016 : Strike

Welcome new and old!

Since the 27th, we've...

• Wrote up more articles.

• Finished the outline for the second version of the NINE quiz (just have to write up the results and update everything).

• Yet more consideration of what to do with The Meridian Holy.

What have we learned?

How will we move forward?

Let's see!

Type vs. Behavior

Are you changing or unchanging?

To be brief, the coming update is a more fundamental one.

The previous versions focused on "what you are" which is a common problem of personality systems and all things like it. It puts you into a box and persuades you to stay inside of it. It diminishes the capacity of choice as well as the capacity for growth.

Now, it takes choice and will (and willpower), bundles it all up, and says "these are the different kinds of choices you can make; with this information, what will you choose to do now?" There are no "types." Only kinds of behaviors that you (and anyone else) can choose for yourself, as you will.

A far more satisfying approach on all fronts.

Minus marketability. A lot of people do like being slotted into types for the fun of it. And fun is popular!

The option of creating types is still available to me, but given my misgivings on "types" and the culture of "typing" people, I'm inclined to see how I would create them while also not encouraging any of it.

I have ideas.

But I'll save it for another update!

Scale & Density

When a story is too big and small at the same time.

As I type, I'm still very much in the midst of thinking about this. I write these updates on the day they're supposed to drop and part of me wonders whether I should let a thought conclude and tell you about it later or just let it fall out of my head. The verdict is still out on that one, but today it'll be the latter!

I've been tossing the imagery and text over in my head, projecting what I envision the final product to be (because if I don't do that, there won't be any mobility). What I keep seeing is a very sparse array of image and very minimal text. As large as this entire project feels to me, that scale wouldn't really carry over in a book, which, I originally envisioned to be some doorstopper of a book.

But that's never really been my style.

The "tomes" I make are pretty thin and dense. But this coincides with the idea of "make a bunch of stuff and select the best parts," that is, to effectively overshoot and land where you must.

What am I getting at? Just that The Meridian Holy doesn't work as a physical book. Some of the images simply work better on a screen. And the text is structured in such a way that only one or two sentences would go on a page at a time. That's a gigantic waste of paper. Especially if plenty of the images are only going to take up one page and not span two (and even if they do, the compositions would start getting a little samey given the subject matter).

All right! So, what's the solution?

I'm thinking visual/kinetic novel. Over the next few updates, we'll see if I'm still okay with that approach.

I'll keep you in the loop!

...

Huh? A drawing?

Uh. Ehh...

Here. Have this one.

That's all I have for you today.

Next update on the 9th barring emergencies.

Thank you for your time and attention.

Until then,

👋