Update: My Plans as of May 2022
I want to be transparent so you can see what I have to offer, why I’m doing what I’m doing, and get your feedback.
Thanks to you, the readers, the past few months have been amazing for me and I want to keep that going. To keep it going, though, I need to talk about a few things and I want to hear your suggestions.
What Do You Want Me to Talk About?
Before I get to anything else, I want to know what topics you want to see me cover. I’ve learned a lot about Math, Physics, Computer Science, and a few more fields (e.g. Bioinformatics, Game Dev, Color Theory, etc.), so I could probably write an article on topics you would like to see. At some point, I want to talk about programming languages since I’ve already written those articles for a different site and I’m looking to publish them here at some point. To motivate good responses, I’ll write an article on any topic suggested in the first few responses.
Don’t You Have Two Active Series to Work On?
Writing a series is far more complex than writing an article. With a singular article, I only need topics to flow within the article. With a series, I need the topics to flow throughout the series. In practical terms, I need to have the next few articles already written before I can publish the next part in a series or the series will become inconsistent, have sudden topic changes, etc. One-off articles allow me to keep publishing while doing the necessary research to write future articles in a series.
Fewer Mistakes
As an added bonus, the more time to write an article, the lower the chances I make a mistake. For example, I made a claim in the article An Intro to Algebra and Group Theory that all finite Abelian groups could be written as modular addition. This statement is false. I only realized that it was false when I looked into multiplicative groups for a later article and saw some clear counterexamples. If I had written that later article before publishing, I could have avoided this mistake.
My Current Series
I’m still working on The Road to Quantum Mechanics and How to Discover Finite Fields While Bored in Class. In fact, I’ve already written the next three articles in the Finite Fields series and the next four articles in the Road to Quantum Mechanics series.
When Are We Getting New Articles?
Expect new articles soon. In fact, I’ve already submitted the next article in the Finite Fields series, so it’s ready when the Cantor’s Paradise editing team finishes reviewing it.
Title Changes
For SEO (search engine optimization) reasons, I’m going to experiment with the titles of the articles in my two main series. Articles in later parts of a series don’t get recommended by algorithms. To make matters worse, people won’t want to click on later articles in the series because it creates the misconception that you need to read all the previous articles. It can also be confusing for people on mobile apps since the title gets cut off before the topic is mentioned.
I won’t be able to make enough money to keep writing these series unless I try to hack the algorithm. To be clear, I’m far from starving, but I’ll have to write other articles for a while until I can afford to write these articles. For all these reasons, I’m going to use shorter titles without the series name. I’ll try to make sure that you know that the articles in this series are still part of the relevant series.
YouTube
Right now, my YouTube channel consists of streams working on these articles or related projects with the occasional animation made for one of my articles. Once I finish the Finite Fields series, I want to start making a video series in line with the Essence of _______ series you’ll find on YouTube (e.g. Linear Algebra, Calculus, Complex Analysis, etc.). In this case, it would either be called Essence of Abstract Algebra or How to Discover Finite Fields While Bored in Class. For SEO reasons, Essence of Abstract Algebra would probably win out.
Later, I would like to make The Road to Quantum Mechanics into a video series, but that will have to wait until I’ve established a firm foundation in the article series. Unlike articles that I can go back and change within an hour, I would have to make an entirely new video. For this reason, I want to minimize the chances of having to remake a video, which I can do by writing the majority of the series before making videos.
Patreon or Something?
I’ve been thinking about possibly starting a Patreon account or something similar to make sure I can continue to write my articles (and eventually make videos). If I made a Patreon account, I don’t know what bonuses I could offer besides letting people vote on future articles/videos without feeling conflicted. I want to hear your thoughts on whether I should, any alternatives to Patreon, and how I should go about it. Should I make it a monthly thing or a per article thing? What kinds of tiers should I have and what rewards should I have? I’m down to hear any suggestions you have.
What Do You Think?
I really want to hear what you think about anything I’ve said above, any advice you want to offer, etc. Please leave a response below, shoot me an email, or DM me on Twitter. Whatever’s easiest for you.
