#I mean.... yes they use the same phrases yes they were the hare and the hatter with a false split path leading to both yes there's-

[frederickabberline]

Seeing a theory that the doctor was will because of the similar silhouette and staring off into the distance as I am torn between "uwill things I really wish would be canon" and "utwill things I think are simply too extreme and sudden to be canon"

[kimkymury]

Blue Rose Tears - Chapter 3

Hello everyone!

I’m back with the third chapter of my Carl x Pascal fanfiction. I hope you like it!

I would like to thanks @depressedoverdrawings​ for  reviewing the history and help fixing grammatical errors.

Warning:  Just a little warning, some characters have distorted views about sexuality, and those views do not represent what I think in real life. This was written on purpose to suit the environment and the time that the story takes place, since at that time people were more closed minded.

The Portuguese Version of this story is also Available on Wattpad: https://www.wattpad.com/928977847-as-l%C3%A1grimas-da-rosa-azul-cap%C3%ADtulo-3

Under the cut! Enjoy the story.

Blue Rose Tears

Chapter 3

P.O.V Narrator

The whole situation was new to Carl, he had already talked to the scientists about psychology, but being one of his "patients" was new. Pascal held a clipboard and a pencil, he wrote quickly without worrying whether his handwriting was legible or not. After a few more minutes of silence, the redhead turns his attention to his friend.

"I will ask you a few questions, all of which are basead on my research and on reliable sources."  - The elder boy said, he seemed excited to help his friend.

The dark-haired boy nodded silently. It was the first time he had vented to someone like that, It felt like a consultation with a doctor. Carl hoped he would be "fixed", that after those series of questions, he would stop feeling things for Serge.

"First question, descibre in detal how you feel being around this person." - The redhead asks patiently, preparing to write down the answet that would come.

For a few moments, the religious boy thought about how he could verbalize the feeling he had for the pianist. He had never felt anything like it. It felt mote like an obssession, if he could call it that.

"When I am with this person, I feel happy and I want to be closer to them. I really admire that person, they are everything I am not and will never be." - He says, praying internally that all that would pass.

"Okay, can you tell me what it's like to know that this person doesn't love you back?" -  The eldest boy asks, carefully writing down every word his friend said.

Carl felt desolate, that was the perfect way to describe what he was feeling. It was like he was never going to be good enough to be with someone like Serge. He tries to turn his feelings into words, in a way that is easier to understand and at the same does not sound so desperate.

"I feel...horrible. It's like I'm drowning in a wave of guilt, every time I'm with this person, I need to pretend I don't feel anything." - The dark-haired boy answers the question as he lowers his head, his eyes were fixed on the floor.

Pascal was surprised by his friend's response, It was normal to be sad because he fell in love with someone who doesn't correspond his feelings, but there was no need to feel guilty about something he couldn't control. That was when he decided It was necessary to find out who Carl had fallen in love with.

"Why do you feel guilty about loving that person? I mean, you're not doing anything wrong." - The redhead looks at the friend who sat opposite him with a worred look.

He didn't want his best friend to get involved with someone who might hurt him.

The religious boy was silent, not knowing what to say. He couldn't belive tha he was feeling things for another man, It was too much for him.

"Do I know this person?" - Pascal asked, diverting Carl's attention from those bad thoughts, making him focus only on question.

"Yes, you know.." -  He replied, afraid of the possible reaction of the scientist to know who he was referring to.

"I see, is this person your friend?" -  The redhead asks while looking at the boy in front of him, It was as if he was analyzing him inside and out.

"Yes, they are..." - At this point, Carl just wanted to his friend to stop trying to find out who was the person and to come up with a solution right away, so his problems could be solved.

"Last question." - After the scientist said this, the religious boy was more relieved.

"Is this person called Serge Battour?" - Pascal said with the same naturalness that asked the other questions, that phrase shocked Carl.

The dark-haired boy went pale when he heard that, he didn't expect it to be so easy to find out who he was in love. His mind was littered with fears and worries about what would happen next.

Would Pascal remain my friend? Would Pascal continue to treat me the same way? Would Pascal tell Serge this? But the most important, Could Pascal find a way to heal me?

"How did you find out?" - Carl said startled, looking at the scientist. He expected an aggressive reaction from him, but he received the usual calm look.

"It was really easy, actually. I just needed to analyze what you said, compare it with your social cycle and see who else fit in. As you said that we both know and the person was your friend, I just thought and discard the options that didn't match." - Pascal replied calmly, taking another drag on his cigarette that was in one of his hands.

No matter how long they had know each other, the scientist always found a way to surprise him.

"Aren't you...disgusted?" - The youngest said confused, his reaction was of someone who had just heard the most normal thing in the world.

"Of couse not, I'm surprised you think I would react in that way. So many conversations we've had, I've already explained to you that same-sex love is a natural thing." -  The eldest replied while leaving the clipboard aside, noting was no longer necessary.

"But...this is wrong. If someone finds out I could end up being expelled from school, and if Serge finds out, he-" - Carl was saying before he was interrupted by his friend.

"He won't find out because none of us are going to tell him, and about school, chill out. If they expel you. it'll be for the best, if it weren't for the lab I woudn't be in this school full of people who are limited and have closed mind." - The redhead replied while lying back in the armchair.

" Pascal! I can't leave this place, I grew up here. You too spent a lot of your life here, would you leave if you had the chance?" - The religious boy spoke a little irritated by the friend's comment.

"Of course not, I am being ironic, Despite all the defects, I would not leave Lacombrade, I would miss you and the others." -  The scientist replied, being a little kinder than usual.

"I would miss you too...but that is not important now. I need you help, that's why I agreed to answer the question." -  The dark-haired boy said the beginning of the sentence in a lower tone, before changing the subject.

Demonstrations of affection weren't exacltly Carl's thing, he didn't know how to express his feelings for people, sometimes others thought he didn't care much. But when he wanted someone to know that they were special to him, he found a way to demonstrate.

~Flash from a Year Ago ~

When Carl was younger, until he was about thirteen, he was closer to his younger brother. They moved away because the older one was too busy with his studies and did not like to hang out with his brother's friends. But the love Carl felt for Sebastian never changed, even though they didn't spend much time together or argue from time to time, he always protected his brother On a normal day, Sebastian looked more downcast than usual. He was usually smiling and running around, but this time was different.

"What happened?" - The eldest says approacing his brother, who was surprised by his presence.

"Tomorrow is my birthday, I asked Rosemariné if I had received a letter, but he said no. Mom and Dad must have forgotten about me." -  Sebastian replied saldy, it broke Carl's heart to see the 8 year old boy like that.

"They haven't forgotten about you, there was probably a delay in the post office and the letter may arrive after your birthday. Don't be sad." - The dark-haired boy tried to comfort his brother, bending down when speaking to stay the same height as him.

"Sometimes, I miss them..." - The tears threatened to flow from the small dark eyes, but were prevented by the same.

"I miss them too, but don't be sad. Tomorrow is a special day, so you better be smiling!" - Carl tried to cheer up the sad boy, running his hand lightly through his hair.

The two said goodbye and followed different paths, Carl's intention was good, but he was not very good at showing what he felt. Sebastian thought about his parents' letter all day, forgetting about it only at bedtime. The following morning, he was eight years old. Upon waking uo early as usual, he gets up and looks at his table. What was on it surprised him: there was a note wrote in a very familiar calligraphy, along with a small miniature hare, carved from wood.

