Impact and Reach

How effective are you at connecting with your audience? Do you even really know who your audience is? Who are you even speaking to anymore?  

These are questions many of us alive today have had to ask ourselves when we look in the mirror. However, it wasn't always that way. There was a time before the internet, before social media, and before smartphones. Technically, most of us alive today remember what it was like. There are those who refuse to enter the 21st century, and that's ok. It was a pretty cool century. The part I lived through, at least. 

Some of us decided to be a part of the new millennium and attempt to adapt along with the changing world instead of holding onto the past. And a few of us twentieth-century foxes shook our asses for attention long before it was the normal thing to do because of social media. As a writer and former actor, I know the drill. There was a time when what I was doing was an outlier, trying to pimp out my screenplays and books or my abilities as an actor. Back in an era when most people waited for a phone call to find out what everyone was up to. Now, everyone is the center of their own little universe, and a text message or a social media post is all you may hear from someone for months or years. Now everyone is an actor playing the role of a version of themself. These masks of sanity we know too well. And for many, that may be enough.

I learned a lot in the corporate world. Some of it was actually good. It's all research. Thankfully, for a storyteller, living life has two purposes: the experience of living life in this moment in time and research. And I love life and research. 

There are times I wonder why I am even shaking it anymore. I don't really do it for others. Those who had been listening as I used to bang on about the things that I was doing have drifted away. I suppose I still think it matters to tell stories, regardless if the audience is large or small. Whether it be here and now or somewhere down the road. It is, at its core, self-expression. Shining our inner light outwards.

I've definitely thought of just shutting it all down before. Just turn the lights off and lock the door. After the release of Monarch, I was exhausted and considered pulling the plug on this blog. I definitely took a step back from pumping out content. Just look at my blog archive on the right side of the page. The Writer's Realm has always been a place where I organize my thoughts and share where I am in my process. I can't tell you how many times over the past decade I have wondered if I should stop shaking things for attention. I mean, in the scheme of things, what does it all matter for anyway? 

It matters because the work still matters to me. And in the end, that is what drives us all—what matters to us. Besides, I really enjoy the process. Chasing a story, digging into my memories while also viewing and experiencing the world as it is. From a creative pulp emerges something familiar and yet different than what came before. And in the end, I enjoy sharing it with others, and I still like writing blog posts, too. The posts are less about me shaking my ass for likes or sales, and more about me reflecting on my process and looking forward to what comes next. The name itself tells you all you need to know. Could I have changed it to A Writer's Realm or The Writers Realm? Sure. But it was never meant to be about anyone other than me. I am the writer, and this is my realm. It is the only place where I have dominion. It is my courtyard, and where I choose to discuss and share things in my tiny area of the world. 

There is a scene in The Last Samurai that has stuck with me through the years—The Perfect Blossom. Nathan (Tom Cruise) and Katsumoto (Ken Watanabe) talk of poetry and war as they walk through a garden courtyard dotted with trees filled with pink cherry blossoms. It's a brief but powerful scene.    

Katsumoto is the last samurai, much like those of us still remaining from the 20th century are all that remain from a fading era. And yet we are still helping to shape this one. Hard to believe we are already over a quarter of the way through this century.

I feel fortunate to have grown up in a time before all of our lives became so connected to technology. Sure, we had phones, but they were landlines, and entertainment was also based on wires and paper pages, so you either had to listen to the radio, read a book, watch TV, play video games, or go to the movies. You can do all those things now while sitting on a rock in the middle of the desert or on a boat in the middle of a lake. And so I often remind myself how fortunate we were, even though it hasn't all been peaches and cream, to have lived in two different eras. 

One that, for my generation in my nook of the world, was relatively peaceful and that can be looked back on with actual fondness. It wasn't perfect, but it was hopeful. I fear many will not have that, knowing only complicated times and not having a sense of hope for the future. It is both easier and more difficult to plan for what comes next, and therefore, it is doubly difficult for those who don't have those experiences already that have shaped who they are. At least they are growing up with technology and can master it in ways that none of us could have imagined was possible back in the day. Even if we had been preparing for it all our lives, with science fiction predicting the future throughout the 20th century. Those who grew up with all that as background noise are now creating a version of that future. 

Every week, there is something new. Just the first month and a half of 2026, we've had massive updates with Kling 3.0, Seedance 2, Claude 4.6, Codex 5.3, Open Claw, & Gemini 3 Deep Think and 3.1.  (As you can tell, I sat on releasing this blog post for a few months, for whatever reason, because we now have even more amazing models released over the past two months since I started writing this blog.) Had any one of those models dropped on its own at any time before 2023, the world would have collectively lost its shit. 

