July Update

It's now been two months since I launched Wizard Workshop, and during that time I've gained a few new followers. I'm so thankful you're all here and hope you've been learning as you follow along! If you haven't subscribed yet, it's free, and each post will land in your inbox so you'll never miss a thing. I've had a little outside contract work that helps in the short term and offers a potential path to more long-term stability, but it can also slow updates here; nevertheless, Wizard Workshop remains a vessel for my passion of learning and staying curious. I have a few updates this month on my progress and evolving goals.

City of Curiosity

I've decided to pause active development on the game for a few reasons:

• Discord CEO – With Discord preparing for an IPO and appointing a new CEO, I’m unsure about the platform’s future direction. While opportunities remain, they aren’t ones I’m interested in pursuing right now.
• Development Cost – I was using a lot of AI credits to develop the game. While costs will likely continue to drop, the volume of work I was trying to accomplish wasn't sustainable for Wizard Workshop without additional cash flow. To make this work, everything must fit within the resources and time I can dedicate without compromising my health and stability.
• Working Alone – I struggle to work by myself without a team aligned with the vision. There are gaps in my interests and skill sets that make it hard to do everything on my own, and it's difficult to stay accountable and motivated when working solo.
• Opportunity Cost – Other projects within Wizard Workshop excite me, and having City of Curiosity always waiting in the wings has kept me from pursuing them.

I don't think this is the end of City of Curiosity—just a pause in its current iteration. I hope to return to its development in the future in an even more open and transparent way, one not constrained by launching the game as a commercial product.

opbox

I've continued using the tools I've built into opbox and want to keep improving and expanding its functionality. By pausing work on City of Curiosity, I can focus more energy on opbox and eventually hope to make it open‑source and more flexible.

Blog

I've been enjoying writing these posts and the direction they're taking. The audience here is still small, but the more I write, the more there is for people to discover. I've created a new category, Curiosities, so I can share speculative ideas and interesting finds. I've also enabled comments, so please say hi and let me know what you think!

Social Media

Building a social‑media presence is demanding and makes authenticity difficult. I've researched campaign strategies and experimented with various posts. Persistent investment in these platforms is critical for success, but much of it feels like learning to game the algorithm for attention, which is misaligned with my goals. I'll keep posting, but with fewer expectations for reach and quantity and a greater focus on authenticity and enjoyment.

Electronics

I started assembling a robotic car kit I picked up a while ago. It has a camera, microphone, and speaker, all running on a Raspberry Pi, so it's completely programmable. I'm working towards setting it up with voice‑controlled AI; it should be a great learning project and something I'll share more about in the future.

Thank you for reading and for being part of this journey. I look forward to sharing more experiments and progress with you over the next month!