First usable prototype for the new mnemonic medium: Shape Up (Patreon)

Making the demo/talk on the new mnemonic medium last month really helped me refine my ideas. The next step of course was to see how people actually behave. I turned the smoke-and-mirrors prototype in the video into something usable—for people already familiar with SRS and the mnemonic medium, at least.

I've been learning a great deal from live sessions with test readers in the past week (thanks to some of you for that!), and from crit with designer friends. So (as always), this prototype is already out of date, fails to rise to my own present vision.

But I thought I'd share it with you all anyway: click here to give it a try. Don't share that link externally. I don't have permission to redistribute that book, and I haven't yet implemented the rewriting proxy scheme I'll use to skirt that issue.

The prototype adapts Shape Up, a book on product management and strategy. If that's highly relevant to important projects in your life—i.e. it's a book you'd read under normal circumstances—I'd love to hear about your experience. In particular, I'd be grateful if you would: open a blank text file when you start reading, and every time some thought or reaction occurs to you while you read, just type it, unedited, into the file. Stream-of-consciousness reaction is very helpful.

As you'll see, this prototype isn't wired up to Orbit, but you can save your work as an Anki deck. I'm quite keen to hear how these prompts fare in the following days and weeks in your reviews.

Some more guidance:

• There's no mobile support at all.
• I'm less interested in "testing" and "evaluating" (are there bugs? is this a good product?) than in notes on your qualitative experience, surprising behaviors, feelings, etc.
• At least for the purpose of writing to me about your experience, please try to read authentically. That is, don't review or save stuff just because you think I might expect you to. If you'd normally skim that chapter of the book and wouldn't want to review anything, that's what you should do.
• I'm aware that this won't currently make any sense to people who aren't already familiar with the mnemonic medium. I'll handle that, but I want to refine the core mechanism first.

To come, perhaps next week: a letter on what I've learned so far from this prototype and how I expect to evolve the medium.

This post and an excellent past couple weeks are brought to me and you in particular by Rob Ochshorn, who helped me see how to take incremental steps in making usable prototypes of this new design, and got me out of an oh-god-this-will-take-months malaise. Perhaps more on that in the next letter too.