
<AssumedAudience>
  People who have heard of GPT-3 / ChatGPT, and are vaguely following the
  advances in machine learning, large language models, and image generators.
  Also people who care about making the web a flourishing social and
  intellectual space.
</AssumedAudience>

<Spacer size="xs" />

<IntroParagraph>

The [[dark forest theory]] of the web points to the increasingly life-like but life-less state of being online.<Footnote idName={1}>[Dark Forest](https://onezero.medium.com/the-dark-forest-theory-of-the-internet-7dc3e68a7cb1) [Theory of](https://onezero.medium.com/the-dark-forest-theory-of-the-internet-7dc3e68a7cb1) [the Internet](https://onezero.medium.com/the-dark-forest-theory-of-the-internet-7dc3e68a7cb1) by Yancey Strickler</Footnote> Most open and publicly available spaces on the web are overrun with bots, advertisers, trolls, data scrapers, clickbait, keyword-stuffing “content creators,” and algorithmically manipulated junk.

</IntroParagraph>

It's like a dark forest that seems eerily devoid of human life – all the living creatures are hidden beneath the ground or up in trees. If they reveal themselves, they risk being attacked by automated predators.

Humans who want to engage in informal, unoptimised, personal interactions have to hide in closed spaces like invite-only Slack channels, Discord groups, email newsletters, small-scale blogs, and [[digital gardens]]. Or make themselves [illegible](https://www.ribbonfarm.com/2010/07/26/a-big-little-idea-called-legibility/) and algorithmically incoherent in public venues.

<ResponsiveImage
  width="1000px"
  alt="An illustration of layers of the web: the dark forest on top, followed by layers of cozyweb holes where people hide away from bots and ad scavengers"
  src="/images/posts/ai-dark-forest/cozyweb.png"
/>

That dark forest is about to <div style={{transform: "scaleX(1.85)", display: "inline-flex", margin: "0 2.2rem"}}>expand</div>. Large Language Models (LLMs) that can instantly generate coherent swaths of human-like text have just joined the party.

Over the last six months, we've seen a flood of LLM copywriting and content-generation products come out: [Jasper](https://www.jasper.ai/), [Moonbeam](https://www.gomoonbeam.com/), [Copy.ai](https://www.copy.ai/), and [Anyword](https://anyword.com/) are just a few. They're designed to pump out advertising copy, blog posts, emails, social media updates, and marketing pages. And they're _really_ good at it.<Footnote idName={2}>Primarily because [GPT-3](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/GPT-3) which powers many of these products was specifically trained on text from the web. It's intimately familiar with the style of language we use online.</Footnote>

These models became competent copywriters much faster than people expected – too fast for us to fully process the implications. Many people had their come-to-Jesus moment a few weeks ago when OpenAI released [ChatGPT](https://openai.com/blog/chatgpt/), a slightly more capable version of GPT-3 with an accessible chat-bot style interface. <Footnote idName={3}>They're calling it GPT-3.5. It's the same model with human [reinforcement learning](https://huggingface.co/blog/rlhf) layered on top.</Footnote> The [collective](https://twitter.com/elonmusk/status/1599128577068650498?s=20&t=MgaSdgsaF0uU1lITCVPghw) [shock](https://twitter.com/volodarik/status/1600854935515844610?s=20&t=MgaSdgsaF0uU1lITCVPghw) and [awe](https://twitter.com/yu_angela/status/1599808692085743616?s=20&t=MgaSdgsaF0uU1lITCVPghw) [reaction](https://twitter.com/levie/status/1599156293050433536?s=20&t=MgaSdgsaF0uU1lITCVPghw) made clear how few people had been tracking the progress of these models.

To complicate matters, language models are not the only mimicry machines gathering speed right now. Image generators like [Midjourney](https://www.midjourney.com/home/?callbackUrl=/app/), [DALL-E](https://openai.com/dall-e-2/), and [Stable Diffusion](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stable_Diffusion) have been on a year-long sprint. In January they could barely render a low-resolution, disfigured human face. By the autumn they reliably produced images indistinguishable from the work of human photographers and illustrators.

<TwoColumn maxWidth="1100px">

<ResponsiveImage src="/images/posts/ai-dark-forest/mj8.png" alt="..." />

<ResponsiveImage src="/images/posts/ai-dark-forest/mj1.png" alt="..." />

<ResponsiveImage src="/images/posts/ai-dark-forest/mj7.png" alt="..." />

<ResponsiveImage src="/images/posts/ai-dark-forest/mj3.png" alt="..." />

<ResponsiveImage src="/images/posts/ai-dark-forest/mj9.png" alt="..." />

<ResponsiveImage src="/images/posts/ai-dark-forest/mj4.png" alt="..." />

</TwoColumn>

<Subtext>Images I generated with Midjourney's V4 model</Subtext>

## A Generated Web

There's a swirl of optimism around how these models will save us from a suite of boring busywork: writing formal emails, internal memos, technical documentation, marketing copy, product announcement, advertisements, cover letters, and even negotiating with medical [insurance companies](https://twitter.com/StuartBlitz/status/1602834224284897282).

But we'll also need to reckon with the trade-offs of making insta-paragraphs and 1-click cover images. These new models are poised to flood the web with generic, generated content.

You thought the first page of Google was bunk before? You haven't seen Google where SEO optimizer bros pump out billions of perfectly coherent but predictably dull informational articles for every longtail keyword combination under the sun.

Marketers, influencers, and growth hackers will set up [OpenAI → Zapier](https://zapier.com/apps/openai/integrations) pipelines that auto-publish a relentless and impossibly banal stream of LinkedIn #MotivationMonday posts, “engaging” tweet <span role="img">🧵</span> threads, Facebook outrage monologues, and corporate blog posts.

It goes beyond text too: [video essays on YouTube](https://twitter.com/SamRo/status/1605919856808714240?s=20&t=QB-eYoISuymlqbHFFDnrWw), TikTok clips, podcasts, slide decks, and Instagram stories can all be generated by [patchworking](https://runwayml.com/) together ML systems. And then [regurgitated](https://byautomata.io/) for each medium.

We're about to drown in a sea of pedestrian takes. An explosion of noise that will drown out any signal. Goodbye to finding original human insights or authentic connections under that pile of cruft.

Many people will say we already live in this reality. We've already become skilled at sifting through unhelpful piles of “optimised content” designed to gather clicks and advertising impressions.

4chan proposed [dead internet theory](https://www.theatlantic.com/technology/archive/2021/08/dead-internet-theory-wrong-but-feels-true/619937/) years ago: that most of the internet is “empty and devoid of people” and has been taken over by artificial intelligence. A milder version of this theory is simply that we're overrun [with bots](https://nymag.com/intelligencer/2018/12/how-much-of-the-internet-is-fake.html). Most of us take that for granted at this point.

But I think the sheer volume and scale of what's coming will be meaningfully different. And I think we're unprepared. Or at least, I am.

---

## Passing the Reverse Turing Test

Our new challenge as little snowflake humans will be to prove we aren't language models. It's the reverse [turing test](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Turing_test).

<TweetEmbed tweetId="1601541418153304064" />

<TweetEmbed tweetId="1601750189974245377" />

After the forest expands, we will become deeply sceptical of one another's _realness_. Every time you find a new favourite blog or Twitter account or Tiktok personality online, you'll have to ask: Is this really a whole human with a rich and complex life like mine? Is there a _being_ on the other end of this web interface I can form a relationship with?<Footnote idName={4}>“Relationship” in the holistic sense – friend, acquaintance, pen pal, intellectual interlocutor, frenemy, drinking buddy, and sure, maybe a lover.</Footnote>

Before you continue, pause and consider: How would _you_ prove you're not a language model generating predictive text? What special human tricks can you do that a language model can't?

### 1. Triangulate objective reality

As language models become increasingly capable and impressive, we should remember they are, at their core, linguistic [prediction systems](https://www.datacamp.com/blog/a-beginners-guide-to-gpt-3#:~:text=Language%20modeling%20is,predicting%20word%20sequences.). They cannot (yet) reason like a human.

They do not have beliefs based on evidence, claims, and principles. They cannot consult external sources and run experiments against objective reality. They cannot go outside and touch grass.

In short, they do not have access to the same shared reality we do. They do not have embodied experiences, and cannot sense the world as we can sense it; they don't have vision, sound, taste, or touch. They cannot feel emotion or tightly hold a coherent set of values. They are not part of cultures, communities, or histories.

They are a language model in a box. If a historical event, fact, person, or concept wasn't part of their training data, they can't tell you about it. They don't know about events that happened after a certain cutoff date. <Footnote idName={5}>Currently 2021 for GPT-3 / ChatGPT, but we can expect that to regularly update as new models are trained</Footnote>

I found Murray Shanahan's paper on [Talking About Large Language Models](http://arxiv.org/abs/2212.03551) (2022) full of helpful reflections on this point:

<BlockquoteCitation author="Murray Shanahan" title="Talking About Large Language Models" url="http://arxiv.org/abs/2212.03551">

Humans are members of a community of language-users inhabiting a shared world, and this primal fact makes them essentially different to large language models. We can consult the world to settle our disagreements and update our beliefs. We can, so to speak, “triangulate” on objective reality.

</BlockquoteCitation>

This leaves us with some low-hanging fruit for humanness. We can tell richly detailed stories grounded in our specific contexts and cultures: place names, sensual descriptions, local knowledge, and, well the _je ne sais quoi_ of being alive. Language models can decently mimic this style of writing but most don't without extensive prompt engineering. They stick to generics. They hedge. They leave out details. They have trouble maintaining a coherent sense of self over thousands of words.

Hipsterism and recency bias will help us here. Referencing obscure concepts, friends who are real but not famous, niche interests, and recent events all make you plausibly more human.<Footnote idName={6}>This feels eerily like a hostage holding up yesterday's newspaper to prove they are actively in danger. Perhaps a premonition.</Footnote>

### 2. Be original, critical, and sophisticated

Easier said than done, but one of the best ways to prove you're not a predictive language model is to demonstrate critical and sophisticated thinking.

Language models spit out text that sounds like a B+ college essay. Coherent, seemingly comprehensive, but never truly insightful or original (at least for now).

In a repulsively evocative metaphor, they engage in “[human centipede](<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Human_Centipede_(First_Sequence)>) epistemology.”<Footnote idName={7}>I found this phrase via Twitter, but posted from a private account so I won't cite the original author.</Footnote> Language models regurgitate text from across the web, which some humans read and recycle into "original creations," which then become fodder to train other language models, and around and around we go recycling generic ideas and arguments and tropes and ways of thinking.

Hard exiting out of this cycle requires coming up with unquestionably original thoughts and theories. It means seeing and synthesising patterns across a broad range of sources: books, blogs, cultural narratives served up by media outlets, conversations, podcasts, lived experiences, and market trends. We can observe and analyse a much fuller range of inputs than bots and generative models can.

It will raise the stakes for everyone. As both consumers of content and creators of it, we'll have to foster a greater sense of critical thinking and scepticism.

This all sounds a bit rough, but there's a lot of hope in this vision. In a world of automated intelligence, our goalposts for intelligence will shift. We'll raise our quality bar for what we expect from humans. When a machine can pump out a great literature review or summary of existing work, there's no value in a person doing it.

### 3. Develop creative language quirks, dialects, memes, and jargon

The linguist [Ferdinand de Saussure](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ferdinand_de_Saussure) argued there are two kinds of language:

- **La langue** is the formal concept of language. These are words we print in the dictionary, distribute via educational institutions, and reprimand one another for getting it wrong.
- **La parole** is the speech of everyday life. These are the informal, diverse, and creative speech acts we perform in conversations, social gatherings, and text to the group WhatsApp. This is where language evolves.

We have designed a system that automates a standardised way of writing. We have codified _la langue_ at a specific point in time.

What we have left to play with is _la parole_. No language model will be able to keep up with the pace of weird internet lingo and memes. I expect we'll lean into this. Using neologisms, jargon, euphemistic emoji, unusual phrases, ingroup dialects, and memes-of-the-moment will help signal your humanity.

Not unlike teenagers using language to subvert their elders, or oppressed communities developing dialects that allow them to safely communicate amongst themselves.

### 4. Consider institutional verification

This solution feels the least interesting. We're already hearing rumblings of how “verification” by centralised institutions or companies might help us distinguish between meat brains and metal brains.

The idea is something like this: you show up in person to register your online accounts or domains. You then get some kind of special badge or mark online legitimising you as a Real Human. It may or may not be on the blockchain somehow.

Google might look something like this:

<ResponsiveImage
  framed
  src="/images/posts/ai-dark-forest/human_google.jpg"
  width="1300px"
  alt="Google search results showing a 'certified human' badge on some items"
/>

The whole thing seems fraught with problems, susceptible to abuse, and ultimately impractical. Would it even be the web if everyone knew you were really a dog?

<ResponsiveImage
  src="/images/posts/ai-dark-forest/Internet_dog.jpeg"
  width="460px"
  alt="The original internet dog meme: 'On the internet, no one knows you're a dog'"
  showalt
/>

### 5. Show up in meatspace

The final edge we have over language models is that we can prove we're real humans by showing up IRL with our real human bodies. We can arrange to meet Twitter mutuals offline over coffee. We can organise meetups and events and conferences and unconferences and hangouts and pub nights.

In [Markets for Lemons and the Great Logging Off](https://www.fortressofdoors.com/ai-markets-for-lemons-and-the-great-logging-off/), Lars Doucet proposed several knock-on effects from this offline-first future. We might see increased [fetishisation](https://www.fortressofdoors.com/ai-markets-for-lemons-and-the-great-logging-off/#:~:text=a%20resurgence%20and%20even%20fetishization%20of%20explicitly%20%22offline%22%20culture%2C%20where%20the%20%22Great%20Logging%20Off%22%20becomes%20literal) of anti-screen culture, as well as [real estate](https://www.fortressofdoors.com/ai-markets-for-lemons-and-the-great-logging-off/#:~:text=Seventh%2C%20real,amenities%20are%20available) price increases in densely populated areas.

For the moment we can still check humanness over Zoom, but live video generation is getting good enough that I don't think that defence will last long.

There are, of course, many people who can't move to an offline-first life; people with physical disabilities. People who live in remote, rural places. People with limited time and caretaking responsibilities for the very young or the very old. They will have a harder time verifying their humanness online. I don't have any grand ideas to help solve this, but I hope we find better solutions than my paltry list.

As the forest grows darker, noisier, and less human, I expect to invest more time in in-person relationships and communities. And while I love meatspace, this still feels like a loss.

<References>
  <ReferencesLink
    title="Talking About Large Language Models"
    href="http://arxiv.org/abs/2212.03551"
    author="Murray Shanahan"
  />
  <ReferencesLink
    title="AI: Markets for Lemons, and the Great Logging Off"
    href="https://www.fortressofdoors.com/ai-markets-for-lemons-and-the-great-logging-off/"
    author="Lars Doucet"
  />
</References>

{/* ### 4. Be weird */}

{/* We're going to need to get weird. Post-post-post-modern-dadaist level weird. Being [illegible](https://www.ribbonfarm.com/2010/07/26/a-big-little-idea-called-legibility/) is a fairly effective defence mechanism against automated forces. */}

{/* Being so unpredictable and strange that your work only makes sense to a select few is a trade-off. But I bet it's one many online creators will take. */}


Proving you're a human on a web flooded with generative AI content

The Expanding Dark Forest and Generative AI

On seeing tools for thought through a historical and anthropological lens

Tools for Thought as Cultural Practices, not Computational Objects

A newly revived philosophy for publishing personal knowledge on the web

A Brief History & Ethos of the Digital Garden


<IntroParagraph>

With the recent rise of [Roam Research](https://roamresearch.com/), the idea of bi-directional linking is having a bit of a moment.

</IntroParagraph>

We're all very used to the _mono-directional_ link the World Wide Web is built around. They act as one-way pointers we follow in a linear sequence.

While we can link to any site, the destination page hasn't a clue we've done so.

We set up all these single-direction paths, trying to signal relevance and context, only to have the other side completely ignore our efforts.

Our monolinks are trying to establish relationships in vain.

<BasicImage
  width="950px"
  src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dg3gyk0gu/image/upload/c_scale,f_auto,q_auto:good,w_1200/v1589455927/maggieappleton.com/notes/Hyperlinks.png"
/>

We're starting to look around our mono-linked environment and wonder why it's so hard to surface relevant contextual relationships.

Manually interlinking content takes an awful lot of human curation and effort. Efforts we should probably slog off onto our systems.

> ✶ Enter the bi-directional link ✶

A _bi-directional_ link has **social awareness** - it knows about other pages or 'nodes' that point to it, and can make them visible to people. This means we get a two-way conversation flowing between our web locations.

<BasicImage
  width="950px"
  src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dg3gyk0gu/image/upload/c_scale,f_auto,q_auto:good,w_1200/v1589455927/maggieappleton.com/notes/Hyperlinks_2.png"
/>

---

## Bi-directional links are not new

The idea of the bi-directional link goes back to 1945 when [Vannevar Bush](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vannevar_Bush) dreamed up the [Memex](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Memex) machine.

Vannevar outlined this hypothetical gadget in an essay in _The Atlantic_ called [As We May Think](https://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/1945/07/as-we-may-think/303881/). He wanted a system capable of “associative indexing... whereby any item may be caused at will to select immediately and automatically another... [so that] numerous items have been thus joined together to form a trail.”

This essay turned out to be a foundational document for the ideologies that directly led to both the internet and the Web. <Footnote idName={1}>Yes, those are two entirely separate pieces of technology.</Footnote> Vannevar was one of the key movers and shakers rallying folks to help build the original internet infrastructure. He corraled folks at MIT, the US Department of Defence, the National Science Foundation and various research labs like the Standford Lincoln Lab, Bell Labs, the RAND Corporation, and Xerox PARC to get involved. <Footnote idName={2}>Walter Isaacson, [The Innovators](https://www.librarything.com/work/15179823): How a Group of Hackers, Geniuses, and Geeks Created the Digital Revolution (London: Simon & Schuster, 2015).</Footnote>

Suffice to say, the guy was driven by a belief that enabling people to connect information and share knowledge would expand the scope of human understanding. The Memex was one idea of how that might manifest in material form.

<br />

<BasicImage
  showalt
  alt="Vannevar even created a small informative diagram of this desk-bound vision. Marketing chops 101."
  width="800px"
  src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dg3gyk0gu/image/upload/c_scale,w_960/v1589545798/maggieappleton.com/notes/memex.jpg"
/>

Vannevar's evocative description of the Memex is especially impressive given that digital computers had only come into existence 5 years earlier. Most were still the domain of large military operations like Bletchley Park, and were seen as inconveniently large calculators.

Implementing a wildly interactive computational personal knowledge base wasn't much of an option.

So the idea went into hiberation and didn't resurface until the idea of personal computing began blooming in the sixties and seventies. [Ted Nelson](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ted_Nelson), an unlikely film director and sociologist, stumbled into a series of computing lectures and began to imagine how graphical interfaces might reinvent the way we write and connect ideas. He took inspiration directly from Vannevar's essay, and in 1965 when he coined the term _hypertext_ to describe his vision for a sprawling network of interlinking information.

Nelson planned to implement these hypertextual dreams in his perpetually-imminent Project Xanadu. <Footnote idName={3}>If you have some time, this is quite the internet history [rabbit hole](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Project_Xanadu) to run down. Ted Nelson is on [another level](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=F0NgV3yNd2o).</Footnote>

The Xanadu project was a hypertext system that imagined that every sentence, block, and page would be part of a vast bi-directionally linked network.

<br />

<ImageFrame
  showalt
  alt="A design mockup of how Project Xanadu might visually connect pieces of text across multiple documents"
  width="1050px"
  src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dg3gyk0gu/image/upload/c_scale,w_1000/v1589545780/maggieappleton.com/notes/xanadu.png"
/>

<Center><img
  width="100px"
  alt="fleshed emoji face"
  src="https://emojipedia-us.s3.dualstack.us-west-1.amazonaws.com/thumbs/120/apple/237/flushed-face_1f633.png"
/></Center>

You'd be able to trace information back to its origin the way current web links do. But you'd also be able to see who had referenced, remixed, and expanded off that original. The full [[Pattern Language of Project Xanadu]] expands far beyond just bi-directional links to include features like [[Transclusions]], but we won't dive into it all here.

Suffice it to say, Xanadu didn't pan out.

Instead, we got the less fancy, but far more real and useable World Wide Web that currently does not support bi-directionals on an infrastructure level.

While Sir Tim Berner's Lee [wrote himself a note](https://www.w3.org/DesignIssues/Topology.html) debating their pros and cons back in 1999, there is an obvious design issue with letting two-way connections flow freely around the web.

If _every_ site that linked to yours was visible on your page, and you had no control over who could and couldn't link to you, it is not hard to imagine the Trollish implications...

Figuring out how we might filter, moderate, and set permissions around link visibility turned into [quite the challenge](https://dl.acm.org/doi/epdf/10.1145/74224.74236). The [design details](https://dl.acm.org/doi/epdf/10.1145/74224.74229) [grew complex](https://dl.acm.org/doi/epdf/10.1145/74224.74245).

It became clear implementing the Web with simpler mono-directional links was the right thing to do, given that its creators wanted universal adoption. Lots of people are still mad about it. Let's not venture too far down that historical wormhole.

> **The TLDR is technology is hard**.

Until [Xanadu ships](https://www.wired.com/1995/06/xanadu/) and we're all immersed in the universe of multi-linked, version-controlled nodes of remixable micro-content (that somehow solves the problems of permissions and moderation), there are still plenty of ways we can resurrect the possibility of bi-directional links on the web.

---

## Bi-direction Linking in Personal Digital Gardens

Most of the design issues with adding bi-directional links to the global web were related to moderation and permissions. However, adding them within the bounds of a single website with one author sidesteps that problem.

There's been a flurry of interest around bi-directionals among people involved in the [[Digital Gardening]] movement.

Much of this was originally sparked by <a href="https://notes.andymatuschak.org/">Andy Matuschak's notes</a>. Go have a good browse through them.

<ImageFrame
  showalt
  alt="Andy's linked notes stack on top of one another, allowing you to browse to new notes while previous notes are still visible"
  width="1050px"
  src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dg3gyk0gu/image/upload/c_scale,w_960/v1589545795/maggieappleton.com/notes/andy-note-links.png"
/>

<Spacer size="small" />


There's plenty to admire here.<Footnote idName={4}>It should be noted Andy is an experienced developer and interaction
designer, and these notes should not be taken as the standard expectation
for the rest of us normal plebby internet citizens.</Footnote> But the key part of this system that creates interlinked context is
the **"Links to this Note"** section at the bottom of each post.


Anytime Andy links to another one of their notes on the site, it'll pop up as a related note at the bottom of the page. This is the bi-directional dream.

<BasicImage
  width="1050px"
  src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dg3gyk0gu/image/upload/c_scale,f_auto,q_auto:good,w_1200/v1589483829/maggieappleton.com/notes/Hyperlinks_3.png"
/>

It gives us a way to navigate through these ideas in exploratory mode, rather than navigating a hierarchy of categories on a main index page.

Since it's all contained within a single-author site, our Spammish-Troll-risk factor is at a comfortable zero. <Footnote idName={5}>This is mildly tangential, but I love how the topic of bi-directional links
makes fully visible our “websites are locations” and “websites are
containers” conceptual metaphors with **"inside"** and **"outside"**
links.</Footnote>

---

### Building Your Own Bi-Directionals

That's all very cool, but how are you supposed to build bi-directionals into your own site? Thankfully, setting up your own public gardening bi-directional Memex doesn't involve Xanadu.

One fantastic option for non-developers is based around a personal wiki system called [TiddlyWiki](https://tiddlywiki.com/). Anne-Laure Le Cunff wrote up an easy-to-follow guide to getting [your own up and running](https://nesslabs.com/tiddlywiki-beginner-tutorial).

For those of us here for the hyper-customised, over-engineered JavaScript solution (that would be me 🙌), the [Gatsby.js](https://www.gatsbyjs.org/) community has a number of active gardening enthusiasts building themes and plugins.

I built mine using Aengus McMillin's [gatsby-theme-brain](https://github.com/aengusmcmillin/gatsby-theme-brain). Aengus has documented the theme well and it's not too challenging to implement (as long as you're comfortable in JavaScript and React).

I also curate a list of tools for [[Digital Gardening]] on this [Github repo](https://github.com/MaggieAppleton/digital-gardeners/)

---

### Bi-Directional Linking with WebMentions

While I argued that Web-wide bi-directional links are unlikely to happen at a global scale, there's a way you can add bi-directionals to your personal website that picks up on references anywhere on the web.

[WebMentions](https://webmention.io/) are a piece of web infrastructure the [IndieWeb](https://indieweb.org/) community has done a lot of work to advocate for. The W3C gave the [specification](https://www.w3.org/TR/webmention/) _recommendation_ status in 2017.

The system notifies a URL whenever that site is mentioned elsewhere on the web. You're then able to show that mention and its contents on your site. It's essentially an opt-in bi-directional linking system.

Plenty of folks have written useful guides on how to add these to your site. Here's one for any [static site](https://keithjgrant.com/posts/2019/02/adding-webmention-support-to-a-static-site/), one for [Gatsby](https://www.christopherbiscardi.com/post/building-gatsby-plugin-webmentions), one for [Next.js](https://css-tricks.com/jumping-into-webmentions-with-nextjs-or-not/). There's a whole list of implementation examples on the [IndieWeb Wiki](https://indieweb.org/Webmention#IndieWeb_Examples) you can look through.


Seventy years ago we dreamed up links that would allow us to create two-way, contextual conversations. Why don't we use them on the web?

A Short History of Bi-Directional Links

My fairly banal, basic, but beautiful command line setup

Aesthetic Command Lines with Hyper, Spaceship, and Oh My Zsh


<IntroParagraph>

Two years ago, I [[joined Elicit]] as their first and only designer. Or rather, I joined Ought – a small AI research lab which [evolved into Elicit](https://blog.elicit.com/elicit-raises-9-million-and-becomes-a-public-benefit-corporation/).

</IntroParagraph>

Just over a month ago I handed in my notice and worked my last day. I have plenty of reasons to leave, which I'll get into below, but none of them are that I don't believe in [Elicit](https://elicit.com/) as a product or the team behind it. Quite the opposite. I think Elicit is one of a handful of companies doing interesting and impressive work applying language models to real-world problems. If you're looking for high-impact work with lovely people [they're hiring](https://elicit.com/careers) for both design and engineering.

## Growing with Elicit

I joined Elicit in mid-2022, pre-ChatGPT-hype-wave, back when it was mostly a promising prototype: a free tool that used language models to help scientists, academics, and researchers find and analyse papers as part of the scientific [literature review](https://www.perplexity.ai/search/What-is-the-SZJIJ_.pTPeo4js_pwYSGg) process. It's now a real VC-backed product with paying subscribers, enterprise clients, and hockey-stick-shaped growth.

In that time we grew from 10,000 to over 250,000 monthly active users, started charging them money which took us from $0 to over a million in revenue in under 4 months, rebuilt both the front and backend of the product, and literally became a [different company](https://blog.elicit.com/elicit-raises-9-million-and-becomes-a-public-benefit-corporation/).

Both Elicit and I are drastically different entities today.

When I joined I thought my job as a designer was to layout sidebars, write clear error messages, pick accessible colour schemes, and make sure the hover states on buttons all looked consistent.

While I certainly did all those things, I learned to spend far more time defining problems, validating they were actually problems, writing those problems clearly and concisely in documents, rigorously documenting my exploration of possible solutions, testing those with users, and justifying every decision along the way.

In short, I went on the classic journey from “design is what the user sees” to “design is a reliable process for identifying and solving problems, then clearly communicating that process to others.”

Being the only designer, on a very small team, for a rapidly growing product, working with unprecedented technological capabilities, solving novel problems for which we have no previous art or products to be “inspired by”, made me learn a _lot_. I slogged through mountains of machine learning papers. I designed a hundred prototypes. For an eight month stretch we had no product manager or front-end developer. Which meant I helped cover those roles on top of design work (with assistance from colleagues).

To be honest, a lot of it was stressful and difficult. I waded in and out of imposter syndrome. I learned things the hard way. But I wouldn't undo any of it.

## Why I'm Leaving

I'm leaving for three big reasons: time zone misalignment, not enough in-person collaboration, and lack of senior design mentorship.

When it comes down to it, these are primarily problems of time and space.

The vast majority of the Elicit team live in California. And I live eight time zones and 5,354 miles away in London. I've spent over 88 hours on planes going between the two – a trip every 2-3 months – on top of flying around for conferences and the like.

Even with frequent trips over to work in person, I found it was never enough. Trying to do early-stage design work on a brand new product requires a huge amount of team alignment, open-ended exploration, rapid feedback loops, and trust. An amount you can't get over a few hours of daily zoom calls and some async documents.

The time difference exacerbated this. Working eight hours behind everyone else was lonely and exhausting. When I was stuck on hard problems, there was no one to bounce ideas off. When I wanted to validate possible design solutions, there were no engineers around to speak to its feasibility. When I wanted to sense check a product decision, no one could give me quick feedback.

Being the only designer on the team only made this harder. It's difficult to do exceptional design work without a good sparring partner or a more senior designer to roast your work.

Most people in this position would just move themselves to San Francisco. But the Bay Area is not to my taste, and I'm unwilling to leave London – it's my home and I adore it; it is packed full of curious, intellectual, hilariously funny people who do all manner of things unrelated to “tech”.

Even the tech people here lack the egotism and self-importance our industry is known for. The [beating heart of the London coding scene](https://x.com/genmon/status/1729803903028351004) is alive and delightful. The [people who come](https://x.com/Mappletons/status/1753555201800233316) to events like my [Future of Coding](https://lu.ma/foclondon) meetup are unabashedly enthusiastic, kind, and good-weird.

London has it's share of shitty things – dark and damp winters, Northern line trains packed like sardines, the tories<Footnote idName={1}>Now defeated! God bless Keir Starmer and his boring [50 shades of beige](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ghr2M8mh8MA).</Footnote> – but none compare to the viscerally upsetting wealth disparity on display in San Francisco. It's not something I could live within.

On a more principled level, I resent and reject the idea that everyone in this field needs to move to California to do good work. We need to diversify the kinds of people who make software, the kinds of problems they're solving, and the philosophies and worldviews that govern how they build. Putting every software creator inside a tiny, privileged bubble that's awash in VC cash and obsessed with hierarchical status games isn't going to give us novel, “innovative”, or diverse software that serves the needs of everyone.

If you're currently debating moving to the Bay Area, reconsider!

## What's Next

I'm taking the summer off to muck around with my own research projects, bake too many loaves of banana bread, acquire some new engineering and prototyping skills, and get married in a giant field <span role="img">⛺🌳💍</span>.

I've also joined [Ink & Switch](https://www.inkandswitch.com/) as a researcher in residence for the next 6 months, which will give some structure to my chaotic explorations.

At the end of July I'll be joining a small, thoughtful, and impressive prototyping and design agency based here in London. But I'll talk more about that later.


Reflections on two years of working at Elicit and why it's time to leave

Leaving Elicit

The emerging golden age of home-cooked software, barefoot developers, and why the local-first community should help build it

Home-Cooked Software and Barefoot Developers

An exploration of the problems and possible futures of flooding the web with generative AI content

Talk: The Expanding Dark Forest and Generative AI


<IntroParagraph>

Art by the most famous artists in the world has never been more aesthetic than it is now. Between its creation a few centuries ago and today, everyone's art has gotten brighter, more colourful, more dramatic, more aesthetically pleasing, better composed, and more desireable.

</IntroParagraph>

While Monet, Van Gogh, Klimt, and Matisse are sleeping in their graves, we've been busy improving their life's work. [The Water Lily Pond](https://www.claude-monet.com/the-water-lily-pond.jsp) might have wowed people in 1904, but it's looking a little pale and boring in 2024, and it could do with an upgrade.

Fear not; sellers on Etsy are all over this problem. When you [go looking for](https://www.etsy.com/uk/search?q=classical+art+prints) prints by infamous artists on there, you'll be pleasantly surprised by the huge range of options. There are _way_ more pieces of artwork than you remember any of these artists creating. How were they so prolific??

And the artwork itself will hit you differently. Monet's landscapes didn't seem this vivid on a screen projector in art class. Matisse's use of shapes and colours seems more experimental and bold than you remembered. Van Gogh's work is more detailed than it looked in textbooks.

<ThreeColumn margin="0 auto 2rem">

<BasicImage src="/images/posts/generative-forgery/klimt1.webp" alt="Painting of flowers in a garden with the name Gustav Klimt in large letters below it"/>

<BasicImage src="/images/posts/generative-forgery/monet1.webp" alt="Painting of an ocean scene with the name Claude Monet in large letters above it"/>

<BasicImage src="/images/posts/generative-forgery/monet4.webp" alt="Painting of flowers by a pond with the name Monet in large letters below it"/>

<BasicImage src="/images/posts/generative-forgery/monet3.webp" alt="Painting of water lillies under a bridge with the name Claude Money in large letters above it"/>

<BasicImage src="/images/posts/generative-forgery/matisse1.webp" alt="Painting of a bright pink living room with a cat on the sofa with the name Henri Matisse in large letters above it"/>

<BasicImage src="/images/posts/generative-forgery/klimt2.webp" alt="Painting of flowers in a garden with the name Gustav Klimt in large letters below it"/>

</ThreeColumn>

<Subtext>Monet, Klimt, and Matisse prints available on Etsy – by [Peardrop Prints](https://www.etsy.com/uk/shop/PeardropPrints?listing_id=1602489177&from_page=listing&section_id=38048874), [PerfectPaperPrint](https://www.etsy.com/uk/shop/PerfectPaperPrint?listing_id=1605328144&from_page=listing), [AttikiStudio](https://www.etsy.com/uk/shop/AttikiStudio?listing_id=1696950873&from_page=listing&section_id=48258235)</Subtext>

<Spacer size="xs" />

How did you fail to appreciate this craftsmanship when you first saw it? Why hadn't you explored their full bodies of work beyond the classics? And why does it all seem so much more _impressive_ now?

I asked myself all these questions as I scrolled through rows and rows of beautifully aesthetic [William Morris](https://www.perplexity.ai/search/Who-is-William-aG1WY_btQMKu6Lx6zdWIpg) prints, liberally adding them to my shopping cart.

<TwoColumn>

<BasicImage src="/images/posts/generative-forgery/morris1.webp" alt="Illustration of birds and flowers"/>

<BasicImage src="/images/posts/generative-forgery/morris2.webp" alt="Illustration of two large, blue and white flowers"/>

<BasicImage src="/images/posts/generative-forgery/morris3.webp" alt="Illustration of bright oranges among blue and green leaves"/>

<BasicImage src="/images/posts/generative-forgery/morris4.webp" alt="Illustration of two birds facing one another surrounded by floral patterns and fruits"/>

</TwoColumn>

<Subtext>“William Morris” prints available on Etsy – by [Peardrop Prints](https://www.etsy.com/uk/shop/PeardropPrints?listing_id=1602489177&from_page=listing&section_id=44753402)</Subtext>

<Spacer size="xs" />


I knew Morris was a British print-maker from the mid-1800's, famous for designing wallpaper and textile patterns, while still finding time for community organising and promoting socialist ideals. I'd heard of his famous [Strawberry Thief](https://www.perplexity.ai/search/What-is-William-2nWwMLPwTQ.bWpub1ebjqg) pattern and seen his intricate floral designs on everything from teatowels to tote bags here in London.

But I'd never seen **this** collection of his work. I was shocked and delighted to discover Morris was somehow also a fine-art illustrator?? No one had ever told me. And a _way_ better illustrator than I would have imagined. These prints echoed his other work, but with far more detail, rich colours, and compositional beauty. Perhaps he did these later in life? Perhaps the other work I'd seen was by a younger, less skilled Morris?

I was confused, but distracted by a set of important decisions; should I get the bee or the bird print? Should I get the matching pair of blue flower prints or was one enough? Would an A2 print be large enough to see all the lovely details?

Wrapped up in the thrill of discovering this new, delightful art and securing versions of it to gaze at while stirring tea in the morning, my dark, skeptical, spidey-senses failed to engage. High on consumer dopamine and browsing picture frames, I forgot, for an important moment, that we recently crossed over into a different sort of world.

The sort of world where it is trivial to prompt a neural network to create an image that pulls on the traditional patterns, subject matter, and motifs of William Morris, but layered with the hyper-realistic, high-definition, pixel-perfect asethetics of the modern web; dramatic lighting and sweeping landscapes ripped from ArtStation, meticulously art-directed details from Wes Anderson film stills, the two-tone color overlays and soft glow effects popularised on Instagram and Pinterest. A system trained on everything we've clicked _like_ on, priming us to like what it makes.

I finally thought to ask the now-blindingly-obvious-question; what if William Morris _didn't_ make these? 

I tried reverse image searching a few of the prints, only to find they were one-of-a-kind. I started googling “morris artwork” and found images that, while beautiful, seemed to lack the finesse and colour range of my new prints.

<ThreeColumn margin="0 auto 2rem" maxWidth="1100px">

<BasicImage src="/images/posts/generative-forgery/real-morris1.webp" alt="Strawberry theif pattern by William Morris"/>

<BasicImage src="/images/posts/generative-forgery/real-morris2.webp" alt="Floral pattern by Wiliam Morris"/>

<BasicImage src="/images/posts/generative-forgery/real-morris3.webp" alt="Floral pattern by Wiliam Morris"/>

<BasicImage src="/images/posts/generative-forgery/real-morris4.webp" alt="Floral pattern by Wiliam Morris"/>

<BasicImage src="/images/posts/generative-forgery/real-morris5.webp" alt="Floral pattern by Wiliam Morris"/>

<BasicImage src="/images/posts/generative-forgery/real-morris6.webp" alt="Floral pattern by Wiliam Morris"/>

</ThreeColumn>

<Subtext>Genuine (as far as I can tell) William Morris Prints – Source: [Wikimedia Commons](https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?search=william+morris+pattern&title=Special:MediaSearch&go=Go&type=image)</Subtext>

<Spacer size="xs" />

It was well past time to withdraw the benefit of my doubt.

I zoomed in on some of the prints to find tell-tale artefacts of generated images. Most had inconsistent patterns and incomplete objects in the backgrounds and corners. Elements blurred into one another, with tenative edges and unusual shapes – quirks I've learned to recognise from plenty of late nights playing with [MidJourney](https://www.midjourney.com/showcase).

<TwoColumn maxWidth="680px" margin="0 auto 4rem">

<BasicImage src="/images/posts/generative-forgery/quirk1.webp" width="300" alt="Warped details of a plant from a generated Morris image"/>

<BasicImage src="/images/posts/generative-forgery/quirk2.webp" width="300" alt="Warped details of a rose from a generated Morris image" />

<BasicImage src="/images/posts/generative-forgery/quirk3.webp" width="300" alt="Warped details of a flower from a generated Morris image"/>

<BasicImage src="/images/posts/generative-forgery/quirk4.webp" width="300" alt="Warped details of a mushroom from a generated Morris image"/>

</TwoColumn>

I rechecked the Etsy print listings for disclaimers or details I must have missed the first time around, but none appeared. Nothing said these prints were “inspired by” or “influnced by” or “made to mimic” or any other derivatives of Morris, rather than originals.

To confound matters, the Etsy stores selling these generated images _also_ sell genuine prints by Morris, Monet, Klimt, and Matisse. These sit alongside their modern expansion packs, blending right in. But which are which? You get coerced into playing an art historian forgery spotter.

It is hard to overlook the intentional deception at play here. Every print says “William Morris” in the listing title, and has his name in giant block letters on the print itself. The same goes for the Monet, Matisse, and Klimt prints. They often include informational details like artwork titles, exhibit or museum names, cities, and years. What are we to conclude?

<TwoColumn maxWidth="1400px" margin="0 auto 4rem">

<BasicImage src="/images/posts/generative-forgery/detail1.webp" alt="Zoomed in label on a painting: Plage Rose, Musee de L'orangerie, 1886"/>

<BasicImage src="/images/posts/generative-forgery/detail2.webp" alt="Zoomed in label on a painting: Rural Elegance: Allegories in Rustic Beauty, The Vienna Secessionist Group, 1909"/>

</TwoColumn>

<Subtext>Titles, dates, museum, and exhibition names on paintings that don't exist.</Subtext>

<Spacer size="xs" />

What is a label, if not factual information about the thing next to it?