That made the smile, he excitedly opened the note and read in a low voice;

" Happy Birthday, Sebastian.    I hope you like the gift, I bought it when we went to Arles and I thought you would like it.   I know it's not like the toys that Mom and Dad could give you, but I think it can be a susbtitute while we´re here. As much as they don't show it, know that they love you, and so do I. Congratulations for your eight years. Your brother,                          Carl Messier."

If Sebastian had ever doubted whether he was loved by Carl, those doubst were gone. He smiled, not cating if he hadn't received a letter from his parents. He knew he was not alone, as he had his brother by his side."

~End of FlashBack ~

"Why do you want my help?" - Pascal said, taking his friend out of those memories.

"Well, because I did imagine that maybe you could heal me. Can't you do something to make me stop feeling this way?" - He replied seriously, showing his concern

The religious boy was surprised by a laugh, of all the hours that Pascal could laugh, this was the least suitable. Carl watched his friend with an incredulous look, he didn't know why the scientist was laughing so hard.

Had he said something funny?

" How do you want me to heal you if you are not sick? Carl, you are just in love, there is no reason to see this as a disease." - The eldest speaks composing himself, while drying the tears that flowed while laughing.

"Yes but, feelings these things for another man is wrong. In fact, I don't even know what I'm feeling anymore..." - He replies, worried as always.

"I already said and I will repeat, if you want to sleep with someone, just go and do it. Life is too short to worry about what society will think." - The redhead says still recovering from the laughter

"P-Pascal! I did not mention that I would like to do these things, that would be outrageous!" - The dark haired boy says as get up from his chair.

He hadn't been thinking about that, had he? Feelings things for Serge, wanting to be around him was one thing, but...sleeping with him? This thought made the religious boy red with shame, he was not used to having that kind of though.

Since he was a child, he was taught not to question and not to think about this type of thing, especially with other men. People around him taught him to leave that kind of thinking only after he got married.

Pascal, different from his friend, saw no problem in thinking, studying or even talking with other people about sex. For him it was a natural thing, he was delighted at how the human body was capable of generating life. The relationships between people of the same sex did not boher him either, he used to ask himself why they did this, since it did not lead to reproduction. But that changed when he discovered the relationship between Serge and Gilbert, he realized that the feeling of love was more important than biological factors.

"Well, forget about that. You  said you're confused what you feel, what exactly confuses you?" - Pascal asked, motioning for Carl to calm down and sit down again.

"I don't know exactly, maybe I just admire him a lot and I'm confusing things..." - The youngest replied, with his usual shy way.

The two were silent for a while, the scientist was thinking of some way to help his friend understand what he was feeling. The questions were useless, he knew he felt something for Serge, but he wasnt sure what it was. Until suddenly, the older boy had an idea: he wanted to find out if Carl was attracted to other boys, just so he could discover the kind of feeling he had for the pianist.

"There is a way to make you understand what you feel." - Pascal said, with a smile from someone who made a discovery.

"Whatever it is, I am accepting it, I can't take this feeling anymore." - The dark haired boy spoke, showing a little excitement.

Seing that his idea had a good reception, he continues with what he was doing:

"Sit in front of me." - He says, right after that Carl gets up from the chair and puts it in front of his friend, before sitting down again.

The two are close, with only a slight inclination their face would meet. Carl seemed a little apprehensive, he was not used to being so close to people, but the desire to find out what he was feeling was bigger than any fear.

"Let's do an observation experiment, the fuction of it is to relax your mind and let your subconscious guide you." - Pascal explains to his friend, carefully analyzing every trace of his face.

"And will it help me understand and get over what I'm feeling?" - The youngest question, curious about what comes next.

"Maybes yes or maybe not, it's very relative. What matters most is the moment itself and how you felt." - The scientist explains, reassuring his friend.

"Okay, I accept. What do I need to do?" - Carl asks, determined to continue with that.

"I'll explain, but first I have to ask you...Do you trust me?" - The redhead asks, with a serious expression, showing that he expected an exact answer.

Carl did not hesistate, he trusted Pascal more than anyone else, perhaps even more than Serge. The two boys have know each other for a long time, have always been honest with each other and never keep secrets from either of them. In all the bad times, the scientist was there to help him, and vice versa.

 The answer was obvious to Carl, he trusted his friend and knew that he would never do anything bad to him.

If I could choose from all the people in the world to know one of my secrets, It would obviously be you. The one who never judged me, even though I was wrong. The one who was by my side in difficult time.

"Yes, I trust you." - The religious boy replied, assuring the eldest that everything was fine.

CONTINUED IN THE NEXT CHAPTER

Written by KimKymury, thank you for reading <3

[whitecatgraycatblackcat]

Fictober 2020, Day 2

Prompt: “That’s the easy part”

Original Fiction

Rating: G

Warnings: None

Word Count: 1396

“That’s the easy part!? Are you kidding me?” 

I gestured down to myself, at my torn clothes with a few slits in the sleeves and a scorch mark on one of my shoes. I had had a few too many close encounters, and my clothes showed it. Lia smirked. “Yeah, easy peasy.”  She still looked pristine, with only a few small slits on her right sleeve.

I just rolled my eyes. “Alright, where do we go from here, leader?” I couldn’t help the sarcasm that crept into my voice at the end - this had been Lia’s hare-brained plan from the beginning, and she had only barely convinced me to come along. At this point I was pretty sure I should have stayed home. 

She gave me a pat on the shoulder. “Don’t worry, we’re almost there. We just have to go down this hall, take a right, then a left, then another right, jump across a short gap, then go one floor up.” I narrowed my eyes at “jump”, but kept my peace. “Alright, and what makes this worse than before?”

Lia pursed her lips. “Wellll, the part we’re going into now is even higher security than where we were, so the bots are going to be a few grades higher and a few kliks faster.”

I stared at Lia. “What? I barely made it past the first set, and now you’re telling me the bots ahead of us are even worse?” She gave me a grin. “You made it past them, though, right? And now you know what to expect.” I grumbled, and then acquiesced. “If you had given me more info upfront, I could have been better prepared.” She replied, “Yeah, but I couldn’t, so here we are.” 

I turned to face the direction she said to go. “Fine, let’s just go. You lead the way.” She nodded, then walked past me. We crept along the hallway, trying to be as silent as possible so we didn’t set off any alarms. We had almost made it to the last turn when Lia accidentally tripped a sensor. Immediately panels in the walls slid open and five bots came out. 

I could tell at a glance they were higher grade than the previous ones, and I wanted nothing to do with them. I leaped over Lia and the bots and started to run down the hall, stopping after I turned the corner. I knew Lia wouldn’t have too much trouble getting out of the situation, but I still wanted to check. She was barreling toward me, a goofy grin on her face and all five bots behind her. She kept zig zagging and jumping to miss the shots they were firing at her. As she got closer she called, “Your turn up next.” 

I didn’t know what she meant until I turned to look down the hall. The “gap” she had mentioned was twenty feet across, and now I knew the reason she had been so insistent on me coming with her. I gave a deep sigh. 

She came around the corner at a run, and as she did so I grabbed her and then jumped, unfurling my wings to their full span and rising to be out of reach of the bots. “I can’t believe this is why you were so insistent on me coming. You should have warned me at least.” She just smirked and said, “I told you, I couldn’t, and anyways, I knew you definitely wouldn’t come if I told you about this.” I rolled my eyes. She had me there. 

