Domino is a game played by laying down small tiles with one end bearing an arrangement of dots like those on a die. The other end of each tile is either blank or identically patterned to match the identifying marks on its opposite side. These identifying marks are called “pips.” Each domino belongs to a suit of pips – for example, the suit of threes or the suit of blanks, referred to as 0’s. The first to place all of their tiles in order and then let them fall according to the laws of physics wins. Dominoes are available in many different shapes and sizes. They can be arranged in straight lines, curved lines, grids that form pictures when they fall, stacked walls and even 3D structures like towers and pyramids. Some of these arrangements take several nail-biting minutes to set up, but once they are in place, the only thing left to do is let gravity take over and watch the domino effect.
The word “domino” comes from the Latin dominus, meaning master of the house. The word eventually evolved into the English dominate, a noun meaning dominance or power. The most common domino sets contain 28 or 55 tiles. These are often used for games that involve multiple players or for players looking to play long domino games. In addition, there are a number of extended set variants with more than 55 tiles.
A physicist named Lorne Whitehead demonstrated how powerful the domino effect is in 1983 by creating a series of 13 dominoes that were each about a one-and-a-half times larger than the previous. The 13th domino was more than three feet tall and weighed 100 pounds. He showed that a domino only needs to be tipped slightly for it to tumble down, thanks to the fact that each domino has a very high center of gravity.
Another way of seeing the domino effect is through the Dominos Pizza brand’s strategy of “Think Global, Act Local.” The company has developed a variety of purpose-built vehicles for pizza delivery, from an electric scooter to a robotic vehicle that can drive itself. Despite the fact that each vehicle serves a specific purpose, they are all designed with the same idea in mind: that domino effect.
Scene Dominoes
For novelists, the concept of scene dominoes is a useful way to understand how scenes in your story work together. Each scene is a domino that contributes to the overall structure of your novel. When you place these scene dominoes in the proper order, they will naturally fall into place to advance your story.
When you start writing your story, it’s important to plan out what each scene will do. This will help you visualize how it all fits together, just as a row of dominoes will naturally fall into place. For example, if you have a scene in your novel where a character does something immoral or unethical, you’ll need to provide enough logic for readers to give the hero permission to continue behaving outside of social norms.