And what is forgery, if not an attempt to pass off an imitation as an authentic original?

You can peruse this evidence and conclude I'm just a gullible idiot, which I'll accept. A more learned and cultured individual could easily distinguish a real Morris from a Midjourney hoax. Despite earning a snowflakey liberal arts degree, I failed this test. How many others do you think would pass it?

What happens to the next generation of gullible idiots, when they ask their AI assistant to show them “william morris prints,” and those keywords have already been tainted by the sea of Etsy images? What about when more capable models can create even-more-convincing Morris prints, sans their telltale artefacts and slip-ups? When do the generated images become epistemologically indistinguishable from what Morris created?

What happens if we wait years to pass legislation or policy requiring every generated image to bear clear labels and harcoded watermarks? And all the while the model-makers continue to scrape data from the web, train new generations of neural networks on it, and pump the results back out into our information ecosystem. Where shady, short-sighted entrepreneurs and capital-seeking opportunists sit waiting to leverage it in culturally irresponsible ways. Regurgitating history in an endless loop.

What happens if we never pass that legislation?

The snake eats its own tail. And we scramble a whole generation's understanding of history, tearing at our already threadbare epistemological fabric.

Buying fake William Morris prints on Etsy and other early signs of epistemological collapse

Faking William Morris, Generative Forgery, and the Erosion of Art History

How to open pieces of narrative non-fiction writing, conference talks, and sticky jars

On Opening Essays, Conference Talks, and Jam Jars


<IntroParagraph>

Now, and for the rest of my brief life, I'll be trying to write narrative non-fiction that isn't entirely crap. _Narrative non-fiction_ is the catch-all term for factual writing that uses narrative, literary-like techniques to create a compelling story for the reader. It's non-fiction work that goes beyond presenting bland information in chronological order, and instead uses plot, character, structure, tension, and drama to make plain reality more compelling.

</IntroParagraph>

Authors like [John McPhee](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_McPhee), [Joan Didion](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Joan_Didion), [Tom Wolfe](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tom_Wolfe), [Jon Krakauer](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jon_Krakauer), [Oliver Sacks](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oliver_Sacks), and [Rebecca Solnit](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rebecca_Solnit) epitomise this way of writing.

I'm not a _Writer_, but I write to explore other things – anthropology, weird cultural quirks in the web development community, interaction design, and the rising field of "[[tools for thought]]". These things are all factual and grounded in reality, but have interesting stories twisted around them. Ones I'm trying to tell in my little notes and essays.

Perhaps you're the same kind of non-_Writer_ writer. The playful amateur kind who uses it to explore and communicate ideas, rather than making the medium part of your identity. But even amateurs want to be good. _I_ certainly want to get good.

Knowing what you like is half the battle in liking what you create. In that spirit, I collect narrative non-fiction essays that I think are exceptional. They're worth looking at closely – their opening moves, sentence structure, turns of phrase, and narrative arcs.

The only sensible way to improve your writing is by [[echoing]] the work
of other writers. Good artists copy and great artists steal quotes from Picasso.

You may want to start your own collection of lovely essays like this. There will certainly be some Real Writers who find my list trite and full of basic, mainstream twaddle. It probably is. I've done plenty of self-acceptance work and I'm okay with it.

Twaddle aside, the essays below are worth your attention.

## The Essays

### [What is Code?](https://www.bloomberg.com/graphics/2015-paul-ford-what-is-code/)

<p className="small-caps">by Paul Ford</p>

<p>
Paul Ford explains code in 38,000 words and somehow makes it all accessible, technically accurate, narratively compelling, and most of all, culturally insightful and humanistic.

I have unreasonable feelings about this essay. It is, to me, perfect. Few essays take the interactive medium of the web seriously, and this one takes the cake. <Footnote idName={1}>Most of the rest live on [The Pudding](https://pudding.cool), though they are focused on data visualisation rather than exploring long-form, narrative writing in particular.</Footnote> There is a small blue cube character, logic diagrams, live code snippets to run, GIFs, tangential footnotes, and a certificate of completion at the end.
</p>

<ImageFrame
  width="1100px"
  src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dxj9qr5gj/image/upload/c_scale,f_auto,q_auto:good,w_1100/v1640188990/maggieappleton.com/notes/essays/ford-2_w4zoqb.jpg"
  alt="Screenshot of the essay what is code"
  style={{ marginBottom: 0 }}
/>

<ImageFrame
  width="1100px"
  src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dxj9qr5gj/image/upload/c_scale,f_auto,q_auto:good,w_1100/v1640188990/maggieappleton.com/notes/essays/ford-1_bxqtj8.jpg"
  alt="Screenshot of the essay what is code"
  style={{ marginTop: 0 }}
/>

### [A Supposedly Fun Thing I'll Never Do Again](https://harpers.org/wp-content/uploads/2008/09/HarpersMagazine-1996-01-0007859.pdf)

<p className="small-caps">by David Foster Wallace – Published under the title 'Shipping Out'</p>

<p>
Forgive me for being a David Foster Wallace admirer. The guy had issues, but this account of his 7-day trip on a luxury cruiseliner expresses an inner monologue that is clarifying, rare and often side-splittingly hilarious.

He taught me it is 100% okay to write an entire side-novel in your footnotes if you need to.
</p>

### [What’s the Point If We Can’t Have Fun?](https://thebaffler.com/salvos/whats-the-point-if-we-cant-have-fun)

<p className="small-caps">by David Graeber</p>

<p>
Graeber explores play and work from an anthropological perspective. He's a master of moving between the specific and the general. Between academic theory and personal storytelling. He's always ready with armfuls of evidence and citations but doesn't drown you in them.
</p>

### [The Ketchup Conundrum](https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2004/09/06/the-ketchup-conundrum)

<p className="small-caps">by Malcolm Gladwell</p>

<p>
This piece uses a typical Gladwellian style. He takes a fairly dull question – **Why had ketchup stayed the same, while mustard comes in dozens of varieties?** – and presents the case in a way that makes it reasonably intriguing. He's great at starting with specific characters, times and places to draw you in. There are always rich scenes, details, personal profiles, and a grand narrative tying it all together.

Some people find the classic _New Yorker_ essay format overdone, but it relies on storytelling techniques that consistently work.
</p>


### [Quitting the Paint Factory](http://www.molvray.com/ebooks/Quitting_the_Paint_Factory_Mark_Slouka.html)

<p className="small-caps">by Mark Slouka</p>

### [Goodbye To All That](https://essaysspring13.qwriting.qc.cuny.edu/files/2013/04/Joan-Didion-Goodbye-to-All-That.pdf)

<p className="small-caps">by Joan Didion</p>



Narrative essays that I consider ideal models of the medium

The Finest Narrative Non-Fiction Essays


<AssumedAudience>

Anyone suffering from vestibular neuritis, labyrinthis, or other vestibular issues looking for some reassurance and points of comparion. Or anyone with a normal balance system curious what it's like to spend months unable to see, walk, or talk straight, and wants to read an account of my unhinged hypochondria.

</AssumedAudience>

<Spacer size="small" />

<IntroParagraph>

At around 2pm on January 23rd, while on a work trip to San Francisco, jet-lagged, staring into a screen, and trying to organise a chaotic Figma file, my brain began to malfunction. My eyes refused to focus on the shapes in front of me and my head felt like it was floating away from my body.

</IntroParagraph>

Alarmed, I thought I must be dehydrated or in a dire blood sugar crash, and headed towards the kitchen of our little co-working space. Mid-way down the corridor I fell into the wall. Or rather, veered into the wall as the floor began to spin above my head. Panicking, I ducked into the bathroom, and only remember staring at myself in the mirror, clutching the sink, and thinking I was utterly losing my mind. This must be a stroke. Or a heart attack. Or sepsis.

I had completely lost my sense of balance. In waves of disorientation, the room was spinning around me. To simulate the sensation, imagine being on a violent version of the [teacup ride](https://youtu.be/tBw6JBK26fw?si=pAD0RMz3jEoVgRAc&t=10) at Disneyland. Where the scene in front of you whips away so fast, your brain doesn't have time to register anything in it. Your eyes flit around for solid ground, unable to tell how far away walls or objects are, nausea builds in the back of your throat, and your stomach threatens to empty itself.

Except you're standing completely still in an empty womens bathroom, wondering if you're dying.

I stood anchored to that sink for a long time, afraid that letting go might fling me off the earth. Over something like fifteen minutes, the spinning began to ease off. I gingerly palmed my way to the wall, doorframe, along the corridor, and back to the office to sit down and try to strategise what to do, while still trying not to throw up or melt down into a pile of panic. Even with my eyes closed the room twirled around me. One of my co-workers came over to ask a question, noticed my strange state of disarray, and helped me find the nearest urgent care clinic.

By the time I made it to the clinic and saw a doctor an hour later, the spinning had slowed to a more manageable lightheadedness and off-kilter feeling. They did a suite of tests that all came back normal, declared I wasn't dying, and sent me off with a diagnosis of “vertigo,” possibly caused by BPPV: [benign paroxysmal positional vertigo](https://www.perplexity.ai/search/What-is-benign-M6aUTav6TteHw.HPpEKXfA). In other words, a set of small calcium crystals inside my ears that regulate my sense of up and down may have become dislodged, and were floating free in places they shouldn't be. 

Relieved to hear the word “benign” in the diagnosis, and reassured I wasn't in any grave danger, I tried to shake it off and boarded my flight back home to London. I spent the following days sleeping and recovering among the creature comforts of home. The dizziness dissipated and within a week I was barely feeling it. Problem solved! I figured it was a blip in the matrix I no longer had to worry about.

Except the blip came back a few days later. Not as dramatically this time. But consistently. I awoke every morning and within minutes noticed my head was slightly floaty, as if rocking back and forth in space. Moving around sped it up to a twirl. I had to lean against walls to stay upright. Walking took exceptional concentration, and happened at a snail's pace. Going outside onto the street was visually overwhelming, and I stumbled about like someone six beers deep. It felt like watching a film with three-quarters of the frames skipped; I couldn't accurately sense how far my body was from the ground, objects, or people around me. The contradictory signals travelling from my eyes and body to my brain left me perpetually seasick and on the verge of vomiting.

Certain things made it worse; turning my head too quickly, bending down, standing up too fast, bright lights, screens, scrolling on websites, fast moving objects like cars passing by, complex scenes like busy streets, being on trains or buses. Frankly, doing anything but lying down with my eyes closed seemed like a bad idea.

This went on for weeks. Some days were worse than others, but no days were free and clear. I began my tour of various doctors, all with different theories on what was happening. The first did some blood tests, saw nothing out of the ordinary, and declared there was nothing wrong with me and I didn't need a follow up appointment (love that guy).

The second was more concerned, asked many questions, had me touch my fingers to my nose a lot, and tested me for BPPV (misaligned ear crystals) by watching how my eyes moved when she tilted my head. I tested negative. This only made me anxious that something more nefarious was going on. If you google “causes of vertigo, dizziness, and nausea,” of course you hit the worst-case-scenario jackpot: brain tumour. Fantastic. Doctor two eventually declared she was “stumped”, prescribed me anti-nausea meds, and said we should just wait a few weeks to see if it would go away.

At this point I was in full-on “I'm dying of a brain tumour” mode and not keen on waiting it out. Brain fog had set in; I had trouble concentrating and finding the right words in conversations. I mispronounced things and began sentences I couldn't quite find the ends of. My neck became extremely stiff and sore. I began to have weird pains, pressure, and constriction sensations at the back of my head. The web suggested these might be tension headaches (another common symptom of brain tumours – very reassuring).

I booked an appointment with an ENT <Footnote idName={1}>Ear, nose, and throat specialist. Also known more poetically as an otorhinolaryngologist.</Footnote> at a private clinic, willing to pay any amount for someone to ground my worries in reality. <Footnote idName={2} isClosed>I'm very lucky to have medical insurance which covered this, but it was initially unclear how much outpatient treatment they would pay for, so I was prepared to eat the cost myself.</Footnote> Doctor three (my favourite) had me do lots of strange coordination and balance tests, ruled out various possibilties, and finally declared he was “80% sure” it was [vestibular neuritis](https://www.perplexity.ai/search/What-is-vestibular-0UsDHNmCTCWMYBxXDQk5QA). <Footnote idName={3}>This is almost the same thing as [labyrinthitis](https://www.perplexity.ai/search/What-is-labyrinthitis-6jPvEn8sQcyXmkasflhN0g), but without the hearing loss or tinnitus.</Footnote>

80% of the dread left my body. I'd read plenty about vestibular neuritis by that point, having let my hypochondriac side run wild on the web. It's an infection of the  vestibular nerve that connects the balance system in your inner ear to your brain. The infection damages the nerve, which then sends warped and incorrect signals about your position in space to your brain.

<BasicImage src="/images/posts/spinning.webp" width="1100px" alt="A diagram of the vestibular nerve sending mixed signals to the brain" />

This diagnosis seemed great! But it still felt a bit tentative. Vestibular neuritis is usually preceded by a respiratory or ear infection, and I'd had neither before my episode of vertigo back in January. I didn't love the 20% chance it was something else, so asked for an MRI (or rather, said I was willing to pay an extortionate amount for an MRI to avoid lying wide awake at 5am, imagining the giant mass growing in my cerebellum). Thankfully it came up clean. No tumours. No bleeding. No lesions. God bless my extremely normal brain.

As I write this, eight weeks in, I'm not yet recovered. My head currently feels like it's doing a gentle spin in my unmoving body. I've been looking at a screen for about two hours, which means I'm pretty nauseous, but that's par for the course these days. On the bright side, my symptoms have faded enough for me resume normal life; I can walk in a straight line, grocery shop, go for runs, meet friends for coffee, and work on screens all day. I'm just dizzy the whole time.

Even in my disoriented state, I'm profoundly relieved and happy. While this might sound like a warped recipe for joy, try spending weeks believing you're about to discover you have a tragic and fatal diagnosis, then all at once being freed from it. To be fair, this was a cage of my own making. More sensible people don't google every last symptom, and fixate on the dire ones. Let's just say I have a strong survival instinct.

I'm deeply grateful to the dozens of people who have written accounts or made YouTube videos about their vestibular diseases.<Footnote idName={5}>There are many besides vestibular neuritis that have very similar symptoms and prognoses; BPPV, labyrinthitis, vestibular migrane, PPPD, and Ménière's disease.</Footnote> Without them I would still be in a wild panic. The lightweight medical material available on the web claims most people recover within a few weeks, and mention nothing about concurrent symptoms like brain fog, light sensitivity, stiff necks, or head pains and pressure. Many of the cursory, sterile medical descriptions of what vestibular issues feel like didn't match my lived reality, which sent me into a spiral of imagining something more sinister was causing this.

Hearing real people describe their symptoms in long forum posts and diary-style vlogs reassured and informed me far more than any doctors did. It helped me adjust my expectations of how long recovery could take. Others suffer more severe symptoms for months, or even years. Once the vestibular nerve is permanently damaged, the brain has to _relearn_ how to process visual and bodily sensations of where you are in space. The warped signals coming in from your ears are unfamiliar, and it figures out ways to cope by relying more on vision and proprioception. This is impressive! Neuroplasticity in action.

Most people said their quality of life improved once they recieved [vestibular rehabilitation therapy](https://www.perplexity.ai/search/What-is-vestibular-cxWg_Wp1QVK9pHZLP6310Q) which involves specific exercises tailored to retrain your brain. I'm currently waiting on a referral for this. Overall, recovery rates are great; everyone relearns how to balance eventually, you just feel a bit wobbly every now and again. The medical literature doesn't have many exact numbers on recovery time, other than “weeks to years,” but [one study](https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5420806/) showed the majority of improvements happen by week ten, and then it becomes a management and coping game.

I hope someone disoriented, scared, and harbouring their own statistically unlikely brain tumour self-diagnosis finds this as they frantically Google their distressing symptoms. Take a deep breath. Find yourself a good ENT. It'll all be okay.


Gaining a strange disease and losing my ability to see straight

Spinning Worlds, Seasickness, and Dealing with Vestibular Neuritis


<AssumedAudience>

People trying to figure out what a **Design Engineer** is and want to see tangible examples of design engineering work.

</AssumedAudience>

<Spacer size="small" />

<IntroParagraph>

**Design Engineer** is the latest label we're chucking onto the pile of obfuscatory design titles alongside interface designer, interaction designer, software designer, web designer, product designer, design systems architect, UI/UX designer, UX engineer, UI engineer, and front-of-the-front-end engineer.

</IntroParagraph>

I won't walk you through what defines and distinguishes each of these, because I don't fully understand most of them. Few people do. They're fuzzy, malleable pointers to a wide array of skills and responsibilities that differ from company to company. But they're our best attempt at describing emerging roles in the very young field of software creation.

Throwing this extra label onto the pile feels necessary though. **Design engineer** captures something simple, important, and worth distinguishing: a person who sits squarely at the intersection of design and engineering, and works to bridge the gap between them.

<BasicImage src="/images/posts/design-engineers/deseng.webp" width={800} />

They're people who know how to run a design process to decide how something should work, look, and feel, _and_ have the engineering chops to implement it. They can quickly iterate on ideas by cycling between design exploration, research, and live code. The skillset is ideal for prototyping, exploratory interaction design, and building robust design systems.

Others have written about the role in more detail, so I'll lean on their insights to flesh out the definition:

<QuoteCard sourceTitle="Design Engineering: An Emerging Role in Software" sourceLink="https://www.proofofconcept.pub/p/design-engineering" author="David Hoang" year="March 2024">

“Design Engineering is a true blend of two conventional roles. [They] have deep knowledge in technological systems while scaling interface quality. They naturally fit in design crit or reviewing code with engineering.”

</QuoteCard>

<QuoteCard sourceTitle="Design Engineering Handbook" sourceLink="https://marketing.invisionapp-cdn.com/www-assets.invisionapp.com/epubs/InVision_DesignEngineeringHandbook.pdf" author="Natalya Shelburne, et al." year="2020">

“They are able to contribute wireframes and mockups as well as front-end code. Prototyping at all levels of fidelity, whether via pen-and-paper sketch or live code, lets design engineers quickly grow their idea and shepherd it through the development process.”

<div style={{width: '100%', height: '1px', backgroundColor: 'var(--color-gray-100)', margin: '2rem auto' }} />

“A design engineer might focus on setting up a design system, documenting patterns, performing workflow audits and updates, building UI components, writing usage documentation, or working with stakeholders spread across an organization.”

<div style={{width: '100%', height: '1px', backgroundColor: 'var(--color-gray-100)', margin: '2rem auto' }} />

“From prototyping to production-ready code, this function fast-tracks design decisions, mitigates risk, and establishes UI code quality”

</QuoteCard>

<QuoteCard sourceTitle="The Case for Design Engineers
" sourceLink="https://blog.jim-nielsen.com/2022/the-case-for-design-engineers/" author="Jim Nielsen" year="May 2022">

“They can bridge the chasm of design to browser engineering, skipping the need for 60+ artifacts. How? They have an understanding of the constraints of the medium, so from sketches to wireframe to high fidelity mocks, they only have to produce one or two artifacts while simultaneously keeping a picture in their head of how the elements of those designs flex and flow and change across different sizes. They can imagine how it works, so they don’t have to articulate it for every iteration. There’s no need to explicitly design and document all possible states for whoever is downstream of the designs because _they are the ones downstream of the designs._”

</QuoteCard>

<QuoteCard sourceTitle="On Design Engineering: I think I might be a design engineer" sourceLink="https://www.trysmudford.com/blog/i-think-im-a-design-engineer/" author="Trys Mudford" year="Feb 2021">

“The role I’ve been trying to push towards without realising:

* Idea validation
* Rapid prototyping
* Production code
* UI code quality
* Creating useful tools
* Encapsulating systems
* Setting up project groundwork
* Empowering effective collaboration”

</QuoteCard>

<Spacer size="small"/>


Rather than dwell too long on the definitions and literature, I'm more interested in practical examples of design engineering work out in the wild. Selfishly, I'm trying to figure out whether _I'm_ a design engineer, or want to become one when I grow up.<Footnote idName={1}>I probably count as a hobbyist design engineer, but not a professionally-employable-capital-D-Design-Engineer. And it's unlikely I'll ever grow up.</Footnote>

The best way to do this is to find and follow people doing design engineering work in public, and pay attention to their outputs, skills, and responsibilities.

Over the last year or two, I've seen an increasing numbers of these folks pop up. Most from a small set of companies like [Vercel](https://vercel.com/), [Linear](https://linear.app/), [The Browser Company](https://thebrowser.company/) and [Replit](https://replit.com/), known for their attention to interface design detail and slick product interactions, who are clearly encouraging and cultivating design-engineer hybrids.

So here's my list of people I consider design engineers, based on the work they put in public.<Footnote idName={2}>Some of these people don't explicitly call themselves “design engineers,” but their work sits solidly at the intersection of the two disciplines.</Footnote> It's not exhaustive or comprehensive. I am not listing all design engineers known to the universe. Only the ones I pay attention to and respect the work of. Maybe it'll help you figure out what design engineers are too.

<Spacer size="small" />



### 1. Rauno Freiberg

<div style={{ display: 'flex', gridGap: '1rem', alignItems: 'center', flexWrap: 'wrap'}}>

<span style={{ fontFamily: 'var(--font-sans)', marginBottom: '0.25rem', fontSize: 'var(--font-size-sm)'}}>Staff Design Engineer at [Vercel](https://vercel.com/)</span>

<div style={{ width: '6px', height: '6px', backgroundColor: 'var(--color-gray-300)', borderRadius: '50%', marginBottom: '0.25rem' }} />

<LinkWithIcon iconName="Link" href="https://rauno.me/">Website</LinkWithIcon>

<div style={{ width: '6px', height: '6px', backgroundColor: 'var(--color-gray-300)', borderRadius: '50%', marginBottom: '0.25rem' }} />

<LinkWithIcon iconName="Twitter" href="https://twitter.com/raunofreiberg">Twixxer</LinkWithIcon>

</div>

<TwoColumn alignItems="top" maxWidth="1100px">
<TweetEmbed tweetId="1755244270712127834" />
<TweetEmbed tweetId="1742975608789819785" />
</TwoColumn>


### 2. Paco Coursey

<div style={{ display: 'flex', gridGap: '1rem', alignItems: 'center', flexWrap: 'wrap'}}>

<span style={{ fontFamily: 'var(--font-sans)', marginBottom: '0.25rem', fontSize: 'var(--font-size-sm)'}}>Webmaster at [Linear](https://linear.app/). Previously Software Engineer at [Vercel](https://vercel.com/)</span>

<div style={{ width: '6px', height: '6px', backgroundColor: 'var(--color-gray-300)', borderRadius: '50%', marginBottom: '0.25rem' }} />

<LinkWithIcon iconName="Link" href="https://paco.me/">Website</LinkWithIcon>

<div style={{ width: '6px', height: '6px', backgroundColor: 'var(--color-gray-300)', borderRadius: '50%', marginBottom: '0.25rem' }} />

<LinkWithIcon iconName="Twitter" href="https://twitter.com/pacocoursey">Twixxer</LinkWithIcon>

</div>

<TwoColumn alignItems="top" maxWidth="1100px">
<TweetEmbed tweetId="1696389547696009554" />
<TweetEmbed tweetId="1732579342230937651" />
</TwoColumn>


### 3. Szymon Kaliski

<div style={{ display: 'flex', gridGap: '1rem', alignItems: 'center', flexWrap: 'wrap'}}>

<span style={{ fontFamily: 'var(--font-sans)', marginBottom: '0.25rem', fontSize: 'var(--font-size-sm)'}}>Design Engineer at [Replit](https://replit.com/). Previously Principal Investigator at [Ink & Switch](https://www.inkandswitch.com/)</span>

<div style={{ width: '6px', height: '6px', backgroundColor: 'var(--color-gray-300)', borderRadius: '50%', marginBottom: '0.25rem' }} />

<LinkWithIcon iconName="Link" href="https://szymonkaliski.com/">Website</LinkWithIcon>

<div style={{ width: '6px', height: '6px', backgroundColor: 'var(--color-gray-300)', borderRadius: '50%', marginBottom: '0.25rem' }} />

<LinkWithIcon iconName="Twitter" href="https://twitter.com/szymon_k">Twixxer</LinkWithIcon>

</div>

<TwoColumn alignItems="top" maxWidth="1100px">
<TweetEmbed tweetId="1289942401318977537" />
<TweetEmbed tweetId="1283069644102864899" />
</TwoColumn>

### 4. Amelia Wattenberger

<div style={{ display: 'flex', gridGap: '1rem', alignItems: 'center', flexWrap: 'wrap'}}>

<span style={{ fontFamily: 'var(--font-sans)', marginBottom: '0.25rem', fontSize: 'var(--font-size-sm)'}}>Research & development at [Github](https://github.com/). Previously Designer at [Adept](https://adept.com/)</span>

<div style={{ width: '6px', height: '6px', backgroundColor: 'var(--color-gray-300)', borderRadius: '50%', marginBottom: '0.25rem' }} />

<LinkWithIcon iconName="Link" href="https://wattenberger.com/">Website</LinkWithIcon>

<div style={{ width: '6px', height: '6px', backgroundColor: 'var(--color-gray-300)', borderRadius: '50%', marginBottom: '0.25rem' }} />

<LinkWithIcon iconName="Twitter" href="https://twitter.com/Wattenberger">Twixxer</LinkWithIcon>

</div>

<TwoColumn alignItems="top" maxWidth="1100px">
<TweetEmbed tweetId="1645434961825255425" />
<TweetEmbed tweetId="1638589449419513857" />
</TwoColumn>

### 5. Andy Allen

<div style={{ display: 'flex', gridGap: '1rem', alignItems: 'center', flexWrap: 'wrap'}}>

<span style={{ fontFamily: 'var(--font-sans)', marginBottom: '0.25rem', fontSize: 'var(--font-size-sm)'}}>Designer and Founder of [Not Boring Software](https://www.notboring.software/)</span>

<div style={{ width: '6px', height: '6px', backgroundColor: 'var(--color-gray-300)', borderRadius: '50%', marginBottom: '0.25rem' }} />

<LinkWithIcon iconName="Link" href="https://www.notboring.software/">Website</LinkWithIcon>

<div style={{ width: '6px', height: '6px', backgroundColor: 'var(--color-gray-300)', borderRadius: '50%', marginBottom: '0.25rem' }} />

<LinkWithIcon iconName="Twitter" href="https://twitter.com/asallen">Twixxer</LinkWithIcon>

</div>

<TwoColumn alignItems="top" maxWidth="1100px">
<TweetEmbed tweetId="1749844002667680203" />
<TweetEmbed tweetId="1762962571571986817" />
</TwoColumn>

### 6. Alex Obenauer

<div style={{ display: 'flex', gridGap: '1rem', alignItems: 'center', flexWrap: 'wrap'}}>

<span style={{ fontFamily: 'var(--font-sans)', marginBottom: '0.25rem', fontSize: 'var(--font-size-sm)'}}>Independent researcher. Collaborates with [Ink & Switch](https://www.inkandswitch.com/)</span>

<div style={{ width: '6px', height: '6px', backgroundColor: 'var(--color-gray-300)', borderRadius: '50%', marginBottom: '0.25rem' }} />

<LinkWithIcon iconName="Link" href="https://alexanderobenauer.com/">Website</LinkWithIcon>

<div style={{ width: '6px', height: '6px', backgroundColor: 'var(--color-gray-300)', borderRadius: '50%', marginBottom: '0.25rem' }} />

<LinkWithIcon iconName="Twitter" href="https://twitter.com/alexobenauer">Twixxer</LinkWithIcon>

</div>

<TwoColumn alignItems="top" maxWidth="1100px">
<TweetEmbed tweetId="1359545010371366914" />
<TweetEmbed tweetId="1372978617425264640" />
</TwoColumn>

### 7. Bret Victor

<div style={{ display: 'flex', gridGap: '1rem', alignItems: 'start', flexWrap: 'wrap'}}>

<span style={{ fontFamily: 'var(--font-sans)', marginBottom: '0.25rem', fontSize: 'var(--font-size-sm)', maxWidth: '550px'}}>Independent researcher. Creator of [Dynamicland](https://dynamicland.org/). Frankly, much more than a design engineer and working many meta levels above those of us mucking about with cool UI interactions, but fits the definition anyway.</span>

<div style={{ width: '6px', height: '6px', backgroundColor: 'var(--color-gray-300)', borderRadius: '50%', marginBottom: '0.25rem', flexShrink: '0', position: 'relative', top: '0.6rem' }} />

<LinkWithIcon iconName="Link" href="https://worrydream.com/">Website</LinkWithIcon>

<div style={{ width: '6px', height: '6px', backgroundColor: 'var(--color-gray-300)', borderRadius: '50%', marginBottom: '0.25rem', flexShrink: '0', position: 'relative', top: '0.6rem' }} />

<LinkWithIcon iconName="Twitter" href="https://twitter.com/worrydream">Twixxer</LinkWithIcon>

</div>

<TwoColumn alignItems="top" maxWidth="1100px">
<TweetEmbed tweetId="986704974183710720" />
<TweetEmbed tweetId="1156248136370679808" />
</TwoColumn>

### 8. Emil Kowalski

<div style={{ display: 'flex', gridGap: '1rem', alignItems: 'center', flexWrap: 'wrap'}}>

<span style={{ fontFamily: 'var(--font-sans)', marginBottom: '0.25rem', fontSize: 'var(--font-size-sm)'}}>Design Engineer at [Vercel](https://vercel.com/)</span>

<div style={{ width: '6px', height: '6px', backgroundColor: 'var(--color-gray-300)', borderRadius: '50%', marginBottom: '0.25rem' }} />

<LinkWithIcon iconName="Link" href="https://emilkowal.ski/">Website</LinkWithIcon>

<div style={{ width: '6px', height: '6px', backgroundColor: 'var(--color-gray-300)', borderRadius: '50%', marginBottom: '0.25rem' }} />

<LinkWithIcon iconName="Twitter" href="https://twitter.com/emilkowalski_">Twixxer</LinkWithIcon>

</div>

<TwoColumn alignItems="top" maxWidth="1100px">
<TweetEmbed tweetId="1734201071969374614" />
<TweetEmbed tweetId="1754968070639038671" />
</TwoColumn>


### 9. Steve Ruiz

<div style={{ display: 'flex', gridGap: '1rem', alignItems: 'center', flexWrap: 'wrap'}}>

<span style={{ fontFamily: 'var(--font-sans)', marginBottom: '0.25rem', fontSize: 'var(--font-size-sm)'}}>Founder and designer of [TLDraw](https://www.tldraw.com/). Previously at [Framer](https://www.framer.com/). Master of the arrows</span>

<div style={{ width: '6px', height: '6px', backgroundColor: 'var(--color-gray-300)', borderRadius: '50%', marginBottom: '0.25rem' }} />

<LinkWithIcon iconName="Link" href="https://www.steveruiz.me/">Website</LinkWithIcon>

<div style={{ width: '6px', height: '6px', backgroundColor: 'var(--color-gray-300)', borderRadius: '50%', marginBottom: '0.25rem' }} />

<LinkWithIcon iconName="Twitter" href="https://twitter.com/steveruizok">Twixxer</LinkWithIcon>

</div>

<TwoColumn alignItems="top" maxWidth="1100px">
<TweetEmbed tweetId="1727625036159234555" />
<TweetEmbed tweetId="1728532377809383687" />
</TwoColumn>


### 10. Bartosz Ciechanowski

<div style={{ display: 'flex', gridGap: '1rem', alignItems: 'start', flexWrap: 'wrap'}}>

<span style={{ fontFamily: 'var(--font-sans)', marginBottom: '0.25rem', fontSize: 'var(--font-size-sm)', maxWidth: '550px'}}>Creates interactive explanations. Not a Design Engineer as a profession, but a good example of blending design and engineering for educational content.</span>

<div style={{ width: '6px', height: '6px', backgroundColor: 'var(--color-gray-300)', borderRadius: '50%', marginBottom: '0.25rem', flexShrink: '0', position: 'relative', top: '0.6rem' }} />

<LinkWithIcon iconName="Link" href="https://ciechanow.ski/">Website</LinkWithIcon>

<div style={{ width: '6px', height: '6px', backgroundColor: 'var(--color-gray-300)', borderRadius: '50%', marginBottom: '0.25rem', flexShrink: '0', position: 'relative', top: '0.6rem' }} />

<LinkWithIcon iconName="Twitter" href="https://twitter.com/bciechanowski">Twixxer</LinkWithIcon>

</div>

<TwoColumn alignItems="top" maxWidth="1100px">
<TweetEmbed tweetId="1762517254472868262" />
<TweetEmbed tweetId="1582399273466925056" />
</TwoColumn>


### Some caveats

I've intentionally only listed people who put _lots_ of work in public. But the work people put in public is not necessarily the work they do day-to-day.

People are incentivised to only share their sexy, shiny, flawless creations, rather than their messy process or shameful failures. Some of the especially tedious and labourious work isn't easily shareable, such as advocating for robust design systems and cleaning up legacy code.

I am not under any illusions that these public works constitute the entirety of what design engineers create or spend all day making. I'm sure some spend their days “aligning stakeholders,” buried under a mountain of strategic documents and trapped by heirarchical approval chains. Say a small prayer for them.

If you're mortally offended that I didn't include someone who you think is the _definition_ of a design engineer, tweet at me and include examples of their work. It's not helpful to send me people who don't work in public. I'm sure there are a thousand and one exceptional design engineers buried in the basement of Apple, but we'll never get to see their work or learn from them.

<References>
  <ReferencesLink
    title="Design Engineering: An Emerging Role in Software"
    href="https://www.proofofconcept.pub/p/design-engineering"
    author="David Hoang"
  />
  <ReferencesLink
    title="Design Engineering Handbook"
    href="https://marketing.invisionapp-cdn.com/www-assets.invisionapp.com/epubs/InVision_DesignEngineeringHandbook.pdf"
    author="Natalya Shelburne, et al."
  />
  <ReferencesLink
    title="The Case for Design Engineers"
    href="https://blog.jim-nielsen.com/2022/the-case-for-design-engineers/"
    author="Jim Nielsen"
  />
  <ReferencesLink
    title="On Design Engineering: I think I might be a design engineer"
    href="https://www.trysmudford.com/blog/i-think-im-a-design-engineer/"
    author="Trys Mudford"
  />
</References>

Collecting people I know who work at the intersection of design and engineering, in an attempt to figure out what a design engineer is

A Collection of Design Engineers

How to gather people and create communities in ways that are low-stress and high-payoff

Gathering Structures


<IntroParagraph>

My calendar fails me in many ways, but the most egregious is its failure to support speculative events.

</IntroParagraph>

Every week, I engage in an elaborate scheduling game with multiple people. I do this with friends I need to get coffee with, professional contacts trying to set up meetings, and new acquaintances who want to catch a weekday breakfast.

We email, WhatsApp or DM each other very specific lists of options.  
8-10:30 a.m. on Tuesday, Weds, and Friday next week?  
Or 2-3:30 p.m. next next Thursday?  
Or 11 a.m. on February 20th?

<TwoColumn alignItems="start" margin="0 auto 3rem">

<ImageFrame src="/images/posts/speculative-events/chat1.webp" />
<ImageFrame src="/images/posts/speculative-events/chat2.webp" />

</TwoColumn>

<Subtext>My highly inefficient standard process for coordinating meetings</Subtext>

<Spacer size="xs" />


Once this message is sent, these time blocks need to be marked on my calendar somehow. One naïve, hacky solution is to add them as normal events, but with a `?` at the end. `Coffee with Paul?`

But real calendar events have real repercussions: my co-workers can't book calls with me at times when I have blocks on my calendar. My watch buzzes me 10 minutes before each one. My Mac pops a little notification reminder in the corner of my screen. Receiving notifications for not-real speculative events is immensely frustrating.

<ImageFrame src="/images/posts/speculative-events/cal-notifs.webp" width="1100px" margin="1rem auto 2rem" />

So I don't want to add them as real events. Because they are not real events. They are speculative possibilities of events. The majority of them won't be filled, and having both speculative and real events looking and behaving like the same type of thing is messy and confusing. I can't glance at my calendar to get a quick read on how busy my day or week is.

But I also need to remember who I have promised time slots to! I am often telling multiple people I'm free 8-10:30 a.m. on Tuesday next week. What if they all say yes to that time?

What I need is a new type of calendar primitive: <Highlight>the speculative event</Highlight>. Speculative events may or may not happen. So they show up _tentatively_. Perhaps with a dashed border and some light opacity.

<ImageFrame src="/images/posts/speculative-events/spec-event.webp" width="1200px" alt="A speculative calendar event marked with a dotted border, light opacity background, and question mark icon" />

A very basic implementation of this idea in Mac's native calendar could be adding a little “unconfirmed” checkbox in the editing window:

<BasicImage src="/images/posts/speculative-events/spec-event.gif" width="1400px" margin="1rem auto" alt="Marking a new calendar event as 'unconfirmed' in Mac calendar" />

This is not the _ideal_ design solution, but it's a low-effort starting point. By visually distinguishing these events and turning off their notifications, we've solved most of the problem.

Without this, I shall have to continue doing what I do now: sending people lists of times that I may or may not be free for, forgettings I've promised those times, booking other events and meetings into those times, and then having to play four extra rounds of oh-sorry-I'm-actually-busy-email-scheduling-ping-pong.

Some of the fancy new calendar startups like [Cron](https://cron.com/) and [Amie](https://amie.so/) are trying to solve this problem by letting you send someone a link with your available times.

<TwoColumn gridTemplateColumns="3fr 4fr" alignItems="start" maxWidth="1600px" margin="0 auto var(--space-xl)">

<ImageFrame src="/images/posts/speculative-events/cron.webp" width={685} alt="Selecting avaliable blocks in Cron" showalt />

<ImageFrame src="/images/posts/speculative-events/amie.webp" width={915} alt="Booking an avaliable slot time in Amie" showalt />

</TwoColumn>

The recipient can then select which slots also work for them, and the event is added to your calendar. This is perfect for professional meetings, but feels a bit impersonal and automated for some contexts. When I'm trying to coordinate dinner with family or a close friend over WhatsApp, sending an automated scheduling link makes me look and feel like an intolerable tech bro.

Maybe I don't want a perfectly optimised system. Maybe I just want a bit more flexibility in marking up my calendar.

Just as I was finishing this note, I spotted the infamous [37Signals](https://37signals.com/) / [Basecamp](https://basecamp.com/) / [HEY](https://www.hey.com/) team announced they've added a [new calendar view](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SztU4232u_o) to their email service. And it includes a “maybe” event type! 

<TwoColumn alignItems="start" maxWidth="1400px" margin="1rem auto 2rem">

<ImageFrame src="/images/posts/speculative-events/maybe2.webp" alt="Maybe events on HEY calendar" />

<ImageFrame src="/images/posts/speculative-events/maybe.webp" alt="Maybe events on HEY calendar" />

</TwoColumn>

<Subtext>Screenshots from the calendar [announcement video](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SztU4232u_o)</Subtext>

<Spacer size="xs" />

It works exactly as I described in my concept above. The event displays with a light, monochrome patterned background and doesn't have notifications. Good to see this out in a real product, although I'm not about to move from my beautiful system-level MacOS calendar to something as quirky as HEY.

<Spacer size="xs" />

<SimpleCard alignLeft>

#### End Notes

I've had this frustration for a long time. But only had the impulse to mock up a tangible solution after reading Julian Lehr's beautiful reflection on [Multi-layered Calendars](https://julian.digital/2023/07/06/multi-layered-calendars/).

Seeing others beautifully present ideas always compels me to contribute my own. Thanks to Julian for making the effort, and everyone else consistently publishing small, thoughtful, well-crafted ideas in public.

</SimpleCard>


Designing tentative calendar events to solve complex scheduling problems

Speculative Calendar Events

Video, slides, and transcript from my talk on the challenges of designing with language models

Squish Meets Structure: Designing with Language Models


<IntroParagraph>

We don't quite know what to do with language models yet. But we have some hunches. To me they seem obviously useful as epistemic [rubber ducks](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rubber_duck_debugging) <span role="img">🐥</span> – as things we can query for fuzzy answers, bounce ideas off, and think through problems with. They can help strengthen our own critical thinking and reasoning abilities in the same way a good debate partner does.