I set us both down on the opposite side, careful to look around and make sure nothing was waiting for us. She noticed and replied, “We should be good for now, but let’s go. There should be stairs down the hall and to our right, and then the room is just off the stairs on the next floor up.” I nodded, giving my wings one more stretch and then carefully folding them back into their customary place against my back. No need to get a sprained wing out of this.

We crept the rest of the way, Lia taking more care than before since she had set off the last sensor. We made it up the stairs and down a hall, and then Lia motioned to a door. “Through here”, she whispered. We slipped through the door into a darkened room.  I looked around, trying to tell why we were here, but Lia just motioned to go behind the desk. “We have to wait here, but,” she glanced over at a clock on the wall, “it shouldn’t be more than fifteen minutes or so.” I raised my eyebrow at her checking the clock and us having to wait, but I had come this far and figured I might as well trust her until the end.

It felt like forever, but eventually we heard the door open, and someone walked in, turning on the lights as they entered. As soon as the lights turned on Lia popped up, motioning me to do the same. I wasn’t insane, so I stayed crouching for a half second and heard her say, “Hello Mr. Haight, I hope you’re doing well this evening.” 

At that I slowly stood up. So this was what she was up to. I saw a flabbergasted older gentleman looking at Lia and I. He was clean shaven, in a suit and apparently finishing up work for the day since he had his briefcase in hand. He stuttered as he said, “M-Ms. Lia, I wasn’t expecting you. H-how did you get in?” He looked around the room, as if he would be able to see an explanation laying around somewhere. 

Lia simply gave a large smile and bowed. “Mr. Haight, you did hire me to audit your security system, and I just wanted to back-up my proposal. You seemed hesitant to believe that your system might not be sufficient for your needs, and I figured that giving you direct proof would be easier than me showing you charts and numbers. Especially if it was two ladies such as ourselves testing it, security amateurs.” She moved back against a bookshelf as she spoke, so that she could motion to both of us. I could tell from her tone what kind of client he was, and I snickered to myself. He really shouldn’t have gotten on Lia’s bad side.

Lia continued, “Your security is fully automated, with the latest tech and bots, but that’s your problem. Fully automated feels safer, but it’s bound to miss things that humans watching video cameras wouldn’t. Splitting your building into separate quadrants for security may feel more efficient and be cheaper, but it means no one has an integrated view and one quadrant may not always notify another of an issue.”

Mr. Haight still looked confused, but he slowly nodded. “Alright, Mrs. Lia, I see your point. I’ll set up a meeting so that we can discuss this in more detail.” 

She gave another small bow. “Thank you, Mr. Haight. I hope you won’t mind if we take a shorter way out?” He nodded and waved his hand, still looking rather out of it, “Yes, go right out of this room and the elevators will be on your left just down the hall.” 

Lia gave another small nod and then left, with me on her heels. Once we were outside the building and a few blocks away I said, “Really? Security? I thought your policy was to tell the truth to clients.” She smirked. “Well, it’s true for me at least, and what he doesn’t know won’t hurt him.” I gave her a side-eye at that comment. She was the one in security -- wasn’t she supposed to have the morals?

“Well, whatever. Does this mean tonight was charity? Based on your phrasing I thought I’d be getting something out of this.” She smirked again. “Don’t worry, once I get paid I’ll give you your cut.” 

I shrugged. “Good enough. I would have made more my way, but, you know, to each their own.” She gave me a side-eye at that, so I grinned back. Thieves and security consultants don’t always have to be on two separate sides, after all.

[365daysofsasuhina]

[ 365 Days of SasuHina || Day One Hundred: Culture Shock ] [ Uchiha Sasuke, Hyūga Hinata, Uchiha Itachi ] [ SasuHina, death ] [ Verse: Divine Light ] [ AO3 Link ]

“May I ask you something?”

Looking up from his blank-minded stare into the campfire, Sasuke blinks before giving a nod.

“Do you…” A pause as Hinata tries to think of how to phrase her query. “...did you ever live anywhere with other el’ven people?”

“Yeah...why?”

“...I think I did when I was very young, but...I can’t quite remember. Most of what I do recall is our home in the countryside. Where we met. So, before you...beyond my family, I can’t remember meeting any other el’ven. I do remember fleeing...and when my m-mother died. But I can’t remember why, beyond the reasons my father tells me.”

“Which was?”

“Fighting broke out. Things have always been...tense between those who wield ven and those who don’t, o-of course. But for some reason, things had reached a peak that day, and...we ran. I can’t remember anything of the city we’d lived in. Someday...I think I’d like to go back.”

“Your story isn’t uncommon,” Sasuke assures her, using a bit of magic to stoke the fire. “Ever since the Rift - when the el’ven and the el’kor finally broke into war - most of our kinds have gone into hiding or seclusion. In some places, it got so bad, entire cities were left abandoned.”

Sasuke gives a nod to the sleeping mage of light. “...the place we’re going, the Luxerian capital, is one such city. Rumor has it, the Elemental themself put a dome of magic over the city to keep it untouched by any el’kor seeking to loot it. It’s stood empty since the day of the coup at the Elemental Summit.”

“...if that’s true, then...how will we get in?”

“She seems to think if she goes, something will happen. For a while now, everyone’s believed her kind extinct. So there haven’t been any other lux’el’ven to try it. But maybe with her ven, she can bring down the barrier...or at least let us pass through it. And there...she thinks we’ll find a way to fully cure my brother of his illness. Which,” Sasuke adds, shifting position atop his log, “is the only reason I agreed to this hare-brained adventure.”

Hinata hums, lost in thought. “...so, why did you leave...where you were before?”

“Same as you. Fighting broke out, and it wasn’t safe to stay. My whole clan lived in that city...and we were scattered to the four winds. My father was clan head. A huge influence in our city. And now? He lives in hiding with his family in the woods.”

“...was it...d-did anyone die?”

“Plenty. Ironically enough, it was the night we were putting one of our own to rest. A friend of the two who raised the light mage. He’d been there when they found her. Died trying to save her mother. We were just lighting the funeral pyre when -”

“W-what?!”

Sasuke startles, not expecting to be interrupted. “...what?”

“You burn your dead…?”

His brow furrows. “Well, yeah...we’re disciples of Ignitrios. The Elemental of fire. What better way to return to the earth than as ashes?”

Hinata’s face is full of horror. “But…”

“Well, what do your people do?”

“We...we return to the place of our birth, which - i-if done properly - is near a body of water. The ocean, a lake, a river...anything like that. And we’re returned to the water.”

“So, fish food?”

It’s Hinata’s turn to frown. “...our people are connected to the water. Of course we go back to it.”

“Yeah. Just like we go back in fire.”

“But that’s so...gruesome!”

“So is being a soggy corpse! You’d rather be waterlogged and wrinkly than -?”

“All right you two...that’s enough.”

They both look over, quieting as they see they’ve woken Itachi. “...brother, you should be sleeping -”

“I was,” Itachi replies good-naturedly, carefully taking a seat beside his brother. “But it’s a bit noisy tonight.”

Both young elves look aside, sheepish.

“Not to worry. A little missed sleep isn’t going to kill me.”

Sasuke flinches. “You shouldn’t talk of your health so lightly -”

“I’m fine, Sasuke. I do a little better every day, thanks to my new treatment. Admittedly, I’m still weak...but not to a degree that a short night’s rest will ruin me. Worry not.”

Still, Sasuke and Hinata both look thoroughly chastised.

