and a Merc story with panache. 

It’s also not lost on me that the blog as a medium for reporting offers the latitude to capture vignettes that otherwise wouldn’t be substantial enough to make the printed page. 

Still, I think this exercise sheds light on how to create – or suffocate – drama in business communications.

“Apple is reaching more people in more ways than ever before, so like many companies, trade shows have become a very minor part of how Apple reaches its customers. The increasing popularity of Apple’s Retail Stores, which more than 3.5 million people visit every week …”

Certain storylines never go out of style.

People love to see bullies get punched in the nose (like when Michael J. Fox’s Marty McFly clocked Biff in “Back to the Future”).

Perseverance overcoming all obstacles is another can’t-miss theme.

But there’s no story quite like coming back from the dead to spike the ratings. Such was the case last week when Bloomberg inadvertently published its latest version of Steve Jobs’ obituary, available in its entirety at Gawker.com.

The search volume on Google Trends is just one indicator of substantial traction for the story.

As you would expect, the blogosphere had a field day with the gaffe. There were a few headlines that I thought were particularly good: “Bloomberg: Steve Jobs is dead! Wait, no he’s not” on Ars Technica and “Steve Jobs: Still Not Dead. Film at 11″ on The Unofficial Apple Weblog. 

Even the blog serving the society of professional obituary writers — I suppose if you’re not a “professional” obit writer, venture in at your own peril — got in on the fun with the double entendre: “Whoops a daisies!”

Humor is a great tool to snag the audience’s attention from the get go and a powerful element for storytelling in general.

The fact that humor is underutilized in business communications makes it all the more effective.

I’ve been thinking about the headline of the Scoble post I addressed last week: “What do the freaking tech bloggers want?”

Specifically, does the periodic cuss word (or derivative) enhance storytelling or at the very least command attention?

I think the power of a cuss word can come from the element of surprise. If Martha Stewart drops an f-bomb while she’s baking brownies that’s going to grab your attention.

But the words “freakin” and “freaking” tend to be so overused today that they’ve lost their ability to jar. Rather than depend on gut feel, I turned to the wonders of the Factiva database to chart usage over the past five years.

You can see the two words have been gaining traction to the point that we’re projecting - I know the polls haven’t closed but go with me on this one - 7,122 articles will carry them in 2008. For context, Steve Jobs, who can hold his own with the likes of Britney Spears when it comes to media captivation, won’t show up in as many articles this year at the current pace.

Furthermore, I think it’s fair to say the words enjoy even greater use in the blogosphere. I couldn’t figure out how to search postings employing “freakin” or “freaking” by year, but a quick IceRocket search resulted in 122,923 hits.

Talk about overexposure.

Then again, with the right context the repetition of a cuss word can become a story in itself. For Exhibit A, look at Lee Elia’s meltdown back in 1983 when he was the manager of the Chicago Cubs. His profanity-laced tirade after the Cubs lost another game lives on in infamy thanks to the Internet.

Why?

It was so over the top for a public figure to spew expletive after expletive.

And yes, like all good stories it rang with authenticity.