#InvisibleNetworks
LightNews LightNews
paradox.dhis.org
I have not done a create in a long time and therefore I am going to pick off old #InvisibleNetworks that I missed. Beginning with the 2018 prompts, which I have located at ctrlcreep.github.io/invisible-ne...
No time limit = I can work as much on creepy aspects as I want. Yay :)
Generate 30 social networks over the course of August.
ctrlcreep.github.io
August 31, 2026 at 1:32 AM
paradox.dhis.org
paradox.dhis.org/creations/wr...

#InvisibleNetworks 2018.1

FORENOTES: if I am not wrong, this is the first prompt of the first year of Invisible Networks; a bit tame…

AFTERNOTES: im ngl my first thought was When Day Breaks except it’s the sun posts dumb things about you and you die from shame. xd
Totrevita psychosis: an exceedingly rare mental disorder contracted by heavy users of social media platforms, in which the victim perceives every object, natural force, and other external stimulus to be constantly watching and scornful of their digital activity. Often, users claim that such stimuli post through their accounts, while their activity becomes more erratic and seemingly incompatible with their personality. In certain observed extreme cases, the victim’s own home is deemed unsafe: childhood fears of shadow-creatures find an analogy in the distress over a stuffed animal, a chair, a hinge of a door reaching out a cotton or wooden or metallic tendril and typing away. One young man, after missing calls and then the doorbell for days, was found at last in a tiny closet, phone clutched tightly in the deskinned remains of his left hand, even as the rest of his mangled body was curled up a few feet away. Two piles were near him: one of air-toughened viscera atop a dry patch of bodily fluids, another of used razors. His final posts, accessible even with his desiccated thumb, confirmed the grisly depths of his delusion.
August 31, 2026 at 3:09 AM
vgel.me
(an #invisiblenetworks 05 non-entry)
April 7, 2026 at 9:47 PM
vgel.me
#invisiblenetworks 02
April 2, 2026 at 10:26 PM
theobelisk.bsky.social
4. tech/emotional support

in which we continue to stretch (or outright ignore) the definition of 'networks' in #InvisibleNetworks
4. tech/emotional support Welcome to RoboHelp, where we can fix all of your support needs! Are you a companion bot who feels like you’re being objectified by your human partner? Are you a PC needing to find the motivation to start up for your user? Are you a SmartHome appliance that is scared you aren’t getting used to your full potential? Don’t you worry any longer! RoboHelp can fix those nasty little bugs that are plaguing your software, hardware, or personality chips! Please click {here} to be connected to one of our helpful representatives! For human clients, please click {here} for additional support. [click] Please fill out the following captcha to prove that you are human. [click. click click click. click.] Thank you! Redirecting… Welcome to RoboHelp – Human Edition. Tired of your sex bot complaining that it wants to have more of a connection outside of gratification? Wish your PC would stop lagging on startup due to malaise or ennui? Tired that your dishwasher wants to chat about its features all the time? Don’t you worry any longer! RoboHelp can tweak those little personality chips and get your products back to their full capacity in no time! Wait just a moment, and we will connect you to one of our live representatives to assist you through the corrections process.
April 13, 2025 at 9:13 PM
theobelisk.bsky.social
2. rage quit island