“So, discussing the differences in our culture, are we? It must be quite a shock...especially given how isolated you’ve both been since you were young. I imagine that - before the Rift, when we were all far more connected (as we should be) - such differences were more openly discussed, and therefore a bit easier to swallow. The ven in our veins means a different calling when death finds us. Though we all relinquish our two forms - the spirit granted to us by Luxeria, and the body by Tenebreos - when we die, our methods for how each are treated vary, as dictated by our beliefs stemming from our patron Elementals.”

“...I suppose that makes sense,” Hinata admits quietly. “It’s just so…”

“Each element treats it differently. Therian disciples, for example, are the most direct: they bury their dead into the earth to be taken back into the dirt.”

Both Hinata and Sasuke startle “What?”

“But that’s so...so…!”

“Strange, yes? To us both, it is. But for them, it’s how they feel the most connected to Thera when they die. Just as Ignitrian disciples burn their dead, and Auquianan disciples return theirs to the water. Our elements are part of us...and so we are part of them, when the time comes.”

The group goes quiet, lost in their thoughts, until Hinata speaks up. “...what about Luxerians? What do they do?”

“That, I will admit, I do not know. And given her upbringing by those outside her bloodline, I doubt our companion knows, either. Perhaps such knowledge isn’t completely lost, however - it may yet be found in the old Luxerian capital. There may be a great number of things we may find there thought lost to the ages. Luxeria’s protections, I hope, have kept such things safe...awaiting the return of their line.”

“Well...hopefully funeral rites for a lux mage aren’t something we’ll need any time soon,” Sasuke mutters. “We need her alive to keep you alive.”

“Indeed we do...but she has far greater tasks to attend to than the life of one igni mage, my dear brother. For that reason and many more, we must endeavor to keep her safe.” With that, Itachi claps Sasuke atop the shoulder. “Now...I think I’ll try to get some sleep before it’s my turn to keep watch. Wake me when it’s time to trade.”

“...all right.” Watching him go, Sasuke sighs.

“So,” Hinata asks, smiling teasingly. “If I die on this journey of ours...will you take my body to the ocean?”

“No.”

She sharply frowns. “...why not?”

All this talk of death...it bothers him. Not with his brother’s health still on the line. And Hinata, she…

“...because I’m not going to let you die,” Sasuke retorts, getting to his feet. “...I’m going to patrol the area. We’ll wake them when I return.”

Looking a bit taken aback, it takes Hinata a moment to nod, watching him go. Gaze then dropping to the campfire, she mulls over his words in silence.

...neither will I, Sasuke.

     So I know this crossover (technically with my own original lore) isn't the most popular, BUT...I thought it'd make sense for the prompt! I could have done AtLA, but...I wasn't sure I knew enough to make it work. My own lore, of course, I know inside and out. So I hope you'll indulge me =P      Each of the twelve elements in DLDS handles death differently. Even the atmosphere of funerals can vary widely: some are somber, serious occasions, while some are more akin to celebrations. So to say that the differences can be shocking - especially in the time period this crossover takes place in, being that when the el'ven people are still mostly in hiding - is a bit of an understatement.      Anywho, that'll do it for today! Thanks so much for reading n_n

[talkagency]

10 COMMON SEO MYTHS DEBUNKED 2019

SEO is like having a child. It constantly needs attention, rarely does what you expect, and it’s pretty much a full-time job!

Huge algorithm shifts and years of outdated information and mistruths has made it a minefield. You think you’re moving in the right direction… then BOOM! 

With so much misinformation and so-called “facts” waiting for you at every turn, it’s hard to know what’s effective and what is defective.

Most information is wildly outdated. What worked 5 years ago could be as useless as a waterproof tea bag today.

Google is much smarter than people give it credit for. Huge advances with AI and deep machine learning lets it understand much more than it ever has before.

So, let’s get started. How many of these common SEO myths are you going to be guilty of in 2019?

1 – Using Exact Match Keywords in Content

This might have been true up to a few years ago. But with Google’s evolution, exact match keywords in your content no longer need to be quite as exact.

Technological advancements, such as LSI keywords (latent semantic indexing) help search engines like Google gain a deeper understanding of your content context.

As voice search is set to account for more than 50% of all searches by 2020, natural sounding speech is not only recommended, but encouraged. It’s time to optimise content for voice based searches.

This means that using stop words in your keywords and utilising semantically related phrases can both work to help your SEO efforts.

You can write for the search engines using unnatural sounding keywords. And sure, you might get the rankings that you want. But when the user faces unnatural sounding content, you can bet your bottom dollar that they are going to bounce like a rubber ball!

Just to show you that stop words and word order don’t interfere with primary keyword search volumes and top three placement, here are a few screenshots of variants of one keyword:

See, the keyword may not be an exact match, but its intent remains the same… and Google knows this.

And the first page ranking for the top 3 websites using each variation?

    Top 3 sites are identical across the board. And every single site on the first page remains on the first page. Clever old Google!

If you can weave an exact match into the title or headings, awesome. But the main thing to remember here is that  Google focuses on user intent… and has done for several years now.

Forcing unnatural keywords into your text creates poorly constructed content. And that can cause more damage than good to your rankings.

Focus on checking how each variation weighs up and check the metrics, then use a mix of them if you can. Stop words (articles, conjunctions, etc.) are rapidly rising in search volume, so ignoring them is not really best practice.

Even Yoast, an avid campaigner for avoiding stop-words has backtracked on its previous stance.

Remember: poor user experience = high bounce rate. High = bounce rate is a signal your content isn’t delivering.

2 – SEO is About Ranking Number One on Google

Taking that top spot on the first page of Google is what everyone aims to achieve, and that is a good target to have.

But here’s the thing:

Whether you rank number one, number five or number 10 on the first page of the SERPs, your organic site  traffic is going to explode.

When people perform a search, they rarely only ever visit one page. When it comes to gathering information, several sources are usually required.

So while you definitely want to have your keywords rank on the first page of the SERPs, hitting number one is no more advantageous than hitting number five.

And even if you do hit that top spot on Google, rich snippets, PPC ads, Google’s answer box, maps and more are still likely to be above you.

For ranking success, it’s all about being on page one, not being number one. So focus on a broad range of keywords instead of trying to push just one or two into the top spot.

3 – Google Penalises Duplicate Site Content

This is a big one that circulates worldwide. You’ll see it left, right and centre… and it’s really not what some people make it out to be.

In fact, Google have confirmed on more than one occasion that duplicate content does not result in site penalties.

So what is actually going on here?

Let’s say that you’re a new website and you have simply copied and pasted content from another site onto your own…

Google doesn’t look at it and say “this is duplicate content, let’s give them a penalty.” It just ignores the content completely!

And this is where this myth arose from.

People were snatching content and using it on their own sites… and not ranking for it. Even though the site they took it from was on the first page!

The search engines know that duplicate content happens on a website for several reasons. So no, you are not going to be penalised for it.

However, now that you know Google simply ignores duplicate content, any duplicate content you have should be optimised so that it can rank in the SERPs.

4 – One Tool can Fix it All

You’ll see tools everywhere on the internet claiming that they have an all-in-one solution for fixing your SEO.

In a perfect world, this would be true. But this world is far from perfect… 

That is not to say that there are not some truly useful SEO tools out there. But none of them are a magic solution to instantly fix all of your SEO problems on your behalf.

One of the best SEO tools that anyone can use for their website is SEMrush. Automated report detailing exactly what needs to be changed or fixed go a long way with pointing you in the right direction.

