Follow along with my WorldEmber progress!

I promised you a look over my shoulder this month as I bring a vague and disjointed collection of ideas together into a cohesive piece of world-building. These resources will help you keep track of my progress through this month-long marathon challenge:

• Haly’s Official WE Progress Report — each participant gets a page that automatically collects their author information and all WE-eligible articles across all worlds into a single, shareable package.
• Haly’s WorldEmber on Argentii Index — an on-the-fly journal page and handy sidebar displaying only new Argentii WE-eligible articles.

Wishing you a warm and well-lit Yule!

Thank you for being here with me through the long night. Your support, encouragement, and steady presence are a real gift! Building a career out of creativity is impossible without the loving and genuine support of a community. From the very bottom of my heart, I am grateful for you!

Quick Six 12/21/24

It’s not enough to build your world around what’s happing in contemporary times, you also have to look at what came before. The past is the foundation of the present, even in fictional worlds. The things that came before create a direct line to the things that are.

Outdated Technology & Magic

Progress is just another word for adaptation, and adaptation is what enables a species to survive. Who- or whatever is best equipped to deal with a changing environment will survive. While this might sometimes mean evolution, many times it means progress, especially when people are involved!

New inventions incorporate imaginative solutions to changing problems and often build on existing technology. The same with magic, someone finds a new way of casting an old spell, to make its effects permanent, or to increase its range or yield.

Think about the magics and/or technologies in your world, the people who use them, and what it takes to make them work. Think about where they came from, the problems they solve, and how people think about them now.

Somewhere in your world, describe…

Who:

…someone who fell from grace due to the introduction of new tech/magic.

An example might be Tesla succumbing to Edison in the electric grid race. How were they involved with the supplanted technology? Did they somehow contribute to their own downfall through poor choices or bad behavior? What was the result of their downfall? Who else was affected?

What:

…an old or obsolete tech/magic that is preferred over its modern replacement.

Here’s a great one: the number of people who don’t want to upgrade to Windows 11. Another is the preference for vinyl over digital music recordings. And some people still love non-smart flip phones! Why are people in your world hesitant to upgrade? Is it an issue with the new tech, or a resistance to change, or something else entirely? How does not upgrading affect their interaction with the world?

When:

…a time when an old or obsolete tech/magic item was found to cause harm.

In the mid to late 20th century, gasoline had lead in it which created poison exhaust. The same with lead-based paints, mercury in thermometers, and asbestos in insulating materials. Who or what was harmed by this tech? How was that harm done, was it poisonous, explosive, radioactive, or something else entirely? Has the damage healed or been undone, or is it permanent?

Where:

…a place that is reliant on old tech/magic.

In the United States, a lot of rural communities still rely on dial-up internet and landline phone connections to make contact with the outer world. Amish communities shun modern technology. Why doesn’t this place have access to new technology, or do they not want that access? How does this hinder the people there? What do they do when/if they need to overcome this lack.

Why:

…the reasons behind a new tech/magic’s failure to be accepted by young people.

For every success in the toy industry, there are 100 failures. Too simple, too complicated, not colorful enough, colors too bright, too much noise…the list goes on and on. Is it an advertising failure? Do the makers not know what young people want? Or is there a counter-cultural movement among the youth?

How:

…an old tech/magic that has been put to a new and completely different use.

Turning a bicycle into a spinning wheel for making fiber into yarn or using a pencil and an old CD to make a drop spindle for spinning. What was the tech originally meant to do? Are any changes required to make it functional for the new use — such as removing parts, changing layouts, or combining elements? Is there a more convenient, modern alternative?

Wrapping the Day

As always, I hope that you find these prompts inspiring and helpful! Don’t forget to share your inspired creations with me. I always love seeing how y’all take these in such wonderful and unexpected directions!!

Please, please send me your WORLD-BUILDING questions NOW!! I want to pre-schedule my 12/25 and 1/1 posts so that I can maximize the time I spend with my family on these holidays!

As I write this, I am sitting at 30,424 new words of world-building toward my 50,000-word goal.