</IntroParagraph>

This isn't the _only_ way they're useful, but it's the one I'm most curious about. So I've been playing with it.

The primary interface everyone and their mother jumps to at this point is the chatbot. We are irreversibly anchored to this text-heavy, turn-based interface paradigm. And sure, it's a great solution in a lot of cases! It's flexible, familiar, and easy to implement.

But it's also the lazy solution. It's only the obvious tip of the iceberg when it comes to exploring how we might interact with these strange new language model agents we've grown inside a neural net.

<ResponsiveImage
  framed
  margin="var(--space-s) auto"
  width="600px"
  src="/images/posts/lm-sketchbook/chatbot-iceberg.jpg"
  alt="An iceberg where chatbots are only the tip"
/>

I won't turn this into an anti-chatbot-tirade, but I am certainly brewing one. A few of my friends have eloquently [written](https://wattenberger.com/thoughts/boo-chatbots) [about](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rd-J3hmycQs) [this](https://austinhenley.com/blog/naturallanguageui.html) so just go read their work in the meantime.

Back to the point: I have a large, sprawling Figma file full of tiny interface sketches trying to explore what kinds of non-chatbot, epistemic-rubber-ducky-interfaces could be helpful for us. Here's a couple of them.

## Daemons

Imagine the environment you're writing in has a few characters who hang out in the background and suggest ideas to you every now and then.

These [daemons](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Daimon) have particular personalities – one plays devil's advocate, one says encouraging things and compliments your writing, one synthesises your ideas into more concise statements, one fetches evidence and research for you, one elaborates on points you haven't fully explained, etc. 

As you write, one of them might highlight a sentence and suggest a revision, or ask you to defend a claim. You can always ignore them if you like and the suggestion will fade.

Here's a more detailed walkthrough of how this works

<Video src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/oDuVAczLqTk?vq=hd720" />

<Spacer size="small"/>

<ResponsiveImage
  framed
  margin="var(--space-xs) auto"
  width="950px"
  src="/images/posts/lm-sketchbook/daemon_1.jpg"
  alt="Screenshot of the daemons prototype"
/>

<ResponsiveImage
  framed
  margin="var(--space-xs) auto"
  width="950px"
  src="/images/posts/lm-sketchbook/daemon_2.jpg"
  alt="Screenshot of the daemons prototype"
/>

<ResponsiveImage
  framed
  margin="var(--space-xs) auto"
  width="950px"
  src="/images/posts/lm-sketchbook/daemon_3.jpg"
  alt="Screenshot of the daemons prototype"
/>

<ResponsiveImage
  framed
  margin="var(--space-xs) auto"
  width="950px"
  src="/images/posts/lm-sketchbook/daemon_4.jpg"
  alt="Screenshot of the daemons prototype"
/>

<ResponsiveImage
  framed
  margin="var(--space-xs) auto"
  width="950px"
  src="/images/posts/lm-sketchbook/daemon_5.jpg"
  alt="Screenshot of the daemons prototype"
/>

<ResponsiveImage
  framed
  margin="var(--space-xs) auto"
  width="950px"
  src="/images/posts/lm-sketchbook/daemon_6.jpg"
  alt="Screenshot of the daemons prototype"
/>

<Spacer size="small"/>

## Branches

A lot of what we think of as “understanding an issue” often comes down to “What caused this?” and “What are the consequences of this?”. Or put another way, “Why did this happen?” and “What's likely to happen next?”

We usually get to the bottom of these questions through a mix of research and sitting alone trying to think hard about the issue at hand.

It seems plausible language models would be good helpers in this department. They have plenty of latent knowledge and I've found they're quite good at suggesting reasonable cause-and-effect chains. As long as you double-check its suggestions and don't take them as gospel.

This concept is centered around exploring these cause/consequence chains

<Video src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/otxgVcyQNdU?vq=hd720" />

<Spacer size="small"/>

<ResponsiveImage
  framed
  margin="var(--space-xs) auto"
  width="950px"
  src="/images/posts/lm-sketchbook/branches_1.jpg"
  alt="Screenshot of the branches prototype"
/>

<ResponsiveImage
  framed
  margin="var(--space-xs) auto"
  width="950px"
  src="/images/posts/lm-sketchbook/branches_2.jpg"
  alt="Screenshot of the branches prototype"
/>

<ResponsiveImage
  framed
  margin="var(--space-xs) auto"
  width="950px"
  src="/images/posts/lm-sketchbook/branches_3.jpg"
  alt="Screenshot of the branches prototype"
/>

<Spacer size="small"/>

## Epi

While I love interfaces with a tightly-scoped and specific purpose, there's clearly some opportunity for a more general-purpose reasoning assistant with LMs. Specifically for folks doing research and non-fiction writing.

Models can help in a bunch of small ways – rephrasing sentences, offering critiques of ideas, helping to find evidence for claims, generating possible research questions, and pointing out our assumptions.

Epi uses the familiar right-click context menu to make these moves available in a simple writing context.

<Video src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/8XpIPbhgq0M?vq=hd720" />

<Spacer size="small"/>

<ResponsiveImage
  framed
  margin="var(--space-xs) auto"
  width="950px"
  src="/images/posts/lm-sketchbook/epi_1.jpg"
  alt="Screenshot of the epi prototype"
/>

<ResponsiveImage
  framed
  margin="var(--space-xs) auto"
  width="950px"
  src="/images/posts/lm-sketchbook/epi_2.jpg"
  alt="Screenshot of the epi prototype"
/>

<ResponsiveImage
  framed
  margin="var(--space-xs) auto"
  width="950px"
  src="/images/posts/lm-sketchbook/epi_3.jpg"
  alt="Screenshot of the epi prototype"
/>

<ResponsiveImage
  framed
  margin="var(--space-xs) auto"
  width="950px"
  src="/images/posts/lm-sketchbook/epi_4.jpg"
  alt="Screenshot of the epi prototype"
/>

<ResponsiveImage
  framed
  margin="var(--space-xs) auto"
  width="950px"
  src="/images/posts/lm-sketchbook/epi_5.jpg"
  alt="Screenshot of the epi prototype"
/>

<ResponsiveImage
  framed
  margin="var(--space-xs) auto"
  width="950px"
  src="/images/posts/lm-sketchbook/epi_6.jpg"
  alt="Screenshot of the epi prototype"
/>

<ResponsiveImage
  framed
  margin="var(--space-xs) auto"
  width="950px"
  src="/images/posts/lm-sketchbook/epi_7.jpg"
  alt="Screenshot of the epi prototype"
/>

---

I'm still building out this collection. More to come.

{/* Magnet

Embeddings feel like the dark horse in this whole generative AI hype cycle.

Sixer

This is based off Edward de Bono's famous [Six Thinking Hats]() technique. You take a problem you're facing and look at it through a series of lenses. Or in this case, while wearing one of many different hats.

There are – unsurprisingly – six hats:

- White for considering what information you currently know
- Red for emotional hunches, feelings, and intuitions
- Green for creative possibilities and exploring alternatives
- Yellow for optimistic positivity
- Black for pessimism, caution, and considering risks
- Blue for meta-analysis: are you approaching the problem the right way?

Using language models to help fill out some of the answers within a well-defined framework

Invenntion
 */}


Sketchy ideas for interfaces that play with the novel capabilities of language models

Language Model Sketchbook, or Why I Hate Chatbots


A growing collection of all my favourite Neologisms.

These are freshly coined words or phrases inching their way into common usage, but not fully mainstream yet. Neologisms emerge when we are unable to express or conveniently refer to an emerging collective idea or experience.

They're **acts of creativity** as we fill the gap between our symbolic understanding of the world and our documented language.

<SimpleCard alignLeft>

#### Brahmin Left

"The “left” has become the party of the intellectual elite (Brahmin left), while the “right” can be viewed as the party of the business elite (Merchant right). In India’s traditional caste system, upper castes were divided into Brahmins (priests, intellectuals) and Kshatryas/Vaishyas (warriors, merchants, tradesmen). To some extent the modern political conflict seems to follow this division."

##### From <a href="http://piketty.pse.ens.fr/files/Piketty2018.pdf">Thomas Piketty </a>

</SimpleCard>

<SimpleCard alignLeft>

#### Cargo Cult Programming

Ritualistic inclusion of code into a programme without fully understanding why it needs to be included.

The term is a riff off the anthropological concept of **Cargo Cults** - a phenomenon in early 20th century Melanesian communities where people began to perform religious-like rituals hoping to summon modern technological goods.

They were often island communities who had previously been brought cargo-loads of foreign supplies by European colonisers.

In times of short-supply, communities would build symbolic totems like airplane runways, steamship docks, warehouses, and radio masts out of timer and straw. In the hopes of attracting the airplanes and ships that had once showed up with excesses of material wealth onboard.

</SimpleCard>

<SimpleCard alignLeft>

#### Digital Prepper

Riffing off **doomsday preppers**, people who have seen so many centralised services shut down, they default to Open Source Software to prevent losing their data and system setups.

<TweetEmbed tweetId="1221804267083718656" />

</SimpleCard>

<SimpleCard alignLeft>

#### Epistemic Peer

People who have demonstrated clear cognitive overlap with you. You trust their thinking enough that if they feel strongly about a topic you haven't researched, you're willing to defer to their judgement. If they disagree with you, you take it seriously. Even if you don't change your mind, you consider their viewpoint valid.

You earn epistemic peerhood by doing your research on topics you choose to write about, presenting compelling evidence, and making creative arguments that help reframe existing debates in more interesting ways.

</SimpleCard>

<SimpleCard alignLeft>

#### Failson

The proudly self-applied moniker of <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chapo_Trap_House">Chapo Trap House</a> hosts and listeners - "downwardly mobile, disappointing male offspring of complacent baby boomers"

##### From n+1's <a href="https://nplusonemag.com/online-only/online-only/professional-managerial-chasm/">Professional-Managerial Chasm</a>

</SimpleCard>

<SimpleCard alignLeft>

#### Greenpilling

When someone reaches the tipping point of researching too much about the reality of our climate breakdown situation, and can now no longer function as a normal person in society.

The climate crisis version of Redpilling, Blackpilling, etc.

</SimpleCard>

<SimpleCard alignLeft>

#### Hospice Mode

The stage your when your phone / fitness tracker / laptop is in its final months and you're just prolonging its death through a series of coping techniques. Carrying around extra battery packs. Patiently giving it 10 minutes to restart. Resetting the system at regular intervals. Just give up.

</SimpleCard>

<SimpleCard alignLeft>

#### Glamour Toil

Displaying the social status marker of toiling so hard it's glamorous. You rise, grind, and hustle every day of the week. And only take breaks to watch <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PIJElPStJpg">Gary Vaynerchuck</a>'s motivational clips while chugging <a href="https://www.bulletproof.com/recipes/bulletproof-diet-recipes/bulletproof-coffee-recipe/">bulletproof coffee</a>. A variety of Hustle Porn.

##### See also, <a href="https://www.sloww.co/total-work/">Total Work</a>

</SimpleCard>

<SimpleCard alignLeft>

#### Ironesty

“The braiding together of irony and sincerity (honesty) in a unified aesthetic expression.” - Greg Dember

##### From Anne-Laure Le Cunff's <a href="https://nesslabs.com/metamodernism">An introduction to metamodernism</a>

</SimpleCard>

<SimpleCard alignLeft>

#### Manel

Panel made up entirely of men. Usually honouring work done entirely by other men.

</SimpleCard>

<SimpleCard alignLeft>

#### Metarationality

Having epistemological awareness of _how_ you know what you know, _how much_ you know about it, and how much you should _defer to experts_ instead of your own judgement.

We should all aim for at least mediocre metarationality.

</SimpleCard>

<SimpleCard alignLeft>

#### Milquetoast

Vanilla, bland, flavourless Normie behaviour.

Someone might be Milquetoast if the primary features of their personality centre around liking avocados, watching Game of Thrones, and "travel"

</SimpleCard>

<SimpleCard alignLeft>

#### Neofeudalism

The new Feudalist system we all rely upon for online security. No single person or company can defend themselves against hackers, attackers and trolls without aligning themselves with one of the monolithic fortresses (Apple, Facebook, Google, or Microsoft). We hide behind their enormous cybersecurity teams. We're required to live within their walls and tolerate whatever surveillance suits their business model. It's feudalism, with likes.

##### From Cory Doctorow's <a href="https://locusmag.com/2021/01/cory-doctorow-neofeudalism-and-the-digital-manor/">Neofeudalism and the Digital Manor</a>

</SimpleCard>

<SimpleCard alignLeft>

#### Open Washing

When a company tries to appear more open source than they truly are. They release some superficial open-source code or write an elaborate blog post on how their systems work, without sharing any specific details. The point here is to gain community clout and marketing points, without relinquishing the power of being a closed-source company. This fails to fully embrace the principles of collaboration and transparency that make open-source projects remarkable.

##### First [seen on Hacker News](https://news.ycombinator.com/reply?id=35392151&goto=item?id%3D35391433%2335392151) in response to Twitter open-sourcing its recommendation algorithm. A playbook defined in OpenAI.

</SimpleCard>

<SimpleCard alignLeft>

#### Pinkering

Named for Steven Pinker - a common phenomenon among do-gooder elites who cite the long arc of human history in order to downplay and minimise any immediate suffering.

Another variety is _Economic Pinkering_ which justifies any economic concerns by simply citing how many Chinese people have been lifted into the middle class.

##### From Anand Giridharadas' <a href='https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Winners_Take_All:_The_Elite_Charade_of_Changing_the_World'>Winners Take All: The Elite Charade of Changing the World</a>

</SimpleCard>

<SimpleCard alignLeft>

#### Privacy Veganism

Unnecessarily shaming people who aren't willing to delete their Facebook account when it’s a functional necessity in their social context

</SimpleCard>

<SimpleCard alignLeft>

#### Subtweeting

It's about them. And we all know it's about them.
But you're not going to tag them or address them directly. The ultimate expression of digital passive aggression.

</SimpleCard>

<SimpleCard alignLeft>

#### Theoretical Graffitiability

The degree to which an academic theory can be captured in graffiti in public space. I coined this one after someone posted a photo of the <a href="https://sjef.nu/theory-of-change-and-the-futures-cone/">futures cone</a> in spray paint.

<TweetEmbed tweetId="1268881238934380546" />

</SimpleCard>

<SimpleCard alignLeft>

#### Vegan Tourist

Temporary visitors in the land of Veganism. The person who just watched Cowspiracy on Netflix last week and now is **all in**. Often gone within a month or two.

</SimpleCard>

<SimpleCard alignLeft>

#### Yak Shaving

Embarking on a sequence of nested tasks to accomplish a goal, where each step seems logical and necessary in the moment, but becomes less and less linked to the original goal.

You set out to fix a broken image in your code, which leads to refactoring the image rendering function, which requires updating your npm packages, but first you need to plan this all out in Jira, and then install the latest version of Adobe Flash, and on and on in seemingly logical sequence until you find yourself in a zoo... shaving a yak.

##### Originally coined by <a href="https://projects.csail.mit.edu/gsb/old-archive/gsb-archive/gsb2000-02-11">Carlin J. Vieri</a>

</SimpleCard>

<SimpleCard alignLeft>

#### Zemblanity

Unsurprisingly unlucky conditions

##### From <a href="https://www.ribbonfarm.com/2020/03/09/plot-economics/">Plot Economics</a> by Venkat Rao

</SimpleCard>

<SimpleCard alignLeft>

#### Zumping

Dumping someone over Zoom. An unfortunate necessity in the life and times of COVID-19.
Possibly due to a lack of Zex.

</SimpleCard>


A collection of interesting words that have recently been coined

Neologisms


<IntroParagraph>

During my last year of high school, I kept a screenshot record of every time I redesigned my desktop.

</IntroParagraph>

It was 2009 and we were in the heydey of [skeuomorphism](https://medium.com/design-warp/skeuomorphism-design-we-learned-to-outgrow-8a24895a80d0) and bespoke wallpapers made in bootlegged versions of Photoshop. MacOS [Snow Leopard](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mac_OS_X_Snow_Leopard) has just been released, featuring a glossy 3D dock stacked with richly detailed icons.

<ResponsiveImage
  framed
  width="800px"
  src="/images/posts/teenage-desktop/snowleopard.jpg"
  alt="MacOS Snow Leopard complete with shiny 3D dock"
  showalt
/>

Meticulously detailed icons became _the thing_. [The Icon Factory](https://design.iconfactory.com/) were at the peak of their game making bespoke [icon sets](https://freeware.iconfactory.com/icons). Designers like [David Lanham](https://dlanham.com/), [Anthony Piraino](https://anthonypiraino.com/), and [Louie Mantia](https://louiemantia.com/) were part of the team who created the official [Windows XP icons](https://web.archive.org/web/20060821175816/http://iconfactory.com/design/detail/windows_xp), as well as plenty of pop-culture icon sets like the [Wall·E](https://freeware.iconfactory.com/preview/walle) and [Star Trek](https://freeware.iconfactory.com/preview/trxi) series.

<ResponsiveImage
  width="800px"
  margin="0.5rem auto 4rem"
  src="/images/posts/teenage-desktop/icon-factory.jpg"
  alt="Icons designed by the Icon Factory"
  showalt
  sourceUrl="https://design.iconfactory.com/"
  sourceTitle="© Iconfactory"
/>

I followed this work obsessively. Every few weeks I would “redesign” my Macbook desktop with a newly found wallpaper, icon set, and layout. And then for posterity, screenshot it. This eventually led to creating my own wallpapers and icons, and heavily influenced my hyper-detailed [illustration style](/egghead-courses) later on.

I recently found that screenshot archive, and it is a treat! Teenage me left a series of scene-setting details in each shot – music tracks currently playing in iTunes, a CD being burned, a PDF with plane tickets, college course catalogues, a code editor featuring HTML tables (ugh), TV shows I was in the middle of binge-watching, CVs and applications for some New York Times internship I failed to land<Footnote idName={1}>I have no recollection of this, but I'm guessing it was a photography gig. At the time I had my heart set on war photojournalism. I'm glad that didn't last long.</Footnote>

It's the millennial equivalent of a physical scrapbook – but with digital detritus rather than ticket stubs, handwritten notes, and polaroids. Looking through these, I feel overwhelming nostalgia. But also loss. I took so few. I captured so little of my digital environment. The design aesthetics of this time are mostly gone, save for a few snapshots on [internet archive](https://archive.org/).

I'm still thankful for these scraps.

<Spacer size="xs" />

<ResponsiveImage
  framed
  width="1200px"
  src="/images/posts/teenage-desktop/teen-desktop-1.jpg"
  alt="A screenshot of my desktop"
/>

<ResponsiveImage
  framed
  width="1200px"
  src="/images/posts/teenage-desktop/teen-desktop-2.jpg"
  alt="A screenshot of my desktop"
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  framed
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  src="/images/posts/teenage-desktop/teen-desktop-3.jpg"
  alt="A screenshot of my desktop"
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  framed
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  src="/images/posts/teenage-desktop/teen-desktop-4.jpg"
  alt="A screenshot of my desktop"
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  framed
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  src="/images/posts/teenage-desktop/teen-desktop-5.jpg"
  alt="A screenshot of my desktop"
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  framed
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  src="/images/posts/teenage-desktop/teen-desktop-6.jpg"
  alt="A screenshot of my desktop"
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  framed
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  src="/images/posts/teenage-desktop/teen-desktop-7.jpg"
  alt="A screenshot of my desktop"
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  framed
  width="1200px"
  src="/images/posts/teenage-desktop/teen-desktop-8.jpg"
  alt="A screenshot of my desktop"
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  framed
  width="1200px"
  src="/images/posts/teenage-desktop/teen-desktop-9.jpg"
  alt="A screenshot of my desktop"
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<ResponsiveImage
  framed
  width="1200px"
  src="/images/posts/teenage-desktop/teen-desktop-10.jpg"
  alt="A screenshot of my desktop"
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  framed
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  src="/images/posts/teenage-desktop/teen-desktop-12.jpg"
  alt="A screenshot of my desktop"
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  framed
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  src="/images/posts/teenage-desktop/teen-desktop-13.jpg"
  alt="A screenshot of my desktop"
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<ResponsiveImage
  framed
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  src="/images/posts/teenage-desktop/teen-desktop-14.jpg"
  alt="A screenshot of my desktop"
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  src="/images/posts/teenage-desktop/teen-desktop-15.jpg"
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You can still download many of the gorgeous wallpapers and icons shown here. My favourites are from [Louie](http://louie.world/wallpapers/), [David](https://dlanham.com/), and the Icon Factory [archives](https://freeware.iconfactory.com/). I'm sure Pinterest is also full of assets for this kind of interior decoration.


An archive of my high school desktop designs, circa 2009

Teenage Skeuomorphic Desktop Designs


<AssumedAudience>

People who write and/or are interested in designing writing tools. Also people who are familiar with [language models](https://towardsdatascience.com/the-beginners-guide-to-language-models-aa47165b57f9) and curious about their potential to improve the writing process

</AssumedAudience>

<Spacer size="xs" />

<IntroParagraph>

Reverse outlining is one of my go-to writing tactics when I'm stuck on a piece of writing. It's the opposite of traditional outlining. Rather than outlining the shape of your piece first, organising the structure, and then filling in all the details, you do it backwards.

</IntroParagraph>

You start with a long, rambling, unorganised slew of text first: you write the messy and chaotic first draft without worrying too much about structure. _Then_ you go through the piece and for every paragraph, write a single sentence that summarises it.

<ResponsiveImage
  width="600px"
  margin="0 auto 1rem"
  src="/images/posts/reverse-outline/outline-sketch.jpg"
  alt="Illustration of starting with a draft and using it to create an outline"
/>

You then put your one-sentence summaries on small, moveable objects like post-it notes or cards, and reorganise them into a sensible flow.

Once you have a decent structure to work within, you go back to your crappy first draft, cut and paste salvageable bits of it into the new structure, and smooth out all the rough transitions.

This process helps you do a few important things:

- Easily spot logical flaws or holes in your argument
- Add transitional bridges between paragraphs that make large leaps or change topics unexpectedly
- Combine paragraphs that are trying to say the same thing
- Remove paragraphs you don't need or are tangential to the argument
- Break up paragraphs that are trying to say too many things in one breath
- Arrange your points into a narrative arc that will make sense to the reader

For a more comprehensive description of this process, read [this guide](https://explorationsofstyle.com/2011/02/09/reverse-outlines/) from _Explorations of Style_ <Footnote idName={1}>Explorations of Style is a _fantastic_ writing blog that is worth spending a weekend on. Start with the links [for new folks](https://explorationsofstyle.com/for-new-visitors/)</Footnote>.

## Classic Tools for Reverse Outlining

Reverse outlining is popular enough that we already have some specialised tools to help with it. I personally do it with digital whiteboarding tools like [Miro](https://miro.com/) or [Mural](https://www.mural.co/) that give you an infinite canvas to arrange arguments on.

Here's one of my Miro reverse outlines where I'm figuring out the structure of one of my longer essays on [[Tools for Thought as Cultural Practices]]

<ResponsiveImage
  framed
  width="1200px"
  src="/images/posts/reverse-outline/miro.png"
  alt="One of my reverse outlines on a Miro whiteboard"
/>

Miro and Mural work well enough, but they're not specifically designed to help with this task.

[Scrivener](https://www.literatureandlatte.com/scrivener/overview) is a much better example of writing tool that enables reverse outlining. It's designed for huge, heady projects like novels, non-fiction books, or screenplays where you have to wrangle lots of material. It's stuffed full of features but two in particular help with reverse outlining: synopsis sentences and corkboards.

For every chunk of text you can write a "synopsis" that summarises what it's about. These are visible in the inspector sidebar and on the "corkboard" – the other key feature.

<ResponsiveImage
  framed
  width="1200px"
  src="/images/posts/reverse-outline/scrivener1.jpg"
  alt="Highlighting the synopsis and corkboard sections of Scrivener's interface"
  showalt
/>

The corkboard shows you a set of cards with the title and synopsis visible. Each of these cards represents a longer chunk of text that you can view if you click inside them. You can drag and drop these into different arrangements.

<ResponsiveImage
  framed
  width="1200px"
  src="/images/posts/reverse-outline/scrivener2.jpg"
  alt="Dragging and dropping a card on the corkboard"
  showalt
/>

As you drag the cards into a different arrangement, the original, longer text chunks are also rearranged – there's a 1:1 mapping between them. This saves you from cutting and pasting the piece into its new structure after you've sorted your outline. There's a more detailed walkthrough of how Scrivener's synopses and corkboard work in [this video](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UC3tu5z6KL0&list=PLo2CDPcmw9xQFII-qTpj8tb2hlPoFzp4k&index=17).

This is already a big improvement over using whiteboarding software that's completely disconnected from notes and drafts stored elsewhere. We can still do better though.

## Bring in the Language Models

Summarising existing text turns out to be something large language models are very good at. We can feed them long chunks of text and get back shorter, simpler summaries. This makes them promising tools for reverse outlining: we could have a model summarise each paragraph for us.

A few people have already started exploring this idea.

A group of researchers at the University of Bayreuth, Germany built a prototype specifically designed for reverse outlining with language models. In [**Beyond Text Generation**](https://arxiv.org/abs/2208.09323)**: Supporting Writers with Continuous Automatic Text Summaries** (2022) they describe the interface and their results after testing it with a small group of students and academics

Here's an annotated screenshot of the main interface:

<ResponsiveImage
  width="1300px"
  src="/images/posts/reverse-outline/beyondtext.jpg"
  alt="An annotated interface of the prototype in the 'beyond text' paper"
/>

It's a split-view text editor with summary cards linked to each paragraph. The summaries themselves are generated by a language model – in this case [Google's T5](https://huggingface.co/docs/transformers/model_doc/t5) model. They also tried a variation that pulls out the most important sentence directly from the text.

They baked an impressive amount of functionality into this. Users could obviously drag and drop to rearrange paragraphs. But they could also add new paragraphs, delete them, merge them, and split them. These kind of text interactions are essential for editing, but I imagine they're non-trivial to build.

Last year, [Amelia Wattenberger](https://wattenberger.com/) shared a [series of prototype](https://twitter.com/Wattenberger/status/1412480516268437512) [videos](https://twitter.com/Wattenberger/status/1388575699422883849) on Twitter that are remarkably similar in spirit. You have text and generated summaries shown side-by-side, and you can drag and drop to rearrange the content:

<TwoColumn alignItems="top" maxWidth="1100px">

<TweetEmbed tweetId="1388575699422883849" />

<TweetEmbed tweetId="1412480516268437512" />

</TwoColumn>

<ResponsiveImage
  framed
  width="1200px"
  src="/images/posts/reverse-outline/amelia1.jpg"
  alt="Text and generated summaries side-by-side in Amelia's prototype"
  margin="1rem auto 3rem"
  showalt
/>

<ResponsiveImage
  framed
  width="1200px"
  src="/images/posts/reverse-outline/amelia2.jpg"
  alt="Dragging and dropping sections of text in Amelia's prototype"
  margin="1rem auto 5rem"
  showalt
/>

Both of these prototypes feel full of promise. But for the moment, neither exist in any public format. I can't point you to a link or Github repo to try them out yourself.<Footnote idName={2}>Or at least I couldn't find them – I've emailed the paper authors to ask whether they published it and we'll have to see.</Footnote> I also haven't seen this feature in any of the existing “AI writing tools” flooding the market.

I wish I could end this note with a link to my _own_ prototype that we could all play around with. But I am a _very_ mediocre developer, and text editors are notoriously complex beasts. I know better than to dive down that rabbit hole. But I'm hoping someone else doesn't...

## Design Considerations & Open Questions

I still have a few open questions about how this kind of system could be helpful to writers.

- **Are the summaries accurate enough?**  
  It might turn out that the automated summaries don't capture the essence of the idea well. This seems like a solveable problem given the pace of LM development. If they aren't good enough right now, they will be soon.
- **Does getting a generated summary help as much as writing your own?**  
  Perhaps the act of writing summaries yourself is critical to understanding what you're really trying to say. The meaning could very well be hidden in your mind and not on the page. In this case the automated summary points out what you're _not_ saying – this still seems helpful to me, but it reframes the point of the summaries.
- **How much editing functionality does this need?**  
  I imagine any usable writing interface will need a high baseline of text editing functionality: selecting and moving text, copying and pasting, deleting, merging sections, auto-saving, bolding, italics, lists, export in various formats, etc.
- **How can we maximise the human-in-the-loop aspect of this system?**  
  Surely we'll want to sometimes edit or re-write the automated summaries ourselves. Ideally we could give it instructions on the kind of summaries we want it to write: we may need different levels of detail, or different summary types, depending on the type of work we're doing. It should feel like we're collaborating with the system and both working on the piece, rather than having it do all the work for us.
- **What other language model abilities could assist with reverse outlining?**  
  Could they spot logical flaws in your argument? Could they suggest new paragraphs that bridge the gap between points? Could they find duplicate arguments and help merge them?

{/* I'm vehemently against the argument that chatbots are the [ultimate interface]() for language models. This is nonsense. Specific workflows and tasks will always want and need specialised interfaces and affordances. There is no single interface for everything. */}

{/* We should be exploring how language models can be used to craft [small and very sharp tools](https://brandur.org/small-sharp-tools). */}


Using language models to generate reverse outlines of writing drafts

Reverse Outlining with Language Models


<IntroParagraph>
  Most people who work in the field of “Artificial Intelligence” rarely use the
  term. Referring to something as “AI” is a flag you probably don't know much
  about the industry.
</IntroParagraph>

People in the field instead talk about specific technologies and techniques: machine learning, deep learning, neural networks, natural language processing (NLP), transformers, embeddings, reinforcement learning, large language models (LLM), robotics, latent space diffusion, and generative adversarial networks (GAN).

AI becomes a catchall term for this wide array of disciplines that are only united by a hand-wavey philosophy about getting machines to act smart. Prominent researchers [Kate Crawford](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kate_Crawford) and [Meredith Whittaker](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Meredith_Whittaker) poetically [call it](https://ainowinstitute.org/AI_Now_2016_Report.pdf) a "constellation of technologies."<Footnote idName={1}>[The AI Now Report](https://ainowinstitute.org/AI_Now_2016_Report.pdf), Crawford and Whittaker (2016)</Footnote> A bit like how “cancer” is the catch-all phrase for a group of diseases – each with its own set of characteristics, prognoses, and treatment options – but we hear it as a blanket term: [the emperor of all maladies](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Emperor_of_All_Maladies)

Artificial intelligence traditionally means any computational system that mimics human-like intelligence. At the moment we take that to mean understanding language, recognizing patterns, perceiving the world, reasoning, and decision-making. But we end up persistently moving the goalposts on “intelligence.”

All computing is to some degree artificially intelligent. At one point a TI-83 calculator was artificial intelligence. When Google search first came out it was artificial intelligence. Frankly, a modern refrigerator counts as artificial intelligence: it's programmed to achieve an objective by taking action and uses environmental feedback to adjust its behaviour. These things are now so banal and pervasive we are unimpressed by their “intelligence.”

AI becomes a stand-in term for whatever technologies and techniques are new, shiny, and just beyond the grasp of our understanding. We use it to gesture at a future we cannot fully comprehend or currently realise. As soon as we do, it will no longer be “AI.”

Many people have pointed to this lack of specific meaning behind the moniker. Here's an excerpt from a (paraphrased) [conversation](https://youtu.be/txGYG60TICA?t=411) between [Stewart Russell](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stuart_J._Russell) and [Sean Carroll](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sean_M._Carroll) on AI as a shifting continuum:<Footnote idName={2}>Russell wrote one of the original textbooks on AI and has too many accolades in the field to list off. Also wrote[Human Compatible](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Human_Compatible) – an accessible non-fiction book on AI alignment</Footnote>

<AIConversation />

We're in a moment where people are getting hype about very specific tools like large language models and neural networks and GANs but have trouble distinguishing between them. To them, it's all “AI”. Conversations often devolve into confusion or inane generalisations about “robots taking our jobs” simply because we can't clarify which part(s) of the constellation people are pointing at.

It's become an empty pointer. We attempt to point at possible futures and find ourselves all looking in opposite directions.


On the fuzziness of calling things “artificial intelligence” and moving the goalposts

Empty Pointers and Constellations of AI


<IntroParagraph>

The **cozy web** is [Venkatesh Rao](https://venkateshrao.com/)'s term for the private, gatekeeper-bounded spaces of the internet we have all retreated to over the last few years. 

</IntroParagraph>

It's the “high-gatekeeping slum-like space comprising slacks, messaging apps, private groups, storage services like dropbox, and of course, email.” The informal, untracked, messily human space that the bots and algorithms haven't infiltrated yet.

Venkat first proposed the term in one of his _Breaking Smart_ emails on [The Extended Internet Universe](https://breakingsmart.substack.com/p/the-extended-internet-universe). He builds off Yancey Strickler's companion idea of 
[the Dark Forest](https://onezero.medium.com/the-dark-forest-theory-of-the-internet-7dc3e68a7cb1) theory of the web. The “dark forest” is a place that _seems_ eerily quiet and devoid of life. All the living creatures within it are hiding. Because “night is when the predators come out. To survive, the animals stay silent.”

The predators here are the advertisers, tracking bots, clickbait creators, attention-hungry influencers, reply guys, and trolls. It's unsafe to reveal yourself to them in any authentic way. So we retreat into private spaces. We hide in the cozy web.

<BlockquoteCitation
author="Yancey Strickler"
title="The Dark Forest Theory of the Internet"
url="https://onezero.medium.com/the-dark-forest-theory-of-the-internet-7dc3e68a7cb1"
>“These are all spaces where depressurized conversation is possible because of their non-indexed, non-optimized, and non-gamified environments”</BlockquoteCitation>


Loving both of these notions, I felt compelled to bring them together into an illustrated diagram of our current social internet situation.

<br />

<BasicImage
margin="0 auto 2rem"
    width="1100px"
    src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dg3gyk0gu/image/upload/c_scale,w_960/v1589323597/maggieappleton.com/notes/cozyweb-tw.png"
    alt="Layered diagram of the cozy web as a series of underground burrows beneath the dark forest"
/>

We create tiny underground burrows of Slack channels, Whatsapp groups, Discord chats, and Telegram streams that offer shelter and respite from the aggressively public nature of Facebook, Twitter, and every recruiter looking to connect on LinkedIn.

It's the digital realm of 
[Domestic Cozy](https://www.ribbonfarm.com/series/domestic-cozy/) Gen-Z vibes. Casual, comfy, and not trying to kick up a fuss.

The cozy web works on "(human) protocol of everybody cutting-and-pasting bits of text, images, URLs, and screenshots across live streams", hopefully one day evolving "from cut-and-paste to a personal blockchain of context-permissioned, addressable, searchable, interlinked clips" as Venkat puts it.

It's since become a standard part of the Venkat Vocabulary for fellow Ribbonfarmers and Yaks, and remains one of my favourite [[Neologisms]] of this year.


An illustrated diagram exposing the inner layers of the dark and cozy web

The Dark Forest and the Cozy Web


<IntroParagraph>

As a [[Digital Anthropology]] enthusiast, I'm often asked for reading recommendations that are good entry points into the field. I've compiled a list of gateway drugs.

</IntroParagraph>

This is a collection of books, talks, documentaries, articles, and academic papers that are a mix of "essential reads," plus some of my personal picks.  
It will give you a sweeping overview of what digital anthropologists tend to spend their time thinking about and researching.

Most of them aren't overly academic, so you don't need to worry about trudging through too much Foucauldian theory or references to Marxist [reification](<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Reification_(Marxism)>) (no promises though, sometimes it just comes out of left field).

<Center>

### Books

</Center>

<ResourceBook
  image="/images/books/addiction.webp"
  title="Addiction By Design"
  author="Natasha Dow Schull"
  description=""
  url="/addiction-by-design"
>
  A beautiful ethnography of machine gamblers in Las Vegas. Dow Schull explores
  the nature of addictive relationships with machines, experiences of
  embodiment, and the ethics of designing technological systems.
</ResourceBook>

<ResourceBook
  image="/images/books/cyborg.webp"
  title="A Cyborg Manifesto"
  subtitle="Science, Technology, and Socialist-Feminism"
  author="Donna Haraway"
  url="/cyborg-manifesto"
>
  While a bit academically dense to read, Haraway's reframing of the Cyborg is
  an eternal classic.
</ResourceBook>

<ResourceBook
  image="/images/books/comingofage.webp"
  url="https://www.librarything.com/work/5284404"
  title="Coming of Age in Second Life"
  author="Tom Boellstroff"
>
  An ethnography conducted entirely within the virtual world of Second Life.
  This is widely considered the first substantial ethnography of an online
  community. Tom Boellstroff pioneered the idea digital spaces should be taken
  seriously as cultural fieldsites.
</ResourceBook>

<ResourceBook
  url="https://www.librarything.com/work/5642301"
  image="/images/books/twobits.webp"
  title="Two Bits: the Cultural Significance of Free Software"
  author="Christopher Kelty"
>
  Kelty spends an extensive amount of time among start-ups, hackers, and Free
  Software advocates to try and understand the open-source software movement. He
  examines how it shifted the power dynamics of creation, and challenged who has
  authority to build and share knowledge.
</ResourceBook>

<ResourceBook
  image="/images/books/diviningdigital.webp"
  url="https://www.librarything.com/work/10840289"
  title="Divining a Digital Future"
  author="Genevieve Bell & Paul Dourish"
>
  Dourish and Bell examine the dream of
  <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ubiquitous_computing">
    Ubiquitous Computing
  </a>
  through an anthropological lens: as a shared cultural narrative, as a driver
  of resources and funding, and as a utopian vision that is impossibly messy in
  reality. This one is great for understanding what it means to “think
  anthropologically” about a subject.
</ResourceBook>

<ResourceBook
  url="https://www.librarything.com/work/13246426"
  image="/images/books/codingfreedom.webp"
  title="Coding Freedom: The Ethics and Aesthetics of Hacking"
  author="Gabriella Coleman"
>
  An ethnography of “hackers” and creators of open-source software. Coleman
  spends time with people in the F/OSS movement and examines how they
  collaborate, how they understand terms like “free speech” and “freedom,” and
  generally explores hacker culture.
</ResourceBook>

<Center>

### Talks & Documentaries

</Center>

<TwoColumn alignItems="flex-start" maxWidth="1000px">

<LinkCard url="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GQw02-me0W4" title="Our Digital Selves: My Avatar is Me" author="Tom Boellstorff & Donna Davis">

A documentary that follows the research of Tom Boellstorff & Donna Davis on
embodiment in the virtual world of Second Life

</LinkCard>

<LinkCard url="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5aKZwKFFDYw" title="Magical Thinking: Fear, Wonder & Technology" author="Genevieve Bell">

Genevieve Bell presenting at Stanford on the mythological narratives we tell around technical systems

</LinkCard>

</TwoColumn>

<Center>

### Papers & Articles

</Center>

<TwoColumn alignItems="flex-start" maxWidth="1000px">

<LinkCard
  url="https://www.brown.edu/Departments/Joukowsky_Institute/courses/materialworlds/files/1108595.pdf"
  title="The Technology of Enchantment and the Enchantment of Technology"
  author="Alfred Gell"
/>

<LinkCard
  url="https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/full/10.1177/2053951717738104"
  title="Algorithms as Culture"
  author="Nick Seaver"
/>

</TwoColumn>


A few favourite books from the field of digital anthropology

A Digital Anthropology Reading List


<IntroParagraph>

Starting at the end of August, I'm joining [Ought](https://ought.org/) as their first product designer. Ought is a non-profit research lab. They're exploring how [natural language processing](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Natural_language_processing) (NLP) and [machine learning](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Machine_learning) (ML) tools can improve researcher workflows. Specifically, how these new tools can help people with open-ended reasoning – thinking through problems that don't have simple, clear-cut answers.

</IntroParagraph>

Their main product at the moment is [Elicit](https://elicit.org/) - an AI assistant for academic and professional researchers. It uses NLP to find research papers, synthesise them, and extract research questions, evidence, and arguments from them. They're currently focused on helping people do literature reviews. But [the plan](https://docs.google.com/document/d/1D75EsWJdobyxJN7fxygybBIlBtrbgRXEcrYdhcmWppE/edit) is to expand Elicit's capacities to help with the whole research process.