Of course, unless you are a site developer with a detailed knowledge of how to execute everything in the report, you’re going to find it tough.

Luckily, the internet is filled with useful ‘how-to’ guides and forums where you can find all of the guidance and information you need to crack on with it.

If you don’t perform a regular site audits, you won’t know what needs to be fixed. And any software that says it can fix everything for you automatically, well… we have a magical unicorn for sale for just $100,000.

5 – Header Tags are Irrelevant

Nope. Header tags are not and have never been irrelevant. 

Now, we are not saying that they are a major ranking factor. Nor are they the be-all and end-all of your pages syntax.

But they definitely go a long way with helping Google and the other search engines understand your website’s content.

Using your primary keywords and semantically related keywords in your title, H1 and H2 headers, along with in your content can have a positive effect on your SEO efforts.

6 – No Sitemap Equals No Ranking

Here’s another common myth that circulates the internet like a fly around your head in summer.

Now, we are not denying that having a sitemap is useful. After all, it helps the search engines get a deeper understanding of your site structure.

However… not having a sitemap does not have an impact on where your site will rank in the SERPs.

This is especially true for small sites that have properly structured site navigation. 

Of course, the larger your website is, the more a sitemap will help the search engines understand what they are looking at. And then crawl an index it much faster.

But the main point to take home from this is that having a sitemap will not boost your rankings… just help the search engines crawl and index with ease. 

Not a bad thing to have really. But not the end of the world if you don’t.

7 – Avoid Outbound Links

You’ve probably heard this one before, but it goes a little something like this…

having too many outbound links on your website will pause your PageRank to drop.

First things first: PageRank is long gone for SEO average Joe’s. 

Anyone who uses PageRank as a reason not to use outbound links needs to build a time machine and head back to 2013… you know, when the Google toolbar got rid of it.

The only ones who measure PageRank are Google… and as is becoming more and more common with the search engine giant, what happens in Google stays in Google.

Secondly: Google does not penalise people for using outbound links. In fact, it looks like the complete opposite. Websites linking to authoritative and useful resources are actually rewarded.

Yes, it’s true that the website you linked to receives a little bit of your domain authority. But you know what? That’s the whole point of outbound links.

You are voting for the site that you link too by telling Google “hey, I vouch for this site.” 

Of course, you need to make sure that any site or content that you linked to is related to your page content or niche. 

Want to save some of your link juice? Throw in a ‘nofollow’ tag. 

At the end of the day, if there were no outbound links used on the internet, there would be no inbound links (backlinks).

Just make sure that what you linked to makes total sense to the search engines when it looks at both website’s content.

8 – Blackhat SEO Doesn’t Work

This is something that we’re not too happy to admit to… but blackhat SEO absolutely can work when done right. Especially when performed by someone who knows what they are doing.

But just because something works doesn’t make it right. And black hat SEO is seriously risky business for your website.

Just like the black market, black hat SEO usage loopholes, underhanded tactics, and often goes against the rules set by the search engines.

Sure, you could pay someone to cheat your way to the top. But when Google finds out, and Google always finds out, your business will be banned (de-indexed) from the search engines.

This is why, although dodgy tactics can work, it’s always better to play by the rules and develop your SEO strategies over time. 

Building your rankings and developing your website is a marathon, not a sprint. Be the tortoise, not the hare… and reap the rewards for decades to come.

9. Meta Descriptions are a Ranking Factor

A few years back, meta descriptions were taking into account as part of the ranking decision.  2009 saw this all change.

Now, while meta descriptions are no longer a ranking factor, that’s not to say that they are not important. They are!

We like to keep bouncing back to user experience (UX), and a meta description can really help.

Google might not care about it anymore, but people do. It gives them an insight into what the content is about and if it’s what they are looking for.

Plugins, such as Yoast can help you create a personalised meta description. This prevents any text from being cut off in the SERPs. Thus giving the user a complete picture of what lies ahead.

A keyword here or there won’t hurt. After all, the meta description is read by the search engines for further content context.

But the main thing to remember is to always write for people and not the search engines.

10. Link building is More Important than Content

This one is probably one of the most ridiculous one on this list. link building is more important than content! 

See, if you dedicate all of your time to link building, you have no time for creating content.

And here is where the problem lies.

Without quality content, people have nothing to link back to!

Of course, link building is hugely important when it comes to SEO. And having several high-quality links pointing to your site can help the search engines decide when to show you over the competition.

But to be able to attract these highly sought-after links, you first need to focus on providing high-quality content.

In fact, high quality content can generate organic links that you don’t have to work on to get.

When it comes to SEO, content is king and backlinks are brilliant. But your main focus should be content that offers value and generates natural links before moving on to link building strategies.

Final Thoughts

If you really want to know which SEO methods work, ignore what the ‘so-called’ experts are saying and look at what they are doing.

If they tell you that meta descriptions should be less than 140 characters, but they use 160, they aren’t practicing what they preach.

If they say that you’re header body copy should be less than 300 words and then go on to use 600, again, they go against what they say.

Site speed not important? Yet their site loads almost instantly… you can guarantee they spend time and money making sure it is as fast as possible.

Basically, what we are saying is that while the internet is filled with useful SEO advice, take what you read with a pinch of salt.

Many people don’t mean to add fuel to the fire by spouting out more and more myths and outdated information. But this is where a little bit of research truly comes into play.

Focus on what works… but don’t be afraid to try new methods.

For more guides about SEO, SEM, PPC, digital marketing and useful tools and software, check out our blog today.

Article first published here: 10 COMMON SEO MYTHS DEBUNKED 2019

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Important historical references for Castlevania fics

Castlevania III: Dracula’s Curse and the Netflix series based on it are both set in the late 15th century in Wallachia (now the southern part of Romania).  For those of you who don’t specialize in history from this period, there are a LOT of things that were dramatically different back then that you probably never heard about.

So here’s a list of things that the average person might not know about food and clothing, that are relevant to Castlevania fics and other stories written in that time period:

(and it’s a LONG ONE, so I’m putting it behind a cut.)

First, fabrics.  Cotton was rare and expensive, and is actually harder to dye than the other fibers available at the time.  Cotton only became cost-effective for the average person to buy a few centuries later, when slavery--and later, mechanical separation of the seeds and other debris from the boll--drove the cost of production down.  (Well, the financial cost, anyway.  Ethically, this was obviously Not Good.)  Commoners were as unlikely to wear cotton as silk or ermine.

So what did most people wear?  Linen, wool, and leather.

Let’s start with linen.  Linen is made from flax, which has very strong fibers.  It is first soaked in water for a few months to soften up the fibers (yes, this means that flax has to rot before you can use it to make cloth).  The fibers are then spun and woven into linen fabric.    Linen is lightweight and cool in the summer, and because it’s soft, sturdy, and easy to wash, most undergarments and nightclothes were made of linen.