We have entered the future. Not sure when that happened. Maybe it was 2020 or 2023.  It's not quite what we expected, and yet it is here. Soon we'll see robots in grocery stores. Don't ask me when, but it seems inevitable. Some people cannot get around like they used to. If they had their own personal robot assistant, not a chatbot, but a robotic humanoid, they could send their assistant out to run errands or help them get out of a chair, and so many other tasks around the home. 

There will also be the militarized versions as well. Killer drones and other devices are already here. Robots fighting other robots sounds ridiculous, but inevitable. How likely is it that we will leave this planet and make other planets our home? Whatever we do, AI will lead the way.

What small measure of influence might you or I have over what happens? That depends on our impact and reach. A few years ago, I started paying closer attention to the metrics on this blog. The numbers were so much greater than I expected, and yet there was little to no interaction from those who were visiting my blog and interacting with the posts. Then I realized the majority of interactions were likely bots. "Other" became my biggest fan. And that made me think about my impact and reach for today and tomorrow. 

As a storyteller, my objective has always been to express ideas and tell stories that have excited me enough to spend months and sometimes years creating them. The hope was always to be able to instill in others the thoughts and emotions I had felt when writing the stories. As a screenwriter, I learned to accept that most of my written work would go largely unread and rarely ever be seen on a screen. Why? Making movies and TV shows is, or was, a lot of work that used to involve a lot of people. We are ticking closer to the point that I have been waiting for. When one person can take their entire library of unpublished and unproduced work and transform it into the medium of their choice. 

This was one of the first things I thought about in 2023 after spending time with ChatGPT and Midjourney. Back then, things were very limited, but we all knew that things would continue to improve until we had reached a future that we had only seen in science fiction stories. We are there or thereabout now. And I have made changes to what I do as a result.

Twenty years ago, I never gave a thought to legacy. I was too busy trying to write every story that popped into my head. The result was that I would try to push a story to producers or publishers for a little while, and then get frustrated and jump back into my writing cave to write something else. I probably should have pushed harder to get more things published or produced, but since I didn't, I now have dozens of stories from the pre-AI era. Now, I can use my growing knowledge of AI to transform those stories into a variety of different media. 

I know that there is enough AI slop out there. We all see it every day and cringe, but things have gotten so much better than in those early 2023 days. In three years, we have gone from the ridiculous Will Smith eating spaghetti videos to seeing the Seedance videos of Tom Cruise fighting Brad Pitt. I am still not a fan of the live-action AI stuff; most of it still has moments of the uncanny valley peppered in. And once I can tell it is AI, I lose interest. That is why I am still less interested in AI video than some of the other mediums, for now.

I have started learning about AI agents, something that had been part of my plan last year. Unfortunately, back then, agents were not good enough for the workflows I needed. Hell, back then, I thought I might make a few apps to help people. I knew even then that software would become a thing of the past sooner rather than later. I just didn't realize it would happen in less than a year. I have learned so much since 2023, and yet I am still surprised every year by how quickly everything AI is improving. I did the right thing in building a writing app, not because I am making millions of dollars from it, but because it is something that I can use in my own workflow. And I am realizing now that my own workflow is more important than hitting a home run with each of the apps I had in mind last year.

Now I am focused on my own workflows, and Vis-à-vis being able to help others with their own. No, I will never be a content creator in search of engagement and clicks, but if I can help others, that has been something I have wanted to do since I started learning about AI in 2023. Yes, there is a ton of backlash against AI, and much of it is warranted, but AI is not going away. 

I am not worried about my impact and reach like I once was. My goal has always been to be true to myself and the stories that I write. I see no reason why I should change now. If anything, I am being even more true to myself by using AI to bring those stories to life instead of letting them grow dusty on a shelf. I am aware that not everyone will want to run out and read, watch, or interact with my stories. My intent is and always has been to tell stories. Would I like millions of people to enjoy them? Of course, but I will not lose sleep if that doesn't happen. My purpose is like someone who spends their life looking for the perfect cherry blossom. The chaos of the world can pass us by, but as long as we are true to our own purpose, then that is all that truly matters.