<ScrollingImages
	title="Searching for answers to a research question in the current version of Elicit (July 2022)"
	data={[
		{
			src: "https://res.cloudinary.com/dxj9qr5gj/image/upload/c_scale,f_auto,q_auto:best,w_1600/v1657716620/maggieappleton.com/notes/joining-ought/elicit1_sdg5nc.jpg",
			alt: "the main search screen of elicit",
		},
		{
			src: "https://res.cloudinary.com/dxj9qr5gj/image/upload/c_scale,f_auto,q_auto:best,w_1600/v1657716621/maggieappleton.com/notes/joining-ought/elicit4_xqmzqt.jpg",
			alt: "the results screen of elicit",
		},
		{
			src: "https://res.cloudinary.com/dxj9qr5gj/image/upload/c_scale,f_auto,q_auto:best,w_1600/v1657716621/maggieappleton.com/notes/joining-ought/elicit5_dd7ja8.jpg",
			alt: "the suggested questions screen of elicit",
		},
		{
			src: "https://res.cloudinary.com/dxj9qr5gj/image/upload/c_scale,f_auto,q_auto:best,w_1600/v1657716621/maggieappleton.com/notes/joining-ought/elicit3_wooe5j.jpg",
			alt: "the detail view of a single paper in elicit",
		},
	]}
/>

I got access to the alpha version of Elicit in July of 2021 and was immediately hooked. Even though I’m an amateur researcher<Footnote idName={1}>Meaning I do it as part of my job as a designer and writer, but in a rather a naive way compared to anyone writing a PhD.</Footnote>, I still spend a good chunk of time hunting down and reading academic publications.

I found the results were on par with what Google Scholar or Semantic Scholar would turn up. But the Elicit results show _why_ it returns certain papers – each paper has a [GPT-3](https://openai.com/api/) generated summary that tries to answer the original question. It's a small difference, but a huge help when you're drowning in PDFs and trying to quickly find the right ones to read.<Footnote idName={2}>As with all things generated by automated systems, these results aren't meant to be swallowed whole without critical thought and due diligence. They're helpful guideposts that humans still need to double-check and validate.</Footnote>

I'll stop with the sales pitch now. <span role="img">😉</span> Elicit is free and you can [try it out](https://elicit.org) if you want to see for yourself.

I'm also excited to explore what's possible beyond summarising papers. In [[Programmable Notes]] I discussed what it might look like to add AI agents into personal notes and knowledge management systems. Many of Elicit's secondary workflows point in that direction. You can [generate](https://ide.elicit.org/run/JqRpiAJMnNacB7wvq) research questions, [rephrase](https://ide.elicit.org/run/9uFGfJBhFbPRaaQ2z) ideas, or explore [chains of reasoning](https://ide.elicit.org/run/Are3MaP2XsRJFuKLT).

Suffice to say, there's a lot to dive into. Language models and neural networks are all relatively new. GPT-3 is barely 2 years old. We don't have many established design patterns or canonical interfaces for this stuff yet.

I am also new to this space. I haven't worked on any ML and NLP projects yet so I have a fat reading list to work through. Like most people, I've heard plenty of cultural narratives around the nebulous concept of “AI”. Anthropologists like [Nick Seaver](https://nickseaver.net/writing), [danah boyd](https://www.danah.org/), and [Genevieve Bell](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Genevieve_Bell) have given me a good critical lens on the space. But I've never looked into the details of how these systems work.

3Blue1Brown's series on [neural networks](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aircAruvnKk&list=PLZHQObOWTQDNU6R1_67000Dx_ZCJB-3pi) gave me a beautiful, visual synopsis of what happens inside a neural net. [Human Compatible](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Human_Compatible) by Stewart Russell gave me good historical and cultural context. [Distill](https://distill.pub/)'s articles gave me delightfully interactive deep dives into particular topics. It's wild what people put on the internet for free.

I'm leaving behind the team at [HASH](https://hash.ai) and the [Block Protocol](https://blockprotocol.org) project to take on this new role. I still support what they're working on, and I know they'll find another great design lead to take over. I'm still bullish on schema-based knowledge management, block-based editors, and interfaces that enable end-user programming.

Perhaps these threads will all tie back together at some point. I wouldn't be surprised.


A new role at an AI research lab working on tools for open-ended reasoning

Joining Ought


Notes (mostly to myself) on how the CSS <b>position</b> property works because I <i>constantly</i> forget. Specifically in relation to building [scrollytelling](https://medium.com/nightingale/from-storytelling-to-scrollytelling-a-short-introduction-and-beyond-fbda32066964) pieces.

Having control over where elements are positioned on a webpage is essential for building scrollytelling stories. We have to understand exactly how elements will behave within the layout, especially in relation to the scrollbar and viewport.

The `position` property determines where an element appears on the page. Sounds simple. But it also includes how an element relates to its parent element, the browser window, how it behaves on scroll, and whether placement properties like `top`, `right`, `bottom`, `left` and `z-index` will have any effect.

## Position has six possible values

### 1. Static

`static` is the default value for elements. They stick to the normal page flow and placement properties (top, left, z-index, etc.) don't have any effect.

<StaticCSSPosition />

This would be the equivalent code, but we never need to explicitly declare it since all elements are static by default.

```css
.tealBox {
  position: static;
}
```

<Spacer />

### 2. Relative

`relative` keeps the element in the normal document flow, but allows us to use placement properties. This means we can move the element up, down, left or right, relative to where it would have been in the normal document flow.

For example, if we nudge this box `-20px` up, and `-20px` to the left, it moves to here:

<RelativeCSSPosition />

<Spacer size="small" />

In our CSS we would just need to declare a `relative` property on our box, then add `top` and `left` properties:

```css
.tealBox {
  position: relative;
  top: -10px;
  left: -10px;
}
```

<Spacer />

### 3. Absolute

`absolute` removes the element from the normal document flow. It places itself on an absolute position relative to the whole document.

The position of the parent has no influence on where the child shows up. Placement values like `top` and `left` are calculated relative to the document.

Declaring `position: absolute`, `left: 20px` and `bottom: 20px` on this `.tealBox` element would position it 20 pixels from the left and 20px from the bottom of the document.

<AbsoluteCSSPosition />

```css
.tealBox {
  position: absolute;
  left: 20px;
  bottom: 20px;
}
```

<Spacer size="small" />

<SimpleCard alignLeft>

#### Relative Parents and Absolute children

If you declare `position: relative` on the parent element, and `position: absolute` on the child, it now positions itself relative to the parent.

This is useful for creating overlapping elements.

```css
.parent {
  position: relative;
}
.tealBox {
  position: absolute;
  left: 20px;
  bottom: 20px;
}
```

</SimpleCard>

<Spacer />

### 4. Fixed

`fixed` is similar to absolute, but sticks itself to the viewport (the browser window) rather than the document. Fixed elements don't move when you scroll down the page - they are always visible.

Fixed is useful for persistent elements like navigation bars or menus.

Declaring `position: fixed;`, `top: 20px;` and `right: 20px` on an element will position it 20 px from the top and right-hand side of the browser viewport. The rest of the document scrolls behind it.

<FixedCSSPosition />

```css
.tealBox {
  position: fixed;
  top: 20px;
  right: 20px;
}
```

<Alert>

#### An Annoying Transform Quirk

If any parent element has a `transform: translate()` property declared on it, `fixed` won't work.

</Alert>

### 5. Sticky

`sticky` makes an element "stick" to the viewport (the browser window) when it reaches a certain point – usually when the top of the viewport hits the top of the element.

It behaves like a `relative` element until it hits the sticking point, and then becomes `fixed`.

<StickyPosition />

For sticky to work, the parent element needs to have the `relative` property declared.

```css
.parent {
  position: relative;
}
.tealBox {
  position: sticky;
  top: 150px; /* Box becomes sticky when the top of
  the viewport is 150px away from the top of the box  */
}
```

<Spacer />

### 6. Inherit

`inherit` forces an element to inherit the position property of its parent. This wouldn't otherwise happen as `position` doesn't flow down the cascade.

<References>
  <ReferencesLink
    title="Position: CSS Tricks Almanac"
    href="https://css-tricks.com/almanac/properties/p/position/"
    author="Chris Coyier"
  />
  <ReferencesLink
    title="Advanced Positioning Tutorial"
    href="https://www.internetingishard.com/html-and-css/advanced-positioning/"
    author="Internetting is Hard"
  />
  <ReferencesLink
    title="Easier Scrollytelling with Position Sticky"
    href="https://pudding.cool/process/scrollytelling-sticky/"
    author="The Pudding"
  />
</References>


Notes on how to use the position property in CSS to make scrollytelling stories

Positioning Elements & Scrollytelling in CSS

How block-based interfaces can help us create more structured data on the web

The Block-Paved Path to Structured Data


<IntroParagraph>

In 2019 I took a course called <a href='https://www.buildingasecondbrain.com'>Building a Second Brain</a> by <a href='https://twitter.com/fortelabs'>Tiago Forte</a>. Throughout the course I illustrated summaries of the main concepts which you can find below.

</IntroParagraph>

Much like it sounds, building a “second brain” is about creating a system – outside your physical skin-and-bone bodily boundaries – for storing, organising, and eventually transforming information.

This idea is not especially new; [commonplace books](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Commonplace_book) for storing personal knowledge have been around for centuries. Although digital mediums have made it easier and faster to capture, browse, search, and retrieve the information in these systems.

<SimpleCard alignLeft>

#### A Small Disclaimer

In the 3 years since taking the course, I've learned much more about the world of [personal knowledge management](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Personal_knowledge_management) (PKM) and its long history. Tiago's course is a light introduction to the concept of knowledge management, but not deeply rooted in the historical literature. I'd encourage you to explore beyond it.

The price tag on the course has also blossomed since I took it, and the marketing material a bit outlandish. I don't necessarily endorse or actively encourage anyone to take the course.

I also find the metaphor of a “second brain” troubling in that it doesn't speak to the significance of [embodied cognition](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Embodied_cognition) and [tacit knowledge](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tacit_knowledge) in how human cognition works. Filling up a “digital brain” as if it were a filing cabinet is highly unlikely to lead to meaningful knowledge and wisdom.

Some of the content below is good, sensible advice for managing your digital information, but it is not groundbreaking or life changing. It also isn't based in much scientific evidence for what makes people effective thinkers, writers, and creators.

As Andy Matuschak poetically [pointed out](https://notes.andymatuschak.org/zUMFE66dxeweppDvgbNAb5hukXzXQu8ErVNv), "people who write extensively about note-writing rarely have a serious context of use."

Exercise your own discernment here.

</SimpleCard>

<BasicImage
  width="1100px"
  src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dg3gyk0gu/image/upload/c_scale,f_auto,q_auto:best,w_1100/v1586173192/maggieappleton.com/basb/Basb1-4_2x.jpg"
  alt="Building a second brain (BASB) illustrated notes on the PARA system of organising content projects, areas, resources, and archives"
/>

<BasicImage
  width="1100px"
  src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dg3gyk0gu/image/upload/c_scale,f_auto,q_auto:best,w_1100/v1586173190/maggieappleton.com/basb/Basb1-2_2x.jpg"
  alt="BASB sketchnotes on putting projects in priority order and defining the desired outcome"
/>

<BasicImage
  width="1100px"
  src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dg3gyk0gu/image/upload/c_scale,f_auto,q_auto:best,w_1100/v1586173188/maggieappleton.com/basb/Basb1-1_2x.jpg"
  alt="BASB sketchnotes on wiping the slate clean and setting up PARA as a folder structure"
/>

<BasicImage
  width="1100px"
  src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dg3gyk0gu/image/upload/c_scale,f_auto,q_auto:best,w_1100/v1586173189/maggieappleton.com/basb/Basb1-3_2x.jpg"
  alt="BASB sketchnotes on creating metaplans before you start your project"
/>

<BasicImage
  width="1100px"
  src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dg3gyk0gu/image/upload/c_scale,f_auto,q_auto:best,w_1100/v1586173064/maggieappleton.com/basb/Basb2-1_2x.jpg"
  alt="BASB sketchnotes on digital cognition and building a personal knowledge base"
/>

<BasicImage
  width="1100px"
  src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dg3gyk0gu/image/upload/c_scale,f_auto,q_auto:best,w_1100/v1586173065/maggieappleton.com/basb/Basb2-2_2x.jpg"
  alt="BASB sketchnotes on your notes being unpolished, personal, open-ended, and diverse"
/>

<BasicImage
  width="1100px"
  src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dg3gyk0gu/image/upload/c_scale,f_auto,q_auto:best,w_1100/v1586173061/maggieappleton.com/basb/Basb2-3_2x.jpg"
  alt="BASB sketchnotes on considering 12 favourite problems to focus on"
/>

<BasicImage
  width="1100px"
  src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dg3gyk0gu/image/upload/c_scale,f_auto,q_auto:best,w_1100/v1586172896/maggieappleton.com/basb/Basb3-1_2x.jpg"
  alt="BASB sketchnotes on balancing discoverability with understanding in your notes"
/>

<BasicImage
  width="1100px"
  src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dg3gyk0gu/image/upload/c_scale,f_auto,q_auto:best,w_1100/v1586172898/maggieappleton.com/basb/Basb3-2_2x.jpg"
  alt="BASB sketchnotes on putting your notes through 5 layers of progressive summarisation"
/>

<BasicImage
  width="1100px"
  src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dg3gyk0gu/image/upload/c_scale,f_auto,q_auto:best,w_1100/v1586172894/maggieappleton.com/basb/Basb3-3_2x.jpg"
  alt="BASB sketchnotes on focusing on what resonates when summarising your notes"
/>

<BasicImage
  width="1100px"
  src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dg3gyk0gu/image/upload/c_scale,f_auto,q_auto:best,w_1100/v1586172982/maggieappleton.com/basb/Basb4-1_2x.jpg"
  alt="BASB sketchnotes on thinking of return on attention like ROI"
/>

<BasicImage
  width="1100px"
  src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dg3gyk0gu/image/upload/c_scale,f_auto,q_auto:best,w_1100/v1586172879/maggieappleton.com/basb/Basb4-2_2x.jpg"
  alt="BASB sketchnotes on flow state as the pinnacle of experience, learning, and performance. As well as the biochemistry of flow state."
/>

<BasicImage
  width="1100px"
  src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dg3gyk0gu/image/upload/c_scale,f_auto,q_auto:best,w_1100/v1586172878/maggieappleton.com/basb/Basb4-3_2x.jpg"
  alt="BASB sketchnotes on solving the interruptability of flow with placeholding and breaking work down into smaller packets"
/>

<BasicImage
  width="1100px"
  src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dg3gyk0gu/image/upload/c_scale,f_auto,q_auto:best,w_1100/v1586172879/maggieappleton.com/basb/Basb4-4_2x.jpg"
  alt="BASB sketchnotes on wrestling with knowledge by interacting with it in meanginful ways"
/>

<BasicImage
  width="1100px"
  src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dg3gyk0gu/image/upload/c_scale,f_auto,q_auto:best,w_1100/v1586172864/maggieappleton.com/basb/Basb5-1_2x.jpg"
  alt="Just in time project management helps us balance our workflow between capture and delivery."
/>

<BasicImage
  width="1100px"
  src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dg3gyk0gu/image/upload/c_scale,f_auto,q_auto:best,w_1100/v1586172865/maggieappleton.com/basb/Basb5-2_2x.jpg"
  alt="Your orderly system of notes is like mise en place – everything in its place"
/>

<BasicImage
  width="1100px"
  src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dg3gyk0gu/image/upload/c_scale,f_auto,q_auto:best,w_1100/v1586172873/maggieappleton.com/basb/Basb5-4_2x.jpg"
  alt="We need flexible strategies, not static workflows. We diagnose the problem, form a guiding policy to tackle it, and write an action plan to implement it."
/>

<BasicImage
  width="1100px"
  src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dg3gyk0gu/image/upload/c_scale,f_auto,q_auto:best,w_1100/v1586172866/maggieappleton.com/basb/Basb5-3_2x.jpg"
  alt="Some workflow strategies we can use include context switching, changing the form of our notes, and adding color commentary through annotations and highlights."
/>


Illustrated notes on the Building A Second Brain course

Building a Second Brain: The Illustrated Notes


<IntroParagraph>

The [IndieWeb](https://indieweb.org/) community recently hosted an open, [barcamp](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/BarCamp)-style session [on personal libraries](https://indieweb.org/2022/Pop-ups/Personal_Libraries). Specifically, how to create systems on the open web where people can publish their personal book collections, share and find other people's book lists, and generally use books as a medium to connect with each other.

</IntroParagraph>

You can do most of these things via existing platforms; Goodreads being the canonical example. You can track your reading, write reviews, join reading groups, and browse curated book lists. But like all private, walled gardens, it comes with a few predictable catches:

- Your library data belongs to Goodreads and you'll have trouble ever getting it out again. <Footnote idName={1}>Goodreads used to provide an API for developers, but as of [December 2020](https://www.goodreads.com/api/documentation) they no longer issue new keys. There's probably good reason for this, but it speaks to fundamental issues of access and power in closed ecosystems</Footnote> If Goodreads goes down, it'll take all your books, groups, and connections with it.
- You have no power or agency as a user to adapt or extend the Goodreads system to fit your own needs. You have to accept and use whatever features and affordances the product managers, designers, and developers of Goodreads deem important.

This doesn't make Goodreads evil. It makes it unappealing for people who care about long-term resiliency, open data on the web, and end-users having agency over their tools.

The pop-up session focused on exploring alternatives to closed platforms; what pieces of infrastructure might enable us to build a 'decentralized Goodreads'? Plenty of us publish personal libraries to our own websites, but rarely in common formats that can talk to one another or pool data into communal centres to find connections and relationships.

<Disclaimer title="Session Notes">

You can read the [collaborative notes](https://indieweb.org/2022/Pop-ups/Personal_Libraries#Notes) we all took during the session on the IndieWeb wiki.

</Disclaimer>

## Data Exchange Formats

Most of the pop-up focused on the issue of data exchange formats. How do we get independent websites to agree on a common format for books? This includes both the format the data is passed between sites in (RSS, JSON, OPML, CSV), and the shape of the data itself.

My [Library](/library) and [Antilibrary](/antilibrary) book collections on this site are perfect examples of poorly formatted data that can't be automatically read by other sites. They're currently generated by an object in [a JavaScript file](https://github.com/MaggieAppleton/maggieappleton.com-V2/blob/main/posts/data/books.js):

```js
export const bookData = [
  {
    title: "Computers as Theatre",
    author: "Brenda Laurel",
    cover: "/images/books/theatre.webp",
    link: "https://www.google.co.uk/books/edition/Computers_as_Theatre/NedQAAAAMAAJ",
  },
  {
    title: "Everything, All the Time, Everywhere",
    subtitle: "How We Became Postmodern",
    author: "Stuart Jeffries",
    cover: "/images/books/everything.webp",
    link: "https://www.google.co.uk/books/edition/Everything_All_the_Time_Everywhere/pchGEAAAQBAJ",
  },
  {
    title: "The Design of Everyday Things",
    author: "Don Norman",
    cover: "/images/books/designthings.webp",
    link: "https://www.google.co.uk/books/edition/The_Design_of_Everyday_Things/heCtnQEACAAJ",
  },
];
```

I have a title, author, a cover image in a local image folder, and a link to the book record on Google Books. This might be all I need to display a bunch of books on my library page, but it's poorly designed from an interoperability standpoint.

I'd never considered the limitations of this approach before the event, only because I hadn't thought ahead to the possiblity of publishing this list in ways others could consume it. <Footnote idName={2}>I also built this website under the mantra of "do the bare minimum and no more" so it's a garden of low-hanging fruit</Footnote>

How could we improve the formatting of this data to standardise it? First, we'd have to make sure each book entry had a set of properties that would help identify it in a larger context. Title and author are useful, but they're not enough. We'd also need a UID (unique identification) number like an ISBN to make sure we don't misidentify books – duplicate titles and author names are uncommon but not unheard of.

People in the pop-up session suggested adding a number of optional, nice-to-have properties like reading status (to read, reading, read), page count, related notes, reading start and end dates, rating (out of 5), and genre/tags.

These would be harder to standardise than the core properties and factual metadata, but hold much more potential for enabling rich social interactions around books.

A few people reasonably pointed out we'll never have a single, unified format. It's better to pursue forgiving and flexible standards that enable people to publish books in a variety of formats. And instead build tools that can translate between formats and map properties from one type to another.

### Prior Art and Existing Systems

This problem space isn't new and plenty of people have built bits and pieces of potential solutions.

There are a number of existing standard formats for books:

- Schema.org has a [Book type](https://schema.org/Book) with an extensive list of properties
- Google has a [standard format](https://developers.google.com/search/docs/advanced/structured-data/book) for surfacing books in search results

[Tom Critchlow](https://tomcritchlow.com/) wrote a piece proposing [Library JSON](https://tomcritchlow.com/2020/04/15/library-json/) - a standard format for book data exchange. [Tom Zijlstra](https://www.zylstra.org/) adapted it to [OPML format](https://www.zylstra.org/blog/booklist-opml-data-structure/) <Footnote idName={3}>OMPL = Outline processor markup language. A format used to import and export from RSS feeds.</Footnote>using the properties defined on the Schema.org book type.

Publishing feeds in either JSON or RSS would allow us to create streams of books and subscribe to them using existing systems. Working with RSS feeds and writing JSON isn't the most user friendly interface though. Most people outside the world of web development would need something closer to a traditional GUI to manage their collections. Some people suggested spreadsheets as an accessible interface format.

Another possibility is encouraging people to shift from platforms like Goodreads over to more open platforms with API access. The Internet Archive has setup [Open Library](https://openlibrary.org) which is a non-profit, open-source book catalogue. They provide both a user-friendly interface for creating book lists, and have [an API](https://openlibrary.org/developers/api) that allows you to fetch book information like covers, authors, and lists (currently reading, best sci-fi novels, etc.).

Frankly, these data exchange issues are outside my wheelhouse. I'm glad other people get a kick out of standardising schemas. I'm just here for the UX design challenges and social implications once we've sorted out how to surface this data.

## Ad Hoc Reading Groups

An idea I brought to the event and ended up hosting a session on was _ad hoc reading groups_ – discussions and meetups facilitated by our public bookshelves.

Personal bookshelves on website are a jazzy feature, but it's sometimes unclear what they're _for_. What does publishing a personal library to the web _do_ for us?

They certainly help lay contextual groundwork for people visiting our personal websites. They tell others what kind of ideas we've encountered and what disciplines we've studied.

They also work well as invitations. Books are an easy starting point for conversation; "oh you read that too!". People frequently reference a book from my shelf when they first send a Twitter DM or email.

They could do more though. Publishing a book to a public library could be a way to signal you want to _talk_ to other people about it. We all have at least a few obscure or niche titles on our shelves, and it can be hard to find other people willing to read and discuss them. Why not simply start with the people who are already interested in that book?

Bookclubs and reading clubs are obviously well established social formats we can borrow from to imagine how this could work. Usually you gather a group of people, then muddle through some democratic system of voting on books, and eventually everyone compromises on what to read. This is slightly easier with fiction, but non-fiction gets particularly tricky, unless you gather a group based on a specific discipline or domain.

Taking a book-first, rather than a group-first approach would enable reading groups who don't have to compromise on their book choices. They could gather only once or twice to discuss the book, then go their seperate ways. No long-term committment to organising and maintaining a bookclub required. <Footnote idName={4}>For the record, I'm not against the group-first bookclub approach. I was raised in a home that hosted multiple bookclubs a week, and I've been part of plenty of good ones as an adult. I just think there's room for other alternative formats for reading groups.</Footnote>

We would need a system that enables people to:

- Publish a list of books they would be willing to discuss with other people to the open web. [Antilibraries](https://www.antilibrari.es/) – collections of books you haven't read yet but would like to read – are particularly well suited to this proposition.
- See which books people in their social network want to discuss, and/or subscribe to other people's lists
- Be notified when 4+ people in their network have the same book on their discussion list – possibly via an email thread? <Footnote idName={5}>The ideal number of participants in a discussion group is obviously a matter of subjective preference. I've always found 4-7 an ideal number. Enough to lose one. Not too many to jostle for talking time.</Footnote>
- Coordinate and schedule a time to read and discuss the book with that group.

There are plenty of troublesome assumptions and unanswered pragmatic issues in that sketch. What's a "social network" (are using the Twitter API to check for mutuals)? What kind of system is scanning for book matches between lists? Is it capable of firing off group email chains once it finds one? How would it handle keeping email addresses private and double-checking people want to opt-in to a particular discussion group? Could people see upcoming groups and choose to join one opportunistically?

The more I think through these questions, the more it feels necessary to have some third-party intemediary service in the middle to match up book lists and email out proposed discussion groups to people. Not a "platform," but a mediator of independent websites. Ideally one with minimal maitenance costs and moderation work, lest someone try to turn it into a 'startup'.

I have to think about it more. My friends over at [Hyperlink Academy](https://hyperlink.academy/) are experimenting with models and infrastructure to quickly spin up clubs and peer-to-peer learning groups – some of which could be part of the solution.

If you have ideas about how we might duct-tape together internet protocols or existing services to make something like this possible, I'd love to read them. Preferably as a public essay instead of a DM, but I appreciate that's not everyone's MO.


Exploring ways to build social infrastructure around books and reading on the open web

Interoperable Personal Libraries and Ad Hoc Reading Groups


<IntroParagraph>
    
An eponymous law is a principle or rule named after a particular person. The programming community abundantly creates and embraces eponymous laws. Compared to other fields, the number of "unofficial" laws, principals, and rules of thumb considered cultural gospel is overwhelming.

</IntroParagraph>

Each law isn't simply a piece of unique knowledge or insight. They often have a backstory – the context of when and where it was created is signficant. Many of these laws were spawned at critical turning points in the history of computer programming. Some come from inside influential companies, or innovative collectives, or touchstone books. Each feels a small story woven into the mythology and cosmology of computational history.

They come with a social connection to their creators. Their legacy and social credibility adds weight and legitimacy to the principle itself.

<br />

<SimpleCard alignLeft>

**Atwood's law** - Any software that can be written in JavaScript will eventually be written in JavaScript.  
_Jeff Atwood_

</SimpleCard>

<SimpleCard alignLeft>

**Atwood's duck** - When compiling a presentation for corporate managers, programmers should include at least one throwaway "duck" detail that's begging to be to removed or changed. This allows the corporate office to feel like they're participating, despite the change being inconsequential.  
_Jeff Atwood_

##### More on [New Programming Jargon from Jeff's blog](https://blog.codinghorror.com/new-programming-jargon/)

</SimpleCard>

<SimpleCard alignLeft>

**Brandolini's law** - The amount of energy needed to refute bullshit is an order of magnitude bigger than to produce it.  
_Alberto Brandolini_

</SimpleCard>

<SimpleCard alignLeft>

**Conway's law** - The systems we design always reflect the organisational structure of the community that designed them. Our software and automated systems end up 'shaped like' the teams and companies that created them.
_Melvin Conway_

##### More on [Wikipedia](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Conway%27s_law)

</SimpleCard>

<SimpleCard alignLeft>

**Engelbart's law** - Like Moore's law, but applied to human performance. Organisations and human potential increases at an exponential rate.  
_Douglas Englebart_

##### More on [The Doug Englebart Institute](https://www.dougengelbart.org/content/view/316/322/)

</SimpleCard>

<SimpleCard alignLeft>

**Gall's law** - A complex system that works is invariably found to have evolved from a simple system that worked. A complex system designed from scratch never works and cannot be patched up to make it work. You have to start over with a working simple system.  
_John Gall_

##### More on [Wikipedia](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Gall_%28author%29#Gall's_law)

</SimpleCard>

<SimpleCard alignLeft>

**Godwin's law** - As an online discussion grows longer, the probability of a comparison involving Nazis or Hitler approaches one.  
_Mike Godwin_

</SimpleCard>

<SimpleCard alignLeft>

**Wadler's law** - The emotional intensity and time spent debating a language feature
increases along this sequential scale:

1. Semantics (least intense)
2. Syntax
3. Lexical syntax
4. Comments (most intense)

_Philip Wadler_

##### More on [HaskellWiki](https://wiki.haskell.org/Wadler's_Law)

</SimpleCard>

Know about an eponymous law from programming that I'm missing here? [Tweet me](https://twitter.com/mappletons) about it.


A collection of laws named for specific people in the field of programming

The Eponymous Laws of Programming


<SimpleCard alignLeft>

### Can I hire you to design my project?

Sorry, no. I'm unavailable for any contract, side-project, or full-time roles for the forseeable future. I'll post on Twitter and update this status if the situation ever changes.

</SimpleCard>

<SimpleCard alignLeft>

### Do you consider yourself a designer or developer?

Both. I find the distinction between the two fields necessary on the macro scale of our whole industry, but fairly irrelevant on the micro scale of an individual making things in the world.

I starting learning HTML at 12 because I wanted to figure out how to layout a bunch of Neopets images in a table format. Development skills have always been a necessary tool in my design process. You can't divorce the creation from the medium.

</SimpleCard>

<SimpleCard alignLeft>

### What tools do you use to illustrate?

Primarily my brain and upper body limbs. With a little help from [Procreate](https://procreate.art/) on an iPad Pro. I do a little color and brightness editing in Photoshop as well, but it's a pretty minor step.

I'm betting want more information than that, so I wrote a whole post called [[What App is That?]] for you.

</SimpleCard>

<SimpleCard alignLeft>

### Do you have any resources or advice for someone who wants to get started with making illustrations?

Plenty.
Have a look at the [Resources](/resources) page for a collection of courses, learning platforms, and books I personally recommend.

You might also want to read my essay series on [[Drawing Invisible Programming Concepts]]

That said, I no longer work as an illustrator. I spent four years working professionally in illustration (2015-2019) before moving into an art direction and product design role. I'm not a great source of advice on 'making it' as an illustrator, since that's not something I want to do.

</SimpleCard>

<SimpleCard alignLeft>

### I want prints of your illustrations. Can I buy prints from you or print them myself?

You can indeed print any images you find here for your own personal use!

The image quality on the garden notes and twitter is low for printing (72dpi). But if you join my email list I send out high-quality, downloadable versions on there (300dpi – big enough to print on the side of a wall if you so desire).

I'm not fan of the carbon emissions involved in printing, storing, and shipping these from a central location. So if you want professional prints I suggest finding a local printer near you and sending them the high-res files.

</SimpleCard>

<SimpleCard alignLeft>

### How would you describe your work?

I think about this too much, but I would shelve everything I do under the banner of **visual explanations**. This conveniently vague term includes everything from **illustrated notes and essays** to **interface design**.

What I don't make:

- **Comics** - Comics tell a narrative story over time. I mostly explain non-narrative topics and explore ideas atemporarily out of time. They share a lot of comic-like qualities though, and I've spent countless hours studying & stealing techniques from comic artists like [Will Eisner](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Will_Eisner), [Nick Sousanis](http://spinweaveandcut.com/), and [Scott McCloud](http://scottmccloud.com/).
- **Infographics** - Infographics have [a particular aesthetic](https://www.pinterest.com/vectorstock/infographic-templates/) that makes my eyes bleed. While technically these do communicate information through graphics, the word _infographic_ comes with visual baggage. And I would like to run very, very far away from it.
- **Sketchnotes** - If we define 'sketchnotes' as true _sketches_ – unrefined, unplanned visual scribbles – my work doesn't fit.
  They're far more crafted and planned than stream-of-consciousness sketches drawn in one fell swoop.

</SimpleCard>

### Have a question I haven't answered?

[Feel free to ask me on twitter](https://twitter.com/mappletons)


Frequently Asked Questions

The written version of my talk about bringing visual explanations and embodied knowledge to programming tools

A Picture Worth a Thousand Programmes


<IntroParagraph>

I have been seeing an increasing amount of baby pink on developer Twitter.

In lieu of the hooded figures in dark rooms, boxy hardware, and streams of neon green characters that we traditionally associate with code nerds and computer geeks, there's been a sudden influx of pastel shades and baby animals.

</IntroParagraph>

It's an aesthetic that feels like walking into a Sailor Moon episode. Bright, sparkling rainbows and unicorns waft by a soft pink backdrop. Everything looks like a puffy, dusted marshmallow.

<br />

<TwoColumn maxWidth="1000px" alignItems="top">

<BasicImage
  showalt
  alt="Git It Gurl designs created by Amy Wibowo"
  src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dxj9qr5gj/image/upload/c_scale,f_auto,q_auto:good,w_1200/v1615658712/maggieappleton.com/notes/femme-dev/git_it_gurl_1024x1024_2x_zy6vyi.jpg"
/>

<BasicImage
  showalt
  alt="Programming zines created by Amy Wibowo"
  src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dxj9qr5gj/image/upload/c_scale,f_auto,q_auto:good,w_1200/v1615658722/maggieappleton.com/notes/femme-dev/c2_1024x1024_2x_mpb5l5.jpg"
/>

</TwoColumn>

For lack of a better term, I'm calling this style "_femme dev_."
To be clear, by _femme_ I don't mean "for women." I mean it in the sense of celebrating a traditionally feminine aesthetic.

Sex (man / woman) is [not the same](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sex_and_gender_distinction) thing as gender (male / female). If you're not familiar with gender theory, [Judith Butler](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gender_Trouble) is a good introduction.

_Feminine_ and _masculine_ are socially constructed roles, behaviours, activities, and attributes. The way we walk, talk, sit, dress, and decorate our laptops all have the potential to be '_read_' as either masculine or feminine by those around us. Or somewhere in between. It's all a big fuzzy spectrum.

Our ideas about what reads as feminine or masculine is fluid and culturally relative. These roles are constantly shifting and changing under our feet. We have only associated the color pink with femininity for the last 100 years <Footnote idName={1}>Good read by The Atlantic on this - [Pink Wasn't Always Girly](https://www.theatlantic.com/sexes/archive/2013/08/pink-wasnt-always-girly/278535/)<br/>"In the 18th century, it was perfectly masculine for a man to wear a pink silk suit with floral embroidery"</Footnote>, and it's reasonable to expect that in 100 years time we'll once again attach arbitrary color associations to arbitrary gender roles.

But given our current historical moment, it's fair to say the aesthetic on display here draw on an established history of traditionally feminine visual styles. By no stretch of the imagination does that mean it is designed just for women, or off limits to men.

It simply means it's made for anyone who enjoys the aesthetics of soft, puffy Kirby plushies and sparkle text.

---

[Amy Wibowo](https://twitter.com/sailorhg) (@sailorhg on Twitter) is one of the folks at the centre of this fuzzy, adorable shift. Their online store [bubblesort.io](https://shop.bubblesort.io/) sells zines, keyboard designs, and sweatshirts bring an intentionally femimine vibe to an industry overwhelmingly staffed by self-identifying males. <Footnote idName={2}>An unsurprising 91.1% male according to 2020's State of JS [survey](https://2020.stateofjs.com/en-US/demographics/gender) </Footnote>

Since keyboards are one of the only pieces of 'kit' developers use in their jobs (other than 32" tall vertical displays), custom keycaps designs have become a central feature of this movement.

The [Astrolokeys](https://astrolokeys.com/) set designed by Wibowo and [Cassidy Williams](https://twitter.com/cassidoo) is a particularly beautiful example. It's pink, purple, and yellow keys feature astrological symbols for each of the 12 zodiac signs.

<BasicImage
  alt="A split, astrology-themed keyboard made up on yellow, pink, and purple custom keys"
  width="1100px"
  src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dxj9qr5gj/image/upload/c_scale,f_auto,q_auto:good,w_1200/v1615658717/maggieappleton.com/notes/femme-dev/EfqE7d1UYAAd1Nk_qbahzg.jpg"
/>

<TwoColumn maxWidth="1000px" alignItems="top">

<TweetEmbed tweetId="1295494004943933441" />
<TweetEmbed tweetId="1368997186055249922" />

</TwoColumn>

---

The aesthetic has also started showing up in the branding choices of dev-focused tools and companies.

[Charm](https://charm.sh/) is a set of command line tools designed to make the terminal feel "glamorous" – featuring bubble tea, lipgloss, and rainbows.

<ImageFrame
  alt="The charm website featuring pink glow and bubble text"
  src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dxj9qr5gj/image/upload/c_scale,f_auto,q_auto:good,w_1200/v1638703762/maggieappleton.com/notes/femme-dev/charm1_fmuwnw.jpg"
/>
<ImageFrame
  alt="A set of cute 3D characters representing Charm's plug-in ecosystem"
  src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dxj9qr5gj/image/upload/c_scale,f_auto,q_auto:good,w_1200/v1638703762/maggieappleton.com/notes/femme-dev/charm2_ihnlyd.jpg"
/>

<TwoColumn maxWidth="1000px" alignItems="top">

<TweetEmbed tweetId="1371211189703835650" />
<TweetEmbed tweetId="905270297128865792" />

</TwoColumn>

[Compute Cuter](https://computecuter.com/) is Amy's full minisite dedicated to making your computing environment a bt softer. They have fonts, themes, and keycap sets that fit the vibe.

<ImageFrame
  width="1100px"
  alt="A screenshot of the compute cuter website"
  src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dxj9qr5gj/image/upload/c_scale,f_auto,q_auto:good,w_1200/v1615658708/maggieappleton.com/notes/femme-dev/compute_cuter_-_a_guide_to_cute-ifying_your_computer_xu8th0.png"
/>

Considering the plethora of males in development, the rise of femme aesthetics is perhaps both curious and not.

<ComingSoon />


A collection of observations on the rise of soft, sparkly, baby pink aesthetics among developers

Pink, Soft, Glittering Developers


<IntroParagraph>

People who want to improve their drawing and illustration skills [[frequently ask]] what books, courses, and resources I recommend. Trying to Google it leads to an overwhelming pile of cruft and most of the great resources aren't anywhere on the first 10 pages of search results.

</IntroParagraph>

I've compiled all my favourite learning platforms, courses, and books below to help guide you towards the good stuff. Everything below will help teach you how to work in the [[meat and medium]] of visual language, rather than focusing on the materials (the "which iPad should I buy?" distraction). <Footnote idName={1}>If you desperately want to focus on tooling, you can read about the hardware and software I use over on [What App is That?](/apps)</Footnote>

I've read every book and taken most of the course on this page, so can at least vouch for them first-hand. But be aware it's not exhaustive. The volume of illustration education available online is constantly growing and I don't keep close tabs on it anymore.

<Center>

## Learning Platforms and Courses

</Center>

<TwoColumn maxWidth="1200px" alignItems="top">

<LinkCard url="http://bit.ly/35UyJ8l" title="Schoolism" image="https://res.cloudinary.com/dxj9qr5gj/image/upload/c_scale,f_auto,q_auto:good,w_1200/v1638779716/maggieappleton.com/notes/illustration-resources/schoolism_upphcl.png">

Primarily aimed at concept artists and digital painters, Schoolism is strong
on advanced fundamentals.

Probably too intense for beginners. Dives deep on
rendering, composition, and character design.

<br />

**Recommended Courses**

[Drawing Fundamentals](https://schoolism.com/courses/drawing/drawing-fundamentals-thomas-fluharty) by Thomas Fluharty

[Pictorial Composition](https://schoolism.com/courses/illustration/pictorial-composition-nathan-fowkes) by Nathan Fowkes

[Essentials of Realism](https://schoolism.com/courses/illustration/essentials-of-realism-jonathan-hardesty) by Jonathan Hardesty

[Fundamentals of Lighting](https://schoolism.com/courses/art/fundamentals-of-lighting-sam-nielson) by Sam Nielson

</LinkCard>

<LinkCard url="http://bit.ly/3a1S6Q5" title="New Masters Academy" image="https://res.cloudinary.com/dxj9qr5gj/image/upload/c_scale,f_auto,q_auto:good,w_1200/v1638779503/maggieappleton.com/notes/illustration-resources/nma_gh0mzu.png">

While a bit old school and slow-paced, the instructors on here are true veterans. Many are classical painters and sculpters, or come from the visual development and film world.

They're strong on anatomy, traditional painting yechniques, and compositional layout theory.

<br />

**Recommended Courses**

[Composition for Visual Artists](https://www.nma.art/courses/composition-for-visual-artists/) by Bill Perkins

[Constructive Head Drawing](https://www.nma.art/courses/constructive-head-drawing/) by Steve Huston

[Elements of Traditional Composition](https://www.nma.art/courses/elements-of-traditional-composition-with-glenn-vilppu-2013/) by Glenn Vilppu

</LinkCard>

<LinkCard url="http://bit.ly/2uN8KTr" title="School of Visual Storytelling" image="https://res.cloudinary.com/dxj9qr5gj/image/upload/c_scale,f_auto,q_auto:good,w_1200/v1638779504/maggieappleton.com/notes/illustration-resources/svs_x6axnq.png">

Strong on beginner fundamentals – great for anyone just getting started.