Wool, as most people know, comes from sheep.  Just like in the game Minecraft, you get wool by carefully clipping it off a sheep with shears.  (Modern shears are electric and look like the clippers used by a barber to cut human hair.)  An experienced shepherd is very good at shearing a sheep without cutting the skin, getting most or all the wool off.  Wool takes most natural dyes very easily, requiring only the dye itself and some kind of acid to use as a mordant.  (A mordant is basically the chemical that makes the dye “stick” to the fabric.)  I have literally dyed wool yarn with Kool-Aid and boiling water; the unsweetened packets contain food-safe dyes and citric acid.  Wool is basically AWESOME to use for your outer garments.  It’s warm, relatively water-resistant when felted, it wicks away sweat from your skin and undergarments, and it STAYS WARM EVEN WHEN WET, which is a good thing when modern waterproof fabrics don’t yet exist.  Equally importantly, knitted wool was the one natural material that could stretch, so socks and hosiery could be made skin-tight.  Spandex and elastic were a good 400 years in the future.  One reason black sheep were less common and less desirable is because black wool is too dark to dye, and thus makes fewer clothing colors than white or brown wool.  (This is also where the phrase “black sheep of the family” comes from.)

Leather is animal skin that’s been specially prepared to not rot off and stink.  It’s a bit more water-resistant than felt, though it can still get ruined if you let it get soaked through.  Most leather today is made from cows or pigs, but deer and goat leather make a softer leather and would also have been used.  “To handle with kid gloves” comes from the fact that the softest, thinnest gloves were made from kids (baby goats).  Kid-leather is banned today for ethical reasons.  A prepared sheepskin with the wool still on would have made for a super-warm blanket or rug, but wasn’t all that cheap.

Most women spent half the year spinning wool and linen into threads; it was simple enough (although VERY time-consuming) that you could spin while doing other things, and common women definitely did.  During the winter months, when you were stuck inside most of the time anyway, the weaving and sewing would take place.  Most spinning would have still been done with the drop spindle; spinning wheels existed, but they were still very uncommon.

So what color were clothes?  Well, a natural undyed cream color was more likely than pure white--bleaching fabric still involved urine and was a major hassle.  As for dyes, most of them came from plants or insects, and you could get just about any color except royal purple, a deep scarlet, or royal blue (because the sources of these shades were rare and difficult to harvest).  Sypha’s robes would probably have been dyed with woad, which produces the same pigment as the indigo plant (the same indigo that’s used to dye blue jeans).  For more information on dyes from this time period, or how it was done, I’d recommend you click here or here.  (This section is long-winded enough already.)

For the actual fashions of the time, check out the “Central Europe” section of this article, the late-15th-century part of this article, and if you don’t mind fudging it (since heaven knows Alucard’s tight leather pants aren’t period), the early 16th century works too.

Undergarments of the time include: the chemise (full-length for women, waist-length for men), the codpiece, early corsets, hose, and petticoats.  Underpants as we know them probably didn’t exist yet.

FOOD

Most of us know that people used to eat very differently than they do now, but aside from “well, there wasn’t a McDonald’s or anything,” that’s about it.  So here’s what you need to know about food.  (For a more in-depth look, this reddit post is pretty good.)

Dairy would have been milk, cream, and butter near a dairy farm, and mainly cheese elsewhere.  Cheese not only keeps for a very long time, but sharp cheeses actually get stronger and better with age.  There were dozens of varieties, and they would have made up a fair bit of your protein unless you were wealthy enough to eat meat every day.  (Commoners weren’t.)

Beans and nuts were your primary source of protein if you were a commoner.  They were cheap, shelf-stable, and easy to cook.  Just leave some beans and barley in a pot of boiling water for a few hours with your other ingredients, and you’ve got a filling meal.  Not all beans or nuts are European, but you’re pretty safe if you stick to: lentils, hazelnuts, chestnuts, peas, broadbeans, flax, almonds, walnuts, chickpeas (garbanzos), 

Grains were the staple food, and as such, you had them in stews, beer, and bread every day.  You know how the KJV of the Bible says things like “man shall not live by bread alone” and “give us this day our daily bread?”  That’s because bread was the ONE FOOD you were guaranteed to have at every meal, so the word “bread” was often used to refer to food in general.  If you had celiac in the Middle Ages, your life was pretty much guaranteed to suck.  Maize existed in parts of the Old World, but was only used as animal feed; “corn” was instead a general term for ALL grains, instead of the name of the yellow stuff that grows on a cob.  Bread was made of rye, wheat, millet, or barley, all of which were and still are quite common in Europe.  And yes, oatmeal was also A Thing.

Other vegetables you’d find in Europe in the 15th century included cucumbers, radishes, carrots, lots of varieties of onions, dandelions (yes, they’re edible), celery, broccoli, asparagus, spinach, beets, Brussels sprouts, cabbage, kale, garlic, parsnips, and cauliflower.  Since spices were expensive, most people seasoned their food with herbs like basil, thyme, parsley, rosemary, oregano, chives, cloves, bay (laurel), wormwood, and dill.  Eggplants are not originally native to Europe, but they were brought over from Asia during the Middle Ages, so people definitely knew about them and cooked with them.  And of course, edible mushrooms have been eaten pretty much everywhere in the world you can find them, including damn-near all of Eurasia.

Note what is not on the list.  There were no potatoes in Europe.  It is a New World vegetable.  Potatoes weren’t imported into England and Spain until the 16th century, and didn’t reach the rest of Europe until the early 17th century.  They quickly became popular because they’re cheap, easy to grow, and calorie-dense, which is why a lot of traditional Irish food from the last 4 centuries has potatoes in it.  Do not write potatoes into a story set in the 15th century.  DON’T DO IT.  History buffs get very angry when you get potatoes wrong.  A lot of people are mad at the Witcher series for having potatoes in Poland at about the same time period, 100 years before they would have made it there.  Tomatoes are also a New World crop, as are pumpkins, peanuts, cranberries, maple syrup, chocolate and quinoa.  Don’t include any of them in your story either.

Fruits in the part of Eastern Europe we’re looking at would not have included bananas or citrus; the time it took to transport non-native fruits would have made it impossible to get either one.  Here’s what fruits you were likely to actually find:  Blackcurrant, pears, quinces, raspberries, apples, plums.  You might find the following Mediterranean imports when they were in season, but they’d be less common since the plants themselves can’t survive cold winters:  black mulberry, dates, figs, olives, grapes, jujubes, pomegranates.  How common each of these would be depends on how long it can go without spoiling; when in doubt, check.  Dried grapes, of course, are shelf-stable and could well have been imported under the names raisins, currants, or sultana.

Meats were most often eaten by the wealthy, unless you count fish and shellfish, which were mainly seen as food for the poor.  (The idea that fish and lobster and delicacies for the rich would seem completely absurd to people before the 20th century.)  Chicken was uncommon; your hens were more useful as egg-layers than as meat.  Beef, pork, venison, rabbit/hare, mutton (sheep), lamb, goose, and duck were relatively common.  Turkey and salmon are both New World animals and would have been unknown in Europe.  Fish were very common and easy to catch compared to modern times (bodies of water hadn’t been overfished like they are today) and came in lots of varieties.  Oysters, mussels and the like were also harvested and eaten by the common folk.

[729renegades]

Leap Tomorrow…Today is all About The Plan

On a sunny morning in 1979, a bunch of 10-year-old boys got ready for a cross country race.

It was a big deal, this race – the start of school sports day. Okay, there was no prize as such, but honour was at stake!

They lined up, as their teacher set out the route. But too excited to listen, they talked among themselves. Chattering on about their sporting prowess and their chances of winning.

But 30 minutes later, their confidence turned to disbelief.

They were dumbfounded. Because no-one in their wildest dreams would have predicted the outcome…

See, the winner was a smallish boy who’d never come first in his life. Over any distance, he usually finished just ahead of the fat boys and the pale wheezy kid with the inhaler.

But never, ever first.

If someone had opened a book on the race, he was the 200-1 shot.