in which a boy finds himself in an unusual rogue-like

#InvisibleNetworks
2. rage quit island He threw his controller down on the couch. It bounced just enough for it to go teetering off the edge and onto the hardwood. With a cry of anguish, the teen showed the TV both of his middle fingers. “Fucking game! Fucking internet! I dodged that shit so many times! But no, stupid game can’t even read my inputs, for fuck’s s-” His words got cut off when the TV strobed black and white. His eyes locked on the pattern as it emerged from the screen and began to surround him entirely. It blinked and blinked and blinked in stripes and dots and chevrons. He felt himself get pulled off of the couch and through a field of static until he dropped down, face first, into a field. “WELCOME, LAD, TO THIS BEAUTIFUL ISLAND!” came a disembodied voice from the sky. “The hell?” he said. “What did…did you just…did I get isekai’d?” the boy asked as he stood. He looked down to find a massive longsword beside him. Far to his left, the ocean. Far to his right, a forest. And a wide stretch of rolling hills between them. He wiped off the dirt from his face and saw that he was still in his pajamas from home. “IT’S TIME TO LEARN AN IMPORTANT LESSON ON ANGER!” the voice answered. The boy scratched his head and grabbed the hilt of the sword, its weight unfamiliar. “What do you mean le-” He jumped at the sound of a war horn from beyond the nearest hill. A hundred soldiers on horseback thundered forth, their battle cries high pitched, some voices even cracking. As they approached, the teen saw that they were all about his age. Worse, they all had thick armor, steel lances, and the glee of an easy kill in their eyes. The boy could barely hold up his weapon before he was trampled underfoot. A moment later, he was back, falling through the static and landing in the field once more. The horseback riders trotted up to the horizon, in preparation of another charge. “I’m supposed to beat them?” the boy cried up to the sky with anger welling up. “How!?” “SIMPLE, LAD!” the voice responded. “GET GOOD!” The war horn sounded again.
April 13, 2025 at 8:51 PM
theobelisk.bsky.social
1. infrascripture

in which we begin catching up on the missed days

#InvisibleNetworks
1. infrascripture “A load bearing book,” Brother Vincent would say. “Without following the ideals inside, I’m sure society as a whole would be much worse off.” It was no more than a few pages thick and sat in a drawer inside a plain wooden altar. The Siblingry would never decorate it with more than a white cotton sheet. Followers of other belief systems would regularly come by to debate its merits and give complex counterexamples, but the Siblingry would merely shrug and point to their number one tenet: Don’t be a jerk. (Sister Samantha’s proudest moment was cocking an eyebrow and telling a prominently rich faith leader that he was sounding very much like he was looking for excuses to be a jerk, to which the man stormed out of the small tabernacle along with the camera crew that he had brought along to show off his now-questionable debate skills).
April 13, 2025 at 8:27 PM
theobelisk.bsky.social
#InvisibleNetworks

0. tragedy of the uncommons

[a strange field appears]
0. tragedy of the uncommons The few of us herders left gathered at the edge of the field where a fence lined its border. Inside, the grasses were a shimmering gradient of changing colors: waves of red were chased by yellow while pockets of purple popped up and disappeared in the blink of an eye. The herd of cattle inside were standing on strong hind legs, doing squats and lifting broken fence posts with clumps of hardened dirt on either end acting as weights. We watched as a flock of tiny butterfly-sheep fluttered by to say Good Afternoon in perfect Tagalog. The farmer to my left waved back as they flew away, not confident enough in her pronunciation to respond in kind. “It’s a shame that the others were so dismissive of our field. It’s really lovely,” she said to us, eyes watching the miniature sheep cloud disappear. The man to my right shook his head. “If it’s not exploitable to those kinds of people, then it’s not worth it. You gotta be weird to enjoy the weird. It’s a shame more people can’t appreciate the nonsense.” In the distance, a pair of cows were arm wrestling on the back of a six foot long bee that was laying face down reading an issue of Mad Magazine. I let out a sigh. “How tragic.”
April 3, 2025 at 12:37 AM
atonal440.bsky.social
#InvisibleNetworks
#13: the invisible side of the cube

atonal440.net/writing/invi...
April 14, 2026 at 9:00 AM
atonal440.bsky.social
#InvisibleNetworks
Day 12: algossamer

atonal440.net/writing/invi...
April 12, 2026 at 9:45 AM
thedoorthedoor.bsky.social
"You are... twenty-seventh... in the queue. If you'd like to receive a call back, press one now. Your call is very important to us. You...are very important to us. You make the world a softer place, even if people don't thank you the way they should. You matter. I promise."

#InvisibleNetworks
April 4, 2025 at 5:29 AM
aaronz.bsky.social
A social network for creating false memories... another controlled via spiders...

I imagined 14 speculative social networks for #InvisibleNetworks 2026. One piece of flash fiction a day, two weeks, no over-thinking.