Jake Parker and Will Terry teach drawing and digital painting from the ground up through sets of well-designed, hands-on exercises.

<br />

**Recommended Courses**

[How to Draw Everything](https://courses.svslearn.com/courses/how-to-draw-everything) by Jake Parker

[Basic Perspective Drawing](https://courses.svslearn.com/courses/basic-perspective-drawing) by David Hohn

[Painting Color and Light](https://courses.svslearn.com/courses/painting-color-and-light) by Will Terry

[Creative Composition](https://courses.svslearn.com/courses/creative-composition) by Will Terry

</LinkCard>

<LinkCard url="http://bit.ly/3aaLajJ" title="Art of Aaron Blaise"  image="https://res.cloudinary.com/dxj9qr5gj/image/upload/c_scale,f_auto,q_auto:good,w_1200/v1638779503/maggieappleton.com/notes/illustration-resources/aaronblaise_iro6yk.png">

Animation, animals, and character design are the focus here. Ex-Disney artist Aaron Blaise leads most of the courses – his teaching style is friendly and laid-back.

These courses assume basic drawing skills and cover more advanced topics.

<br />

**Recommended Courses**

[Taking Control of Colour](https://creatureartteacher.com/product/color-theory-class-ronnie-wiliford/) by Ronnie Williford

[Character Design](https://creatureartteacher.com/product/character-design-course-aaron-blaise/) by Aaron Blaise

[The Art of Storyboards](https://creatureartteacher.com/product/storyboard-course-with-lyndon-ruddy/) by Lyndon Ruddy

</LinkCard>

<LinkCard url="http://bit.ly/34O5F1K" title="Peter Han"  image="https://res.cloudinary.com/dxj9qr5gj/image/upload/c_scale,f_auto,q_auto:good,w_1200/v1638827480/maggieappleton.com/notes/illustration-resources/peterhan_ardexg.png">

Infamous for his pen and ink techniques, Peter is a master of the Dynamic Sketching style that has spread throughout the art education world. He's a seasoned instructor who knows how to break down concepts into simple, understandable principals.

He runs online courses and individual mentorships a few times a year, as well as in-person workshops in LA and Europe

</LinkCard>

<LinkCard url="http://bit.ly/2NnE6pR" title="Draw a Box" image="https://res.cloudinary.com/dxj9qr5gj/image/upload/c_scale,f_auto,q_auto:good,w_1200/v1638827480/maggieappleton.com/notes/illustration-resources/drawabox_yjrfl0.png">

A community favourite, this site walks you through the core concepts of Dynamic Sketching in a well-organised set of lessons.

Covers the essentials of drawing smooth lines, creating textures, and (obviously) drawing good boxes! You can even get feedback on the homework assignments through their group discord or subreddit.

</LinkCard>

<LinkCard url="http://bit.ly/36PRv1P" title="Modern Day James" image="https://res.cloudinary.com/dxj9qr5gj/image/upload/c_scale,f_auto,q_auto:good,w_1200/v1638827480/maggieappleton.com/notes/illustration-resources/moddayjames_fpp9tn.png">

James is an independent creator running a patreon and selling individual gumroad courses. The style is more directed at game design and concept art for films, but builds on top of classic drawing techniques that are valuable no matter what kind of medium you're interested in.

</LinkCard>

<LinkCard url="http://bit.ly/2NhnKiH" title="Ty Carter" image="https://res.cloudinary.com/dxj9qr5gj/image/upload/c_scale,f_auto,q_auto:good,w_1200/v1638827480/maggieappleton.com/notes/illustration-resources/tycarter_brecyy.png">

Another independent teacher, Ty is a background designer from the animation world creating tutorials on Patreon and Gumroad.

Strong on lighting & colour theory, stylised illustration techniques, and visual design principals

</LinkCard>

<LinkCard url="http://bit.ly/2uKMYj2" title="Concept Design Academy" image="https://res.cloudinary.com/dxj9qr5gj/image/upload/c_scale,f_auto,q_auto:good,w_1200/v1638827480/maggieappleton.com/notes/illustration-resources/cda_pwjvsb.png">

An in-person training school in Pasadena, California that offers a full curriculum of foundational illustration and design skills.

The instructors are all working professionals in the concept art industry, and teaching courses on evenings and weekends.

</LinkCard>

<LinkCard url="http://bit.ly/3a06Ui5" title="Ctrl+Paint" image="https://res.cloudinary.com/dxj9qr5gj/image/upload/c_scale,f_auto,q_auto:good,w_1200/v1638827480/maggieappleton.com/notes/illustration-resources/ctrlpaint_wrnj50.png">

An impressivly high-quality and sizeable collection of video tutorials by Matt Kohr. The videos focus on fundamental painting techniques, specifically around building skills for concept art and digital work.

A great spot for beginners – Matt covers all the basics in a well organised sequence.

</LinkCard>

</TwoColumn>

<Center>

## Books

</Center>

<ResourceBook
  small
  url="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/41583721-how-to-think-when-you-draw-volume-1"
  title="How to Think When You Draw"
  author="Lorenzo Etherington"
  image="https://res.cloudinary.com/dxj9qr5gj/image/upload/c_scale,f_auto,q_auto:good,w_1200/v1638779504/maggieappleton.com/notes/illustration-resources/lorenzo_rw2yuo.jpg"
/>

<ResourceBook
  small
  url="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/15808089-how-to-draw"
  title="How to Draw"
  author="Scott Robertson"
  image="https://res.cloudinary.com/dxj9qr5gj/image/upload/c_scale,f_auto,q_auto:good,w_1200/v1638779504/maggieappleton.com/notes/illustration-resources/robertsondraw_lubamf.jpg"
/>

<ResourceBook
  small
  url="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/2766647-creative-illustration"
  title="Creative Illustration"
  author="Andrew Loomis"
  image="https://res.cloudinary.com/dxj9qr5gj/image/upload/c_scale,f_auto,q_auto:good,w_1200/v1638779503/maggieappleton.com/notes/illustration-resources/loomiscreative_njwqd8.jpg"
/>

<ResourceBook
  small
  url="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/23389095-framed-ink-marcos-mateu-mestre"
  title="Framed Ink: Drawing and Composition for Visual Storytellers"
  author="Marco Mateu-Mestre"
  image="https://res.cloudinary.com/dxj9qr5gj/image/upload/c_scale,f_auto,q_auto:good,w_1200/v1638779503/maggieappleton.com/notes/illustration-resources/framedink_h9pder.jpg"
/>

<ResourceBook
  small
  url="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/2767856-sketching"
  title="Sketching: Drawing Techniques for Product Designers"
  author="Koos Eissen"
  image="https://res.cloudinary.com/dxj9qr5gj/image/upload/c_scale,f_auto,q_auto:good,w_1200/v1638779503/maggieappleton.com/notes/illustration-resources/koossketching_i6ovzm.jpg"
/>

<ResourceBook
  small
  url="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/146300.Rapid_Viz_"
  title="Rapid Viz"
  author="Kurt Hanks & Larry Belliston"
  image="https://res.cloudinary.com/dxj9qr5gj/image/upload/c_scale,f_auto,q_auto:good,w_1200/v1638779504/maggieappleton.com/notes/illustration-resources/rapidviz_mfopn4.jpg"
/>

<ResourceBook
  small
  url="https://www.gallerynucleus.com/detail/21089/"
  title="Dynamic Bible"
  author="Peter Han"
  image="https://res.cloudinary.com/dxj9qr5gj/image/upload/c_scale,f_auto,q_auto:good,w_1200/v1638779503/maggieappleton.com/notes/illustration-resources/dynamicbible_scuqpu.jpg"
/>

<ResourceBook
  small
  url="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/6250465-drawn-to-life"
  title="Drawn to Life: Volumes I and II"
  author="Walt Stanchfield"
  image="https://res.cloudinary.com/dxj9qr5gj/image/upload/c_scale,f_auto,q_auto:good,w_1200/v1638779503/maggieappleton.com/notes/illustration-resources/drawnlife_p2eanr.jpg"
/>

<ResourceBook
  small
  url="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/1027978.Fun_with_a_Pencil"
  title="Fun with a Pencil"
  author="Andrew Loomis"
  image="https://res.cloudinary.com/dxj9qr5gj/image/upload/c_scale,f_auto,q_auto:good,w_1200/v1638779503/maggieappleton.com/notes/illustration-resources/funpencil_cohrn3.jpg"
/>

<ResourceBook
  small
  url="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/136091.The_Animator_s_Survival_Kit"
  title="The Animators Survival Kit"
  author="Richard Williams"
  image="https://res.cloudinary.com/dxj9qr5gj/image/upload/c_scale,f_auto,q_auto:good,w_1200/v1638779503/maggieappleton.com/notes/illustration-resources/animator_vvevbn.jpg"
/>

<ResourceBook
  small
  url="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/899923.Force"
  title="Force: Dynamic Life Drawing for Animators"
  author="Michael D. Mattesi"
  image="https://res.cloudinary.com/dxj9qr5gj/image/upload/c_scale,f_auto,q_auto:good,w_1200/v1638779503/maggieappleton.com/notes/illustration-resources/force_jeslfd.jpg"
/>

<ResourceBook
  small
  url="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/102920.Understanding_Comics"
  title="Understanding Comics"
  author="Scott McCloud"
  image="https://res.cloudinary.com/dxj9qr5gj/image/upload/c_scale,f_auto,q_auto:good,w_1200/v1638779503/maggieappleton.com/notes/illustration-resources/comics_vmklzx.jpg"
/>

<ResourceBook
  small
  url="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/2393396.Graphic_Storytelling_and_Visual_Narrative"
  title="Graphic Storytelling and Visual Narrative"
  author="Will Eisner"
  image="https://res.cloudinary.com/dxj9qr5gj/image/upload/c_scale,f_auto,q_auto:good,w_1200/v1638779503/maggieappleton.com/notes/illustration-resources/graphicstory_srgm0q.jpg"
/>

<ResourceBook
  small
  url="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/517518.Thinkertoys"
  title="Thinkertoys"
  author="Michael Michalko"
  image="https://res.cloudinary.com/dxj9qr5gj/image/upload/c_scale,f_auto,q_auto:good,w_1200/v1638779504/maggieappleton.com/notes/illustration-resources/thinkertoys_bvvn4w.jpg"
/>

<ResourceBook
  small
  url="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/10675.Lateral_Thinking"
  title="Lateral Thinking"
  author="Edward de Bono"
  image="https://res.cloudinary.com/dxj9qr5gj/image/upload/c_scale,f_auto,q_auto:good,w_1200/v1638779503/maggieappleton.com/notes/illustration-resources/latthinking_iw53ec.jpg"
/>


My favourite resources for learning to draw and developing your visual thinking skills

The Best Illustration Books and Courses


<IntroParagraph>
    
A <b>Pattern Language</b> is a set of flexible, reusable solutions to common design problems. 
These patterns evolve naturally within systems, and are found rather than crafted. Identifying and recognising these patterns gives us a framework to craft solutions with.

</IntroParagraph>

There is no one way to implement a design pattern – they are purposefully abstract enough that you can apply them to the situation at hand. They're guiding principles instead of formulaic instructions.

Languages like [[The Knowledge Hydrant]] for collaborative learning and [Material Design](https://material.io/design) for digital screens are examples of pattern languages working out in the wild.

### The history of pattern languages

Christopher Alexander developed the idea of Pattern Languages in their 1977 book by the same name.

<ResourceBook
  url="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/A_Pattern_Language"
  image="/images/books/patterns.webp"
  title="A Pattern Language"
  author="Christopher Alexander"
>
  The book outlined a number of solutions for architecture and urban planning
  design, but the theory has since (appropriately) taken on a life of its own.
</ResourceBook>

Alexander was an architect and urban planner working on building cities and homes condusive to harmonious living.

### Pattern languages in programming

The programming community picked up on on Christopher Alexander's ideas in the late 1980's.

Despite the original book being primarily about public transportation tempos and cafe sidewalk strategies, the notion of design patterns heavily influenced the development of <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Object-oriented_programming">Object-Oriented Programming</a> languages like Smalltalk and C++.

In a charming presentation at the 1996 OOPSLA conference (Object-Oriented Programs, Systems, Languages and Applications, obviously), Alexander openly admits **"I'm about to address a room full of people and I don't know hardly anything about what all of you do"**.

<Video src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/98LdFA-_zfA" />

> Some computer scientist called me and said they had a group of people in Silicon Valley willing to pay $3,000 to have dinner with me... and I thought "What the hell is this?"

[Richard Gabriel](http://dreamsongs.com/SiteMap.html), an engineer at
IBM, was one of the ring leaders actively building these bridges between
software and built landscapes.

### Pattern languages in interface design and design systems

<ComingSoon />


Notes on pattern languages and Christopher Alexander's legacy on software programming

Pattern Languages in Programming and Interface Design


<IntroParagraph>

At [React Rally 2020](http://reactrally.com) I gave a talk on magic, kinship, and ritual within the React development community. Anthropology isn't something we hear a lot of about in the world of programming, and this is my lighthearted attempt to explore some of the odd cultural behaviours and norms we've come to see as 'normal' in the web development world.

</IntroParagraph>

You can watch the whole talk below, or scroll down to see slides and read the transcript.

<Video
  src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/8snrXgzM1bM?start=484"
  title="The cultural anthropology of react"
/>

<BasicImage
  width="880px"
  alt="The cultural anthropology of react title slide"
  src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dg3gyk0gu/image/upload/c_scale,f_auto,q_auto:good,w_880/v1597334915/maggieappleton.com/notes/anthropology-react-slides/ReactRally2020-Draft1.001.png"
/>

## Links and References

- "Anthropology is Philosophy with the people in it” - [Tim Ingold](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tim_Ingold) from [Anthropology: Why it Matters](/anthropology-matters) (An excellent brief introduction to Anthropology).
- "Deep Hanging Out” coined by [Clifford Geertz](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Clifford_Geertz) in a [1998 New York Review of Books essay](http://hypergeertz.jku.at/GeertzTexts/Deep_Hanging.htm)
- [Imagined Communities](/imagined-communities) theory from [Benedict Anderson](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Benedict_Anderson)
- Social interaction is a performance by [Erving Goffman](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Erving_Goffman). Proposed in the book [The Presentation of Self in Everyday Life](https://www.librarything.com/work/5484)
- [Cultural Capital](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cultural_capital) - The theory cultural knowledge and information you hold within a community works in much the same way as financial and material capital. From [Pierre Bourdieu's](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pierre_Bourdieu) essay one [Cultural Reproduction and Social Reproduction](http://piggottsclass.weebly.com/uploads/2/3/1/7/23179512/bourdieup_cultural_and_social_reproduction.pdf)
- [Alfred Gell](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alfred_Gell) on the connections between technology, enchantment, and magic in [his essay on](https://www.brown.edu/Departments/Joukowsky_Institute/courses/materialworlds/files/1108595.pdf) **The Technology of Enchantment and the Enchantment of Technology**
- "Technology is society made durable” from [Bruno Latour](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bruno_Latour) in his [1990 essay](http://www.bruno-latour.fr/sites/default/files/46-TECHNOLOGY-DURABLE-GBpdf.pdf) by the same title.

<Center>

<SimpleCard>

### Take a look at all the [slides on Github](https://github.com/MaggieAppleton/react-anthropology-slides)

</SimpleCard>

</Center>

---

## The Abridged Essay Version

I've been immersed in the world of React developers since 2016. As a cultural anthropologist, the beliefs, norms, and social dynamics of Reactland have always been more intriguing to me than the useEffect hook or concurrent mode.

### What is cultural anthropology?

If you have never head of “**cultural anthropology**,” don't worry. That's expected. It doesn’t often overlap with the world of web development and as a discipline it's not great at self-promotion.

It's essentially the study of human cultures and trying to understand how they work.

Or as one of my favourite anthropologists [Tim Ingold](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tim_Ingold) puts it:

<BasicImage
  width="880px"
  alt="Cultural anthropology is philosophy with the people in it"
  src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dg3gyk0gu/image/upload/c_scale,f_auto,q_auto:good,w_1200/v1597334937/maggieappleton.com/notes/anthropology-react-slides/ReactRally2020-Draft1.012.png"
/>

<Subtext>

From [Anthropology: Why it Matters](/anthropology-matters)

</Subtext>

Anthropology tries to answer many of the same questions philosophers concern themselves with;

_Why do we have language?
How should we organise our societies and institutions?
How do we deal with birth, death, morality, and conflict?_

Philosophers turn inwards to find these answers. They go into a small quiet room alone, think a lot, and read books by mostly old dead white men to find answers.

In contrast, Anthropology turns outwards - **it looks for the answers in people.** By living among them, learning from them, and taking part in their lives. A process known as [Participant Observation](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Participant_observation).

It isn't searching for one universal truth of all humanity, but rather **particular truths for particular people**, at particular points in time.

---

### Why care about the anthropology of React?

Looking at React through a cultural lens helps us understand it as more than simply **"a JavaScript library for building user interfaces"**.

Technical definitions can be reductive - they draw a technological box around our concepts that hide the historical and cultural context.

<BasicImage
  width="880px"
  alt="The react logo inside a strict technical box"
  src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dg3gyk0gu/image/upload/c_scale,f_auto,q_auto:good,w_1200/v1597334929/maggieappleton.com/notes/anthropology-react-slides/ReactRally2020-Draft1.008.png"
/>

What happens if we expand our understanding to include all the people who surround this React, and how they might **affect** and **be affected by** what's inside it?

<BasicImage
  width="880px"
  alt="An expanded circle of all the people of react"
  src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dg3gyk0gu/image/upload/c_scale,f_auto,q_auto:good,w_1200/v1597334932/maggieappleton.com/notes/anthropology-react-slides/ReactRally2020-Draft1.010.png"
/>

What if we entertain the idea that humans and the culture of React are an essential part of what defines React? What if we consider it a cultural ecosystem we're _active participants_ in, rather than simply a package we `npm install`

Cultural anthropology is perfectly placed to help us find answers to these questions.

---

### Understanding the “The React Community"

We should establish who we’re talking about when we say “the react community” - where do we think the boundaries of the React community are, and who do we think is part of it?

<BasicImage
  width="880px"
  alt="How do we define the React community?"
  src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dg3gyk0gu/image/upload/c_scale,f_auto,q_auto:good,w_1200/v1597334943/maggieappleton.com/notes/anthropology-react-slides/ReactRally2020-Draft1.014.png"
/>

I drew a very incomplete and fuzzy map of the React world here. It’s definitely not comprehensive or to scale.

<img
  alt="A hand drawn map of the react community"
  src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dg3gyk0gu/image/upload/c_scale,f_auto,q_auto:good,w_1200/v1597334948/maggieappleton.com/notes/anthropology-react-slides/ReactRally2020-Draft1.015.png"
/>

I drew this to point out two key things.
First, being a React person isn’t a mutually exclusive identity - you can be other things too.

We have many overlapping and neighbouring communities we all belong to. You might also be part of the Data Viz world, or hang out within a sub niche like React Native.

Second, our community has very fluid boundaries. People flow in and out quite easily – anyone who finds it can join. To become a member you didn’t need to fill out a form and send it to a committee, or go through an initiation ceremony.

You also have the freedom to leave whenever you like.

These fuzzy boundaries sometimes make us a little bit anxious - it's hard to know who's part of the group, and weakens our sense of being a cohesive whole.

Another way to try and understand the React community is to look at some rough numbers.

<BasicImage
  width="880px"
  alt="Stats on how many React developers participate in Github, Reddit, and Dsicord groups"
  src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dg3gyk0gu/image/upload/c_scale,f_auto,q_auto:good,w_1200/v1597334954/maggieappleton.com/notes/anthropology-react-slides/ReactRally2020-Draft1.016.png"
/>

These are interesting indicators, but they're not necessarily helpful if we're primarily interested in how React works as a cultural system.

---

### React is an Imagined Community

Rather than talking about stats and numbers, it’s much more meaningful for us to talk about React an an [imagined community](/imagined-communities)

This was a concept developed by a political scientist called [Benedict Anderson](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Benedict_Anderson) in the 1980’s.

Anderson was writing about how nations imagine themselves as collective wholes, but his theory maps very well to how online communities like React work.

An imagined community has nothing to do with it being imaginary in the sense of being fake, but simply that it’s something we have to mentally construct across thousands of individual minds. It gets built through shared images and rituals.

Anderson specifically uses the idea of a national daily newspaper.

The act of sitting down and reading the daily news, and imagining a whole nation of other people, similar like you, sitting and reading those exact same words at roughly the same time, creates a sense of collective belonging.

It’s a daily ritual that reaffirms your membership, and sense of unity with a greater whole.

<ComingSoon />


An anthropological look at the cultural norms of the React community

The Cultural Anthropology of React


[Jared Pereira](https://awarm.space/) has been running a wonderful series of personal [website tours](https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLEXbN99LY3OCarUeXcxWeZzOelXQvVdAA). The guest list features many of my favourite [[Digital Gardeners]] and [indie web](https://indieweb.org/) creators such as [Tom Critchlow](https://tomcritchlow.com/), [Chris Aldrich](https://boffosocko.com/), and [Azlen Elza](https://azlen.me/).

At the end of 2020 I stopped in to show what this website looks like behind the Wizard of Oz curtain:

<Alert>

The video walkthrough on this page walks through how I built my [previous
website](https://github.com/MaggieAppleton/maggieappleton.com) in Gatsby.js. To learn about the tech stack behind the current
version visit the
[Github](https://github.com/MaggieAppleton/maggieappleton.com-V2)

</Alert>

<Video src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/bUGoPcQleto" />

<Spacer size="small" />

### Tech Stack and Features

- Built with [Gatsby](https://www.gatsbyjs.org/), which uses [React](https://reactjs.org/) for rendering and [GraphQL](https://graphql.org/) for data fetching
- All posts (notes, essays, books) written with [MDX](https://mdxjs.com/) - allows me to write React components inside markdown files for extra JavaScript power ✨
- I use the CSS-in-JS library [emotion](https://emotion.sh/docs/introduction) for styling components
- Responsive footnotes implemented with [Tufte CSS](https://edwardtufte.github.io/tufte-css/) (no JavaScript required!)
- [[Bi-Directional Links]] with <a href="https://github.com/aengusmcmillin/gatsby-theme-brain">gatsby-theme-brain</a>, and page previews adapted from <a href="https://github.com/aravindballa/gatsby-theme-andy">gatsby-theme-andy</a>
- [Tippy.js](https://atomiks.github.io/tippyjs/) for tooltip popovers
- Images hosted on [Cloudinary](https://cloudinary.com/) to avoid the long build times when using [gatsby-image](https://www.gatsbyjs.org/packages/gatsby-image/)
- Deploys to [Netlify](https://www.netlify.com/) directly from Github. Currently takes 4 minutes for the site to build and deploy. I have no idea if that's good or not, but I'll take it 🤷🏻‍♀️

<Spacer size="small" />

<SimpleCard>

If you want to see all the source code yourself, feel free to wander around in the [Github repo](https://github.com/MaggieAppleton/maggieappleton.com).

</SimpleCard>


A video tour through how I build the old version of this site

A Meta-Tour of This Site


<IntroParagraph>

This is the introduction and first chapter of my mediocre undergraduate thesis about the Quantified Self movement, [[cyborg]] anthropology, technological embodiment, and Western Cosmology.

</IntroParagraph>

I wrote it between 2012-2013 for my BA degree in Cultural [[Anthropology]].

Some of my opinions and many elements of the self-tracking community have changed since this was written. Yet I'm still thinking along many of the same threads and exploring parallel ideas. It's relevant to the rest of my work, but should be taken with a large grain of salt 🙃

<br />

<AssumedAudience>

Anthropology professors trying to judge my research, analytical writing, and critical thinking skills.  
Anyone who has heard of the Quantified Self movement.

</AssumedAudience>

<Spacer size="small" />

## Introduction

The Quantified Self movement is concerned with exactly what you might expect – quantifying the self.

Aligning their identity with units of measurement and numerical data, **they seek self-knowledge that will lead to the improvement of both the individual and implicitly, the greater society** – the supposed ultimate goal of progressing humanity forward.

The ideology of the Quantified Self movement is important to us because it is not only theirs, in many ways it is our own.

Based on ideas native to the Western world that have now reigned for centuries, **their curious conceptions about the body and self are ones we share**.

Understanding the historical emergence, beliefs, concerns, and interests of this community will teach us about ourselves as much as it does about them.

---

Beginning with an exploration of the historical foundations of the West, my theory builds off the work of Marshall Sahlins in bringing attention to how **we have a very particularly constructed idea of the “self,” as a need-driven and imperfect being** living within a dualistically divided body and mind.

Seeking to fix our supposed imperfections, we cultivated the dominance of science and medicine over our natural bodies by beginning to **understand our physical form within the metaphor of machinery**.

While the Quantified Self movement in many ways ascribes to these beliefs and is built upon these foundations of imbuing objective, empirical and quantifiable data with legitimacy, they also challenge and seek to revolutionise the modern institutions of science and biomedicine.

Primarily concerned with the generalised knowledge that the two impose upon individual bodies, the Quantified Self ideology believes each singular person should be able to determine their own personal truths and treatments, leading them to establish and advocate for the joint concepts of _personal science_ and _personalised medicine_.

---

I discuss how the technological devices pervasively used within the Quantified Self community are leading them to new experiences of embodiment.

This **technological embodiment redefines the boundaries of the self.**

It engages us in debates over animated agency, emotional intimacy, and holistically interdependent and interconnected systems. It challenges many of our default anthropocentric attitudes towards the world.

These emerging relationships with technology are indicative of those going on within our greater society. Quantified Selfers should be considered the frontier of those fully embracing these new embodiments.

They construct new identities and ways of being through technology, especially through the medium of data.

Massive **troves of immaterial online information become representations of selves in the public sphere**, as well as potential channels for manipulation and domination on a socio-political level.

Though many have read the data-collection practices of the Quantified Self community as solely self-surveillance, we find they are actually **choosing to generate and control their own information** rather than wait for greater social and political forces to do it for them.

We are now all implicated in acts of self-quantification and the rise of data-selves by nature of being digitally connected.

A state which raises a plethora of political and personal complications for us to navigate.

If we are already intertwined in a system of data surveillance, **self-trackers may be the ones turning the system into a source of identity, positive meaning and empowerment.**

---

Though they are politically resistant in the field of data surveillance, their underlying ideologies still inherently tie them to fulfilling the needs of a capitalist economy.

> They strive to be optimal citizens: organised, productive, timely, fit, and responsible, giving off the social perception of a well-ordered and lived life.

This pursuit is driven by **a conviction in the natural goodness of capitalism** that resembles religious belief, yet one that fails to result in the transcendent state implicitly promised.

The existence of the Quantified Self movement, a collection of individuals seeking to improve and upgrade themselves in order to manage the unreasonably demanding requirements of the capitalist economy using the same ideological base that brought it into being, should lead us to critically question what they mean by seeking “improvement” in the interests of “progress.”

**We should ask what we they progressing towards and whether it truly serves their own interests.**

---

Throughout this critical exploration, and despite the occasional bold conclusion, I do not mean to “other” the Quantified Selfers.

When taken in cultural context, **their practices and beliefs are reasonable and rational**. The ways we enact these same beliefs are simply more familiar to us – we have been performing them for so long they do not seem alien or absurd to our eyes.

Amassing, meticulously graphing, and developing formulas based on the data points of a morning routine puts these convictions into such a stark light that we react with shock, and often quickly move to ridicule those who practice it.

**Out of a lack of empathetic understanding (and perhaps some confusion and fear), many have defaulted to portraying Quantified Selfers as a misguided, fringe population** numerically desecrating the sanctity of the human self.

My research explores and challenges both this inaccurate portrayal of the community, as well as the notion that we have a sacred pre-defined “human nature” in need of defending.

The movement is not what many take it as.

> They are often holistically humanistic rather than reductively mechanical, diverse rather than monolithic, evolving and dynamic rather than static, and critically questioning rather than passively complying.

Above all other qualities, I found the Quantified Self movement to be **defined by a diversity and complexity of opinions**.

Members expressed wide varieties of dynamic, evolving ideas and contradictory ideologies. To study, think, and write about the movement as a whole concept and bound community was a challenging and confusing task on numerous occasions.

Despite these rifts and differences, the Quantified Self community indeed shares fundamental and core beliefs about the value of self-improvement through quantified self-knowledge, providing them with enough common ground to engage in building a meaningful social world.

---

## Chapter One - An Introduction to the Quantified Self

<TwoColumn maxWidth="800px" justifyItems="start">

<p>

Heart rate: 67bpm.  
Blood pressure: 110/74.  
Blood-oxygenation: 97%.  
Weight: 126.3lbs.  
Hours of sleep: 7.23.  
Quality of sleep: 83%.  
REM cycles: 5.

</p>

<p>

Caffeine intake: 126mg.  
Steps taken: 2,405.  
Calories expended: 809.  
Emails received: 54.  
Emails sent: 13.  
Motivation level: 4.  
Stress level: 7.3.

</p>

</TwoColumn>

Location: the world of the Quantified Self – the self understood and expressed through numbers, data, and quantified statistics.

Summed up by their tagline “self-knowledge through numbers,” the concept of the “Quantified Self” encompasses both a cultural ideology and a community of people – who congregate both online and offline – that ascribe to it (Quantified Self 2013).

This distinction between the Quantified Self movement or phenomenon, and the Quantified Self community is an important one.

There is an understanding of a greater “movement” taking place on a social level, believed to be a historical force in itself, with some trackers even calling it “our millennium’s renaissance” (Top Coder Inc 2012).

The movement is driven by specific and historically-located ideas and beliefs guiding this technologically-oriented approach to self-tracking. With it comes an international community whose members self-identify and connect through self-tracking.

---

#### Self-Tracking

What members of this community hold in common is the practice of self-tracking: they collect and store data and information about particular aspects of their life and self.

This practice revolves around designing projects that target specific variables. The kind of things that people choose to track is seemingly infinite – ranging from the common areas of sleep, time, physical exercise, and food intake, to the more creative variable of monitoring of Twitter activity, shower temperatures, snoring, and perceived quality of social conversations (Quantified Self 2013).

It is a running joke within the community that any aspect of life you can imagine being tracked, probably is being tracked a Quantified Selfer somewhere in the world.

Keeping tabs on the self is nothing terribly new: Benjamin Franklin is one historical figure known to have written of his adherence to thirteen key values each day (Dembosky 2011). <Footnote idName={1}>There now exists an iPhone application where you too can track Franklin’s thirteen prescribed virtues over the course of your day.</Footnote>

Self-trackers often like to harken back to such historical individuals, attempting to convey the message that surveying the self in pursuit of improvement has been a noble and worthwhile activity for hundreds of years (Kelly 2012b).

The practice seems to have been an especially prevalent theme in the history of Western culture, appearing everywhere from religious virtues to nationalistic demands of responsible citizenship.

Appreciating the influence of these historically-based ideas on the current Quantified Self movement is central to understanding how and why it has emerged.

In many ways that is part of the real significance of this movement: self-tracking has long been a part of ourselves and our cultures.

It is a practice that all of us can relate to, and engage with in small ways – one that is not only growing rapidly, but also shifting forms.

Advancements in technology have now infinitely expanded the realm of self-tracking – making the practice exponentially easier compared to the old pen-and-paper method. From body monitors to smartphone applications, we are now enabling a new age of the measured self.

<br />

#### History and Founding

The Quantified Self movement does not begin or end with any single individual or set of people.

Instead of being “founded,” its origin story is told as a natural emergence out of the way human interaction with technology is already taking shape.

It would be more accurate to say certain leaders emerged who encouraged and facilitated the rise of the culture, shaping the phenomenon by giving it a name and a central digital space where they could communicate, organise, and establish their identity.

These leaders were Gary Wolf and Kevin Kelly who set up Quantifiedself.com – the website acting as the online hub of the movement.

The two were journalists already invested in exploring the social and personal meanings behind technology when they met as co-workers at the forward-thinking magazine Wired in 2007.

One an editor and one a writer, they began to collaborate over their shared interest in a technologically-driven trend both had noticed gaining ground among their social circles in the bay area of California; “people subjecting themselves to regimes of quantitative measurement and self-tracking that went far beyond the ordinary” (Wolf 2010b).

They attribute the rise of these habits to four factors:

- The growing ubiquity of personal mobile devices – allowing people to carry powerful computing capacities around in their pockets
- Advances in the quality, affordability and miniaturisation of electronic body sensors and tracking tools
- Social media’s normalisation of perpetually sharing intimate information; and the rise of “the digital cloud”
- The massive increase in capacity of online data hosting and storage, making its collection seem immaterially infinite. (Wolf 2010a; Kelly 2011)

By 2008, the community had grown enough for Kelly and Wolf to feel they needed to establish a supportive limited liability company: Quantified Self Labs (Quantified Self 2013).

Acting as an organisational support, the structure of the company is simple. There are no full-time employees and they have a stated goal of “not making organising QS feel like work” (Butterfield 2012:16).

The community aims to promote an egalitarian and democratic power structure by downplaying officiality and hierarchy.

#### Community Organisation

The community aspect of the Quantified Self movement is intentional and active; bounded together by voluntary, self-expressed membership, they connect through online hubs that typically include forum posts, twitter conversations, blog entries with streams of discussion comments, and informative resource pages such as wikis. On the central website Quantifiedself.com, they define themselves as a “collaboration of users and tool-makers who share an interest in self-knowledge through self-tracking” (Quantified Self 2013).

As of April 2013, there are currently 111 registered meet-up groups consisting of 18,558 members across 31 nations in 89 cities–these mini-communities are represented in New York, San Francisco, London and Tokyo, and also extend to places such as Rio de Janeiro, Bangkok, Beijing and Cape Town (Meetup 2013). However, as a geographical trend, the vast majority of tracking communities are condensed within the Global North.

Meet-ups are regularly scheduled, organised events where members can share their stories of self-experimentation. Run through the website Meetup.com, each geographical area has local voluntary leaders who facilitate the monthly gatherings. These meetings centre around a series of slide-show presentations, called “show-and-tells,” which are usually filmed and later uploaded to internet blogs and websites (Christensen 2013).

Anthropologist Adam Butterfield conducted his master’s thesis specifically on Quantified Self community meet-up groups and succinctly defined their content as “personal stories of self-tracking projects” (Butterfield 2012). While this is a simplified description of how the ideology gets communicated between its members and the general public, in a literal sense it is fairly accurate.

The emphasis on storytelling using meaningful data is a key component of the Quantified Self movement. Understanding how and why these stories are told is central to understanding the Quantified Self movement and the cultural forces driving and shaping it.

Throughout this thesis I will cite many tracking tales told through blog posts, personal websites, filmed presentations, and second-hand accounts in articles.

At meet-ups presenters are advised to base their talk around three prime questions; first, explain what you did; second, explain how you did it; and third, explain what you learnt (Wolf 2011). Some meet-up communities further structure the story-telling form by suggesting that speakers limit their talks to five minutes, encouraging simple and clear communication (Christensen 2013). The purpose of these presentations is to offer ideas that others might spark inspiration from: different tools and methods for self-tracking, different variables to track, and inventive solutions to common problems like trouble sleeping or stress at work.

The movement sees itself as trying to cultivate a “culture of sharing” (Christensen 2013). The ultimate value they share is seeking self-improvement, and through sharing stories, hope to collaboratively encourage and support one another in that goal. Conferences follow a similar structure but are much larger events, usually drawing members from all over a region (such as Europe or the Pacific Northwest) instead of a single city.

The glue holding this community together is undeniably the website Quantifiedself.com. Much like an ever-expanding family tree, it branches outwards connecting a seemingly infinite number of links to online data logging tools, company pages for commercially produced tracking devices and services, YouTube and Vimeo videos of presentations, reviews of smartphone tracking applications, notable personal blogs of self-trackers, and relevant journalistic and academic articles. It is the central hub of this internet-based society.

Quantifiedself.com features many aspects typical of websites that facilitate open and interactive online societies; social forums, active commenting on blog postings, occasional surveys, prompts for open discussions, frequent guest writers, and interviews with notable community members (Quantified Self 2013).

This includes a number of recurring features such as: “What We’re Reading” – a compiled list of the latest publications and articles related to the Quantified Self movement, “Toolmaker Talks” – question and answer posts with the developers of popular tracking devices and applications, and “Numbers from Around the Web” – a showcase of especially interesting self-experiments and the resulting data from community members (Quantified Self 2013).

This small slice of what type of content is posted should make apparent this website is by no means written or controlled by a single or small handful of individuals.


The introduction to my thesis on the Quantified Self movement and the culture of self-tracking

Tracking Humanity


<IntroParagraph>

My obsession with metaphor isn't original, it's genetically inherited. My mother <a href='http://www.thelibrarianedge.com/'>Katie Day</a> planted all the original seeds. The paperback copies of [Metaphors We Live By](https://www.google.co.uk/books/edition/Metaphors_We_Live_By/m8Sp5m9vZcwC) and [Women, Fire, and Dangerous Things](https://www.google.co.uk/books/edition/Women_Fire_and_Dangerous_Things/CfCnzSF9de8C) are visceral childhood memories as much as they're current intellectual kindling.

</IntroParagraph>

As a teacher and librarian, her research focuses on using metaphors in pedagogy, digital literacy, and information science. But our worlds overlap in the more fundamental obsession with how we can use metaphors to communicate ideas to others.

We started collecting <a href="https://www.librarything.com/list/20481/all/Metaphors-etc">a metaphorical reading list</a> a few years back that I just rediscovered.

If you're exploring conceptual metaphor and want to start digging deeper, have a look at these

<ResourceBook
  url="https://www.librarything.com/work/63333"
  title="Metaphors We Live By"
  author="George Lakoff & Mark Johnson"
  image="/images/books/mwlb.webp"
  small
/>

<ResourceBook
  url="https://www.librarything.com/work/45956"
  title="Philosophy in the Flesh"
  author="George Lakoff & Mark Johnson"
  image="/images/books/flesh.webp"
  small
/>

<ResourceBook
  url="https://www.librarything.com/work/249581"
  title="The Way We Think"
  author="Gilles Fauconnier & Mark Turner"
  image="/images/books/waywethink.webp"
  small
/>

<ResourceBook
  url="https://www.librarything.com/work/63555"
  title="Women, Fire, and Dangerous Things: What Categories Reveal About the Mind"
  author="George Lakoff"
  image="/images/books/womenfire.webp"
  small
/>

<ResourceBook
  url="https://www.librarything.com/work/9544846"
  title="Surfaces and Essences: Analogy as the Fuel and Fire of Thinking"
  author="Douglas Hofstadter & Emmanuel Sander"
  image="/images/books/surfaces.webp"
  small
/>

<ResourceBook
  url="https://www.librarything.com/work/10674534"
  title="I Is an Other"
  author="James Geary"
  image="/images/books/iother.webp"
  small
/>


A collection of my favourite books on conceptual metaphor theory

A Metaphorical Reading Collection


<IntroParagraph>

My previous website was built in a JavaScript framework called [Gatsby.js](https://www.gatsbyjs.org/). It's one of a host of new website builders based around [static site-generation](https://www.netlify.com/blog/2020/04/14/what-is-a-static-site-generator-and-3-ways-to-find-the-best-one/) and [the JAMStack](https://jamstack.wtf/) <Footnote idName={1}>JAM stands for JavaScript, APIs, and Markup. It's a relatively new approach to building websites that's been gaining popularity over the last half decade.</Footnote> If you've heard of Gatsby before but haven't wrapped your head around it yet, this might be for you.

</IntroParagraph>

I already have some illustrated notes up on using the [[JAMStack with Gatsby & Contentful]] and [[Building Gatsby Themes]], but they're a little more advanced.

[Khaled Garbaya](https://khaledgarbaya.net/) put out an egghead course on
[Getting Started with Gatsby](https://egghead.io/courses/get-started-with-gatsby) that's better suited to Gatsby beginners.

## Illustrating the Key Concepts

I made a set of illustrations that capture the _key concepts_ from Khaled's course. They don't summarise all the course content. They're just supporting material that help clarify the most important ideas.

First up is a **big picture view** showing all the essential parts of a Gatsby site.