And yet, he did it. Stunned the whole field – breaking the finishing tape, with no-one else in sight.

How did he do it?

Well, not by running faster, that’s for sure! Technically, at least two dozen boys ran a better time that day.

No, this boy won for one simple reason:

Everyone else went the wrong way!

Be more like the other type: the one who looks before leaping

Their fate was sealed back at the starting line, when they were too busy talking to listen to the teacher.

Within a minute of setting off, they’d taken a wrong turn. The Alpha Male leading the pack, with the other boys following – just assuming that their leader knew where he was going!

Only the smallish boy thought to ignore the pack, and doggedly stuck to the designated route.

So, the faster boys were left stranded out in the open, looking for the finish line…while the unlikely hero plodded on and stole the glory.

Now, as you’ve probably guessed…

Yes, the boy in question was me.

I was no great shakes as an athlete. I could bowl a decent cricket ball, and hold a tennis racquet the right way up. But as a runner, I had no power at all.

I only won by staying on track.

But never mind me. For a moment, just imagine you’re one of those other boys.

You’ve given it your all. Run your hardest, till your lungs could burst. Pummelled your legs till they turned to jelly. But still pushed on, determined that you’ll sweep to victory…

…Only to find out, right at the end – it was a duff mission. Doomed to fail from the start.

As a 10-year-old, who thinks this stuff matters, you’d be devastated – right?

Hell, yeah.

And you know what?

This happens in marketing every single day

The masses won’t pay attention to detail, because they’re too distracted…too impatient…at the start. They just want to tear off and do it.

So they set off without a plan. Or with a flawed notion of where they’re headed, based on a few words they remember from the latest “Marketing Ninja”.

Then they follow each other blindly. All using the same half-baked tactics – and assuming there’s someone out in front who knows what the hell they’re doing.

Result: an epic fail. No matter how much promise or talent they show, it all goes south very quickly.

But you don’t have to go that way.

You could be more like the other type: the one who looks before leaping. Who quietly sets out with a clear route, and follows it.

I’m living proof – even a lesser talent succeeds with this approach!

Of course, this is not exciting. I’m urging you to be more tortoise than hare, and I know that’s deadly dull. Not as sexy as yelling “JFDI!” and charging right on in there.

But I’m sorry, it’s essential. If you want to break the finishing tape, there’s no other way.

That’s where my new book is coming from

It’s an antidote to the massively over-used phrase “JFDI”.

I’ve seen this coming. As a sales and marketing guy with a 20-year pedigree, I’ve seen the rise of “JFDI” from its early days.

It used to be a call to arms, to gee up procrastinators. Telling them to shake a leg and finally get started.

It was a pretty good thing. Back in those distant days.

But in the digital age, the self-styled gurus have claimed “JFDI” as their own. It’s come to mean, “Don’t think – just do”. As if there’s time for thinking later.

Nope – the time for thinking is now.

Unless you like the idea of strapping on a blindfold and hoping for a bullseye.

So here’s the deal…

I’m not suggesting for one second that you dedicate months – or even weeks – to the planning stage. Whether you’re starting a whole new venture, or a new campaign, you’ve got targets to meet and bills to pay…you’ve got to step up and take action.

But I am saying, there’s a balance: a happy medium, where you ask yourself a few vital questions…make a plan, write a brief…Before You JFDI.

Trust me, it’ll be time well spent.

For the last 13 years, I’ve worked solely as a copywriter and strategist. And I see people taking the wrong route every day.

It starts when they approach someone like me, asking – for example – “How much to write a sales letter?”

It might seem like a sensible question. But in truth, the decision to send a letter has come way too soon. They’ve jumped straight into a tactic, without considering strategy.

Meaning, they don’t know yet if a letter is their best option.

And it might not be. Think about it – with some digging, we could discover all sorts of issues. Like:

…For their chosen audience, an online campaign would be better.

…Or they’re right to use direct mail, but they’re targeting the wrong list.

…Or they’re making the wrong offer.

…Or they’re mailing at the wrong time.

…Or maybe there are underlying problems that need fixing first. It happens…

Example: a few years ago, a client hired me to write a letter that would generate leads for a call centre. But during the research phase, I unearthed a few gremlins:

Their call handling process was dreadful – so leads were getting lost in the system.

Their lead conversion was poor, because agents were working from a dud script.

Their follow-up was non-existent. If they didn’t close the deal on the phone, the prospect would never hear from them again.

Their sales tracking was weak. They didn’t know which marketing channels generated leads – so they couldn’t focus money and effort on the stuff that worked.

Plus, they had no testing process. No way to run one message against another, and declare a winner. So they’d never find the best possible versions of their letters and emails.

When I took this back to the client, we had to conclude that the whole sales funnel was broken…so it would have been crazy to refill it with expensive leads.

We needed to fix things first: work through the whole snag list before we’d deem it safe to invest in a new mailshot.

It delayed things, of course. But it was one step back to take two forward… a sensible move, you’d agree.

So – I’m asking you to do the same before you dive into a new project. To take some time at the start, to ask a few questions and make a few plans. And I hope my new book is going to help you through that process.

Of course, I don’t know you, and how much you know about this already – so you’ll have to forgive me if you feel I’m teaching you to suck eggs here and there!

That’s unavoidable, sorry, if we want to cover all bases.

So, the book starts with the much-debated question: what is marketing anyway? In this section, we quickly run through a dummy campaign to show you the thinking behind a decent strategy.

Then, we’ll work through the 7 major decisions you’ll need to make at the start: your target audience, your offer, your route to market, and more.

Then finally, we’ll turn it all into a watertight brief. We’ll go through a set of questions that will give your copywriter all the facts and emotional hooks they’re going to need.

Work through the whole thing, and you’ll have a sound basis for your next campaign.

If you like the sound of that, you can claim a free copy via the link below.

Then do your planning – make your decisions – before you start the race.

I promise, it’ll save you the misery of running at full pelt… only to realise you’ve been hurtling down the wrong track.

For a free copy of James’ new book Before You JFDI, go to www.jamesthecopywriter.co.uk.

  from Blog | 729renegades https://ift.tt/2VvN7zW

[dawnajaynes32]

HOW Design Live 2017: A Recap (Part 1)

by Maureen Adamo

HOW Design Live, the yearly gathering where designers can talk kerning, clients and the increasingly commonplace insanities of #creativelife and everyone totally gets it. As Stefan Mumaw likes to remind attendees in his networking event at the conference opening, “These are your people! This is your tribe.” And it’s true. The person next to you totally does understand where you’re coming from, whether you actually come from Miami, New York, Portland, LA, or the middle-of-nowhere-Kansas.

The themes of passion, productivity and voice took center stage from the get-go, creating a strong image of a world in which the designer-as-creator can thrive. If designers can relearn how to be themselves, if they can reach for more authenticity, it seems the experts and design leaders who spoke at HOW Design Live 2017 would be proud. In their words: Shake it up, get loud, be real, come back and play again tomorrow. As Sonja Rasula typified in her short presentation on embracing your inner weirdo, designers shouldn’t be afraid to bang the table sometimes, get passionately involved and be present: “NO! This font is better!”

This year, the conference programs were personalized — no cover alike for the more than 3,000 attendees, and each featured an inspirational quote from a past HOW speaker or thought leader. In the same spirit that the conference was framed by powerful words, I want to share the experience with a few insightful phrases I gleaned from this year’s speakers, starting with Tuesday’s and Wednesday’s sessions in the first of a two-post series.

