Hey guys,
This post is a semi-organized brain-dump of the things being planned or are underway. Before I delve into all of that, a little background information into what we've been doing for the past couple months will help give some context.
A few months ago, Hallie and I started learning a little about content marketing, SEO strategies, something called search analysis and several other things like that. We work from home and work as contractors for a company who needs this kind of support, so that's how we got pointed in that direction. Hallie is taking courses in Google AdWords, Analytics, social media marketing, things like that. I'm taking courses in content marketing.
One of the resources I've been using is something called Income School:
https://incomeschool.com[/URL]https://incomeschool.com
Their course costs money, but they've also got a ton of great videos here:
https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCytOqtKYpACcWMD14UjhSeQhttps://www.youtube.com/channel/UCytOqtKYpACcWMD14UjhSeQ
Take a look at a couple of their videos there and you'll see what sort of strategies they're about: White hat, good content, slow and steady wins the race. No tricks or weirdness. The paid course helps you figure our WHAT content to write, so that's where I am.
Even though this is for my day job, all of this has helped me see the gaps in my approach to TTI and Curious Cosmos in the past. I've known that design and development aren't enough for quite a while, but it's been difficult to know WHAT content is worth spending my time creating. Properly done, a site ike this should be able to replace at least half of our current income. That said, if I'm going to spend time on this I don't want to make stabs in the dark. I don't want to make garbage. I have resources and tools to help me succeed. I have the skills to build anything I want., Now it's time to shit or get off the pot.
Time travel seems like a small niche, and that's why I thought rolling it into Curious Cosmos would make it easier to build a big site around it. I think that's the wrong approach now because that really just turns Curious Cosmos into a poor clone of Above Top Secret. When your topic is spread that broadly (ALL the fringe topics), you lose the ability to carve that niche out and make it special.
I love time travel. I think it's an outstanding idea that ties a lot of very valuable kinds of education together in a way that makes it fun to learn about them. Time travel has ties to most kinds of science, all of history, anthropology, psychology, sociology and creative writing. Time travel is nostalgia, remembering the "good old days", or experiencing a well-done period piece on television (Mad Men, Outlander). It's reading a history book and being able to empathize with the people of the time.
Time travel isn't just about time travel with a machine, either. It's slipping between dimensions and realities. The Mandela Effect. It's immortal beings. It's all things time and space. It's understanding the nature and substance of reality.
How is that not the foundation of an epic website?
Here's the sitemap I've come up with. Note that this is for the MAIN site, not the forums:
[*]SCIENCE
[*]HISTORY
[*]SHOP
This is a lot of information. Don't feel like you have to do anything with it! This is here to help give you the temperature and wind direction
Hopefully at least some of this makes sense.
[*]Men's
[*]Women's
[*]Kid's
[*]Board Games
[*]Books
[*]Movies
[*]TV Series
[*]Video Games
This post is a semi-organized brain-dump of the things being planned or are underway. Before I delve into all of that, a little background information into what we've been doing for the past couple months will help give some context.
A few months ago, Hallie and I started learning a little about content marketing, SEO strategies, something called search analysis and several other things like that. We work from home and work as contractors for a company who needs this kind of support, so that's how we got pointed in that direction. Hallie is taking courses in Google AdWords, Analytics, social media marketing, things like that. I'm taking courses in content marketing.
One of the resources I've been using is something called Income School:
https://incomeschool.com[/URL]https://incomeschool.com
Their course costs money, but they've also got a ton of great videos here:
https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCytOqtKYpACcWMD14UjhSeQhttps://www.youtube.com/channel/UCytOqtKYpACcWMD14UjhSeQ
Take a look at a couple of their videos there and you'll see what sort of strategies they're about: White hat, good content, slow and steady wins the race. No tricks or weirdness. The paid course helps you figure our WHAT content to write, so that's where I am.
Even though this is for my day job, all of this has helped me see the gaps in my approach to TTI and Curious Cosmos in the past. I've known that design and development aren't enough for quite a while, but it's been difficult to know WHAT content is worth spending my time creating. Properly done, a site ike this should be able to replace at least half of our current income. That said, if I'm going to spend time on this I don't want to make stabs in the dark. I don't want to make garbage. I have resources and tools to help me succeed. I have the skills to build anything I want., Now it's time to shit or get off the pot.
Time travel seems like a small niche, and that's why I thought rolling it into Curious Cosmos would make it easier to build a big site around it. I think that's the wrong approach now because that really just turns Curious Cosmos into a poor clone of Above Top Secret. When your topic is spread that broadly (ALL the fringe topics), you lose the ability to carve that niche out and make it special.
I love time travel. I think it's an outstanding idea that ties a lot of very valuable kinds of education together in a way that makes it fun to learn about them. Time travel has ties to most kinds of science, all of history, anthropology, psychology, sociology and creative writing. Time travel is nostalgia, remembering the "good old days", or experiencing a well-done period piece on television (Mad Men, Outlander). It's reading a history book and being able to empathize with the people of the time.
Time travel isn't just about time travel with a machine, either. It's slipping between dimensions and realities. The Mandela Effect. It's immortal beings. It's all things time and space. It's understanding the nature and substance of reality.
How is that not the foundation of an epic website?
Here's the sitemap I've come up with. Note that this is for the MAIN site, not the forums:
- LEGEND
- Short Stories
I've been averse to fiction here in the past, or at least haven't done enough with it. Fiction is one of the coolest ways to experience the ideas we talk about here, and I've begun working on some short stories to post. Some of these will be my own, some of them I'll hire freelancers to write for me. Ultimately, I'd like to build an "expanded universe" around TTI that ties the stories together.