TWENTY SIX

If I were to approach 2026 as if I were twenty-six, how would I proceed? When I was 26, I felt all but invincible. I had already seen cracks in the facade of reality, but they were cracks and not giant chasms. I was in LA and had witnessed Nancy Regan being ridiculed by those closest to her, or at least those who were in her orbit. I was bartending a gig up in Beverly Hills and overheard these two idiots sitting at my bar, with the former first lady sitting alone at a table only several feet behind them. They were either her aides or some family relations. I've only brought it up a few times, but that moment stuck with me. Why? 

I thought it was disrespectful. The former president was still alive but suffering from Alzheimer's disease, and here was his wife still going to social functions, and instead of supporting her, these clowns were mocking her. It was pretty clear they had not taken her advice from the 80s and just said no to drugs, either. These guys were obviously living out of their noses, and it seemed so weird to have the woman who coined the phrase "Just say no to drugs" sitting there by herself as these insignificant clowns were geeked out of their minds, making fun of her. The irony was not lost on me.

I saw a lot of things back in those days. Not all of it was tinged with humor. My few years in LA were sensory overload, and I was kind of just taking it all in. My acting career was winding down, but my storytelling journey was taking shape. The century was nearing an end; I was primed for just about anything. 

A lot of water has passed under the bridge since then, though I still feel a connection to those times creatively. I know we are only granted a short stay here on this rock, yet I have always felt a need to be a part of the storytelling process. Whether that be as a consumer of the stories others tell, or in telling my own. 

When we are children, a great fiction is created for us. One such example is Christmas. It is a joyous time of year, but at its heart is a great fiction wrapped up in pageantry. A fiction masquerading as something wondrous, but also hiding its true meaning. We grow up and learn the truth about the world, and realize that these fictions are created to keep us happy and to provide us guidance. When in reality Christmas is the most important time of year because it marks the passage of time, and the beginning of a new year. I am not picking on Christmas. I love Christmas and celebrate all of it. I appreciate it for what it is, the history and deeper meaning of it, as well as the religious story wrapped around it. This is something every kid who celebrates Christmas must confront as they get older. It is a big part of growing up, and the falling of the veil of illusion should be something that is studied in greater detail. 

When I was 26, I thought a lot about such things. I was reading and writing poetry every day, and I was breaking down the doors of perception in an effort to better understand myself and the world around me. I miss those times. It was when I learned how to live on my own and not be codependent. It was a time of liberation and the dawn of big creative ideas. 

I am so thankful that I never became a celebrity actor. Sure, the money would have been nice, but the ability to disappear cannot be overvalued. I can't imagine having cameras snapping my picture anytime I sneeze in public. Awful. Did I ever want that? No, I wanted to get lost in an acting role that I truly loved, but I never sought fame. I wasn't cracked up for it, and I was never close to achieving it, thank goodness. 

In 2026, after spending much of last year slowly getting STORiCORE off the ground, I am eager to tell more stories. I have a novel series all but completed that I have been sitting on for years. Michaelmas is a part of the series. I am debating doing what I did with Michaelmas, which is to release it as an illustrated series. I've thought about releasing it as a graphic novel series, or even releasing it in even shorter segments as more of a comic series. I have a few other pulpy series that I could release as graphic novel series. There is also this novella/movie script I'd like to write. Could it also be a graphic novel? Yes, but I just want to get lost in writing again. 

I'd prefer to create graphic novels out of TV series or movie scripts I've already written. I have a dozen or so to choose from, and I can't see my first graphic novel being something I write from scratch. This is one of the main reasons I started STORiCORE. To produce fun and exciting content in different formats, as well as creating storytelling related apps. 

Last year, I came up with a few story ideas that I need to write as well. One of those would be a new type of story. New for me, at least. I've thought about writing an autobiography for several years, and I will at some point, but my new story idea is instead a fictional semi-autobiographical story inspired by my own experience over the past few years. 

While I have a number of stories I have been wanting to write, this is my first quality story idea of the new year. Last year was all about starting STORiCORE, my first "official" company. As a writer, you are your own company, and when I created a few short films a decade ago, I produced those as if they were each part of my company. So, I had been laying the groundwork for a while. However, I never filled out the paperwork and paid the fees to actually be a company until last year. 

The 1st Draft App was only the first app I intended to create. It is a tool that I am using and will continue to use in my writing process, but I made it for anyone wanting to write a story. It is meant to be used from the first idea until the completion of the 1st draft. It's simple and easy enough to use that anyone could get great value out of it. 