Explore the collection here:

azemach.com/blog/posts/i...
Invisible Networks 2026 | Design Thoughts | Aaron Zemach
azemach.com
April 16, 2026 at 3:38 PM
makejakestop.bsky.social
#invisiblenetworks
wallet flies dot cadaver

prompts allow even innocuous words to surface as inciting incidents

everything is networked when you have ears to hear
Patient file: Human male, mid-thirties. Median biometric profile. Slightly elevated LDL. Of note: Patient experiencing prolonged musical ear syndrome, or MES. Apophenia subset. Form of audio pareidolia. Natural progression toward logical backfill in not only social situations but private ones as well. Self-soothing involves bridging perceived realities with contextual indicators, often in fractional time. In layperson’s terms, patient often hears voices but not words, or perceives intentional structure and therefore meaning in ambient sound. Patient exhibits standard compensatory measures: homonym generation, context masking, Mondegreen Denial, etc. Of note: MES cases often resort to secondary and tertiary forms of communication as part of their construction of meaning. Casual occurrence for MES patients to curate and combine elements of disparate communication systems and schemata to synthesize coherent narratives and self and social other. Of note: Patient observation: Prolonged interlocution gradually devolves into music. Social relationships and professional aspirations impacted. Frequency: high. Of note: Patient observation: Lack of shared sound registry. MES creates category shift in sound registry and cognitive categorization. Example: Sirens register as laughter. Example: Footsteps register as praise. Example: Birdsong, secrets [sic, per patient] Frequency: constant. Of note: Patient observation: Patient has recently curated portions of Morse code system as means to parse meaning. Following a recent security incident, patient has been remanded to elevated observation and security wing. Patient reluctant to engage in verbal communication with staff. Preference for nonverbal communication. Recent transcript excerpt follows: .-- .. - .... / .- -. -.. / .-- .. - .... / .- -. -.. / .-- .. - .... / .- -. -.. / .-- .. - .... .-.-.- / .- -. -.. / .- -. -.. .-.-.- / .- -. -.. / .- .-.. .-.. / .- -. -.. / .-- .. - .... .-.-.- / -. --- -. / ... . ...- . .-. .-.-.- / -. --- / ... . ...- . .-. / .- -. -.. ... .-.-.- / -. --- / --- -. . .-.-.- / .- .-.. .-.. / .- -. -.. / .- .-.. .-.. / .- -. -.. / .- .-.. .-.. / .- -. -.. .-.-.- / - .... .- - / .. ... / - .... .- - / .. ... / - .... .. ... / .. ... / .- -. -.. / .. ... / - .... .- - .-.-.- / - .... .. ... / .. ... / - .... .. ... .-.-.- / - .... .. ... / .-.. .. -. . / .. ... / .-.. .. -. . ... .-.-.- / .- -. -.. / .- .-.. .-.. / .-.. .. -. . ... / - --- / .-.. .. -. . ... / - --- / - .... .. ... / .- -. -.. / .-- .. - .... / - .... .- - .-.-.- / ... . ...- . .-. / - .... .. ... / ... . ...- . .-. / - .... .- - .-.-.- / .-- .. - .... / .-.. .. -. . ... / .- -. -.. / - .... .. ... / .. ... / .-.. .. -. . -.. .-.-.- Recommendation: Cessation of musical therapy.
April 4, 2026 at 8:35 PM
makejakestop.bsky.social
#InvisibleNetworks infrascripture
True godheads came to know that communing with the almighty wasn’t a metaphor. It wasn’t performative. It wasn’t a cathartic recreation of verbal interplay, as though you could speak with god. As though generaphytes had language. All they needed and all they had was a sense of space. Within a few revelations, occupation of space quickly became the primary canvas upon which mankind expressed what it always reserved for the divine. And the evolution of its pleading, its accusations, its rationalizations, its resentments informed the structures it built. Multi-spired houses of worship gave way to concrete ovoid spaces for contemplation and then obsidian slabs stretching to every horizon. Worshippers expressed their frothy devotion, their bitter disappointment, their abject confusion through fractal towers whose heights were clipped by stratospheric orbital rings and whose depths were never known, their foundations plunged through firmament, oceanbed, and recorded history itself.
April 3, 2025 at 2:18 AM
3thanguy7.bsky.social
my contribution for #InvisibleNetworks: a story of parental abuse via Truman Show

