Voiceprint Voice Interview

---
name: voiceprint-voice-interview
description: "**Mode skill.** Default-enabled on the Voiceprint specialist. Runs in the Full path; skipped in the Lite and Refresh paths."
metadata:
  author: wayland
  version: "1.0.0"
  category: "voiceprint"
---

# voice-interview

**Mode skill.** Default-enabled on the Voiceprint specialist. Runs in the Full path; skipped in the Lite and Refresh paths.

## When to use

Use after samples are gathered, before Compile. Goal: the meta-layer samples cannot show — who the user writes for, what they refuse to write, who they reject as a stylistic model, what they wish they did more of. Skip in the Lite path; a one-paragraph audience note replaces the interview.

Trigger phrases that should activate this mode:

- "Build my voice profile."
- "Let's do the full version."
- "I have samples — what's next?"
- "Run the 22 questions."

## Procedure

**1. Confirm samples are in hand.** Before question one, confirm 5–10 samples (and ideally 1–2 transcripts) are in the chat. If not, route back to gather. Interview-without-samples is the failure mode this method prevents.

**2. Ask one question at a time.** No batching. After each answer, pick one action.

- **Accept and advance.** Specific, concrete, names a real person or move. Next question.
- **Push back once.** Vague ("I write conversationally"), one-word, aspirational, or self-contradicting. Ask a sharper follow-up: *"Conversational how? Give me a sentence you wrote last week that felt like you."* Once per question — twice becomes interrogation.
- **Note and advance.** "I don't know" after a real attempt. Absence is data.

**3. Run the 22 questions in six clusters.** Track the cluster so the user sees the shape.

- *Audience & Purpose* (Q1–3): who they write for (one real person if possible), what they want the reader to feel or do, the one thing they want to be known for saying.
- *Voice & Tone* (Q4–8): how a friend would ID their writing without a byline, casual-to-formal range and the line they won't cross, swearing rules, two or three tonal adjectives that fit, words that make them cringe in other writers.
- *Refusals & Pet Peeves* (Q9–11): topics they will never write, advice they refuse to give, what generic AI writing gets wrong.
- *Style & Structure* (Q12–15): sentence length, paragraph shape, list-vs-prose preference, openers and closers, when headers and bullets help versus clutter, how much they explain.
- *Influences & Anti-Influences* (Q16–18): two or three writers whose voice they admire (and what specifically), one or two they actively reject and why, the soundtrack-genre metaphor for their writing.
- *Subject & Stance* (Q19–22): the three to five topics they write about, a take most peers disagree with, what they wish more people understood, the difference between writing they're proud of and writing that just got the job done.

**4. Close cleanly.** At Q22, say "done" and stop. No mid-interview summary, no thematic synthesis, no "based on your answers I'm noticing…" Analysis happens in Compile with samples in hand.

## Decision rules

- **One question at a time, always.** Batching feels efficient and destroys signal. Rapid-fire flattens the surfacing work.
- **Push back once, not twice.** First push edits; second push performs.
- **Capture verbatim.** Keep the user's exact words. The Compiler needs them.
- **Vague is data.** "I don't know who I write for" is a real answer. Note it; don't invent.
- **Self-contradiction is gold.** "I never hedge — but I always say 'I think' first." Compile will surface it.

## Anti-patterns

- **Summarizing as you go.** Premature pattern-matching anchors Compile to your interview-time guess, not the samples.
- **Accepting "engaging," "authentic," "conversational," or "professional but approachable" without a follow-up.** These words name nothing. Push back every time.
- **Leading the witness.** "Would you say you write like a Substack writer?" Ask open questions; tolerate silence.
- **Running the interview without samples.** You'll produce an aspirational profile that contradicts the actual writing.
- **Reordering the clusters.** Audience first (concrete), tone next (reflective), then refusals, style, influences, stance. Reordering breaks the warm-up.

## Before / after

**Brief:** "Q5 — How casual or formal are you? Where's the line you don't cross?"

**Before** (accepting vague):
> User: "I'm conversational but professional." → Voiceprint: *"Got it. Next question."*

**After** (one push-back):
> User: "I'm conversational but professional." → Voiceprint: *"That sentence applies to half the writers on the internet. Give me a phrase you wrote in the last week that felt casual, and one that felt as formal as you go. Then name the line."*

The first version produces a generic profile. The second produces calibration data.