<BasicImage
  alt="Gatsby is a collection of tools for building static sites"
  src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dg3gyk0gu/image/upload/c_scale,f_auto,q_auto:best,w_1200/v1597741851/maggieappleton.com/egghead-course-notes/intro-gatsby/IntroGatsby_1_Small.png"
/>

Gatsby sites are able to pull in data from multiple sources all at once. This includes REST API endpoints, classic content management systems like [Wordpress](https://www.gatsbyjs.com/guides/wordpress/) or [Contentful](https://www.gatsbyjs.com/blog/2018-1-25-building-a-site-with-react-and-contentful/), or just your local file system.

These are pulled in through [GraphQL](https://www.graphql.com/), which acts as a _transportation layer_.

[Node.js](https://www.gatsbyjs.com/docs/glossary/node/) is the main engine inside a Gatsby site which generates the pages, nodes, and metadata.

And finally [React](https://www.gatsbyjs.com/docs/glossary/react/) creates all the user interface elements.

### Page Queries vs. Static Queries

Once people wrap their heads around the structure of a Gatsby project, GraphQL is usually one the first sticking points.

If you've never worked with it before, the syntax looks very odd and it's hard to tell what it's doing.

It gets more confusing to learn there are _two types of queries_ - **page queries** and **static queries**

<BasicImage
  alt="Diagram of a pageQuery request inside a page, and a static query request inside a component"
  src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dg3gyk0gu/image/upload/c_scale,f_auto,q_auto:good,w_1200/v1597741854/maggieappleton.com/egghead-course-notes/intro-gatsby/IntroGatsby_2_Small.png"
/>

It only seems complex on the surface, but it's easy to distinguish these two. Most of your queries will be page queries – these live inside your page files like `blog.js` or `about.js`

Static queries go inside individual component files like `Navbar.js` or `Footer.js`. There's also a handy React hook to handle these for us: [useStaticQuery](https://www.gatsbyjs.com/docs/use-static-query/)

### Progressive Enhancement

One of the main benefits of a Gatsby site is it uses a technique called **Progressive Enhancement** to render pages.

<BasicImage
  alt="Animation of a page rendering static HTML elements first, then being updates with React afterwards"
  src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dg3gyk0gu/image/upload/c_scale,f_auto,q_auto:good,w_1200/v1597741856/maggieappleton.com/egghead-course-notes/intro-gatsby/IntroGatsby_3_Animation.gif"
/>

This is what makes Gatsby page look like they load quickly. The lightweight static HTML version appears first, and then heavier files and interactive elements are layered on afterwards.

React handles any changes and user interactions. Once an element is clicked or changed, React "[rehydrates](https://www.gatsbyjs.com/docs/react-hydration/)" the page.

<br />

These illustrations are part of the [egghead community notes](https://github.com/eggheadio/eggheadio-course-notes/tree/master/get-started-with-gatsby) on Khaled's [Get Started with Gatsby course](https://egghead.io/courses/migrate-from-create-react-app-to-gatsby).

You can find more notes taken by people who have been through the course on there.
If you take the course yourself, you can also add to them to the shared [github repo](https://github.com/eggheadio/eggheadio-course-notes/tree/master/get-started-with-gatsby).


Illustrated notes on the key concepts of how Gatsby.js works

Illustrating Gatsby's Key Concepts


I've been a [cellular agriculture](https://www.new-harvest.org/cell_ag_101) and [cultured meat](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cultured_meat) enthusiast for a couple of years now. If you've never heard of cultivated meat, my [illustrated notes](/meat-planet) on the fantastic book **Meat Planet** will get you caught up.

The TLDR is we've found a way to grow meat without killing animals. You can see why this might be intriguing.

At fifteen I read [Fast Food Nation](https://www.librarything.com/work/3735), [The Omnivore's Dilemma](https://www.librarything.com/work/504173), and [Stuffed and Starved](https://www.librarything.com/work/3657642) in quick succession. That was sadly the end of enjoying [hawker stall chicken rice](https://theculturetrip.com/asia/singapore/articles/a-brief-history-of-hainanese-chicken-rice-singapores-national-dish/).

In the 14 years since, I've maintained various levels of Really Bad veganism. <Footnote idName={1}>The highly flawed and non-judgemental variety. I have no interest in policing your personal plate. </Footnote> Which is the state of knowing all the facts, understanding their moral implications, and still only making the "right choice" about 82% of the time.

Because here's the thing; [given the statistics](https://www.statista.com/statistics/237464/share-of-vegans-in-the-united-states/), individuals voluntarily choosing to be vegan, and/or putting enourmous effort into convincing other people into veganism is a terrible game plan for addressing the complex, wide-ranging problems of animal agriculture:

<BasicImage
    width="700px"
    alt="Statistic: Do you consider yourself to be vegan? | Statista"
    src="https://www.statista.com/graphic/1/237464/share-of-vegans-in-the-united-states.jpg"
/>

<Subtext>
    
A sad bar chart from [Statistica](https://www.statista.com/statistics/237464/share-of-vegans-in-the-united-states/)
</Subtext>

---

Rather than judgementally guilt-tripping people into making _hard sacrifices_, exploring alternative ways of making meat (and meat-alternatives that aren't sad lumps of tofurkey) feels like a better use of everyone's time.

The thriving industry of cultured meat and cellular agriculture agrees. Research organisations like the [Good Food Institute](https://www.gfi.org/) and [New Harvest](https://www.new-harvest.org/) have been promoting, funding, and supporting new companies in this space over the last few years.

Keen to get involved, I talked my way into sketchnoting the 2019 [New Harvest conference](/newharvest2019) at the MIT Media Lab.

<br />

## Illustrated notes from the New Harvest 2019 Conference

<TwoColumn>

<img
    alt="illustrated notes on biotechnology and fisheries"
    src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dg3gyk0gu/image/upload/c_scale,f_auto,q_auto:best,w_800/v1589845700/maggieappleton.com/new-harvest-2019/NH_10-Sullivan.png"
/>

<img
    alt="illustrated notes on decellularized plant scaffolds"
    src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dg3gyk0gu/image/upload/c_scale,f_auto,q_auto:best,w_800/v1589845680/maggieappleton.com/new-harvest-2019/NH_1-CampuzanoArtboard-1.png"
/>

<img
    alt="illustrated notes on engaging people with cultivated meat by being transparent and clearly labelling food"
    src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dg3gyk0gu/image/upload/c_scale,f_auto,q_auto:best,w_800/v1589845696/maggieappleton.com/new-harvest-2019/NH_5-Arceolo.png"
/>

<img
    alt="illustrated notes in cellular changes in proteins"
    src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dg3gyk0gu/image/upload/c_scale,f_auto,q_auto:best,w_800/v1589845711/maggieappleton.com/new-harvest-2019/NH_11-CoxArtboard-1.png"
/>

</TwoColumn>

---

The conference work led to a new initiative with New Harvest; illustrating a series of podcast episodes around their impressive community of [research fellows](https://www.new-harvest.org/current_research_projects).

The [Cultured Meat and Future Foods Show](https://anchor.fm/futurefoodshow/) interviewed each research fellow. For each episode I made a one-shot illustrated summary that explains their research focus.

## Cultured Meat and Future Foods Show illustrations and episodes

### Natalie Rubio on Insect Cell Cultures

<BasicImage
    width="880px"
    alt=""
    src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dg3gyk0gu/image/upload/c_scale,f_auto,q_auto:best,w_990/v1596579655/maggieappleton.com/notes/new-harvest-podcast/NH1_Rubio_Full.png"
/>

<Podcastiframe
    src="https://anchor.fm/futurefoodshow/embed/episodes/Natalie-Rubio---New-Harvest-Fellowship-Series-eesp9p/a-a2c2nno"
    scrolling="no"
></Podcastiframe>

---

### Sam Peabody on Food Safety

<BasicImage
    width="880px"
    alt=""
    src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dg3gyk0gu/image/upload/c_scale,f_auto,q_auto:best,w_990/v1596579662/maggieappleton.com/notes/new-harvest-podcast/NH2_Peabody_Full.png"
/>

<Podcastiframe
    src="https://anchor.fm/futurefoodshow/embed/episodes/Sam-Peabody---New-Harvest-Fellowship-Series-efr659/a-a2hpocq"
    scrolling="no"
></Podcastiframe>

---

### Jordan Jones on Decellularized Meat

<BasicImage
    width="880px"
    alt=""
    src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dg3gyk0gu/image/upload/c_scale,f_auto,q_auto:best,w_990/v1596579667/maggieappleton.com/notes/new-harvest-podcast/NH3_Jones_Full.png"
/>

<Podcastiframe
    src="https://anchor.fm/futurefoodshow/embed/episodes/Jordan-Jones---New-Harvest-Fellowship-Series-ege5pl/a-a2l5264"
    scrolling="no"
/>

---

### Janis Wollschlaeger on 3D Printing

<BasicImage
    width="880px"
    alt=""
    src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dg3gyk0gu/image/upload/c_scale,f_auto,q_auto:best,w_990/v1596579671/maggieappleton.com/notes/new-harvest-podcast/NH4_Jannis_Full.png"
/>

<Podcastiframe
    src="https://anchor.fm/futurefoodshow/embed/episodes/Jannis-Wollschlaeger---New-Harvest-Fellowship-Series-DE-egnesi/a-a2mpdp7"
    scrolling="no"
></Podcastiframe>

---

### Andrew Stout on Nutritional Engineering

<BasicImage
    width="880px"
    alt=""
    src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dg3gyk0gu/image/upload/c_scale,f_auto,q_auto:best,w_990/v1596579677/maggieappleton.com/notes/new-harvest-podcast/NH5_Stout_Full.png"
/>

<Podcastiframe
    src="https://anchor.fm/futurefoodshow/embed/episodes/Andrew-Stout---New-Harvest-Fellowship-Series-ehm8uu/a-a2s6l6n"
    scrolling="no"
></Podcastiframe>


Illustrations made for a set of episodes of the Cultivated Meat podcast

New Harvest & Illustrating the Cultivated Meat Podcast


<IntroParagraph>
    
Nearly every computer programme created in the last 68 years was made by typing linear characters into a text editor. <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ASCII"> ASCII</a> symbols arranged from left
to right, top to bottom, are the universal medium of code.

</IntroParagraph>

<BasicImage width="570px" src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dxj9qr5gj/image/upload/c_scale,f_auto,q_auto:good,w_1200/v1627424133/maggieappleton.com/notes/learnable-programming/linear-code_shrink_ss6iqj.png" alt="Python code showing a function that solves the FizzBuzz challenge in a text file" />


Every language from FORTRAN to Python to Haskell works this way.

It's then unsurprising every major IDE <Footnote idName={1}>IDE stands for intergrated development environment. Essentially a souped up text editor with lots of helpful functionality for programmers baked in.</Footnote> and code editor is designed to optimise working in text; VS Code, Vim, PyCharm, WebStorm, xCode, Atom, Sublime Text are all text-first environments.

<BasicImage
  src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dxj9qr5gj/image/upload/c_scale,f_auto,q_auto:good,w_1200/v1627423845/maggieappleton.com/notes/learnable-programming/code-editors_rabptu.png"
  alt="The standard text-heavy interfaces of WebStorm, xCode, and VSCode"
  imageWidth="1300px"
  showalt
/>

This might seem so obvious it's not worth pointing out. Textual programming is the water we swim in. We express computation logic in written text because that must naturally and obviously the best medium for it. At least, this is what we tell ourselves from the vantage point of people who have only ever lived in a textual programming world.

What, exactly, might be the alternative to programming in pure text? Am I suggesting we interpretive dance our way through a function that prints out the Fibonacci sequence?

Not exactly. Although I would like to see someone try.

What I want to explore here is the relative **lack of visuals, graphics, and spatial design** in our current programming environments. While we've crafted widely accessible graphical user interfaces (GUIs) for everyone else, programmers remain in the land of typed commands. As the mediators between meatspace and binary logic, we don't get to click buttons, drag sliders, pan canvases, or select options from dropdown menus while we build. Instead, we type.

There are plenty of good reasons for this – both historical and logical – that we'll get into. Understanding how we ended up in this purely textual place is a necessary first step if we want to question it.

<Spacer size="small" />

## Inventing the End User

In the early 1980's a wide new divide opened up. With the rise of personal computing and the arrival of accessible machines like the Macintosh, we created a clear distinction between "programmers" and "end users." Before that point, the people who designed and wrote computer programmes were primarily the same people who used computer programmes. You couldn't do much of one without the other.

And all of these people were exclusively using text to talk to their machines. Because it was the only show in town.

The aesthetic of bright green blocky text on black terminals isn't just a fun, retro media trope – our pre-GUI interfaces geuinely looked like this.

<BasicImage
  src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dxj9qr5gj/image/upload/c_scale,f_auto,q_auto:good,w_1200/v1631569504/maggieappleton.com/notes/learnable-programming/oldinterfaces_shrink_ul4wep.png"
  alt={
    <span>
      Interfaces used between 1980-1990; courtesy of{" "}
      <a href="https://betawiki.net/">betawiki.net</a>
    </span>
  }
  imageWidth="1200px"
  showalt
/>

Before the 1980's showed up with its neon leg warmers and big hair, most computers _didn't even have screens_. You blindly typed commands onto a keyboard that punched holes into paper.

<Draft />

Many, many programmers will argue programming in linear text is simply _better_. And they're not entirely wrong. Textual notation is an extremely efficient way to condense meaning. It's quick to write and allows us to create precise abstractions other programmers can interpret and work with.

By _graphical_ I mean any arrangement of shapes (square, circle, irregular nonagon, what have you) in space that aren't written words.

By _spatial_ I mean the way we use our understanding of being a body with a front, back, left, right, up, and down, to understand the world around us.

Humans are exceptionally skilled at spatial thinking.

Using visual representations like maps, diagrams, and shapes in 2D / 3D space to communicate meaning is something we've been doing far longer than we've been typing text into screens. About 43,832 years longer. <Footnote idName={2}>Taking the 43,900 y.a. hunting scenes <a href="https://www.nature.com/articles/s41586-019-1806-y">found</a> in Sulawesi, Indonesia as a conservative marker of when we first started doing pictorial storytelling on surfaces around us</Footnote> Given all that time, humans are much better at reasoning using graphical and spatial mappings than they are with linear abstract text.

I am certainly not to first to find it odd. People have been harping on about the limitations of textual programming since the beginning of programming. These complainers tend to gather under the umbrella of **Visual Programming** – a field that encompasses so many efforts and projects it's hard to figure out what it wants.

<Spacer size="small" />

## What is Visual Programming?

Good question.

The name itself is a bit of a misnomer since anything we see with our eyes technically counts as _visual._ Which would certainly include linear text. When people use the term they are usually referring to some kind of **spatial** or **graphical** programming environment.

<Spacer size="small" />

## Visual Programming for Learnable Programming

Bret Victor coined the term <b>Learnable Programming</b> in his <a href="http://worrydream.com/LearnableProgramming">canonical essay</a> lamenting the current state of programming education. Bret has a few concerns with the way most of us learn to code. Mainly that the learning environments we drop people into are poorly designed.

These environments tend to look something like this:

<TwoColumn>

<BasicImage
  src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dxj9qr5gj/image/upload/c_scale,f_auto,q_auto:good,w_1200/v1614174726/maggieappleton.com/notes/learnable-programming/learnprog_1_nsfflv.png"
  alt="repl.it slpit screen interface"
/>
<BasicImage
  src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dxj9qr5gj/image/upload/c_scale,f_auto,q_auto:good,w_1200/v1614174727/maggieappleton.com/notes/learnable-programming/learnprog_4_dk82q8.png"
  alt="codesandbox split screen interface"
/>
<BasicImage
  src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dxj9qr5gj/image/upload/c_scale,f_auto,q_auto:good,w_1200/v1614174727/maggieappleton.com/notes/learnable-programming/learnprog_5_tlycev.png"
  alt="free code camp split screen interface"
/>
<BasicImage
  src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dxj9qr5gj/image/upload/c_scale,f_auto,q_auto:good,w_1200/v1614174726/maggieappleton.com/notes/learnable-programming/learnprog_3_bkslg8.png"
  alt="khan academy split screen interface"
/>

</TwoColumn>

<span
  style={{ textAlign: "center", marginBottom: "var(--space-m)" }}
  className="metadata"
>
  Interfaces from Repl.it, Codesandbox, freeCodeCamp, and Khan Academy
</span>

They're your standard column-based "live coding" interfaces popular across the industry. You write code into one section, and hopefully get the output you expected in another. Syntax is abstracted away from the elements it affects.

<Spacer size="small" />

### Programming into the Void

It's easy to see why these linear, text-based interfaces _seem_ like the best approach. They look identical to the standard interfaces the whole development industry uses to programme.

We write code into an isolated text editor. If you type the correct sequence of words and symbols into the editor, the correct series of events happens somewhere out of view.

We start this process in a context that looks something like this...

<MysteriousVoid />

...and get the output in a separate browser window. God only know what happened in the middle.

Functions ran in an some unseen JavaScript engine, interface elements drew themselves onto the canvas, and somewhere a value changed in a distant database.

We're only shown the end result. To see anything happening in the middle, we have to `console.log` out data at each step of the way. Or dig into dense developer panels and debuggers. The industry has accepted flying blind as standard operating procedure.

<Spacer size="small" />

### Raising the Programming Bar

We're training people in the same kind of environment they'll be working in professionally. In the just-get-a-job-mindset that's an excellent approach. But Bret isn't talking about the ideal way to learn programming in the short-term, bootcampy world view. When he talks about these environments as inadequate, he's referencing a much larger paradigm shift around how we should design human-computer interfaces.

He's pointing out that the standard text-based, disembodied, non-graphical interfaces we all put up with are unintuitive to humans who live in a highly visual, spatial, embodied world. While most of our modern user interfaces have graduated to a graphical, 3D space-based system, programming is staunchly attached to the linear text paradigm.

There's good reason for this. While many people have tried to develop [visual programming languages](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Visual_programming_language), they've largely failed to gain traction. There's lots of [well-reasoned](https://www.outsystems.com/blog/posts/visual-programming-language/) [arguments](https://dzone.com/articles/visual-programming-why-its-a-bad-idea) [explaining](https://mikehadlow.blogspot.com/2018/10/visual-programming-why-its-bad-idea.html) why it's so difficult to design visual systems complex and extensible enough to programme in, so I won't repeat them here.
The fact is that our current visual languages aren't sophisticated enough to do the job, and we're a long way from any system that could.

<Spacer size="small" />

### Visual Programming for Learning

While visual programming isn't great for the scale of complexity professional programmers deal with, it's _ideal_ for people who are learning to code. When we simply need to explain what's happening under the hood, graphical representations are the best way to help people build clear mental models.

Computer history legends like [Alan Kay](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alan_Kay) and [Seymour Paypert](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Seymour_Papert) were the earliest champions of using intuitive visuals to teach programming. Paypert developed a language called [Logo](<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Logo_(programming_language)>) in the late 1960's where you would type commands to direct a small green turtle around the screen, leaving a visible trail behind it. Through simple instructions like `go(20)` and `turn(90)` and `for i in range(12): go(20) turn(30)` you could draw elaborate graphic patterns. It became widely used in education and a whole generation began their programming lives in Logo.

<BasicImage
  width="500px"
  src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dxj9qr5gj/image/upload/c_scale,f_auto,q_auto:good,w_1200/v1622109247/maggieappleton.com/notes/learnable-programming/screenshot_eifk3w.png"
  alt="A classic example of a logo-based interface where you direct a small turtle around a canvas. Source: pythonturtle.org"
  showalt
/>

My own earliest memory of programming involved directing one of these small green amphibians around in circles. If you want a little throwback, you can play with a live Turtle environment at [Turtle Academy](https://turtleacademy.com/playground)

The modern manifestation of Logo is MIT's [Scratch](https://scratch.mit.edu/) learning platform. It expanded the character range beyond just turtles, offering everything from llamas to dancing starfish. It also gives you the syntax as drag-n-drop blocks which visually distinguish variables from loops, logic operations, events, and motion commands.

<ImageFrame
  width="1000px"
  src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dxj9qr5gj/image/upload/c_scale,f_auto,q_auto:best,w_1400/v1622107452/maggieappleton.com/notes/learnable-programming/scratch_aqp3ts.png"
  alt="The scratch learning platform that allows you to construct clear visual chains of programming commands"
  showalt
/>

If we look past the campy, child-friendly aesthetics of Scratch, it's hard to argue this kind of visual interface isn't helpful. There is no need to memorise the syntax, it's easy to browse through the available commands, and the physical shape and color of each command limits makes clear where you can and can't put it. Hovering over operations shows you whether they're true or false and variables reveal their current value.

<BasicImage
  imageWidth="1000px"
  src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dxj9qr5gj/image/upload/c_scale,f_auto,q_auto:best,w_1400/v1624617679/maggieappleton.com/notes/learnable-programming/scratch_symbols_shrink_gkiw5q.png"
  alt="A selection of the available programming commands in Scratch"
  showalt
/>

I could wax lyrical about the genius of this approach for paragraphs but I'll spare you. The [autocomplete](https://code.visualstudio.com/docs/editor/intellisense), syntax highlighting, and linter systems in modern IDEs <Footnote idName={3}>IDE stands for integrated development environment. These are pimped out code editors that offer programmers a buffet a helpful tools like debuggers, git logs, and advanced search functionality. VSCode, WebStorm, and XCode are all popular IDEs</Footnote> get us close to this, but offer just enough freedom to still hang ourselves sometimes. You also need to know IDEs exist in the first place, and _then_ learn how to setup and effectively use one; a heady challenge in itself. Many beginners flail around in blank, unresponsive code files with no autocompletion, syntax snippets, or linters to assist them until someone lets them in on the industry secret (speaking from personal experience here).

---

## Principles of Learnable Programming

Let's circle back to Bret Victor and his concept of _learnable programming_. Bret outlined a set of principles he believed all programming environments should follow if they want their learners to make any headway. He argues a good environment should allow learners to:

1. **Read the vocabulary** of a language by making clear what each keyword and function does
2. **Follow the flow** of what happens at each stage in executing a programme
3. **See the state** as the programme changes variables over time
4. **Create by reacting** to how the programme behaves
5. **Create by abstracting** from the simple to the complex

Most of these are explicitly **visual**. We need to make what's happening in the programme _readable_ through visual representations of each syntax element, variable, and change of state over time. As Bret puts it:

> "People understand what they can see. If a programmer cannot see what a program is doing, she can't understand it."

I won't expand on these too much as Bret elaborates on them in the [original piece](http://worrydream.com/#!/LearnableProgramming) and provides plenty of tangible examples of how they might look in an interface. These principles amount to a kind of [[Pattern Language]] - they're a set of design rules that loosely define how a system should work, rather than a strict specification or implementation.

Since Bret wrote his piece in 2012, it's recieved plenty of buzz and cultish admiration (deservedly, IMHO). But I haven't seen it fully applied in any live learning platforms.

The world of programming education has certainly stepped up its visual game over the last decade. It's no longer just two column, text-based execution contexts. We're now swimming in interactive visual environments and gamified educational platforms.

I began researching the field to see how many of them were putting Bret's principles into practice. The examples I looked at ranged from full-on illustrated games to lightly animated sequences of text. As I explored, I started to notice design patterns beyond the principles Bret outlined.

While Bret defined a set of ideals for a hypothetical learning platform, I became more interested in finding patterns in what already exists. While we're a long way from achieving the '_ideal_' system, there's plenty of good design happening here and now.


What's wrong with linear, static programming mediums and how might we improve them?

Making Programming Visual, Spatial, and Learnable


<IntroParagraph>

There are some of us who believe digital life should be lived through a series of keyboard shortcuts. There is nothing quite as satisfying as making one quick keyboard gesture and watching a whole cascade of events unfold before you. This is the definition of programmatic magic.

</IntroParagraph>

I'm not just talking about vanilla hotkeys like `Cmd + S` or `Cmd + Q` that save a file or quit an application.

Any hotkey that triggers a single action like copying text to your clipboard is equally capable of performing multiple actions in quick succession; opening a specific set of files, launching multiple applications, pasting a pre-written string of text, playing a particular song in Spotify, starting a countdown timer, and arranging your desktop windows just the way you want them.

Anything you can manually do on your machine with your two hands can be wrapped up into a programmatic sequence and performed by the machine without you touching it.

These sequences are called **macros** and you don't need to know how to programme to create them. Programmatic plebs (like me) can build powerful automations without needing to write a bunch of BASH commands in the Terminal. <Footnote idName={1}>Programmers traditionally write macro scripts in a language like Bash or Python using the **Terminal** – an application you already have on your machine that allows you to control your computer with text-based commands.</Footnote>

<ImageFrame
  width="700px"
  src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dxj9qr5gj/image/upload/c_scale,f_auto,q_auto:good,w_1200/v1629467741/maggieappleton.com/notes/keyboard-maestro/bash-command_gjxdsh.png"
  alt="The exact kind of programming gibberish you will not be writing"
  showalt
/>

You do need a macro application with a user-friendly interface though. IMHO [Keyboard Maestro](https://www.keyboardmaestro.com/main/) is one of the best designed and easiest to use options.<Footnote idName={2}>Now is the time to diclose that Keyboard Maestro have not paid, bribed, or manipulated me to write this post, and the link above is not an affiliate link. Doing this is all my choice as a KM enthusiast.</Footnote> It's a Mac app (sorry Windows users) that allows you to visually compose small sequences of actions that you can easily trigger at any time.

<img
  width="900px"
  src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dxj9qr5gj/image/upload/c_scale,f_auto,q_auto:best,w_1200/v1629467242/maggieappleton.com/notes/keyboard-maestro/km-demo-1_shrink_ipykkq.png"
  alt="The Keyboard Maestro main window"
  showalt
/>

There are alternative (Windows-compatible) macro applications that can do similar things: [AutoHotKey](https://www.autohotkey.com/), [Automator](https://support.apple.com/en-gb/guide/automator/welcome/mac), and [Macro Recorder](https://www.macrorecorder.com/). However, I haven't personally used these and will only be singing the praises of Keyboard Maestro from here on out.

This isn't going to be a beginner's guide to using Keyboard Maestro (hereafter known as KM), so I suggest you take a look at this [YouTube playlist](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=C-M2ECt9gIc&list=PLa0EpEatE4TIUSob_dkMuDP7MpPceth30) and this TutsPlus [article series](https://computers.tutsplus.com/tutorials/keyboard-maestro-i-introduction--cms-23415) if that's what you need. If you want to get extra intense about learning KM, David Sparks has created a very [comprehensive course](https://learn.macsparky.com/p/km) that covers everything under the macro sun. There is also an [official wiki](https://wiki.keyboardmaestro.com/doku.php) you can reference, but it throws you into the technical weeds a lot.

Rather than giving you I'm going to jump into the ways I use KM and the particular macros I find useful on a daily basis. By seeing some very tangible examples of what KM can do, perhaps you'll be intruiged and get ideas for what you might want to automate.

<Spacer size="small" />

## Workflow Macros

One of the most basic groups of macros I rely on are what I call _workflow macros._

<ComingSoon />

Triggers can of course be hotkeys, but you can also use certain times of day, trackpad gestures, or typed strings of text as triggers. You can also use computational events as triggers: your machine waking up, a certain application launching, or connecting to a certain wifi network.

These actions can do anything you can do through manual interaction on your machine – type text, copy/paste from the clipboard, open menus, click buttons, launch applications, navigate to websites. It's a programmatic version of you that you write instructions for ahead of time.


How to write macros without touching the terminal

Plebeian Programming with Keyboard Maestro


<IntroParagraph>

Nature is flourishing down at my local Sainsbury's. The mineral water is natural. The unrefined cane sugar is natural. The low-fat Greek style yogurt is natural. The gluten-free buckwheat toasted muesli is natural. The anti-oxidising cranberry, chocolate, and coconut vegan protein bars are natural.

</IntroParagraph>

"Natural" has become both a ubiquitous and meaningless label on food packaging. This observation is nothing profound. Hundreds of op-ed authors have lamented the lack of governmental regulation stopping producers from putting "natural," "free-range," "wholegrain," "authentic," "superfood," and "organic" on their shiny cereal box of sugar puffs. We have all become comfortably jaded with the empty, hyperbolic language of our food. At least enough to not take it seriously.

But this is not a diatribe about food packaging. The bone I'm picking is not with the label on my chicken, but the chicken's supposed origin – **nature.**

At its core, nature defines the world without humans in it. It is everything that the birds, bacteria, forests, fish, and ocean currents do without our input. We consider it distinct and opposed to the expansion pack that humans brought to life; culture. We think of culture as everything humans layer on top of the natural world; the icing on the cosmic cake.

At least, this is one version of the mythological story; the one most of us accept as historical fact. Hominids sprang up in South Africa 80,000 years ago and began carving wooden digging sticks, smearing red ochre on one another, and threading long necklaces made from shards of ostrich eggs. While they were busy decorating, the cosmic fabric split and created a division. The world before the humans, and the world after. At least this is the story we, the humans, tell ourselves.

<ComingSoon />

Why there is nothing natural about the idea of 'nature'

Natureculture, Moral Purity, and Cultural Boundaries

A walkthrough of how I manage and tend Evergreen notes in Roam

Tending Evergreen Notes in Roam Research


<IntroParagraph>

In the story of Echo and Narcissus, a chatty mountain nymph and a self-obsessed hunter both die from unhealthy obsessions. Echo won't shut up, annoys the wrong goddess, and ends up cursed to repeat the words of others; she's unable to say anything original. She then falls in love with Narcissus, a pretty boy who spends his whole day staring at his reflection and is wholly unimpressed with the woman repeating everything he says. In the end, they both spend so much time staring at Narcissus they forget to eat, bathe, or sleep and slowly waste away.

</IntroParagraph>

<img src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dxj9qr5gj/image/upload/c_scale,f_auto,q_auto:best,w_800/v1617971024/maggieappleton.com/notes/echo-narcissus/800px-John_William_Waterhouse_-_Echo_and_Narcissus_-_Google_Art_Project_zpecxl.jpg" />

This delightful story is a good reminder to eat regular snacks. It's also a fitting metaphor for one of the clubs I run at [Hyperlink Academy](https://hyperlink.academy/)

The [_Echo & Narcissus Writing Club_](https://hyperlink.academy/courses/echo-and-narcissus-writing-club/118) is all about mimicking the work of exceptional writers in order to learn from them.

This might sound scandalous depending on your understanding of creativity. I'm personally a subscriber to the [everything is a remix](https://vimeo.com/14912890) and [great artists steal](https://austinkleon.com/steal/) schools of thought.

I used to think copying was unseemly before one of my writing professors in college filled me in on the big, unkept secret. He handed us a small trove of writing samples from folks like [Joan Didion](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Joan_Didion), [John McPhee](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_McPhee), [Barbara Kingsolver](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Barbara_Kingsolver), and [Ernest Hemingway](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ernest_Hemingway). Essentially a Who's Who of New Yorker essayists. We had to copy out their work, then write our own pieces using the copied sentences as 'templates.'

You would take a Didion sentence like '_Only the very young and the very old may recount their dreams at breakfast, dwell upon self, interrupt with memories of beach picnics and favorite Liberty lawn dresses and the rainbow trout in a creek near Colorado Springs_,' and learn how to see it as "Only the **\_\_\_\_** and the **\_\_\_\_** may **\_\_\_\_**, **\_\_\_\_**, **\_\_\_\_** and **\_\_\_\_**." A reusable format for pointing out similarities between two distinct things.

The point is not to rip off Didion, but to begin to see how she uses nouns. Where she places verbs. How she handles semi-colons. Where she begins a story and where she ends it. How she asks a question. How she makes you doubt her credibility as a narrator.

Copying forces you to look at writing techniques under a microscope. You stop seeing your favourite authors as magical beings who pump out great work from behind a veil. Everything you need to know about their process and how to write like them is already on the page in front of you.

Great writers become great by closely studying and copying other great writers.
This is how cultural knowledge works. We learn the foundational skills from each other first, and then get all weird and experimental later on once the normal rules become boring.

<Spacer size="small" />

## Who This is For and What to Expect

If you have a writing practice of any kind, and feel the urge to improve it, this club is for you. You will need to bring along a Narcissus - a writer whose work you love and want to emulate. If you are bad at making choices, you can bring along two.

We keep it casual - the weekly meetings are to chat, compare what we've learned, and give each other feedback in pairs. There won't be lectures or lots of instruction. As a peer learning group, it's simply a way to gather together and support each other on our journey to being less-crap-writers.

It will require a commitment to write. The writing doesn't have to be good or profound or SEO-optimised. It simply needs to try and copy the style of your Narcissus.
We'll write 500 word pieces for the first 4 weeks, and 1000+ words in the final week.

It runs for **6 weeks** and **costs 35 USD**. I find a little skin in the game helps everyone show up on time. Committed folks make the experience better for everyone.

---

## Cohort 1

The first cohort of this club ran from **May 1st** to **June 6th 2021**.

We ended up with a wonderfully committed and insightful group of folks – something you don't always bank on with online learning groups.

Everyone came in with an active writing practice which I think made a significant difference. They already made time to write; publishing to personal blogs, newsletters, or ongoing fiction collections. The club simply directed that writing effort toward certain themes and assignments.

<Spacer size="small" />

#### Our Echos and Narcissus Pairs

[Daniel Miller](https://twitter.com/danielindustri4) echoed William Gibson  
[Jan Sondermann](https://twitter.com/jsoendermann) echoed Steven Pinker  
[Abe Kim](https://twitter.com/ich_bin_abe) echoed Colin Barrett  
[Catherine Woodiwiss](https://twitter.com/chwoodiwiss) echoed George Saunders  
[Dave Bernhard](https://twitter.com/daveforall) echoed Terry Pratchett  
[Keni](https://adagia.org/writer/13) echoed Scott Adams / Trevor Noah  
[Jonathan Yeong](https://twitter.com/JonoYeong) echoed Brandon Sanderson / Ed Yong  
[Shime](https://shime.sh/) and [Andrew Nalband](https://twitter.com/nalband) both echoed Paul Graham  
And I echoed Ursula K. LeGuin / Joan Didion

<Spacer size="small" />

#### Club Logistics

I wanted to run the club in a space where we could take open-ended notes, write individual essays, and leave comments on each other's work. I ended up using [Notion](https://notion.so) which worked great – it became the organising spot for agendas, weekly assignments, resources, and casual chatter:

<ImageFrame
  width="1000px"
  src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dxj9qr5gj/image/upload/c_scale,f_auto,q_auto:best,w_1200/v1623137511/maggieappleton.com/notes/echo-narcissus/The_Echo_Narcissus_Writing_Club_shrink_yfymsh.png"
  alt="Screencapture of our Notion space listing weekly themes and links to other pages"
/>

We all posted our weekly writing to a central database in here. I then used Notion's fancy [linked databases and filtering](https://www.notion.so/Linked-databases-fb007e2798d04c57aee839ecf6ce450a) features to have the right assignments show up in each week's agenda. This made it easy to see everyone compiling notes, analysing texts, and writing over the course of the week.

Here's an example of what each weekly agenda looked like:

<ImageFrame
  width="1000px"
  src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dxj9qr5gj/image/upload/c_scale,f_auto,q_auto:best,w_1200/v1623138078/maggieappleton.com/notes/echo-narcissus/Week_4_-_Descriptions_and_Details_shrink_drzycw.png"
  alt="The agenda, writing pieces, and homework assignment for week 4 of the club"
/>

Notion worked great for this round. For future cohorts I might try running it on the new platform Hyperlink is building (aptly named _Hyperspace_) which is based around wiki-like shared documents.

If you're interested in joining a future cohort, you can sign up to be notified on the [Hyperlink club page](https://hyperlink.academy/courses/echo-and-narcissus-writing-club/118).


A Hyperlink Academy writing club where we mimic the work of others

The Echo & Narcissus Writing Club


> "What app is that?"

<IntroParagraph>

I get asked this question at least once a day on Twitter. People are always keen to hear what tools I use to make illustration. It's frankly daft it's taken me this long to just write a note about it rather than answering a thousand people individually.

</IntroParagraph>

## I'm a Promiscuous Polytooler

I use wide variety of different tools and apps for different kinds of visual creations. I'm not wedded to any one tool in particular – they all have their strengths and weaknesses.
I'll use whatever fits the task at hand and move work between them liberally.

Here's all the apps and hardware that might be involved in a particular creation...

<Tools>

<a href="https://www.adobe.com/products/photoshop.html" noStyling>

<BasicImage
  width="160px"
  src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dg3gyk0gu/image/upload/c_scale,f_auto,q_auto:good,w_300/v1590318986/maggieappleton.com/notes/tools/photoshop.png"
/>
<h5>Adobe Photoshop</h5>

</a>

<a href="https://www.adobe.com/products/illustrator.html" noStyling>

<BasicImage
  width="160px"
  src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dg3gyk0gu/image/upload/c_scale,f_auto,q_auto:good,w_300/v1590318986/maggieappleton.com/notes/tools/illustrator.png"
/>
<h5>Adobe Illustrator</h5>

</a>

<a href="https://procreate.art/" noStyling>

<BasicImage
  width="160px"
  src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dg3gyk0gu/image/upload/c_scale,f_auto,q_auto:good,w_300/v1590318987/maggieappleton.com/notes/tools/procreate.png"
/>
<h5>Procreate</h5>

</a>

<a href="https://www.adobe.com/products/aftereffects.html" noStyling>

<BasicImage
  width="160px"
  src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dg3gyk0gu/image/upload/c_scale,f_auto,q_auto:good,w_300/v1590318986/maggieappleton.com/notes/tools/ae.png"
/>
<h5>Adobe After Effects</h5>

</a>

<a href="https://www.figma.com/" noStyling>

<BasicImage
  width="160px"
  src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dg3gyk0gu/image/upload/c_scale,f_auto,q_auto:good,w_300/v1590318987/maggieappleton.com/notes/tools/figma.png"
/>
<h5>Figma</h5>

</a>

</Tools>

<Hardware>

<a href="https://www.apple.com/macbook-pro/" noStyling>

<BasicImage
  width="460px"
  src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dg3gyk0gu/image/upload/c_scale,w_420/v1590318986/maggieappleton.com/notes/tools/macbook.png"
/>
<h5>Macbook Pro 15" 2015</h5>

</a>

<a href="https://www.wacom.com/en-us/products/pen-displays/cintiq-22-hd" noStyling>

<BasicImage
  width="460px"
  src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dg3gyk0gu/image/upload/c_scale,w_440/v1590318987/maggieappleton.com/notes/tools/wacom.png"
/>
<h5>Wacom 22HD Cintiq Tablet</h5>

</a>

<a href="https://www.apple.com/ipad-pro/" noStyling>

<BasicImage
  width="460px"
  src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dg3gyk0gu/image/upload/c_scale,w_400/v1590318987/maggieappleton.com/notes/tools/ipad.png"
/>
<h5>iPad Pro 12.5" 2018</h5>

</a>

</Hardware>

<Subtext>
  None of these are affiliate links - I'm just pointing you to official sites
  for more context
</Subtext>

## Workflows

And here's a couple of my common workflows for different styles of illustrations and visuals...

### 1. Illustrated notes

Anything I make that has a painterly and loose hand-drawn feel was made in Procreate on the iPad or Photoshop on the Wacom Cintiq. Or probably a combination – it's easy to move files back and forth between the two and the tools they offer are very similar.

Illustrations like these...

<TwoColumn>

<BasicImage src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dxj9qr5gj/image/upload/c_scale,f_auto,q_auto:good,w_1200/v1621767637/maggieappleton.com/notes/tools/Photo_by_Maggie_Appleton_on_June_30_2019._htaur3.jpg" />

<BasicImage src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dxj9qr5gj/image/upload/c_scale,f_auto,q_auto:good,w_1200/v1621767975/maggieappleton.com/notes/tools/Unfathomable_Meat_wp_wge87m.png" />

</TwoColumn>

<BasicImage
  width="1100px"
  src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dxj9qr5gj/image/upload/c_scale,f_auto,q_auto:good,w_1200/v1621767505/maggieappleton.com/notes/tools/GitMistakes--large_shrink_qm96ik.png"
/>

Both of these applications allow you to draw in “raster” graphics, meaning you paint pixels onto a canvas. They require a decent level of hand-skills to make sure your lines aren't wobbly, although both applications have smoothing features to help with that.