I have had second thoughts about moving forward with two other apps I had been wanting to create without first having a period of reflection and learning. The tools to create these apps are improving quickly, and I was locked into my process for a while. I need to get caught up. Also, another app has come into focus over the past six months. It was one I was not intending to create until I completed the other two. But I now feel like it may be the one to work on. I say one, but actually, it will be a combination of several apps in many ways. And I will create these different parts separately before combining them. Unless it makes sense to just combine them all at once. We'll see. I was thinking about possibly making them stand-alone apps before unifying them. 

Something I realized over the past few years is that with AI improving so quickly, we will reach a point where some people will just be creating their own apps, and then personalizing them for their own workflow. Not everyone will do this, but they could if they wanted to. We are there or thereabouts now. The ability to create apps on the fly has become possible. Are they perfect 1st time? Not really, but with patience and iteration, they will be close to fitting your specific workflow. There is an expression that has stuck with me that I heard last year: The Future of Software isn't Software. 

I believe we have entered that era. Soon, schools will be teaching how to create the tools students will use in classrooms designed specifically for how they learn best. At that point, the only ones not able to create an app on the fly will be those who never needed to learn about doing so. Right now, that constitutes most of the people alive on this planet. That will change over time, and in 25 years, most people on this rock will be AI literate. 

When I started down this path three years ago, I was aware that the window to build and share with others what I create with AI would be small. It is shrinking as I write this, and will likely be closed before 2030. After that is anyone's guess what happens, but I would not be surprised if a majority of us are all living in our own self-created bubbles. 

World models are being talked about a lot right now. If there is a proper world model by the end of the year, then essentially all I talked about in a TV show bible over a year ago will be possible, and I could, at that point, create everything I talked about in there by myself. I could use AI tools to create the TV series, the music, the fictional podcast, and the video games that would allow a user to have an individual experience set in the world of the TV show. While I could create it all myself, it would be extremely difficult to do so. I would need AI agents to help, and maybe that could cut down on the time to create it all. But even if that were the case, it would take a long time to complete. Probably years. However, I don't know what the AI Agents will be like once these world models start rolling out. If history is an example, then world models will not be perfect when they first roll out, and it will likely be DeepMind, OpenAI, Runway, or Midjourney who will release it, followed shortly thereafter by a Chinese version. Because nothing AI-related has been perfect when they first roll it out, and it usually takes another year or so to get to a point where a new AI tool is more broadly useful. 

So, let's say by late summer, we see the first true world model. It will be cool, and we will all be blown away, but it won't be perfect. But the other tools (video, audio, image, etc.) will be good enough by late summer to begin on the creation of a TV series like the one I have been thinking about. Will I begin work on it at that point? I will at some point. Not sure if it will be this year, though. But technically, I think this is the year that if I had the funding, I could begin on it. Would it actually take me years to complete all that I had laid out in the series bible if I did it all on my own with the assistance of AI tools? Probably. Unless agents get a lot better. Even if I learned all there is to know about all the tools that I would need to create it all, it is still a massive undertaking. If I were 26, I'd still lack the confidence and knowledge to have even completed the series bible and written 1/2 of the first season, but I might feel emboldened enough because of AI to at least get the ball rolling at all costs.  

There may come a time when I could do it all much easier and faster, but even with these tools being as good as they are now, it would be inconceivable that I could complete it all on my own anytime soon. I'd love to try. Maybe someday. Sigh. 😟

Until that time, I think it is best to just keep learning about everything AI that can help me create all that I can. With a focus on apps and releasing story content in one format or another. Once I have enough knowledge and the tools are good enough, then maybe I can build the world of that TV series I envisioned. I think you will love it. At least some of you. It's dark and a bit twisted, but relatable. 

I was asked about my New Year's resolution this weekend when out hiking with a few friends. They all had reasonable resolutions, but I didn't and don't have any. I'm not sure why I didn't make any. Maybe because I feel like they are silly. I make plans, and I try to complete them each year. That's not really the same as a resolution to lose weight or not be so overreactive. Would I like to lose a few pounds and become more Zen? Sure. But I have enough big plans for the year to not worry about keeping some meaningless promise to myself just because it's another year in the books. 

One friend joked when I said I hadn't: "Why not, because you're so perfect?" To be honest, I have enough on my mind that a promise to myself to try to lose weight seems like a waste of mental energy. In years past, I have definitely made New Year's resolutions, using the passage of time as a great starting point for change. However, I am in the midst of a massive change, and adding something else onto the pile just didn't cross my mind. Maybe in the years ahead I'll buy that Peloton and use it for a month and then abandon it, but not this year.