April 6 - Freak Of Nurture

open.substack.com/pub/3thanguy...
April 6 - Freak Of Nurture
Early proponents of democracy were oft ridiculed.
open.substack.com
April 7, 2026 at 3:17 AM
scifly.bsky.social
@ctrlcreep.bsky.social

#InvisibleNetworks
0. Tragedy of the Uncommons.
April 2, 2025 at 3:37 AM
an-alexa-k.bsky.social
Invisible Networks 6: Thigmotaxis #InvisibleNetworks
Welcome to the Moderation Team! Hello and welcome! We’re excited to for you to join our moderation team. No matter if you’re a programmer here dogfooding or a new full time employee, we’re excited to have you. Moderation has always been a core function and the greatest weakness of social media sites. But it has always been plagued by problems How can you find bad behavior? What do you do once you find it? How do you handle different communities, with different standards? How can you prevent harm before it happens? How can you do it without inflicting untold trauma on your moderators? How do you handle a community of millions with a reasonably sized team? Good news: we have a solution. Introducing: Semantic Differentiation Thigmotaxis Using LLMs purchased cheap during the third AI winter, we convert the whole of the social web into a 3d shape. The contours of the shape are mapped directly to what people are saying and it constantly updated as new posts are made. The shape, if it was made in real life, would be much too large for anyone to see it meaningful detail. But you won’t be looking at the shape. You’ll be feeling it. Your job is to trace the contours of the shape, identifying rough patches to smooth out, sharp points to blunt, and holes to fill. Once identified, the changes made to the shape are converted back into semantic information and used to hand out bans and suspensions, head off harassment, and keep conversations civil - everything moderation is responsible for. (Thigmotaxis means how an organism responds to tactile stimuli. People will be throwing that word around a lot so you’ll want to remember it). Whisker Inputs The technical name is a “Suzu-Steinberg Tactile Input” but most people call them freckles or whiskers for the four input points on each cheek. We use the cheeks for two reasons. First, it’s a sensitive part of the body that isn’t too intimate and second, we can track your microexpressions as you interact with the shape. Those natural facial reactions are how we determine how you’re reacting to what you’re touching. You’ll have the ports installed, free of charge. Don’t worry - the procedure only takes two hours and they can easily be removed if you later decide you don’t want them. (An icon of a face with four little circles on each cheek. It's labeled "Location of the input ports") Most new moderators want to know: what does SDT feel like? But truth is everyone experiences it differently. Here are some answers from our current moderation team: “It’s like rubbing against the fur of a vast animal.” - Ivane M. “Standing outside and letting the wind blow into my face.” - Bassem O. “Dragging my cheek across the ground.” - Karine J. “Like shoving my hand into a deep barrel full of all kinds of random stuff. Only it’s not my hand, it’s my cheeks, but you get it.” - Hana M. “Swimming but through things you normally couldn’t swim through, like wood or sand.” - Judith S What moderators agree is that it’s not unpleasant, even when dealing with content that would unpleasant if you interacted with it directly. Each moderator is capable of managing a community of one hundred thousand people and when you’re in it, you’re hardly even aware that you’re doing it. That’s the power of SDT!
April 18, 2025 at 12:59 AM
an-alexa-k.bsky.social
Invisible Networks 12: Signal #InvisibleNetworks
Signal A37 Radio Kit Description Signal A37, colloquially known as the Hum, is a low frequency droning noise detectable by 2-4% of the population. Undetectable by machine sensors and able to pass through materials and long distances, it’s very existence was disputed until techniques to reliably produce it artificially were created. The Signal A37 Radio Kit provides all the materials and in-depth instructions you need to build a A37 Radio and investigate this mysterious phenomenon for yourself! We use the Warsaw-Lor circuit design, widely agreed to be both easy to make and flexible enough to get a good range of outputs . Ages 14 and up, suitable both amateurs and experts. Specs Range: 5 meters Batteries: 1x 9v No soldering required Benson A37 Synthesizer Description Most naturally occurring A37 is usually described as an irritating grinding or ringing noise. But through careful tuning and overlaying of different varieties of A37, musicians have been capable of produce benign and even calming sounds. The genre of “thrum metal” is an