- Urban Legends
This is nothing new. Articles about Rudolph Fentz, John Titor and other urban legends. Where a story can be debunked, we'll do so. The goal here is to write the BEST explanation for each urban legend possible. All of these (every post, actually) should be 1250 words minimum.
- Out of Place Artifacts
Like Urban Legends, we're writing the best possible explanations for things like the Baghdad Battery, the London Hammer, etc.
- I'm a Time Traveler
We're going to actively invite time travelers to share their stories anonymously through the frontend of the site. This is more of a fun way to share some creative writing than it is to catch a "real" time traveler, but it works both ways. Claims will be listed on the site, but will link to the specific thread here.
Claim Form
There will be a form that guides travelers through some questions and will prompt for specific information depending on the type of claim they're making."I'm from the future" will ask different questions than "I've slipped into an alternate reality". Once submitted, we'll get a chance to look at and approve it before it shows up in the forum for discussion. There will be no way to make a claim through the forum directly.
- Time Travel Hotline
TTI will have a phone number you can call and leave messages on, similar to how the claim form works. You'll navigate a phone tree answering a couple questions, then you'll record your message and it gets moderated the same way forms do. I don't expect this to generate good content, but I think it's interesting and will get people visiting. It might also give me something to create YouTube videos about: Strange messages from the time travel hotline.
- CULTURE
- Catalog
This is an idea I've had for a long, long time. TTI needs a way to direct people to great time travel content, so I've fleshed out a way to make that happen. At first, our catalog won't be much different from any other movie/book/whatever database. As things get built up, we will add a method for people to rate the "time travelness" of an entry; how well time travel is used as a plot device, how believable it is, whether it incorporates interesting paradoxes. Stuff like that. Then, we'll be able to filter things by those ratings https://facetwp.com/demo/cars/using something like this.
- Reviews
I will have a continual hit list of things to write reviews for. Right now, I'm working on reading https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Magic_Tree_HouseThe Magic Teeehouse books for a blog post about good time travel books for kids.
Board Games
- Books
- Movies
- TV Series
- Video Games
[*]SCIENCE
- Patents
A simple database with links to patents related to time travel. Each one should contain about 600 words explaining its application or importance in terms a normal human can understand.
- Time Travel Physics
Typical time travel science articles. How time travel can be achieved, what Ronald Mallett is up to, stuff you'd expect on a time travel site.
- Experiments
Science experiments you can do at home relating in ANY way to kinetic physics. Most of these will have videos.
- Paradoxes
Posts talking about paradoxes, how they work and how they can be solved (if possible). Bootstrap paradox, Grandfather paradox, etc.
- Theories
Articles about the POSSIBILITY of time travel. Theorizing about using wormholes or other scientific based hypothesis that can't yet be tested or applied.
- Resources
A way to direct people to appropriate avenues of learning. This will also link to the Resources sections here, containing user created experiments and stories.
[*]HISTORY
- A Day in the Life
These are short stories. Fictional, but meant to give the reader a sense of what it was like to live during a given time or event. Maybe something written from the perspective of a passenger who survived the Hindenburg, or someone in 13th century Italy just getting through the day.
- What Really Happened
Articles that answer a common myth or misconceptions about history. Napoleon wasn't actually short for the time, Mrs.O'Leary's cow probably didn't actually start the Great Chicago Fire of 1871, George Washington didn't cut down a cherry tree.
- Preparing For Time Travel
A mixture between "A Day in the Life" and "What Really Happened". These are instructional articles explaining how to prepare for a trip to a given time or event. What to bring when traveling to 1950s New York, how best to prepare when visiting London during the plague.
[*]SHOP
- Experiments
I have some ideas for how to create a small line of kinetic physics experiments for middle school kids. Something along the lines of Tinker Crate, but done with 3D printed parts. These aren't elaborate, but care is taken in designing them.
- Kits
Similar to experiments, but things middle schoolers might have fun putting together. This is more about playing with a fun mechanic or building something cool. Maybe a replica of Titor's machine?
- Apparel
- Accessories
Phone cases, other print-on-demand stuff that isn't clothing.
- For the Lab
Things someone interested in time travel might enjoy having on their desk at home or work. Newton's Cradle, a weird hourglass, etc.
- When in Rome
Not entirely sure about this one, but including it anyhow. Something along the lines of gear you might need when time traveling. Perhaps some period-style gifts, or a collection of fake money from different time periods.
- Fun & Novelty
Everything else.
- eBooks
TTI will be publishing fiction eBooks geared towards young adults. This is many months out.
- Time Capsules
@KerrTexas gave me this idea a long, long time ago. However, a proper time capsule needs to be made out of steel or aluminum. You can't use PVC because chemicals in the plastic will leech into whatever you're storing in the capsule (because its enclosed, not flowing).I've been researching sources of steel or aluminum pipe that's at least 6 inches in diameter, but it's not cheap or sustainable right now. My brother and I are looking at using old fire extinguishers and some other ideas, but for now I think we can just use PVC. I'll sell them as something to display on a shelf instead of being buried. Plenty of ideas here:
Time capsule as a period gift box filled with nostalgic stuff (think 50s, 60s, 70s, 80s...)
- Time capsule with a period style (steampunk, 80s tech, futuristic)
- Customizable
- Automotive-quality paint jobs? My brother has a garage to do this in.
This is a lot of information. Don't feel like you have to do anything with it! This is here to help give you the temperature and wind direction
Hopefully at least some of this makes sense.
[*]Men's
[*]Women's
[*]Kid's
[*]Board Games
[*]Books
[*]Movies
[*]TV Series
[*]Video Games