Tuesday

Web Design Tools and Techniques for Print Designers

Jeremy Loyd and Ben Callahan, Sparkbox

“Every time you improve page load speeds, conversion goes up.”

Perhaps a dry start to the week, but wannabe slashies looking for a solid foundation in the crossover from print to web got a high-level overview of the techniques and processes Jeremy Loyd and Ben Callahan use in their work at digital agency Sparkbox. The masterclass session held an hour-and-a-half’s worth of info on everything from how to get projects started on the right note, with examples of kickoff exercises and research techniques (they use a lot of Google forms), to how they use a handful of tools and workflows to keep team members and clients on the same page, minimizing downtime incurred in rework and handoffs. Big ideas: Communicate the look of the project early and quickly, inform development with reusable templates and modules, and try pairing designer and developer in discrete work sessions to blast through snags and build a stronger team.

They offered collaborative notes on the conference at bit.ly/how2017. As of now, there are only a few sessions outlined, so any latecomers can add notes and help fill it out, or check back later to see what’s been updated.

Brian Collins

“Instead of minimum viable product, how about maximum f*#&@g love?”

This was such an amazing keynote on which to launch the conference and absolutely set the standard for all who followed. Brian Collins learned branding from his young exposure to the Catholic church, although it was essentially what could be deemed the bad old days of branding, perhaps. He experienced revival, in a close to literal sense, in seeing how religion was transformed into human connection, love and joy, when he encountered the uninhibited passion of the Chicago Mass Choir. Oh, and surprise! He brought them onstage — twice — and the whole world was filled with music and light. The lesson? We’re not designers of information, rules and regulations, systems or elitism. We’re designers of inspiration, of emotion, of hope.

You Gotta Make a Lot of Stuff Before You Can Make Stuff Like Yourself

Timothy Goodman

“I’d rather letter my own words horribly than someone else’s beautifully.”

For those who hadn’t been following the trajectory of the 40 Days of Dating co-conspirator and co-author (hello, anyone?), Timothy Goodman walked through how he became the guy who gets paid to Sharpie on walls. He said yes, took on editorial illustration to find his voice making tons and tons of work, cold-emailed a mentor or two when he got in over his head, and finally — the finishing move — politely ignored their advice when he saw the path to creating work that was uniquely his. Also, he’s over our collective obsession with hand-lettering other people’s quotes. Use your own words. 

Wednesday

Out of Juice: How to Replenish Your Creativity Well

Terri Trespicio

“Commit to one thing instead of half-assing everything.”

The same time I was thinking it, my neighbor said it: “Yeah, that’s so me.” 

Designers do have reputations for being a little distracted. There is so much shiny newness to elicit our attention and we’re ravenous consumers of culture, media, projects, hobbies and on and on and on. Which is great, because this informs our work. But it also can leave us a little empty when it comes to our own agendas, unable to leap at opportunity when it’s presented and broke when it comes to minting the currency of our craft, great ideas.

Pointing toward the work of the totally unpronounceable Mihaly Csikszentmihaly in his book on the subject, Trespicio thinks of creativity as a system, one that is used to transcend traditional ways of thinking, patterns or rules. It’s not a realm of mystery or exclusion, and as knowledge workers, everyone in business is entitled to think of themselves as artists.

In this light, she lays out some ground rules for how to keep the well overflowing, beginning with taking care of your vessel (that’s you, the physical body) with good sleep, diet and habits. I loved it when she said your mind is like a freshly fallen field of snow when you first wake up. If, like me, you’ve been searching for a metaphor to communicate the pristine quality you value in your late and early hours of the day, this one is perfect to try out on those who haven’t been getting the message about how disastrous you find morning headlines to be to your work. “Why would you let Matt Lauer trample on your snow?” Trespicio asks. Also, dream a little so you have some ideas in your back pocket in case anyone ever needs you to jump flat-footed into a project, like they do. Idle time is especially useful in cultivating those ideas, which Trespicio also finds incredibly important.

Slay Your Zombies, Slash Your Zigzags, Show Your Zing!

Sam Harrison

“Become unfamiliar with the familiar.” Sam Harrison, #HOWLive Invisible hulahooping with @zingzone pic.twitter.com/B4k9dRHrF6

— HOW Design (@HOWbrand) May 3, 2017

“Ideas happen at the speed of trust.”

If my back-to-back attendance of rut-busting creativity sessions means anything, it must be that it seems like it’s getting harder and harder to keep the juices flowing as everything else we’re asked to do takes greater precedence over doing our best work. You, too? Sam Harrison brought his wisdom to bear on my problem (and Terri was also in attendance at this session, so you really can’t get too much help in this area) with a prescription for keeping our minds loose and open: become unfamiliar with the familiar (take a peek at The Boring Conference to see what he means), avoid contempt for any idea before you start, don’t be afraid to play around with nonsense, leave technology behind every once in a while, stop self-limiting beliefs — and, for heaven’s sake, stop trying to be perfect. Perfectionism will hold you back; “Trying to make things perfect keeps you in place while others move forward.”

Malcom Gladwell, with DeeDee Gordon

“Do you want something bad now, or good a few weeks from now?”

Malcom Gladwell, who self-professedly has zero clients, proceeded to speak on behalf of designers and creative teams who deal with clients every day. While I think everyone in the room wanted to stand and slow clap when he said deadlines kill creativity, I immediately felt the cosmic vibration of every creative director in the world groaning in my head. And it was fantastic to hear him expound a tiny fable of the tortoise and the hare, in which the faster worker does get the job done speedily, but at a significant cost to quality, while the tortoise, who takes his time, submits a superior project in the end. The voice in my head this time was my own, though, and it said, “If only!” And I mean, if only we weren’t all feeling the pressure to be hares.

Gladwell says our world measures success by whether things are done on time, but asks what time has to do with creativity? To that end, he suggests we build diversity into our teams by working with people who are not only culturally diverse, but also diverse in performance traits. We shouldn’t be teams of only hares, or only tortoises. 

I didn’t attend sessions in which this happened, but I got the sense from the #howlive Instagram posts (which were awesome) that his proposal attracted immediate commentary from other speakers who followed. And I think that was partly because it’s a very attractive idea that we can fight for more time, push back against clients and managers for the weeks or months we need to do better work — our best work, even. However, I could also feel the controversial thread of thought snap in the air a bit, because deadlines can often be the beauty queen in the creative pageant, and maybe we’re too comfortable with how often we say when the project is wrapped, “We did what we could with the time we had.” Maybe we’re letting all that pressure to be hares go too far?

Gladwell was hardly the only speaker to address how shortcuts and compressed timelines are affecting design, though. Pentagram’s Natasha Jen dropped the mic on the popularity of the concept of design thinking, describing it as a form of shorthand aimed at non-designers, which raises the question, “Why are non-designers being asked to design?” Jeffrey Zeldman, of A List Apart, looked at the sameness of the web, and pointed to web frameworks as a culprit, because they present fast and easy ways for non-programmers to learn how to make websites. He asked, “Which one of two possible websites are you designing?” Oh, and let’s not forget David Carson, who’d really like us to stop using flush-left, all-caps headlines for quick and easy, go-to typesetting. These people are asking us to spend more time on the work, not less.

So while it may not be an easy or popular notion, questioning our use of and practices around time and the deadline could be of value, lest we become design thinkers, rather than design doers. 

Stay tuned for Part 2!

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