What we learned from “Project 1356” 🗓️
On the oddly-specific countdown that captivated millions
Neighbors,
We can’t wait to see forty-eight of you this Saturday for Powder Blue Presents: Bowling + Social!
It’s our first bowling tourney, and we’ve had a lot of fun putting together the teams. In short: We’re constructing all sixteen based on who we think you’ll have a great conversation with (along with mixing up skill levels).
There’s only two spots left, so if you’d still like to join us, RSVP here.
Onto today’s review. Plus: The latest stories and phenomena that took us offline, featured in this week’s While You Were Scrolling…
— NGL
P.S. Last letter, we shared notes from a black sand beach. You can read it here.
Video: ‘Project 1356 Is Over…’ (2026)
Creator: Armin Mehdizadeh
Runtime: 9m 37s
Review by: Nate Graber-Lipperman
On August 30, 2024, Reddit user u/LoofahLuffa asked the one-point-six million weekly visitors of r/OutOfTheLoop a simple question:
What’s going on with Project 1356?
“I came across this account with a count down to January 1st, 2026,” the user followed up. “Is it the same as project 2025 under a different name?”1
Ultimately, u/LoofahLuffa might’ve been just a liiittttle off. But could you really blame them?
For years, a twenty-something named Armin Mehdizadeh had kept what felt like the entire Internet guessing, posting a short a day on the account @project.1356. The videos were simple: Mehdizadeh would walk up to a whiteboard, erase the number on it, and draw a new one, counting down from the number 1,356 until, presumably, hitting Day 0.
That day was January 1, 2026. And up until that day, fan theories persisted.
Would this be the start of World War III?
Was the world going to end?
Did Mehdizadeh have cancer, and he was counting down his final days?
“Everyone had their theories, but no one actually knew the truth,” Mehdizadeh says in the first thirty seconds of his official reveal video, which saw him talk directly to the camera from a dark room. “Project 1356 is a promise I made to myself—that I have 1,356 days to achieve six of my biggest goals.”
Mehdizadeh goes on to explain how growing up, he struggled to find purpose in his life, lacking “drive.” He’d tried the “traditional” route of going to college, before dropping out; he’d also launched several businesses that “all failed.”
One day—April 16, 2022, to be specific—Mehdizadeh devised the project on a whim. He viewed the whiteboard videos as a public accountability system, waking up every morning and reminding himself “that life is limited.”
Mehdizadeh, sadly, did not reach all six goals. Nevertheless, he seems at peace with this, noting that his value system had changed. The things that were important to him at twenty-two—like reaching one hundred thousand YouTube subscribers, or becoming a “great” music producer—no longer meant as much to him at twenty-six.
Besides: “Achieving everything at once is kinda impossible,” he says. “Even though I didn’t achieve all six of my goals, I’m in a way, way better position in life than I was four years ago.”
Past that, over the course of the project, the countdown derived a new meaning that went beyond its creator. Mehdizadeh notes that “countless people” in his comment section began counting down to the day of their wedding, or how long they’d been sober. “It became a public tracker where people can come and see how everyone is improving their lives within this community,” he recalled.
Clichés are clichés for a reason. It’s about the journey, not the destination. If you want to go fast, go alone; if you want to go far, go together. Maybe the real treasure was the friends we made along the way. If there was no truth to these phrases, we would not continue passing them down to each other.
And when I think about why Project 1356 resonated, I think about the neighborhood we’ve built, right here. I continue to believe that the thing that unites us is a culture of intentionality.
Sure, when you think of being “offline,” the phrase “touch grass” (one of our favorites) comes to mind. But our message has never been one that comes from a place of Luddism. The world is more complex than saying Internet bad and calling it a day.
How you show up every day—the stories you tell, the conversations you spark, the advertisers you partner with, and the beacon you light—does matter, online and off. While growth isn’t linear, intentionality does compound.
One of the ironies of Mehdizadeh’s project was its unintended outcomes. By the time he uploaded the video we’re watching, he tells us, his YouTube grind across four years had only netted him five thousand subscribers—a far cry from the silver plaque he’d been chasing.
In the last three months, Mehdizadeh has uploaded just one new video…and yet he’s gained eighty-one thousand new subscribers.
Life works in mysterious ways. You can gamify it all you want, following a specific path or trying to predict each step along the way.
But in the end, the least ridiculous thing we can do with our time on this pale blue dot just might be to assign our purpose to a random number.
Nate’s Score: 1,356 / 1,356 ⏰
While You Were Scrolling… 📜
Highlighting the week’s online stories and phenomena that inspired us—and took us offline.
🧅 The Onion proves print isn’t dead. Named one of Fast Company’s “Most Innovative Companies,” the Chicago-based satirical outlet has grown to sixty-five thousand (!!) paying subscribers since relaunching its print in 2024.
⚡ Major cities slash air pollution by twenty percent. A new report suggests that since 2010, interventions like building bike lanes and adopting electric vehicles have made a meaningful dent in lowering emissions, from San Francisco to London.
💿 This album reached No. Three on the Billboard charts…without streaming. Country-rock singer Sturgill Simpson dropped Mutiny After Midnight exclusively on vinyl, CD, and cassette.
🏗️ Ready to learn the history of concrete? John Wilson, best known for his cult favorite HBO show How To, is releasing his first feature film later this year.
Wanna meet your next creative collaborator? Join us for Powder Blue Presents: Bowling + Social this Saturday!
Only two spots remain. You can RSVP here.
We’re looking for submissions for the first print issue of OFFLINE with the theme ‘NEIGHBORS.’
Whether it be writing, art, photography, a game, collage, or anything in between, pitch your neighborly stories to us! (And don’t be shy—share the link with a friend who should pitch something, too.)
Thanks for reading! Shoot us a reply, comment, or DM if anything resonated with you in particular—we respond to them all.
They were referring, of course, to the infamous political initiative published by the Heritage Foundation (a conservative think tank) around the time of the 2024 presidential election.
What a cool project! And I approve 1356% of your score