The 30 days challenge I started at the beginning of 2017 is approaching its end. There are just 4 days left.
I am very happy with the results so far. On average, 10 people wrote each and every day, with a few spikes up to 16 people. From a purely statistical point of view, there will be more than 300 root posts generated from this challenge, and I'm talking about genuine content, written, edited and published every day by 10 different authors. From a more holistic point of view, the impact of this challenge will stretch way beyond that: for almost every root post there were comments created, discussions, debates, new people joined the platform and people who were already on the platform created relationships. I think this worked out well. I'm not giving my final word on this, there are still 4 more days to go, but the overall impression is a very positive one.
For the last week I've been thinking about how to replicate this thing. Another challenge in which we will just hone our basic discipline skills, writing every day, without any other metric, seemed a bit dull, to be honest. Also, a little bit of incentive (even symbolic) wouldn't hurt.
So here's my idea.
Starting February 1st, I will deliver a 15 sessions story telling crash course, in 15 short articles, each of them containing an assignment. Articles will be published every other day, leaving at least 24 hours in between sessions. During this interval, those who are embarking on this boat will write their assignment. Also, during this 24 hours interval, I will personally review all the texts, pick the most interesting one (of course, it's all subjective, so please, don't be offended if you don't get picked), and send the ginarmous amount of 1 SBD to the winner. It's all symbolic, of course. Just a way to show you that your efforts are counting. You shouldn't rely on these potential money for lunch. Just saying.
Here is the complete list of the sessions, with the tentative dates:
February 1st: Session 1: Anchoring techniques: personal stories.
February 2nd: review an pick the winner for the first session.
February 3rd: Session 2: Anchoring techniques: using citations.
February 4th: review an pick the winner for the second session.
February 5h: Session 3: Anchoring techniques: using research proof.
February 6th: review an pick the winner for the third session.
February 7th: Session 4: Master the listicle particle.
February 8th: review an pick the winner for the fourth session.
February 9th: Session 5: Define and create palatable text.
February 10th: review an pick the winner for the fifth session.
February 11th: Session 6: Perspective games.
February 12th: review an pick the winner for the sixth session.
February 13th: Session 7: Meaningful detours.
February 14th: review an pick the winner for the seventh session.
February 15th: Session 8: Form constraints: write only 3 sentences per paragraph.
February 16th: review an pick the winner for the eighth session.
February 17th: Session 9: Form constraints: write maximum 10 words per sentence.
February 18th: review an pick the winner for the ninth session.
February 19th: Session 10: More constraints: write without using negations.
February 20th: review an pick the winner for the tenth session.
February 21st: Session 11: The question / response (interview) approach.
February 22nd: review an pick the winner for the eleventh session.
February 23rd: Session 12: The "what if" approach.
February 24th: review an pick the winner for the twelfth session.
February 25th: Session 13: The "press release" approach.
February 26th: review an pick the winner for the thirteenth session.
February 27th: Session 14: Using dialogs.
February 28th: review an pick the winner for the fourteenth session.
March 1st: Session 15: The review / evaluation approach.
March 2nd: review an pick the winner for the fifteenth session.
This pseudo-calendar is here only for your reference, should you decide to enter the challenge later on, or if you want to do a little bit of preparation in advance. It may also change if something unexpected comes, so don't take it as definitive.
The goal of this new challenge is to go beyond the habit of writing (we already master that, aren't we?) and to learn new approaches for our contribution here on Steemit and, why not, to express ourselves in a more creative way in any other context.
Wanna go beyond that?
I'm looking for volunteers to write the daily reports, with the same template I used during this first challenge. I think the reports are very useful, they are not only helping with content discovery but they're creating a lot of accountability for the authors. But I will not have the time to do this anymore. Besides, I think it's time for other writers to step up and gain some exposure as well.
Important!
- in order to be eligible for review, you have to leave a comment on the corresponding session, with a link to your post. It will be really hard for me to dig through Steemit.
- the first tag for the articles in the challenge should be
challenge 30and the second onestorytelling.
I think that's it for now. Just save the date and warm up your fingers. Stuff like that.
We'll be in touch.
image source - Pixabay
This project is part of my witness activities here on Steemit. I think a witness should not only maintain the technical and economical components of the platform, but he should also get involved at a community level and improve as many processes as he can.
I'm a serial entrepreneur, blogger and ultrarunner. You can find me mainly on my blog at Dragos Roua where I write about productivity, business, relationships and running. Here on Steemit you may stay updated by following me @dragosroua.
https://steemit.com/~witnesses