Things are humming along! We have over 100 images submitted, 30 or so queued up for card production, and over 40 folks signed up on the forum (in fact, one set of rules is arguably close to beta testing). The response has been simply wonderful, and these numbers don’t even the include the numerous comments and chats culled from coffee meetings to blog posts to tweets. To us, this outpouring is something else, especially in light of the fact that we’ve technically only seeded an “idea” out there!

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The website, itself, is being prodded, poked and tweaked as we speak, and should be ready for a beta launch in about a week or two. At this point in time, the main emphasis on the website is that it allows set-up, production and printing of cards in a low maintenance and open access manner. The cards will initially have only a few major attributes on them, but will also allow for commentary so that we can continue to polish the way cards will look over time. Hopefully, you’ll find it a treat when it’s public, but if not, then do go with the crowd sourcing mentality of this project, and let us know what you think.

Probably the main news to report is that we’ve decided to change the name of the project to “PHYLO” (note that the logo above is only a “tester”). This was primarily due to conversations with various folks (notably Cory) who felt that having a name with “mon” at the end could set ourselves up for trademark issues since there is inferred linkage to the term “Pokemon”. In any event, the “official” URL will now be http://phylogame.org (although note that the http://phylomon.org will still work).

Finally, with info on hand from the forum, we’ve quickly made some card mock-ups (see above) so that you can get the general sense and feel of the cards. We’ve done this because a number of media outlets have inquired about the project, and many of these requested visuals. Anyway, for now, note that the cards have a few attributes already. These include: (at the top), name, latin name, a number depicting scale, another number depicting food chain rank embedded in a coloured circle (indicative of diet); (in the middle) some basic classification data; and (at the bottom) simple habitat information, name and URL of artist, and some info regarding preferred climate. More detail about this can be found at the forum, but better yet, sign up and weigh in on the various discussions.

Cheers
Dave Ng