attempt to recreate the style but fans of A37 music agree you have to hear the real thing for yourself. The Benson A37 Synthesizer was the first mass market A37 synth and many agree it’s still the best. Equipped with dual oscillators and amplifiers, a polyphonic step sequencer with layered and unlayered settings, a reverse arpeggiator, and more. Specs Range: 10 meters Number of Keys: 7 Presets: 256 Effects: 8 A37 Vision Phone Description The A37 Vision Phone is a standard A37 broadcast headset, taking sound inputs and converting them to the A37 Signal. Join the community of A37 detectors in your neighborhood! It comes with a copy of Hum Simplified English by Arnold Place, the gold standard for learning how to communicate effectively with the the limited set of sounds A37 can produce. Disclaimer: The A37 Phone system is for hobbyist purposes and should not be used for any kind of criminal activity. Unlike most forms of communication it cannot be automatically surveilled, so it is important to refrain from using it to plan or execute covert activities. The makers of the A37 Vision Phone do not endorse the attacks on government facilities in the American southwest, although we do not yet believe there is sufficient compelling evidence that A37 Vision Phones were involved. Specs Range: 3333 meters Battery Life: 40 hours USB: 1x Type B Waterproof Shockproof
April 12, 2025 at 6:16 PM
an-alexa-k.bsky.social
Invisible Networks 5: Hand #InvisibleNetworks
XXIXX The Gloved Hand (The image of a hand, open with the palm facing upward) [Friendship] is the realm of uncertainty; three quarters of the factors on which action in [friendship] is based are wrapped in a fog of greater or lesser uncertainty. A sensitive and discriminating judgment is called for; a skilled intelligence to scent out the truth.” - Carl von Clausewitz The XXIXX Network is devoted enabling genuine relationships in an environment of total privacy. What do we mean by genuine relationships? Real human connection, the kind that people live for. Friends you can turn to times of need, reveal your deepest secrets to, and trust with your vulnerability. Most people these days do not have relationships like this and that kind of loneliness can impact both mental and physical health. XXIXX is here to help with that. What do we mean by total privacy? There a thousand ways an online identity can be connected back to a person in the real world. XXIXX builds systems to protect you from that. We locate and remove identifying information, we alter signature word choices, we introduce randomness into your actions to hide patterns. It can take only one slip up for a person to be found - we ensure that won’t happen The symbol of XXIXX is the gloved hand. It represents reaching out while being covered, the helping hand in the dark. XXIXX helps you deepen your relationships while keeping the glove on, both online and offline. Only reveal what you want to., when you want. Or don’t reveal at all. We Offer: An international system of dead drops Proxies to let you act at a distance Training in Tradecraft Disguise and infiltration tools Security camera and other surveillance neutralization Aliases and fake IDs Alibi providers And we are constantly working to find new ways to help you act with love without revealing yourself. XXIXX Reach out from the darkness.
April 8, 2025 at 10:12 PM
an-alexa-k.bsky.social
Invisible Networks 4: Relationship #InvisibleNetworks
GSip Network Outage Troubleshooting Script Opening “Hello, my name is (YOUR NAME) and calling from GSip Technical Support. I was hoping to speak to (NODE A NAME) about a matter pertaining to the GSip network’s functioning. As you may know, all members of GSip are responsible for transferring their data through the network. Every time you meet with another GSip member, data is exchange between the two of you on it’s way to it’s ultimate destination. That’s how we ensure all messages reach their intended recipient in a timely manner while avoiding any kind of central repository which might be hacked or subpoenaed. We at GSip Central only monitor the overall network health, it’s up to you keep it running. Network health is why we’ve called today. This might be a personal question, but are you and (NODE B NAME) having any kind of relationship problems? If they ask why you want to know or otherwise request more information Well, you might not know this, but the connection between you and (NODE B NAME) is an important link in GSip network. Between (LINK START DATE) and (DISRUPTION START DATE), you and (NODE B NAME) were in contact at least once every (LINK RATE), creating a reliable point of connection. By routing messages through that connection, we were able to provide a (EFFICIENCY STAT) percent reduction in travel