When I'm in Procreate I use a small selection of brushes I've gathered over the years. It's hard for me to remember where they're all from, and I've customised the majority of them to suit my personal prefs. Most of them were originally from Max Ulichney's [MaxPacks](https://maxpacks.com/) brushes. I have the essentials set ($2), the painters set ($8), and the comics set ($15), and can vouch they're all great.

<ImageFrame
  width="1100px"
  src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dxj9qr5gj/image/upload/c_scale,f_auto,q_auto:good,w_1200/v1621764330/maggieappleton.com/notes/tools/IMG_74BF7CB1E720-1_xpci1a.jpg"
  alt="A screenshot of my iPad with Procreate open and my brushes panel displayed"
/>

I move these pieces to Photoshop if I want to work on a larger screen, or have accidentally enlarged the canvas to a 14000px wide sprawling set of sketches that Procreate can't open without crashing.

<ImageFrame
  width="1100px"
  src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dxj9qr5gj/image/upload/c_scale,f_auto,q_auto:good,w_1200/v1621764627/maggieappleton.com/notes/tools/PhotoshopSnap_bduk6w.png"
  alt="A screenshot of my Photoshop setup"
/>

### 2. Polished vector illustrations

Illustrations that look more “polished” are made primarily in Adobe Illustrator, with a touch of Photoshop at the end for lighting effects and texture.

Pieces like these...

<BasicImage
  alt=""
  src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dxj9qr5gj/image/upload/c_scale,f_auto,q_auto:good,w_1200/v1621768811/maggieappleton.com/notes/tools/Linearnotes_shrink_gwvih5.png"
/>

These illustrations are all vector-based, meaning we use mathematical curves to define their shapes, rather than painted pixels. Vectors are great for create hard, crisp edges and working with perfect geometric forms.

<ImageFrame
  width="1100px"
  src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dxj9qr5gj/image/upload/c_scale,f_auto,q_auto:good,w_1200/v1621769123/maggieappleton.com/notes/tools/gatsby-illustrator_l37kgv.png"
  alt="A screenshot of my Adobe Illustrator setup with one of my illustrations on the canvas"
/>

While I love vectors for laying down the foundation shapes of these, I'll move them over the Photoshop once they're 90% done to adjust the colors, add more subtlety to the lighting and shadows, and chuck a bit of texture on the top so they feel more tangible.


A guide to the apps and tools I use to create illustrations

What App is That?


<IntroParagraph>

Every major note-taking app on the market works one way: linearly, in text. [Notion](https://www.notion.so/), [Roam](https://roamresearch.com/), [Evernote](https://evernote.com/), [OneNote](https://www.onenote.com/), [Bear](https://bear.app/), [Obsidian](https://obsidian.md/). They are all centred around writing text documents that flow from left-to-right, then top-to-bottom; the way all text works in English. Even if they support other languages, you'd still write Arabic or Hebrew or Urdu linearly, just right-to-left.

</IntroParagraph>

You might say this is what defines a _note_; it is a chunk of written text, presented as a small piece of digital paper. It's pretending to be a real piece of paper, but without many of the features that make real paper useful. Like the ability make marks on it that are not simply words in a straight line.

<ImageFrame
  src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dxj9qr5gj/image/upload/c_scale,f_auto,q_auto:good,w_1200/v1621509754/maggieappleton.com/notes/linear-notes/linear-scrawl_shrink_juilyb.png"
  showalt
  alt="How it might look if we could draw into our notes without being confined to linear text"
  width="900px"
/>

I find it odd that few apps put sincere effort into becoming more paper-like. Most are too busy trying to become more _hyper_, in the _hyper_-text sense. They pride themselves on their multi-device compatibility, cloud synchronicity, and API integration automations. None of them question the central organising medium of linear text.

In this linear text-based ideology, images are second-class citizens. Illustrations, diagrams, graphics, photographs, doodles, drawings, and icons are visitors here.

You're welcome to pop them "inline", like a pseudo-text element that inconveniently isn't subscribing to the rules. But you're going to have to make your images elsewhere. This is a note-taking app, not a drawing app (we have to wonder when those became two separate things). You'll have to draw somewhere else. Probably on another device. Which you'll have to buy separately. And yes, it will be prohibitively expensive. Unless you've found a way to draw by tapping out lines with your keyboard.

If you're lucky, your particular note-taking app might let you change the size of this image. Good luck trying to place two images next to each other though. Multi-column layouts and horizontal movement are beyond our current note-taking capacities.

Physical space is our third-class citizen. Your notes are only allowed to move to the right and down. You cannot move left, upwards, diagonally, in front, behind, or past Go.

<HackyFormatting />

You cannot freely drag things around and place them wherever you like. That would make it too much like the real world, where we can place one sticky note to the left of another, place both above a small notecard, arrange these next to a book with sticky notes inside it, and pile it all on top a ripped out page from a notebook covered in haphazard scribbles and doodles, half of them upside-down.

One wonders how we haven't hung ourselves with this amount of spatial freedom.

So, who is to blame for our linear, textual predicament?

The designers who invented the paper-based desktop metaphor that haunts all modern interface design? The users who behave like blind, inconsiderate drunks when presented with any slightly novel note-taking system? The venture capitalists who exclusively fund these predictable apps? The entire educational system for its incessant focus on textual literacy over spatial and visual literacy?

Surely, Gutenberg has something to answer for.


What we lose when our digital notes remove the freedom to move

The Linear Oppression of Note-taking Apps


<BasicImage
  width="950px"
  alt="Mary Douglas defined dirt as matter out of place. Socks are not inherently dirty all the time."
  src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dxj9qr5gj/image/upload/c_scale,f_auto,q_auto:good,w_1200/v1619766341/maggieappleton.com/notes/douglas-dirt/Douglas_1_ptxejg.png"
/>

<BasicImage
  width="880px"
  alt="A piece of toast is not inherently dirty, but a sock on a piece of toast is gross. As is finding toast in a sock drawer."
  src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dxj9qr5gj/image/upload/c_scale,f_auto,q_auto:good,w_1200/v1619766340/maggieappleton.com/notes/douglas-dirt/Douglas_2_gzamdm.png"
/>

<BasicImage
  width="880px"
  alt="What offends us here is the crossing of boundaries"
  src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dxj9qr5gj/image/upload/c_scale,f_auto,q_auto:good,w_1200/v1619766339/maggieappleton.com/notes/douglas-dirt/Douglas_3_lsoet3.png"
/>

---

Douglas outlines this theory of dirtiness, boundaries, and taboos in her classic book _Purity and Danger_.

<ResourceBook
  url="https://www.librarything.com/work/157380"
  author="Mary Douglas"
  image="/images/books/purity.webp"
  title="Purity and Danger"
>
  Purity and danger is considered an anthropological classic. Douglas analyses
  of the concepts of pollution, taboo, dirt, cleanliness, and power across
  cultures.
</ResourceBook>


Mary Douglas defined dirt as matter out of place – the crossing of boundaries

Douglas, Dirt, and Matter Out of Place


<IntroParagraph>

In 2013, in a dutch cellular engineering lab just outside of Utrecht, pharmacologist Mark Post [produced a piece of meat](https://www.new-harvest.org/mark_post_cultured_beef) without killing an animal. <Footnote idName={1}>That's the short version of the story. For the meaty details take a look at my illustrated notes on the book [[Meat Planet]]</Footnote> This is terribly impressive. But it also splatters a gigantic can of worms across our definition of “meat.” And by extension the entire food pyramid.

</IntroParagraph>

What is meat without a dead animal? How is that possible? And why does it make some people internally recoil deep in their gut?

## Why do we think 'lab-grown' meat is dirty, icky, or dangerous?

As Mary Douglas so poetically put it, “[[dirt is matter out of place]].” Anything that breaks our known order of the world that we design is a potential threat.

Food is a structured system - from the bite to the dish to the course to mealtimes to the weekly sunday roast to the monthly fast to the annual festival.

We get obsessive about creating rules, divisions, and norms around food. There are times and places and contexts to eat specific things. Oatmeal doesn't belong at the evening dinner party. Wine with breakfast is a disease. Combining cabbage with cake would lead to losing a few friends.

New forms of meat are suspect and transgressive because they cross our established boundaries.

Plant-based meats like the [Beyond Burger](https://www.beyondmeat.com/products/the-beyond-burger/) sit in neither the plant nor animal world, appearing as one while made from the other.

Our current food classifications do not have space for them. The division between vegetables and meat is fundamental. Plants vs animals. Fibre vs protein. Inert vs sentient. Green vs red.

Cultured meat, on the other hand, denies a fundamental part of the definition of meat. The dead animal part.

## The Great Wall of Nature/Culture

There is an imaginary wall in our minds that divides the world of [[Nature]] from the world of Culture. We seem to believe these are eternal, inherent categories of things in the world.

Mushrooms are Natural goodness incarnate, and microplastics are a polluting castoff from the Cultural behaviour of humans.

It wasn't always there. The men of 18th century “Western” rationalist science built it - Francis Bacon, Rene Descartes, and their kin.


How to offend everyone with boundary-crossing steak and nuggets

Problematic Proteins


I spent last week falling down the dark, LED-adorned, discotheque-esque internet hole of custom [mechanical keyboards](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Keyboard_technology#Mechanical-switch_keyboard).

I'd known the hole was there. I live in the world of developers where mechanical keyboards are a unifying community obsession. In a profession marked by immaterial creation, keyboards are one of the few tangible pieces of professional equipment they can fuss over. And fuss they do.

They debate the optimal amount of 'travel distance' a key should move when pressed. They have personal preferences for the type of tactile and audible feedback delivered by each key, a quality controlled by a color-coded range of “switches.” Red switches are 'linear and smooth,' brown switches have a slight bump that 'actuate' with 45g of applied force, and blue switches make an obnoxious clacking noise like a sixties typewriter. They arrange lush colored keycaps into gorgeous palettes, all with blank keycaps because no real typist needs lettering. They reprogramme the keys and write macros to run on a single keystroke. Sets of RGB LEDs under the boards put on light shows worthy of a 1980's acid rave.

Understandably, navigating this array of options requires plenty of guidance. The internet swells with top 10 lists, best of lists, ultimate guides, complete guides, and updated guides for 2021 leading you through the labyrith of choices to find your Perfect Keyboard Design. Perky microcelebrities have built whole YouTube empires by reviewing the specific audio qualities of each switch type and brand. The 828,000 members of the [r/MechanicalKeyboards](https://www.reddit.com/r/MechanicalKeyboards/) subreddit curate an extensive wiki to answer common questions.

And all that only covers the introductory level for people buying moderately priced pre-made units. Dedicated keyboarders stock up on their own base plates, key stabilizers, and printed circuit boards to solder everything together in exactly the way they want.
It would probably be cheaper to just get the luxury $356 [Moonlander Mark I](https://www.zsa.io/moonlander) or the $570 [Esrille](http://www.esrille.com/keyboard/) than to DIY it, but that's not the point. Art has little concern for price comparisons.

---

It's hard to believe that having a glowing rainbow pulse under your fingers is going to help you focus on structuring a user authentication flow, but no one is under the illusion these boards are about productivity.

They are gloriously anti-utilitarian. Developers will certainly rant about how the ergonomic layout of their Ergodox allows them to type 120 words per minute, but the level of flamboyant decoration happening in this space is undeniably about something much grander than efficiency.

These keyboards are expressive extensions of the self in the same way skateboard decks, ball gowns, tattoo sleeves, and instagrammable interior designs are. People have been painting their bodies with chalk and clay since neolithic times. The modern body simply includes mechanical machines.


Developer self-expression through coloured switches, keystroke actuation, and LED light displays

Fetishism & Mechanical Keyboards


<IntroParagraph>

My [[Roam Garden]] is a place I spend between 2-4 hours puttering around in every day according to my <a href="https://www.rescuetime.com/">RescueTime</a> stats. <Footnote idName={1}>RescueTime only tracks the time you're actively focused on a single window, so this measurement has some limitations but sets a nice baseline</Footnote> If I'm staring into something for over twenty hours a week, it better look and
feel like beautiful home that fits my aesthetic tastes. As a maker of aesthetically pleasing things, I'm obviously biased towards the<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aesthetic%E2%80%93usability_effect">
Aesthetic Usability Effect</a>.

</IntroParagraph>

<BasicImage
  showalt
  width="580px"
  alt="A bar graph of the hours I spend in Roam on a typical week"
  src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dg3gyk0gu/image/upload/c_scale,w_580/v1590188743/maggieappleton.com/notes/roamhours.png"
/>

In that spirit, I've gone all-out on customising the CSS that controls how my Roam looks.

I've used colors and font weight to distinguished internal from external links, added custom colors to particular page names, and shifted the contrast and spacing of elements to fit my own design aesthetic.

<ImageFrame
  width="1100px"
  alt="A screen capture of my visual styling system in Roam"
  src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dg3gyk0gu/image/upload/c_scale,w_1720/v1590188713/maggieappleton.com/notes/roam_theme_maggie.png"
/>

## How to paint Roam your own colors

Luckily, this is all fairly easy to do. Roam has a built-in system for
customising how your database looks.

You first need to create a new page called `roam/css`.

<ImageFrame
  width="840px"
  alt="The roam search bar with roam/css entered"
  src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dg3gyk0gu/image/upload/c_scale,f_auto,q_auto:good,w_840/v1607173029/maggieappleton.com/notes/roam-garden/Screenshot_2020-12-05_at_12.47.43.png"
/>

Once there, create a new code block by typing `/code` and selecting the block option.

<ImageFrame
  width="840px"
  alt="Entering /code into the empty page"
  src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dg3gyk0gu/image/upload/c_scale,f_auto,q_auto:good,w_840/v1607173035/maggieappleton.com/notes/roam-garden/Screenshot_2020-12-05_at_12.48.46.png"
/>

Once the code block appears, set the language to `css` from the right-hand drop down menu.

<ImageFrame
  width="840px"
  alt="Selecting the code option from the code block dropdown menu"
  src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dg3gyk0gu/image/upload/c_scale,f_auto,q_auto:good,w_1200/v1607173038/maggieappleton.com/notes/roam-garden/Screenshot_2020-12-05_at_12.48.56.png"
/>

You're now ready to start customising the CSS of your Roam. Any CSS you enter into this new code block will be applied across your whole database.

To test if it's working, type `h1.rm-title-display span { color: salmon;}` into the box.  
The title of your new page should change to a lovely shade of salmon.

<ImageFrame
  width="840px"
  alt="The page title changing to the color salmon"
  src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dg3gyk0gu/image/upload/c_scale,f_auto,q_auto:good,w_1200/v1607173750/maggieappleton.com/notes/roam-garden/Screenshot_2020-12-05_at_13.09.01.png"
/>

<SimpleCard>

#### If you've not entirely sure what CSS is, or you've never written any, I strongly suggest you first work through this short course on Khan Academy

<ButtonLink href="https://www.khanacademy.org/computing/computer-programming/html-css/intro-to-css/pt/css-basics">
  Intro to CSS on Khan Academy
</ButtonLink>

It'll take 30 minutes and learning the basics will give you an enourmous
appreciation for how the web works (as well as how to control it for your own
benefit!). After that, check out <a href="https://developers.google.com/web/tools/chrome-devtools/css">
this Google guide</a> to how to look up CSS elements and selectors a live webpage.

</SimpleCard>

### Pre-made Roam Themes

For those of you entirely uninterested in learning CSS who just want to pop a pre-made theme in, Roam has a whole collection of [pre-made themes](https://roamresearch.com/#/app/help/page/fJRcVITNY) you can pick from.

Copy and paste any of them into your new `roam/css` page and the styles will be applied across your whole database

If you want to use my theme **Leyendecker**, the most up-to-date version is available this [Github repo](https://github.com/theianjones/roam-research-themes/blob/master/leyendecker.css). There's a older version listed on the [Roam database](https://roamresearch.com/#/app/help/page/fJRcVITNY).

### Custom Styling Tags and Page Links

Another neat trick I love with CSS and Roam is creating specific styles for different page title and tags. <Footnote idName={3}>Shoutout to fellow Roam user <a href="https://malcolmocean.com/">Malcolm Ocean</a> who lobbied for this as an official feature of the Roam interface. I found out how to do it digging around in their impressively <a href="https://gist.github.com/malcolmocean/03d777a1c8f89be8c98e3d89d6821607">comprehensive CSS files</a></Footnote>. I have a little workflow taxonomy going that covers different kinds of output and the stages they flow through

<BasicImage
  width="880px"
  alt="A screencapture of my Roam database with various colored tags"
  src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dg3gyk0gu/image/upload/c_scale,w_1457/v1590193543/maggieappleton.com/notes/datatags.png"
/>

We're able to do this because when we use the double bracket or add a # to create a page tag, Roam adds a new attribute to the HTML markup. If the page is made with a #, it adds a `data-tag` attribute. If it's made with double brackets Roam adds a `data-link-title` attribute

```html
<span data-tag="Ideas" class="rm-page-ref rm-page-ref-tag">
  #Ideas What if I learned how to chuck wood like a Chuck Norris woodchuck
  could?
</span>

<span data-link-title="Ideas" class="rm-page-ref">
  [ [Ideas] ] What if I learned how to chuck wood like a Chuck Norris woodchuck
  could?
</span>
```

We can then target both of those attributes with a CSS selector that looks like this:

```css
span.rm-page-ref[data-tag="Ideas"],
span[data-link-title^="Tweet"] .rm-page-ref {
  color: #fcb815;
  padding: 3px 4px;
  font-weight: 700;
  line-height: 1.4em;
}
```

The first selector, `span.rm-page-ref[data-tag="Ideas"]` changes any # link, and the second `span[data-link-title^="Tweet"] .rm-page-ref` selector changes any link made with [ [ brackets]]

It makes an enormous difference in your user experience to be able to quickly identify different block and note types through visual color association.

If you just want to grab the tag and page styles from my theme , scroll down to the bottom of my <a href="https://github.com/theianjones/roam-research-themes/blob/master/leyendecker.css">CSS theme file</a> to find them.

### Block Level Styling

Roam also allows you to style whole blocks based on tags. <Footnote idName={4}>[Cato Minor](https://twitter.com/catominor3?lang=en) originally wrote a script for doing this in JavaScript, but now it's native to Roam's CSS.</Footnote> In my database I use this heavily when taking book notes to visually distinguish between claims, responses, questions, and evidence.

To style an entire block, and all its child elements, we use:

```css
.roam-block-container[data-page-links*="Comment"] {
  // styles in here
}
```

To style only the child elements but not the parent, add `.rm-block-children` to the end use:

```css
.roam-block-container[data-page-links*="Comment"] .rm-block-children {
  // styles in here
}
```

To style just the block itself but none of the child elements, add `> div.rm-block-main` on:

```css
.roam-block-container[data-page-links*="Comment"] > div.rm-block-main {
  // styles in here
}
```

---

## Alternate Styling with Browser Plugins

If you don't want to use the native Roam CSS functionality, there's a way to apply custom CSS styles to any website using a browser plugin.

This is especially useful if you're part of a **multi-player** Roam where everyone has their own styling preferences. [Stylus](https://stylus-lang.com/) has extensions for both [Firefox](https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/stylus/) and [Chrome](https://chrome.google.com/webstore/detail/stylus/clngdbkpkpeebahjckkjfobafhncgmne?hl=en) that allow you to write your own CSS styles in a browser.

<ImageFrame
  width="980px"
  alt="A screen capture of the stylus interface"
  src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dg3gyk0gu/image/upload/c_scale,w_980/v1590188865/maggieappleton.com/notes/stylus.png"
/>

They also have <a href="https://github.com/openstyles/stylus/wiki/Editor">good documentation</a> that will walk you through how to use it.

It's good to note that this is not a Roam-specific hack. You can re-paint any webpage you like with a custom CSS styler (go to town on Craigslist!)


How to customise Roam Research with your own CSS themes

Painting Roam Research with Custom CSS


<IntroParagraph>

At the end of last year I got to attend <a href="https://medium.com/mozilla-festival/tagged/mozfest2019">MozFest</a> here in London. Mozilla events are consistently extraordinarily in their format and coordination level. It's a thousand-person unconference that actually works.

</IntroParagraph>

The only issue is immense FOMO as you try to pick between attending a roundtable discussion on gendered voice assistants, a panel on _The Algorithmic Gaze_, or a debate on _The Future of Disinformation_. You can browse through the overwhelming variety of sessions they ran <a href="https://public.zenkit.com/c/2RH604FcHf/schedule?v=LK9b3laIX&hide=workspaceLists">here.</a>

---

One of my favourite sessions was on **Data Unions and the Future of Data** with speakers from [Streamr](https://streamr.network/) and the [Open Data Institute](https://theodi.org/)

I hadn't encountered the concepts of [Data Unions](https://medium.com/streamrblog/what-are-data-unions-how-do-they-work-which-ones-can-i-use-887e67fb7716) and [Data Trusts](https://medium.com/@anoukruhaak/data-trusts-why-what-and-how-a8b53b53d34) before. While we're all acutely aware of the current economic-internet-clusterfuck where we seem to pay nothing for services, and invisibly hand over valuable data, you don't often hear reasonable solutions to the problem.

Other than some vague mumblings about blockchain that are swiftly followed up with an offer to buy into an ICO...

I'm broadly interested in the idea of what [[Local, Artisan Data Storage]] might look like.

I sketched out some notes during the session which should give you a general idea of the model. I can't speak to any of the technical aspects or feasibility of this, but the concept is intriguing.

<BasicImage
  width="1150px"
  alt="An illustrated note on how data unions might work"
  src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dg3gyk0gu/image/upload/c_scale,w_1150/v1592296979/maggieappleton.com/notes/MozFest_DataUnion.png"
/>


Illustrated notes on how data unions work and what problems they might solve

Are Data Unions the Future of Data?


<IntroParagraph>

The idea of the **Cyborg** was born in 1960 in the thick of the US-Soviet Space Race, to two NASA consultants trying to solve the problem of keeping humans alive in the hostile conditions of outer space.

</IntroParagraph>

Nathan Kline and Manfred Clynes published a paper called '[Cyborgs and Space](http://www.guicolandia.net/files/expansao/Cyborgs_Space.pdf)' where they proposed that rather than trying to construct earth-like environments for humans to live in, we should try altering the humans themselves.

They imagined a _Cybernetic Organism_, or _Cyborg,_ that came with a built-in, self-regulating system that would take care of the bothersome issues of breathing, metabolism, sleep, circulation, and any other biological necessities, "leaving man free to explore, to create, to think, and to feel."

Creations often stray from their origins though.

The idea of the Cyborg has largely become a villainous character in science fiction – used to explore the danger and discomfort we feel around our tools and systems. Let's just call this 'The Terminator Effect.'

Yet the idea has more philosophical promise and potential in it than Hollywood knows what to do with.

---

Anthropologist [Donna Haraway](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Donna_Haraway) is a pioneer of using the term _Cyborg_ as an imaginative toy in her 1991 essay [The Cyborg Manifesto](/cyborg-manifesto). In Haraway’s writing, the Cyborg becomes a way to explore our cultural assumptions around the dividing lines between "nature" and "culture".

It offers us a chance to question the strict categories and historical boundaries _Western Cosmology_ <Footnote idName={1}>I use the term _Western Cosmology_ as a slightly tongue-in-cheek way of referencing the "_Western_" belief system.<br />Although we should acknowledge "_Western_" isn't really a thing, but can be interpreted as some generic mashup of [WERID](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Psychology#WEIRD_bias), Euro-American, Judeo-Christian cultural ideals.<br />Language is flawed. I apologise for the sweeping generalisation.</Footnote> constructs for us. The firm divisions between humans / machines, natural / artificial, male / female, mind / body, fiction / reality, primitive / civilised, and science / society we are told most definitely exist. Despite the fact they are not in the least bit culturally universal.

Haraway’s insight is not only well ahead of her time, but also remarkably accurate as we now struggles to deal with technological relationships that contradict and question those historical divisions. They are all inherently tied to the issue of understanding where the line between organism and machine gets drawn. Or more accurately, the issue of there being a line at all.

---

Cognitive philosopher [Andy Clark](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Andy_Clark) picked up on the idea of the Cyborg in his 2003 book [Natural-Born Cyborgs](https://www.google.co.uk/books/edition/Natural_born_Cyborgs/8JXaK3sREXQC?hl=en).


Notes on the history of cyborgs and why the idea still holds historical weight in Western narratives

A History of Cyborgs


<IntroParagraph>

Using the [GreenSock](https://greensock.com/) web animation library (also known as gsap) in vanilla JavaScript isn't too complex. But when we want it to play nicely with a frontend framework like React, we run into some finicky issues.

</IntroParagraph>

This guide is specifically about using React Hooks with GreenSock, as many of the [existing guides](https://greensock.com/react/) only explain how to set it up with the old style of class components.

This isn't an introduction to the GreenSock library itself – head over to my post on [[The Bare Essentials of Greensock]] for that.

<br />

## React, Meet GreenSock

The issue with combining these two libraries is that React acts as a DOM interloper – it sits between the code we write and the DOM, managing it for us.

React builds it's own internal "tree" of DOM nodes based off our code, and only updates the actual DOM as needed (a concept previously known as the [[React Virtual DOM]]) <Footnote idName={1}>The React team has gone off the term of the _virtual DOM_ and prefer to talk about the _render tree_. Potatoes, potataos. For more on how the virtual DOM works, I have an [illustrated guide](/react-vdom)</Footnote>

<BasicImage
  alt="A diagram of React generating all the DOM nodes for us"
  src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dg3gyk0gu/image/upload/c_scale,f_auto,q_auto:best,w_1400/v1600973172/maggieappleton.com/notes/gsap/react-greensock-2.png"
/>

Meanwhile, the GreenSock library usually works by directly animating our DOM elements. Perhaps you can sense the tension in the room...

Since the GreenSock library needs access to the DOM in order to animate it, we need to tell React about our Greensock animations. Otherwise the two end up in awkward arguments that can end in tears (primarily mine).

## Bring in the React Hooks

There's two essential React hooks we'll use to connect our React code to our Greensock code: **useRef** and **useEffect**

<SimpleCard>

**useRef** lets us access and directly target our DOM nodes

**useEffect** lets us to perform side effects – any functions or data requests that we want to run _after_ rendering the component to the DOM

</SimpleCard>

If you're not completely comfortable with [React Hooks](https://www.freecodecamp.org/news/beginners-guide-to-using-react-hooks/) yet and those technical explanations mean nothing to you, don't worry we're going to slowly walk through this. With illustrations. Because who the fork properly understands _"side effects"_?

---

### Getting Setup

We first need to run `yarn install gsap` or `npm install gsap` into our React project repo <Footnote idName={2}>**gsap** is short for _GreenSock Animation Platform_ and it's the way we reference the Greensock library in all our code sytax</Footnote>

<SimpleCard>

Feel free to open up a Codesandbox project to work through the steps while you read. I've set one up for you with React and Greensock already installed:

<Center><ButtonLink href="https://codesandbox.io/s/reacthooks-greensock-demo-xjoti?file=/src/AnimatedBox.js">Jump into CodeSandbox</ButtonLink></Center>

</SimpleCard>

<br />

### Building our Animation Component

Let's start by creating a React component called `<AnimatedBox/>` that is going to hold all our Greensock code. We're going to build a simple `<div>` element and have it animate across the page (exciting!).

We'll need to import the Greensock library into our component with `import { gsap }from 'gsap'`, as well as React and our two hooks with `import React, { useRef, useEffect } from 'react'`

```js
import React, { useRef, useEffect } from "react";
import { gsap } from "gsap";

const Animation = () => {
  return (
    <div
      style={{
        width: "160px",
        height: "160px",
        background: "salmon",
      }}
    />
  );
};
```

I've set some basic width, height, and color CSS styles on our div to make
it visible on the page.

<p>
  <div
    style={{
      margin: "2em auto",
      width: "120px",
      height: "120px",
      background: "salmon",
      borderRadius: "4px",
    }}
  />
</p>

<Center>

Good looking div, right? Salmon is always the right color choice.

</Center>

---

## Adding the useRef Hook

We're now going to add _references_ to our animation with the **useRef** hook.

We create a new reference by adding `const boxRef = useRef()` anywhere outside of our return statement. Call it anything you like, but _boxRef_ is a good enough name for this example.

We then add a `ref={boxRef}` attribute on our `<div>` element.

```js
const Animation = () => {
  const boxRef = useRef();

  return (
    <div
      ref={boxRef}
      style={{
        width: "120px",
        height: "120px",
        background: "salmon",
      }}
    />
  );
};
```

This tells React we want to be able to control our `<div>` element with the `boxRef` reference once our component is mounted onto the DOM.

---

## Adding the useEffect Hook

Next we're going to add our **useEffect** hook, and write our GreenSock animation inside of it.

If you're already familiar with greensock this will look fairly straightforward.

```js
const Animation = () => {
  const boxRef = useRef();

  useEffect(() => {
    gsap.to([boxRef.current], {
      x: "400px",
      duration: 2,
    });
  });

  return (
    <div
      ref={boxRef}
      style={{
        width: "120px",
        height: "120px",
        background: "salmon",
      }}
    />
  );
};
```

We declare a normal `gsap.to()` tween, but instead of passing in an id or class name as the target element, we use `[boxRef.current]`.

This means we want gsap to animate the `.current` property of our `boxRef` reference – which is the `<div>` element we put that reference on.

```js
gsap.to([boxRef.current], {});
```

We then pass in our variables object, which tells Greensock to move our div 400px along the _x_ axis over a duration of 2 seconds:

```js
{ x: 400px, duration: 2 }
```

And thus, our div animates...

<p>

<Tween
  to={{
    scrollTrigger: {
      trigger: "#boxRef",
      start: "top 60%",
      end: "+=500",
      scrub: true,
    },
    x: "400%",
  }}
  duration={2}
  ease="back.out(1.3)"
>
  <div
    id="boxRef"
    style={{
      margin: "2em",
      width: "120px",
      height: "120px",
      background: "salmon",
      borderRadius: "4px",
    }}
  />
</Tween>

</p>

<Center>

# Tada <span>🎉</span>

</Center>

So by this point, you hopefully have a working animation in that [Codesandbox project](https://codesandbox.io/s/reacthooks-greensock-demo-xjoti?file=/src/AnimatedBox.js) or a local repo.

---

If you don't feel like mucking around with **useRef** and **useEffect**, [John Lindquist](https://johnlindquist.com/use-greensock-with-react-hooks/) created a simple React hook called **use-gsap** that hides them away.


How to use the Greensock animation library inside React using React hooks

GreenSock Animations with React Hooks


_"Drawing the Invisible: React Explained in Five Visual Metaphors"_ is one of my conference talks about the importance of visual metaphors in explaining programming concepts.

It's perhaps also known as the **'React is a Potato'** talk. Due to the fact potatoes make a rather bold appearance in the middle. <span>🥔</span><span>🥔</span><span>🥔</span>

Here's the debut version of it from the [Women of React](https://womenofreact.com/) Conference in 2020

<Video src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/MQGe9zxlRdk" />

<Spacer size="small" />

I've since recorded an expanded version you can [watch on egghead](https://egghead.io/talks/javascript-drawing-the-invisible-react-explained-in-five-visual-metaphors/). I've also expanded many of these ideas in my newer talk [[A Picture Worth a Thousand Programmes]]

<Center>

## The Slides

</Center>

<BasicImage
  width="900px"
  alt=""
  src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dg3gyk0gu/image/upload/c_scale,w_960/v1593532709/maggieappleton.com/notes/react-potato-slides/react-metaphors01.png"
/>

<BasicImage
  width="900px"
  src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dg3gyk0gu/image/upload/c_scale,w_960/v1593532728/maggieappleton.com/notes/react-potato-slides/react-metaphors12.png"
/>

<BasicImage
  width="900px"
  src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dg3gyk0gu/image/upload/c_scale,w_960/v1593532757/maggieappleton.com/notes/react-potato-slides/react-metaphors18.png"
/>

<BasicImage
  width="900px"
  src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dg3gyk0gu/image/upload/c_scale,w_960/v1593532760/maggieappleton.com/notes/react-potato-slides/react-metaphors19.png"
/>

<BasicImage
  width="900px"
  src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dg3gyk0gu/image/upload/c_scale,w_960/v1593532792/maggieappleton.com/notes/react-potato-slides/react-metaphors26.png"
/>

<BasicImage
  width="900px"
  src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dg3gyk0gu/image/upload/c_scale,w_960/v1593532801/maggieappleton.com/notes/react-potato-slides/react-metaphors29.png"
/>

<BasicImage
  width="900px"
  src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dg3gyk0gu/image/upload/c_scale,w_960/v1593532815/maggieappleton.com/notes/react-potato-slides/react-metaphors34.png"
/>

<BasicImage
  width="900px"
  src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dg3gyk0gu/image/upload/c_scale,w_960/v1593532817/maggieappleton.com/notes/react-potato-slides/react-metaphors35.png"
/>

<BasicImage
  width="900px"
  src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dg3gyk0gu/image/upload/c_scale,w_960/v1593537413/maggieappleton.com/notes/react-potato-slides/react-metaphors42.png"
/>

<BasicImage
  width="900px"
  src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dg3gyk0gu/image/upload/c_scale,w_960/v1593537417/maggieappleton.com/notes/react-potato-slides/react-metaphors43.png"
/>

<BasicImage
  width="900px"
  src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dg3gyk0gu/image/upload/c_scale,w_960/v1593537425/maggieappleton.com/notes/react-potato-slides/react-metaphors47.png"
/>

<BasicImage
  width="900px"
  src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dg3gyk0gu/image/upload/c_scale,w_960/v1593537443/maggieappleton.com/notes/react-potato-slides/react-metaphors54.png"
/>

<BasicImage
  width="900px"
  src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dg3gyk0gu/image/upload/c_scale,w_960/v1593537448/maggieappleton.com/notes/react-potato-slides/react-metaphors58.png"
/>

<BasicImage
  width="900px"
  src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dg3gyk0gu/image/upload/c_scale,w_960/v1593537452/maggieappleton.com/notes/react-potato-slides/react-metaphors57.png"
/>

<BasicImage
  width="900px"
  src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dg3gyk0gu/image/upload/c_scale,w_960/v1593537463/maggieappleton.com/notes/react-potato-slides/react-metaphors62.png"
/>

<BasicImage
  width="900px"
  src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dg3gyk0gu/image/upload/c_scale,w_960/v1593537471/maggieappleton.com/notes/react-potato-slides/react-metaphors69.png"
/>

<BasicImage
  width="900px"
  src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dg3gyk0gu/image/upload/c_scale,w_960/v1593537485/maggieappleton.com/notes/react-potato-slides/react-metaphors71.png"
/>

<BasicImage
  width="900px"
  src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dg3gyk0gu/image/upload/c_scale,w_960/v1593537481/maggieappleton.com/notes/react-potato-slides/react-metaphors73.png"
/>

<BasicImage
  width="900px"
  src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dg3gyk0gu/image/upload/c_scale,w_960/v1593537479/maggieappleton.com/notes/react-potato-slides/react-metaphors75.png"
/>

<BasicImage
  width="900px"
  src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dg3gyk0gu/image/upload/c_scale,w_960/v1593537490/maggieappleton.com/notes/react-potato-slides/react-metaphors77.png"
/>

<BasicImage
  width="900px"
  src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dg3gyk0gu/image/upload/c_scale,w_960/v1593537499/maggieappleton.com/notes/react-potato-slides/react-metaphors79.png"
/>

<BasicImage
  width="900px"
  src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dg3gyk0gu/image/upload/c_scale,w_960/v1593537502/maggieappleton.com/notes/react-potato-slides/react-metaphors80.png"
/>


The written version of my talk on explaining React through visual metaphors

Drawing the Invisible: React Explained in Five Visual Metaphors


<IntroParagraph>

When it comes to web animation libraries, [Greensock](https://greensock.com/) is the Rolls Royce of options. It's what powers most of those ridiculously fancy [Awwwards](https://www.awwwards.com/) websites.

</IntroParagraph>

It's also been on my learning wish list for too long. I assumed it would be too complex. Everyone talks about how powerful the library is.

It's usually safe to assume powerful === complex.

But once I started digging in I realised the core of the library was actually quite easy to get the hang of. There's plenty of advanced mechanisms and complexity to get wrapped up in if you want to. But they're entirely optional.

This is a **one-scoop-plain-vanilla introduction to Greensock**.  
Without any sprinkles, nuts, or advanced functionality.

<GsapScroller />

### Tweens

Tweens are the basic building blocks of a Greensock animation. A tween is a single transition – an element changing from state A to state B.

To create a tween, we target an _element_ (this can be any HTML element like a `<div>, <p>, or <svg>`) and pass in _variables_.
Variables define how the element should change over the course of the animation - whether it should move, change opacity or color, grow big or small – you get it.

Let's say we want to make a box go from navy blue to red, move 40% of the way across the screen <Footnote id={1}>I've used `20vw` units in this example which tells the browser to calculate 40% of the **view width**. `vw` is a handy unit for responsive design to make this work on little screens as well as big</Footnote> on the X axis (horizontal), and grow in scale by 1.4 times the original:


<Center><TweenRedBigBox /></Center>

Here's the code to do that in Greensock:

```js
<div class="giantRedBox" background="navyblue" width="100px" height="100px" />;

gsap.to(".giantRedBox", 2, { x: 20vw, scale: 1.4, background: "red" });
```


First we target the element using it's classname: `giantRedBox`.  
We then pass in a _duration_ that defines how long it should take the animation to move from state A to state B – here it's 2 seconds.  
Finally we pass in an object that contains our animation _variables_:  
`{ x: 20vw, scale: 1.4, background: 'red' }`


---

### Types of Tweens

There's three types of tweens:

<ul>
<li>to</li>
<li>from</li>
<li>fromTo</li>
</ul>

In _to_ we define the final state of the animation – what it looks like by the end.
It begins in the position defined in our HTML & CSS, and moves _to_ the state we define inside our greensock tween.

```js
<div class="spinningBox" background="navyblue" width="100px" height="100px" />;

gsap.to(".spinningBox", 3, { x: 20vw, rotation: 360 });
```

<Center><TweenSpinningBox /></Center>

<Spacer />

In _from_ we define the beginning state of the animation, and it moves back to it's state defined in the HTML & CSS

```js
gsap.from(".reverseSpinningBox", 3, { x: 20vw, rotation: 360 });
```

<Center><TweenReverseSpinningBox /></Center>

<Spacer />

In _fromTo_ we declare two states we want the animation to move between.

```js
gsap.fromTo(".hotBox", 3, { background: "#93D0D9" }, { background: "#D93654" });
```

<Center><TweenBlueRedBox /></Center>

---

### Timelines

Timelines are made up of tweens.
They group them together into a sequence.

Once we declare a timeline, we can chain sets of tweens onto it.

```js
const boxTimeline = gsap.timeline();

boxTimeline
  .to(".flyingBox", 2, { x: 100, scale: 1.5 })
  .to(".floatingBox", 3, { x: 10 })
  .to(".flippingBox", 1, { rotation: 360 });
```

---

You may see references around to multiple varieties of tweening and timelines called `TweenMax`, `TweenLite`, `TimelineMax`, and `TimelineLite`.

In late 2019 GSAP [updated to version 3](https://greensock.com/3-release-notes) and got rid of the all lite / max varieties so feel free to ignore that distinction in older code examples or.



Notes on the basics of the Greensock animation llibrary

The Bare Essentials of Greensock


A gift economy is a _system of exchange_ based on gift giving.

Valuables are given without explicit agreement of future rewards between individuals, or within a contained community of people.

<BasicImage
  width="880px"
  alt="Gift economies are systems of exchange based on gift-giving"
  src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dg3gyk0gu/image/upload/c_scale,f_auto,q_auto:best,w_1200/v1589328834/maggieappleton.com/notes/gift-economy.jpg"
/>

Gift economies have a few key qualities. They are...

1. **Loosely and informally tracked** - it is bad form to calculate the exact value of gifts you receive, or keep an obsessive log of it the way we do with business finances
2. **Indirect** - it is not always two individuals giving back and forth. Instead gifting is generalised to a whole community where you may give to people who have not given directly to you
3. **Delayed** - we do not reciprocate gifts the minute we receive them, but instead wait to repay the offering at a later date

The emphasis in a gift exchange is on **strengthening the bond between the givers and receivers.**

It creates a kind of "positive debt," where two people or groups are now tied to one another - one party will always owe the other something. It's a purposeful way of entwining lives and communities together.

