Writer Unblock | Hacker News Reader

Writer Unblock

scriptspry.com

26 pointselnik21 comments

A few years ago I wrote The Most Dangerous Writing App. It's been acquired since, but the open-source version still has a "hardcore mode" very similar to this, where you only see the last letter you typed: https://maebert.github.io/themostdangerouswritingapp/

The irony about these "distraction free writing" projects is that I'd bet the majority of them are created by people procrastinating when they could be writing.

I've made a project that incentivize people to write every day by planting a tree on their behalf for every day they write a certain word count. I made it because I think too many apps try to keep writers writing by punishing them, and I want to try positive reinforcement instead. Unfortunately I don't think that works.

Writer's block is a real thing. As least it seems to me like one. There's no trick to bypass it every time. It's like fighting common cold: it's painful, but it will pass eventually.

You will continue to write if you haven't given up by the time inspiration strikes. It's a test of persistence, really.

Sometimes, you just need to put down your thoughts with out the fear of someone looking at what you are writing, or with out your editor bugging you about all the typos you are making or with your eyes closed and give control to your fingers to put down what thoughts run in your head.

Can do away with the internet too, if a data url can be crafted with this html and bookmarked.

Happy unstucking!

Love the concept! However, is it possible to include a line or two in the actual app about what it does? I was very confused until I read this comment.

Added a popup [1]. It felt sinister. This is how simple, pure things get ruined.

[1] - https://github.com/scriptspry/writerunblock/commit/0ced484a2...

:'( I'm sorry to bring bad news

Link to this:

data:text/html;base64,PCFET0NUWVBFIGh0bWw+DQo8aHRtbD4NCiAgPHN0eWxlPg0KICAgIGh0bWwsIGJvZHkgew0KICAgICAgbWFyZ2luOiAwOw0KICAgICAgcGFkZGluZzogMDsNCiAgICAgIGNvbG9yOiAjZWVlOw0KICAgICAgYmFja2dyb3VuZDogI2VlZTsNCiAgICAgIGNhcmV0LWNvbG9yOiAjMzMzOw0KICAgIH0NCiAgICBwIHsNCiAgICAgIG1hcmdpbjogMWVtIDEwJTsNCiAgICB9DQogIDwvc3R5bGU+DQogIDxib2R5IG9ubG9hZD1kb2N1bWVudC5nZXRFbGVtZW50QnlJZCgnYScpLmZvY3VzKCk+DQogICAgPHAgaWQ9YSBjb250ZW50ZWRpdGFibGUgYXV0b2NvbXBsZXRlPW9mZiBhdXRvY29ycmVjdD1vZmYgYXV0b2NhcGl0YWxpemU9b2ZmIHNwZWxsY2hlY2s9ZmFsc2U+DQogICAgPC9wPg0KICA8L2JvZHk+DQo8L2h0bWw+

Added a neat "hack" instead to set the href of a link dynamically.

'data:text/html;base64,' + btoa(document.documentElement.outerHTML)

My personal favorite writing unblocker isn't a piece of software - it's cannabis use. Writer's block is arguably technically a form of anxiety - so yes it is possible (speaking from personal experience) to be prescribed medical marijuana for writer's block. Of course, YMMV depending on what state you're in.

I'd prefer it if people didn't advocate drug use for productivity or creativity or performance gains.

Duly noted.

I hear you but I specifically am advocating for cannabis use in a medicinal way for anxiety reducing gains - which I suppose could be construed as performance gains. Nowhere did I advocate that it increases productivity or creativity.

It's a white content-editable <p>, for anyone trying to figure it out.

There are plenty of other minimalist text editors, so I'd say this is a one-day-hack kind of thing.

Why don't use pen and paper

I rarely see halfway decent “Show HN” style posts, people seem to prefer amateur hour stuff in that category instead. Why?

Recently we had the uninspired Pickle Rick “terminal” someone made in four minutes and then an allegedly multiplayer game called Space Frigates. It was astonishing to see people upvote and praise Space Frigates one after the other despite it being broken, full of bugs, and completely unplayable. To test my theory I posted a link to microgravity.io which is an actual polished and working browser multiplayer space game created by two bored teenagers, objectively much more inspiring content because if kids can do that then just imagine what you can do if you put in the effort? Yet it only received 3 upvotes while Space Frigates received 180.

Is this because people can relate more emotionally to someone who makes depressingly little progress on a side project? Or is the first step more exciting to witness than the end result? Or what?

Maybe the number of people scrolling through new is too small?

I think if the teenagers themselves came and showed HN their microgravity game, it'd be better received.

I made an uptime monitoring service for wordpress recently and the "Show HN" post didn't get a single upvote [1]. I realized it's not a thrilling thing to show, but it was a bit more effort and is a bit more useful than this (no offence OP).

The funny thing is, the HN community downvotes silly comments to hell but upvotes silly submissions.

[1] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=22757922

You can't test a theory with a single data point. There's too much randomness in what gets traction from /newest. That's why we allow reposts of stories that haven't gotten attention.

In addition to randomness, https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=22271942 probably didn't get attention because there wasn't any context. It wasn't clear what the background to the project was, nor what was interesting or different about it. You did later post a comment explaining that a bit, but the comment was so unpleasant and bilious that it came across as trying to bully the reader into liking the post. You're not going to catch many flies that way! You also posted the comment a couple hours after submitting the article, by which time it would have fallen off the /newest page.

There's another factor which is actually a little interesting. More polished projects often do worse on HN because readers assume that they're being posted by companies for promotional reasons, and people find that boring. Since there really are a lot of such promotional submissions, it's understandable that readers pattern-match that way. More amateurish projects have an advantage here: they're more likely to be judged as authentic, which is intrinsically interesting. It's a lot more satisfying to relate to other humans and their work than to encounter a corporate facade. Especially for a project like a game, an HN thread is usually only very interesting if the creator is present.

Of course there's nothing wrong with professional, well-wrought work! The solution here is to add a comment to the thread giving the backstory of the project, and explaining what's different about it. That does two things: it gives people an explicit starting point to kick off from, but also it implicitly helps classify why the thing was posted. Titles make a big difference too, since that's your first and best chance to interest the reader.

Most importantly, that does look like a great project! We're always on the lookout for good submissions that fell through the cracks, and we often invite reposts. I'd be happy to do that with this one. If you want to, please email hn@ycombinator.com and we'll figure it out. But it would definitely be much better if one or both of the creators themselves were around to engage with readers—that would make the thread more alive. Assuming that the game is as you describe it, I think the community here would have a lot of fun with that, and your bored teenagers might get some good validation to keep creating.

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