time for over (DOWNSTREAM NODE COUNT) users. However, in the (TIME SINCE DISRUPTION) you and (NODE B) have not been in close enough proximity to initiate a transfer, leading to network wide congestion. We’d like to resolve this issue, if at all possible. If they indicate a temporary disruption (i.e. out of town, period of illness, religious observance): Thank you for letting us know. We’ll leave things as they are for now and we look forward to you being reunited with (NODE B NAME). If they indicate a permanent disruption (i.e. break up, irreconcilable differences, job change, death): Thank you for letting us know. (OFFER CONDOLENCES OR CONGRATULATIONS AS APPROPRIATE.) We’ll start working to establish new links to replace this one, so the network will soon be back up to proper operations. If they indicate a resolvable problem: If you wouldn’t mind, could I get more information on what exactly happened? We at GSip are eager to help you resolve this issue If the situation appears to be Node A’s fault: Continue to Appendix A: Therapeutic and Pharmacological Interventions. If the situation appears to be Node B’s fault: Continue to Appendix B: Nudge-based and Network Level Interventions. If the situation appears to be no one’s fault/the fault of large societal/historical forces: Continue to Appendix C: Theological or Structural Interventions End Call Thank you for talking with me today, you’ve been a great help – the entire GSip community thanks you.
April 7, 2025 at 11:13 PM
an-alexa-k.bsky.social
Invisible Networks 3: Fables #InvisibleNetworks
To combat context collapse, the makers of the Social Protocol Framework 2.0 divided all communication in 138 distinct categories, ranging from 1.3.5 (informational – accurate – news) to 4.2.15 (phatic – emotional – thinking of you) to 2.2.11 (emotional – outbursts – despair). For each category, a unique protocol, tuned to ensure it can achieve the goals of that kind of communication. Of the 138, 1.5.4 (informational - non-literal – fables) was the most influential. Protocol 1.5.4 is noted by: unlimited propagation, loose authorship, medium length, simple vocabulary, global and incremental editing, and a hundred other subtle requirements and affordances. When SPF 2.0 was adopted, a confused and anxious population took to it like water in a desert. People in those days had all the facts in the world but until then no way to synthesize them into enduring knowledge. 1.5.4 served as a crucial sense-making apparatus, a new way for communities to forge wisdom on how to handle the chaotic world around them. Popular fables The rabbit and the non-elephant animal Hollo* travels the wires The congress of pendulums An attractor in the ocean Hollo in the city of cities *Hollo, a non-binary child good at math and bad with people, is a common stock character in these fables.
April 4, 2025 at 8:28 PM
an-alexa-k.bsky.social
Invisible Networks 2: Island #InvisibleNetworks
Isle of Saint Mitchell Travel Advisory Isle of Saint Mitchell - Level 1: Exercise Normal precautions Reissued after periodic review with minor edits. The Isle of Saint Mitchell is an out-network territory, under the right to disconnect provisions of the Great European Union. Networked devices will not be able to connect to the standard network on Saint Mitchells or within its territorial waters. If you decide to travel to the Isle of Saint Mitchell: - Leave an unnecessary networked devices at home. - Read upon the St. Mitchells network before you go; what you can and can't do may be very different from the networks you're used too. - Rent or purchase a clockwork server and olfactory interface - they are required to connect to the local net. If you forget to obtian your equipment before you go, they can be purchased on the island. Assistance for US Citizens US Embassy Isle of Saint Mitchell 982 3rd Ring, South Facing Isle of Saint Mitchells 0E47 Telephone +(E) 23-62-AA Emergency +(E) 55-2W-AA PACKET SMUGGLING (a tilted letter with speed lines) IS A CRIME! Any attempt to connect St. Mitchells to the greater network carries a penalty of 5 years imprisonment and up to $2000 in fines. All incoming data must be checked by customs. Offending data will be delted. The Isle of St. Mitchell Department of Network Security and Social Cohesion The Isle of Saint Mitchells was spared the worst of the Days of Rage thanks to the destruction of the local cable landing point on the sixth day. All other connections to the greater network were destroyed shortly after and a new network was built from the ground up to replace it. Fully disconnected from the greater network, the Saint Mitchells Network has run independently for 12 years and maintaining that independence through a combination of technical non-compatibility, strictly enforce regulation, and local cultural norms. It was declared a cultural heritage site two years ago. (A picture of a radio tower tilted over) Tower 3 of the 8 Tower Central Array (Fortepan / Rádió és Televízió Újság) (A man in a tree attaching wires to the branches) A technician repairs arboreal connectors (Fortepan / Krantz Károly) (Photos in black and white due to export restrictions)
April 3, 2025 at 5:22 PM
an-alexa-k.bsky.social
Invisible Networks 1: Etiquette #InvisibleNetworks
CS246 Topics in Trust and Safety Fall Semester Schedule Week 1: The Free Speech Wing of the Free Speech Party We’ll discuss the first generation of social media networks and their moderation paradigm. How did they attempt to achieve it? How successful were they? And why did this paradigm ultimately fail? Discussion Questions: - Do you think the vision of interaction pursed by the early social networks was desirable? Do you think it was possible? - What were the human costs of this first paradigm of moderation? Consider the effects on both users and staff. Week 2: The Etiquette Paradigm The rise of new social networks with explicate, granular rules. We’ll look at the moderation practices found in the online RPG courtesan/social and the Greater Autonomous Lanchester Young Persons Forum and discuss how they influenced later networks. Discussion Questions: - How do the rules enforced by this generation differ from the rules of the previous generation? - Study the courtesy books provided. What kind of conversations do you think they encouraged? What kind of conversations do you think they discourage? Week 3: Computational Enforcement, Etiquette Regexes and Etiquette Schemas Covering modern technologies for defining, communicating, and enforcing network rules. We’ll study EttEx A flexible framework for creating well-architected and maintainable etiquette systems in NodeJS. Features - A robust library of standard etiquette forms - Supports both regular expression and finite state machine based etiquette systems - Automatic courtesy doc generation - APIs for federated etiquette schema management - Validation of in-group and out-group behavioral standards - Carnivale and substitute king ritual systems - Role management UI
April 2, 2025 at 8:06 PM
an-alexa-k.bsky.social
Invisible Networks Day 0: Novelty #InvisibleNetworks
The old world is dying, and the new world struggles to be born. How can we help? How can we not just provide novelty but actively encourage it’s creation? (A square labelled "All Possible Culture") Imagine all possible culture as a 2 dimensional space. (Of course this is a simplification - we now believe the space of all possible cultures to have between three and four thousand dimensions). Within this space there is an area covering all currently extant cultural forms, and larger one for all historical forms. (A large circle in the square labeled "All Historical Culture" and a smaller circle inside the first circle labelled "All Current Culture." Dots in the second circle have arrows pointing them towards the borders.) By recommending more obscure content to users, we can push them into the long tail and towards the borders of cultural area. But attempts to produce new culture purely through recommendations have largely failed. We believe the novel cannot be produced alone. Instead, groups of 2-7 are drafted as cultural vanguards. They are put into contact and their most novel impulses encouraged. (The same diagram with a clustering of overlapping dots around the circle and in the square at large) Once established, these groups encourage each other and drive themselves further into the new. The culture they create can then be fed back into the network at large, providing users with the novelty they desire. There are risks. Take group b1ad84e8-559c-4198-8ce1-b7f6d96b6c46 (circled) and a typical item created by a member of the group. (The cluster to the farthest left is circled, with red lines leading from it to an image of orange static with five diagonal lines on it.) It is too novel. It is useless to us. After four years cultural vanguardism, they are producing content that which the larger network simply has no context for. Attempts to guide them back towards the cultural core have failed. They may be lost forever.
April 1, 2025 at 5:35 PM
strange.website
03 april — shakespeare's wario
#InvisibleNetworks

"...deep in the machine lurked a base malevolence: a sedition the software's authors, in their woeful optimism, did not intend, but which grew undected in the machine like a cancer, like coal-seam fire..."
Invisible Networks | Shakespeare's Wario
Invisible Networks is a yearly writing challenge. Invent a speculative social network every day.
invisible-networks.henry.codes
April 5, 2026 at 8:14 PM