## Why do we feel compelled to reciprocate gifts?

The grand mystery of gifting and gift economies is why we feel _obliged_ to reciprocate. When someone gives you something, it sparks a strong desire to return in kind.

We don't have a pat answer to where this compulsion comes from, but we can certainly argue generosity and social connection are useful evolutionary traits if we want to get biologically reductive about it.

[Marcel Mauss](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marcel_Mauss) is perhaps the most infamous Anthropologist to explore this question in his book [The Gift](https://www.librarything.com/work/69346) <Footnote idName={1}>Not to be mistaken with [Lewis Hyde's book](https://www.librarything.com/work/258760) of the same name, although it's more focused on art and creation as a gift. Not a bad read, but a bit of a title hijack.</Footnote>

<br />

<ResourceBook
  url="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/201766.The_Gift"
  image="/images/books/gift.webp"
  title="The Gift"
  author="Marcell Mauss"
>
  An anthropological classic on gift theory and gift economies. Published in
  1923, Marcel Mauss explores how systems of exchange work in traditional
  societies around the world in relation to politics, power, and kinship.
</ResourceBook>

Mauss concluded that the objects we are given _"are seen to partake of something of the personality of the giver"_. 154

Mauss described it through the idea of the Maori idea of **hau** - the "spirit of the gift" where the giver's 'soul', or some kind of personal quality, is entangled with the gift object that wishes to return home to its owner. Thus compelling the receiver to make a return.

This interpretation of Maori **hau** ended up being strongly criticised as a misunderstanding and vast oversimplification of the true cultural meaning.

But the deeper idea Mauss was trying to get at is still worth highlighting. Just without a culturally appropriated term.

## Reciprocating Appropriately

When we return a gift, our offering has to be of **similar or slightly higher value** than the original. But not by too much.

If you bring me a ginger biscuit with my cup of tea, and two days later I reciprocate with a gourmet, two-tiered red velvet cake with your name in icing, we would all consider that an awkward, creepy, and overall a socially inappropriate response.

Just giving you a ginger biscuit back works well enough. Returning a gift of the exact same value resolves the debt, but also breaks the cycle.

Everyone is now even, and there’s no more need to continue biscuit-gifting. We can safely return to the pre-biscuit-gifting-days, but doing so also weakens our social connection.

If I have a particular political or personal interest in strengthening our social relationship, I need to give you a treat of slightly higher value – perhaps a chocolate hobnob or home-made scone.

Which both demonstrates I'm invested in this relationship, and also leaves you slightly indebted to me, thus compelling the gift cycle onwards.

## Gift Economies and Market Economies

We often contrast the Gift Economy with the Market Economy. This is a wild oversimplification, but humans like to think in Cultural Dichotomies.

<BasicImage
  width="840px"
  alt="We often contrast gift economies with market or barter economies"
  src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dg3gyk0gu/image/upload/c_scale,f_auto,q_auto:best,w_1200/v1596572154/maggieappleton.com/notes/market-barter-economy.png"
/>

Market Economies are _systems of exchange based on buying and selling things with money_. A market exchange is **specific, quantifiable, direct, immediate, founded upon an explicit agreement**. As in, this croissant costs £1 right now.

Buying an irrationally overpriced granola bar from an airport vending machine is an example of a pure market exchange without a social layer. It’s me, a machine, and a £3 bar of sugar to help me survive this long layover.

I want food, and whoever owns this machine wants money. This is not the time or the place for a gift economy. It would be terribly inconvenient for me to rely on an unpredictable system of granola bar gifts from the strangers around me while starving in an unfamiliar airport.

There are humans who own this vending machine, who will eventually get that money. But they are very far away in time and space – both geographically and socially.

If challenged, I would have a terrible time tracking them down and having a chat. I have only the weakest sense of a human relationship with them, and there is hardly a social bond being woven – this granola bar is about an immediate and specific exchange of needs.

Here, the market economy works wonders. Life necessities like food, shelter, and water are not good candidates for a gifting system. Which is why we tend to gift luxury items, novelties, and socks.

This is also why it's problematic when food, shelter, and water are framed as "gifts" which is sometimes how charitable donations work – as _optional_ acts of generosity.


Illustrated notes on the idea of Gift Economies and cultural historys of economic exchange

The Gift Economy


<IntroParagraph>

We all know the "head the family" is not just referring to a floating human head, but instead the entire person who holds the power in a family unit. It's a shorthand way of giving us something small, specific, and often visible to refer to, especially when the whole concept is a more abstract.

</IntroParagraph>

> Using part of something to refer to the larger whole is called **Synecdoche**

We refer to a collection of businessmen as **suits**.  
For politicians who run a national government we use the physical places they meet like **Parliament**, or **Number 10**, or **the White House**.  
To tell someone we like their car we say that's a nice **set of wheels**.  
We might ask for **a hand** carrying in the groceries, when we really need a whole human to come help out.

We pick physical symbols like bits of clothing, buildings, limbs, or locations to give us a tangible reference point for a less tangible group of people or an idea.

Synecdoche is especially important in creating Visual Explanations and Visual Metaphors, as it allows us to reference non-physical concepts in visible, physical symbols we can draw.

It's an offshoot of **Metonymy** - when we refer to one concept using a different but related symbol.


Notes on the metaphorical varieties of synecdoche and metonymy

Synecdoche: Drawing the Part for the Whole


<IntroParagraph>

In September of 2019 I went through the [Building a Second Brain](https://www.buildingasecondbrain.com/) course<Footnote idName={1}>And took illustrated notes that you can take a look at [here](/basb)</Footnote> – an enormously popular online guide to improving your "_Personal Knowledge Management_" system.<Footnote idName={2}>Or PKM as it's commonly known, is a novel name for an old concept. The art of filtering, curating, and cultivating what you read and encounter. And then being able to turn it into "useful output" of some variety. </Footnote> The course did wonders for my information streams and note taking organisation, but the core ethos left me with questions.

</IntroParagraph>

> What does it mean to build a "second brain," and why do we think that's a **Good** and **Valuable** thing to do?

What strange historical and cultural paths led us to this cerebral cyborgian dream?

Many of these questions and themes align with concepts I explored in [[Tracking Humanity]] - my anthropology thesis on the Quantified Self movement.

Luckily I have a small community of fellow BASB enthusiasts here in London to explore these questions with.  
At our March 2020 meetup I put together a lightning talk exploring how Second Braining relates to our notions of cyborgs, our embodied experiences, and the historical legacies that landed us here.

<Center>

## The Talk

<Video
  src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/yOGi9RfC3Eg"
  title="How to be a neo-cartesian cyborg talk"
/>

## Slides and Notes

</Center>

<img
  alt="Slides from my talk on becoming a neo cartesian cyborg"
  src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dg3gyk0gu/image/upload/c_scale,f_auto,q_auto:good,w_960/v1594548502/maggieappleton.com/notes/neocyborgs/cyborgs_19.jpg"
/>

<img
  alt="Slides from my talk on becoming a neo cartesian cyborg"
  src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dg3gyk0gu/image/upload/c_scale,f_auto,q_auto:good,w_960/v1594548503/maggieappleton.com/notes/neocyborgs/cyborgs_20.jpg"
/>

<img
  alt="Slides from my talk on becoming a neo cartesian cyborg"
  src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dg3gyk0gu/image/upload/c_scale,f_auto,q_auto:good,w_960/v1594548501/maggieappleton.com/notes/neocyborgs/cyborgs_13.jpg"
/>

<img
  alt="Slides from my talk on becoming a neo cartesian cyborg"
  src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dg3gyk0gu/image/upload/c_scale,f_auto,q_auto:good,w_960/v1594548500/maggieappleton.com/notes/neocyborgs/cyborgs_11.jpg"
/>

<img
  alt="Slides from my talk on becoming a neo cartesian cyborg"
  src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dg3gyk0gu/image/upload/c_scale,f_auto,q_auto:good,w_960/v1594548502/maggieappleton.com/notes/neocyborgs/cyborgs_14.jpg"
/>

<img
  alt="Slides from my talk on becoming a neo cartesian cyborg"
  src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dg3gyk0gu/image/upload/c_scale,f_auto,q_auto:good,w_960/v1594548499/maggieappleton.com/notes/neocyborgs/cyborgs_4.jpg"
/>

<img
  alt="Slides from my talk on becoming a neo cartesian cyborg"
  src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dg3gyk0gu/image/upload/c_scale,f_auto,q_auto:good,w_960/v1594548499/maggieappleton.com/notes/neocyborgs/cyborgs_5.jpg"
/>

<img
  alt="Slides from my talk on becoming a neo cartesian cyborg"
  src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dg3gyk0gu/image/upload/c_scale,f_auto,q_auto:good,w_960/v1594548499/maggieappleton.com/notes/neocyborgs/cyborgs_6.jpg"
/>

<img
  alt="Slides from my talk on becoming a neo cartesian cyborg"
  src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dg3gyk0gu/image/upload/c_scale,f_auto,q_auto:good,w_960/v1594548500/maggieappleton.com/notes/neocyborgs/cyborgs_8.jpg"
/>

<img
  alt="Slides from my talk on becoming a neo cartesian cyborg"
  src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dg3gyk0gu/image/upload/c_scale,f_auto,q_auto:good,w_960/v1594548500/maggieappleton.com/notes/neocyborgs/cyborgs_7.jpg"
/>

<img
  alt="Slides from my talk on becoming a neo cartesian cyborg"
  src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dg3gyk0gu/image/upload/c_scale,f_auto,q_auto:good,w_960/v1594548498/maggieappleton.com/notes/neocyborgs/cyborgs_2.jpg"
/>

<img
  alt="Slides from my talk on becoming a neo cartesian cyborg"
  src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dg3gyk0gu/image/upload/c_scale,f_auto,q_auto:good,w_960/v1594548499/maggieappleton.com/notes/neocyborgs/cyborgs_3.jpg"
/>

<img
  alt="Slides from my talk on becoming a neo cartesian cyborg"
  src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dg3gyk0gu/image/upload/c_scale,f_auto,q_auto:good,w_960/v1594548500/maggieappleton.com/notes/neocyborgs/cyborgs_9.jpg"
/>

<img
  alt="Slides from my talk on becoming a neo cartesian cyborg"
  src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dg3gyk0gu/image/upload/c_scale,f_auto,q_auto:good,w_960/v1594548502/maggieappleton.com/notes/neocyborgs/cyborgs_18.jpg"
/>

<img
  alt="Slides from my talk on becoming a neo cartesian cyborg"
  src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dg3gyk0gu/image/upload/c_scale,f_auto,q_auto:good,w_960/v1594548500/maggieappleton.com/notes/neocyborgs/cyborgs_10.jpg"
/>

<img
  alt="Slides from my talk on becoming a neo cartesian cyborg"
  src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dg3gyk0gu/image/upload/c_scale,f_auto,q_auto:good,w_960/v1594548508/maggieappleton.com/notes/neocyborgs/cyborgs_39.jpg"
/>

<img
  alt="Slides from my talk on becoming a neo cartesian cyborg"
  src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dg3gyk0gu/image/upload/c_scale,f_auto,q_auto:good,w_960/v1594548508/maggieappleton.com/notes/neocyborgs/cyborgs_40.jpg"
/>

<img
  alt="Slides from my talk on becoming a neo cartesian cyborg"
  src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dg3gyk0gu/image/upload/c_scale,f_auto,q_auto:good,w_960/v1594548502/maggieappleton.com/notes/neocyborgs/cyborgs_16.jpg"
/>

<img
  alt="Slides from my talk on becoming a neo cartesian cyborg"
  src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dg3gyk0gu/image/upload/c_scale,f_auto,q_auto:good,w_960/v1594548502/maggieappleton.com/notes/neocyborgs/cyborgs_15.jpg"
/>

<img
  alt="Slides from my talk on becoming a neo cartesian cyborg"
  src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dg3gyk0gu/image/upload/c_scale,f_auto,q_auto:good,w_960/v1594548507/maggieappleton.com/notes/neocyborgs/cyborgs_37.jpg"
/>

<img
  alt="Slides from my talk on becoming a neo cartesian cyborg"
  src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dg3gyk0gu/image/upload/c_scale,f_auto,q_auto:good,w_960/v1594548508/maggieappleton.com/notes/neocyborgs/cyborgs_41.jpg"
/>

<img
  alt="Slides from my talk on becoming a neo cartesian cyborg"
  src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dg3gyk0gu/image/upload/c_scale,f_auto,q_auto:good,w_960/v1594548505/maggieappleton.com/notes/neocyborgs/cyborgs_30.jpg"
/>

<img
  alt="Slides from my talk on becoming a neo cartesian cyborg"
  src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dg3gyk0gu/image/upload/c_scale,f_auto,q_auto:good,w_960/v1594548503/maggieappleton.com/notes/neocyborgs/cyborgs_24.jpg"
/>

<img
  alt=""
  src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dg3gyk0gu/image/upload/c_scale,f_auto,q_auto:good,w_960/v1594548504/maggieappleton.com/notes/neocyborgs/cyborgs_25.jpg"
/>

<img
  alt="Slides from my talk on becoming a neo cartesian cyborg"
  src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dg3gyk0gu/image/upload/c_scale,f_auto,q_auto:good,w_960/v1594548504/maggieappleton.com/notes/neocyborgs/cyborgs_26.jpg"
/>

<img
  alt="Slides from my talk on becoming a neo cartesian cyborg"
  src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dg3gyk0gu/image/upload/c_scale,f_auto,q_auto:good,w_960/v1594548505/maggieappleton.com/notes/neocyborgs/cyborgs_31.jpg"
/>

<img
  alt="Slides from my talk on becoming a neo cartesian cyborg"
  src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dg3gyk0gu/image/upload/c_scale,f_auto,q_auto:good,w_960/v1594548499/maggieappleton.com/notes/neocyborgs/cyborgs_1.jpg"
/>

<img
  alt="Slides from my talk on becoming a neo cartesian cyborg"
  src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dg3gyk0gu/image/upload/c_scale,f_auto,q_auto:good,w_960/v1594548508/maggieappleton.com/notes/neocyborgs/cyborgs_42.jpg"
/>

<img
  alt="Slides from my talk on becoming a neo cartesian cyborg"
  src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dg3gyk0gu/image/upload/c_scale,f_auto,q_auto:good,w_960/v1594548509/maggieappleton.com/notes/neocyborgs/cyborgs_43.jpg"
/>

<img
  alt="Slides from my talk on becoming a neo cartesian cyborg"
  src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dg3gyk0gu/image/upload/c_scale,f_auto,q_auto:good,w_960/v1594548505/maggieappleton.com/notes/neocyborgs/cyborgs_27.jpg"
/>

<img
  alt="Slides from my talk on becoming a neo cartesian cyborg"
  src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dg3gyk0gu/image/upload/c_scale,f_auto,q_auto:good,w_960/v1594548503/maggieappleton.com/notes/neocyborgs/cyborgs_23.jpg"
/>

<img
  alt="Slides from my talk on becoming a neo cartesian cyborg"
  src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dg3gyk0gu/image/upload/c_scale,f_auto,q_auto:good,w_960/v1594548503/maggieappleton.com/notes/neocyborgs/cyborgs_22.jpg"
/>

<img
  alt="Slides from my talk on becoming a neo cartesian cyborg"
  src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dg3gyk0gu/image/upload/c_scale,f_auto,q_auto:good,w_960/v1594548503/maggieappleton.com/notes/neocyborgs/cyborgs_21.jpg"
/>

<img
  alt="Slides from my talk on becoming a neo cartesian cyborg"
  src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dg3gyk0gu/image/upload/c_scale,f_auto,q_auto:good,w_960/v1594548507/maggieappleton.com/notes/neocyborgs/cyborgs_38.jpg"
/>

<img
  alt="Slides from my talk on becoming a neo cartesian cyborg"
  src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dg3gyk0gu/image/upload/c_scale,f_auto,q_auto:good,w_960/v1594548509/maggieappleton.com/notes/neocyborgs/cyborgs_44.jpg"
/>

<img
  alt="Slides from my talk on becoming a neo cartesian cyborg"
  src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dg3gyk0gu/image/upload/c_scale,f_auto,q_auto:good,w_960/v1594548505/maggieappleton.com/notes/neocyborgs/cyborgs_29.jpg"
/>

<img
  alt="Slides from my talk on becoming a neo cartesian cyborg"
  src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dg3gyk0gu/image/upload/c_scale,f_auto,q_auto:good,w_960/v1594548506/maggieappleton.com/notes/neocyborgs/cyborgs_34.jpg"
/>

<img
  alt="Slides from my talk on becoming a neo cartesian cyborg"
  src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dg3gyk0gu/image/upload/c_scale,f_auto,q_auto:good,w_960/v1594548506/maggieappleton.com/notes/neocyborgs/cyborgs_33.jpg"
/>

<img
  alt="Slides from my talk on becoming a neo cartesian cyborg"
  src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dg3gyk0gu/image/upload/c_scale,f_auto,q_auto:good,w_960/v1594548506/maggieappleton.com/notes/neocyborgs/cyborgs_35.jpg"
/>

<img
  alt="Slides from my talk on becoming a neo cartesian cyborg"
  src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dg3gyk0gu/image/upload/c_scale,f_auto,q_auto:good,w_960/v1594548506/maggieappleton.com/notes/neocyborgs/cyborgs_36.jpg"
/>

<Center>

## Books Mentioned in the Talk

</Center>

<ResourceBook
  url="https://www.librarything.com/work/68400"
  image="/images/books/naturalcyborgs.webp"
  title="Natural-Born Cyborgs"
  author="Andy Clark"
>
  Philosopher and cognitive scientist Andy Clark proposes that what makes humans
  so different from other species is our capacity to fully incorporate tools and
  supporting cultural practices into our existence.
</ResourceBook>

<ResourceBook
  url="/descarteserror"
  image="/images/books/descarteserror.webp"
  title="Descartes Error: Emotion, Reason, and the Human Brain"
  author="Antonio Damasio"
>
  Through a series of neuroscience case studies, Antonio Damasio challenges
  traditional ideas about the connection between emotions and rationality.
  Damasio shows that emotions are not a luxury, but an essential part of
  rational thinking and normal social behaviour.
</ResourceBook>

<ResourceBook
  url="https://www.librarything.com/work/63333"
  image="/images/books/mwlb.webp"
  title="Metaphors We Live By"
  author="George Lakoff & Mark Johnson"
>
  The now-classic Metaphors We Live By changed our understanding of metaphor and
  its role in language and the mind. Lakoff and Johnson argue that metaphor is a
  fundamental mechanism of mind, one that allows us to map our physical and
  social experiences onto countless other subjects.
</ResourceBook>

<ResourceBook
  url="https://www.librarything.com/work/45956"
  image="/images/books/flesh.webp"
  title="Philosophy in the Flesh"
  author="George Lakoff & Mark Johnson"
>
  Lakoff and Johnson philosophically examine our historical understanding of
  minds, bodies, and reasoning through a radically new and detailed
  understandings of modern cognitive science. They re-examine the basic concepts
  of the mind, time, causation, morality, and the self.
</ResourceBook>


A lightening talk I gave on second brains and cyborg embodiment

How to Become a Neo-Cartesian Cyborg


<IntroParagraph>

A[ndy Matuschak](https://andymatuschak.org/) proposed the term [Evergreen Notes](https://notes.andymatuschak.org/z4SDCZQeRo4xFEQ8H4qrSqd68ucpgE6LU155C) to describe a system of note-taking that aspires towards cumulative personal knowledge, rather than simply information capture.

</IntroParagraph>

<BasicImage
  width="1000px"
  alt="Evergreen notes are a fundamental unit of knowledge work. They're a way to build up a personal library of clear opinions, beliefs, and original thoughts."
  src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dxj9qr5gj/image/upload/c_scale,f_auto,q_auto:best,w_1200/v1626013083/maggieappleton.com/notes/evergreen-notes/Evergreen_Notes_03_cyjnrl_shrink_urtoqe.png"
/>

The idea builds off many other note-taking philosophies like Niklas Luhmann's [Zettelkasten](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zettelkasten) method <Footnote idName={1}>Andy also wrote a good post [Comparing Evergreens vs Zettles](https://notes.andymatuschak.org/z4AX7pHAu5uUfmrq4K4zig9x8jmmF62XgaMXm)</Footnote>, and Sonke Ahren's [How to Take Smart Notes](https://www.librarything.com/work/21425376) system.

My personal notes system has been heavily influenced by the Evergreening ethos. In both my [[Roam Garden]] and on this very [[Digital Gardening]] website. My notes taxonomy flows from "Seedlings" to "Budding" to "Evergreens"

To help myself internalise some of the main Evergreen principles, I illustrated them out below. <Footnote idName={2}>These aren't a comprehensive explanation, so I recommend reading the [original source material](https://notes.andymatuschak.org/z4SDCZQeRo4xFEQ8H4qrSqd68ucpgE6LU155C) if this piques your interest.</Footnote>

<br />

<Center>

## Evergreen Notes Should Be...

</Center>

<BasicImage
  width="750px"
  alt="Atomic notes should capture one single idea concisely and in its entirety"
  src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dxj9qr5gj/image/upload/c_scale,f_auto,q_auto:best,w_900/v1626013083/maggieappleton.com/notes/evergreen-notes/Evergreen_Notes_13_ecugdv_shrink_o8p6pr.png"
/>

<BasicImage
  width="750px"
  alt="Densely-linked notes help you connect them through organic associations rather than heirarchical structures"
  src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dxj9qr5gj/image/upload/c_scale,f_auto,q_auto:best,w_900/v1626013083/maggieappleton.com/notes/evergreen-notes/Evergreen_Notes_05_bz2g7l_shrink_nlx03o.png"
/>

<BasicImage
  width="850px"
  alt="Notes should have imperative and declarative titles that make clear statements"
  src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dxj9qr5gj/image/upload/c_scale,f_auto,q_auto:best,w_1000/v1626013083/maggieappleton.com/notes/evergreen-notes/Evergreen_Notes_09_qaql67_shrink_kzbsed.png"
/>

<BasicImage
  width="1000px"
  alt="Notes should be concept-oriented. This means they're based around big ideas rather than specific books, articles, or media"
  src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dxj9qr5gj/image/upload/c_scale,f_auto,q_auto:best,w_1100/v1626013083/maggieappleton.com/notes/evergreen-notes/Evergreen_Notes_17_cqejme_shrink_vyhjaq.png"
/>


Illustrated notes on the concept of 'Evergreen notes' and how to write them

Growing the Evergreens


I've been looking into both [[Pattern Languages]] and [[Computer-Supported Collaborative Learning]] over the past month.

The [Knowledge Hydrant](http://www.industriallogic.com/papers/khdraft.pdf) is where these two meet in a lovely swirl of collaborative learning and organically emergent systems.

It's a draft document written up by [Joshua Kerievsky](https://twitter.com/JoshuaKerievsky) in 1999. The mini-manifesto describes a set of **Design Patterns** that people can use to set up their own indie study groups outside of formal structures like universities.

While the original focused on IRL, "co-present" <Footnote idName={1}>Getting real good at the [[Computer-Supported Collaborative Learning]] buzzwords and jargon over here</Footnote> groups, I'm fascinated by how we might adapt these patterns and turn them into internet-friendly, distributed digital versions.

Here's notes on the original while I'm thinking it through...

<BasicImage
  width="900px"
  alt="A fire hydrant framed by the words 'The knowledge hydrant'"
  src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dg3gyk0gu/image/upload/c_scale,w_800/v1593449022/maggieappleton.com/notes/knowledge-hydrant/knowledge-hydrant-1.png"
/>

<BasicImage
  width="1000px"
  alt="There are 21 patterns split into four groups – spirit, atmosphere, roles, and customs"
  src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dg3gyk0gu/image/upload/c_scale,w_800/v1593449021/maggieappleton.com/notes/knowledge-hydrant/knowledge-hydrant-2.png"
/>

<BasicImage
  width="1000px"
  alt="Step 1 is to find your knowledge hydrant – your source of important and worthwhile material"
  src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dg3gyk0gu/image/upload/c_scale,w_750/v1593449020/maggieappleton.com/notes/knowledge-hydrant/knowledge-hydrant-3.png"
/>

<BasicImage
  width="1000px"
  alt="Step 2 is to create a pool of insight – establihs a regular study group to discuss and debate key texts"
  src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dg3gyk0gu/image/upload/c_scale,w_750/v1593449020/maggieappleton.com/notes/knowledge-hydrant/knowledge-hydrant-4.png"
/>


Illustrated notes on the Knowledge Hydrant guide to collaborative learning

The Knowledge Hydrant


<IntroParagraph>

S[tian Håklev](http://reganmian.net/blog/), a fellow [[Roam Gardener]] and twitter friend, clued me in to the field of **Computer-Supported Collaborative Learning**.<Footnote idName={1}>Stian is a fascinating thinker, and I'd recommend [this podcast interview](https://louis-and-kyle.simplecast.com/episodes/stian-haklev-012) to hear about his PhD in CSCL and applying it at [The Minerva Project](https://www.minervaproject.com/)</Footnote> Much like the name suggests, it's an academic discipline exploring the possibilities of pedagogy and education where **collaboration** and **computers** are first-class considerations.

</IntroParagraph>

Rather than treating digital mediums as a supportive system or extra add-on in a normal classroom environment, they're **The Main Thing**. And rather than focusing on how _individuals_ learn and understand, knowledge building as a _group_ is prioritised.

It's a reaction against what's known as the _"direct transmission"_ model – the view that learning is an individual experience of **passively receiving content** from someone lecturing at you.

TLDR; it's an entire academic discipline studying how we can build digitally-mediated [Communities of Practice](http://edutechwiki.unige.ch/en/Community_of_practice) for learning <Footnote idName={2}>Or, in their own words... "CSCL is a field of study centrally concerned with meaning and the practices of meaning-making in the context of joint activity, and the ways in which these practices are mediated through designed artifacts." <br/> [Stahl, G. (2002) Computer Support For Collaborative Learning](http://www.gerrystahl.net/hci/cscl2002intro.pdf)</Footnote>.

Stian warned me that, like almost all academic disciplines, they haven't mastered the art of [Learning in Public](https://www.swyx.io/writing/learn-in-public/). Some cursory research made it clear the main medium of communication for these folks is obscure academic conference papers and £200 scholarly publications.

The buzzwords and acronyms are stacked high.

This page is a record of my research as I wander into the world of CSCL – wide-eyed, naive, and excitable.

## Key Concepts and Essential Questions

#### Collaborative Learning Not Guaranteed

CSCL does not claim collaboration is a silver bullet solution to effective learning. Quite the opposite.

All the papers makes clear that collaboration in and of itself doesn't magically produce understanding. **Instead, it needs to be designed, structured, and carefully facilitated to lead to learning.**

The most effective techniques are not surprising...

- Meaningful discussion, debate, and negotiation that forces us to question our assumptions and revise our conclusions.
- Explaining your thinking to another human, out loud or in writing, quickly shows how well you know the material.
- Solving a problem, then comparing your solution to someone elses, and mutually agreeing upon the strengths and weaknesses of each.

Most of the research focuses on designing these intentional collaborative experiences. As well as the systems that make them possible (aka. apps, tools, platforms, all that jazz).

These are not new pedagogical findings, but CSCL is exploring how digital mediums are particularly well-suited to enabling them. Not just within small groups, but at scale.

Computer magic means we can have multiple, intertwining discussions all going on simultaneously. With a far wider range of expertise, experiences, and perspectives. Hence, Twitter.

<br />

<TwoColumn maxWidth="1200px" alignItems="flex-start">

<SimpleCard alignLeft>

"Collaborative Learning does not just mean that individual learning is enhanced by participation in small groups; <mark>it means that it is the groups themselves that learn."</mark> Knowledge is a product of the collaboration process: it <b>arises through interaction of different perspectives</b>, heats up in the cauldron of public discourse, is gradually refined through negotiation, and is <b>codified and preserved in cultural or scientific artifacts</b>"

<p className="subtext">Computer Support For Collaborative Learning: Foundations for a CSCL Community – [Stahl (2002)](http://www.gerrystahl.net/hci/cscl2002intro.pdf)</p>

</SimpleCard>

<SimpleCard alignLeft>

"Collaboration leads to positive outcomes only when students engage in **knowledge generative interactions** such as **giving explanations**, and engaging in **argumentation, negotiation, conflict resolution or mutual regulation**""

<p className="subtext">Designing Integrative Scripts – [Dillenbourg and Jermann (2007)](https://www.researchgate.net/publication/227598981_Designing_Integrative_Scripts)</p>

</SimpleCard>

<SimpleCard alignLeft>

"The occurrence of **knowledge-generative interactions** is not a given: such <mark>interactions do not necessarily emerge spontaneously"</mark> (Cohen 1994; Salomon and Globerson 1989)

<p className="subtext">Computer Supported Collaborative Learning and Intelligent Tutoring Systems – [Tchounikine, Rummel, and McLaren (2010)](https://www.cs.cmu.edu/~bmclaren/pubs/TchounikineEtAl-CSCLandITS-ITSBook2010.pdf)</p>

</SimpleCard>

</TwoColumn>

### Creating Structure with Macro-scripts

It quickly became clear that **macro-scripts** are the bread and butter of CSCL systems. These are the [[Pattern Languages]] of the field that create structured collaboration.

CSCL Macro-scripts describe how a learning experience will play out.
On a general level, they define **a sequence of activities** focused around **a learning goal.** The learners all have assigned **roles** and follow a set of **constraints and rules for interaction.**

It sets up the whole dinner party for you, so participants can just show up and know all the learning logistics are taken care of.

That might sound a bit prescriptive. Until you realise every social interaction you engage in works this way. But most of the time our scripts and roles are so internalised they become invisible.

When we walk into a grocery store we play the role of shopper and follow the put-stuff-in-basket script. It would be disastrously off-script to begin eating a fresh croissant while standing in the bakery aisle, or to walk behind a checkout counter and begin scanning our own groceries. We have all been 
_enculturated_<Footnote isClosed idName={3}>The process by which people learn the dynamics of their surrounding culture and acquire values and norms appropriate or necessary in that culture and worldviews – [Enculturation on Wikipedia](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Enculturation)</Footnote> to follow the script. <Footnote idName={4}>What I'm describing is a well-established social theory developed by many people, but my favourite is [Erving Goffman](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Erving_Goffman)'s account that he presented in the classic book [Frame Analysis](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Frame_analysis). Goffman refers to the social setting that scripts play out in as a "Frame"</Footnote>

Scripts make it much more likely learners will **develop a thorough understanding of the material**, and come away with **original perspectives on it.**

There's also a need for a fine balance of structure and improvisation. If scripts are too weak the learning experience falls apart. If they're too rigid or irrelevant, interactions become boring, sterile, and rote.

<br />

<TwoColumn maxWidth="1200px" alignItems="flex-start">

<SimpleCard alignLeft>

"CSCL scripts are primarily considered as support devices enabling learners to **stick to an effective pattern of collaboration more easily** and to obtain improved learning outcomes" (156)

<p className="subtext">Scripting Computer-Supported Collaborative Learning: Cognitive, Computationaland Educational Perspectives – [Fischer, F. et al. (2007)](https://www.researchgate.net/publication/321610653_Scripting_Computer-Supported_Collaborative_Learning_Cognitive_Computational_and_Educational_Perspectives)</p>

</SimpleCard>

<SimpleCard alignLeft>

"Free collaboration does not systematically produce learning. One way to enhance the effectiveness of collaborative learning is to **structure interactions by engaging students in well-defined scripts**. A collaboration script is a set of instructions prescribing how students should form groups, how they should interact and collaborate and how they should solve the problem"

<p className="subtext">Over-scripting CSCL: The risks of blending collaborative learning withinstructional design – [Dillenbourg (2002)](https://pdfs.semanticscholar.org/1556/e5d2f93f6400457b422a011d7d93a3aa29fe.pdf)</p>

</SimpleCard>

</TwoColumn>

### Playing the Role

One of the most intruiging elements of macro-scripts is that they define **clear roles** for each participant.

Most of us have been in meetings with assigned _facilitators_ and _scribes_, but we rarely expand beyond these.

Why stop there? What if we add in...

- A _Research-Runner_ who is in charge of fetching up links and references mentioned in the discussion.
- A _Sceptic_ or _Devil's Advocate_ who (constructively) raises objections and counter-opinions
- A _Timekeeper_ who moves us through the learning plan on schedule
- A _Summariser_ who captures the group's conclusions in succinct statements
- A _Reflector_ who mirrors people's points back to them in their own words
- An _Explorer_ responsible for gathering wildly off-beat references outside the traditional domain

There's a huge range of role options that you can pick and choose from depending on the size, synchronicity, and goals of the group.

The [Group Work Roles](http://edutechwiki.unige.ch/en/Group_work_roles) page on EduTech Wiki (an overall great place) elaborates on this list.

### What's a "Community of Practice"?

Coined by [Etienne Wegner](https://wenger-trayner.com/), a community of practice is a group of people "who **share a concern, a set of problems, or a passion about a topic**, and who deepen their knowledge and expertise by interacting on an ongoing basis."<Footnote idName={5}>[Introduction to br /communities of practice](https://wenger-trayner.com/introduction-to-communities-of-practice/) - Etienne and Beverly Wenger-Trayner (2015)</Footnote>

It's a collection of people who are into the same stuff as you, that you end up stumbling into organically. In an ad-hoc decentralised way, you start collectively problem-solving and learning with them in a weird, emergent, beautiful process.

No one plans the community. No one regulates or controls it. There is no central calendar of events.

You earn membership by proving you have the right domain expertise and [Cultural Capital](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cultural_capital) to belong there. This doesn't necessarily mean an official domain like Biochemical Engineering. Knitting clubs and Favela gangs have equally valid kinds of domain expertise.

CSCL mentions Communities of Practice a lot. While much of the research focuses on your typical K-12 formal school institutions, there's a decent branch of it trying to figure out how we can foster and facilitate better CoP's.


Notes on the academic field of CSCL and major papers in the discipline

A Naive Exploration of Computer-Supported Collaborative Learning


<IntroParagraph>

There's an established concept called **Silent Meetings**. Much like it sounds, it's a meeting where for the most part no one talks.

</IntroParagraph>

Rather than one PowerPoint dictator lecturing to a room full of checked-out people, silent meetings shift discussion into online collaborative documents.

Everyone sits quietly on their own device and comments on a **"Table Read"** – a shared document in Google Docs or Figma or a webpage annotated with <a href="https://hypothes.is">Hypothes.is</a>

People add comments and discussion points to the document directly. They're able to easily refer to specific parts, respond to other people's comments, and **run multiple threaded discussions**. Instead of one leader or instructor talking **at** many people, it's many people all talking **to** each other.

David Gasca wrote up a <a href="https://medium.com/swlh/the-silent-meeting-manifesto-v1-189e9e3487eb">comprehensive manifesto</a> on the phenomenon in 2019 that dives into the implementation details for using them at companies.

While it's a great concept for Corporateland, I'm keen to explore how we could use it for collaborative learning communities online.

Many of my [[Cozy Web]] communities are full of voracious readers. We're often looking for ways to run ad-hoc book clubs and reading groups, but the established formats are fairly vanilla. Standard Zoom calls. Or async stream discussions in Slack-esque apps.

The tools are janky. The [[Pattern Languages]] aren't well established. Systems like [[the Knowledge Hydrant]] give us good starting points, but aren't designed with an online environment in mind.

One challenge of distributed learning is the coordination around timing. **Async reading doesn't focus collective attention in one place at one time.**

Picking a single time to 'meet' in a document gives people a structured frame to fully focus on reading, thinking, and discussing

The opportunity to follow up with a video or voice call right after also creates space for social bonding, nuanced conversations, and collaborative meaning-making. It prevents Twitter-esque brutality and presumptive misunderstandings.

I'm beginning to try this out. TBD


Notes on how to run silent meetings and reading sessions

Silent Synchronous Reading Sessions


<IntroParagraph>

Suspense is [an upcoming React feature](https://reactjs.org/docs/concurrent-mode-suspense.html) that's part of the new "concurrent mode." Since everyone is getting all hyped up about it, I wanted to figure out what the excitement was and drew some quick summary notes.

</IntroParagraph>

<BasicImage
  width="800px"
  alt="Wtf is React supense?"
  src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dg3gyk0gu/image/upload/c_scale,w_750/v1592262756/maggieappleton.com/egghead-course-notes/reactsuspense/WftReactSuspense_1.png"
/>

<BasicImage
  alt="Allows us to suspend rendering parts of our app until a particular condition is met, such as waiting until our data load. This keeps our interface interactive."
  src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dg3gyk0gu/image/upload/c_scale,w_900/v1592262756/maggieappleton.com/egghead-course-notes/reactsuspense/WftReactSuspense_2.png"
/>

<BasicImage
  alt="This allows us to prioritize the order that elements render in, based on those conditions. From high priority to low priority."
  src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dg3gyk0gu/image/upload/c_scale,w_900/v1592262754/maggieappleton.com/egghead-course-notes/reactsuspense/WftReactSuspense_4.png"
/>

<BasicImage
  alt="We create a suspense boundary around our components, and declare a fallback element to display while the data is loading."
  src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dg3gyk0gu/image/upload/c_scale,w_900/v1592262755/maggieappleton.com/egghead-course-notes/reactsuspense/WftReactSuspense_3.png"
/>

This is a pretty lightweight intro, but you get the gist of it. CSS-Tricks has a nice in-depth write up on [React Suspense in Practice](https://css-tricks.com/react-suspense-in-practice/)

If you're looking to properly learn how React suspense works, [Kent C. Dodds](https://twitter.com/kentcdodds) and [Michael Chan](https://twitter.com/chantastic) both made egghead courses on it

<ImageLink href="https://egghead.io/courses/use-suspense-to-simplify-your-async-ui">
  <ImageFrame
    width="800px"
    alt="Shareable Custom Hooks in React"
    src="https://og-image-egghead-course.now.sh/use-suspense-to-simplify-your-async-ui"
  />
</ImageLink>

<ImageLink href="https://egghead.io/courses/build-an-app-with-react-suspense">
  <ImageFrame
    width="800px"
    alt="Shareable Custom Hooks in React"
    src="https://og-image-egghead-course.now.sh/build-an-app-with-react-suspense"
  />
</ImageLink>

### Want to know what the fork is going on with other web development topics?

Take a look at [[What the Fork is xState?]], [[What the Fork is Rust?]], or the [[What the Fork is Babel?]]


Illustrated notes on how React suspense works

What the Fork is React Suspense?


<IntroParagraph>

I've made plenty of illustrated notes for <a href="https://egghead.io/">egghead</a> courses.  
On everything from [[Building Custom React Hooks]] to [[Fixing Common Git Mistakes]] to [[The Basics of Rust]]

</IntroParagraph>

They've always been artefacts made in post-production. I draw them after the course has already been planned, and the videos are all recorded. Over the last month I've been experimenting with a more collaborative approach.

Rather than treating our illustrations as a shiny add-on made by one person, I wanted to directly involve our course instructors and figure out how to **directly pair their expertise with my visual thinking skills**. So I started running visual workshopping sessions.

We hop on a Zoom call and open up a shared canvas in <a href="https://miro.com/">Miro</a> or <a href="https://excalidraw.com/">Excalidraw</a>. <Footnote idName={1}>They're both great and do the trick for the task at hand. I recommend playing with both!</Footnote>
We pick out a few of the toughest concepts, and begin making extremely rough diagrams. Experimental ugliness is the whole point.

We just did our first trial of this with <a href="https://tlakomy.com">Tomasz Lakomy</a>'s new course on <a href="https://egghead.io/courses/build-an-app-with-the-aws-cloud-development-kit">AWS Cloud Development</a>.

Here's Tomasz thinking very hard about API Gateways and Lambda Functions

<ImageFrame
  width="1200px"
  alt="A screenshot of the zoom video call where we're drawing out rough diagrams"
  src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dg3gyk0gu/image/upload/c_scale,w_1200/v1592314229/maggieappleton.com/notes/visual-aws/workshop-screen.png"
/>

## The Process

The visuals we made during the workshopping session were mostly made of boxes
and arrows and labels like this:

<ImageFrame
  width="950px"
  alt="A sketchy diagram of the elements inside an AWS data centre"
  src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dg3gyk0gu/image/upload/c_scale,w_950/v1592317154/maggieappleton.com/notes/visual-aws/aws-cdk-post-10.png"
/>

It's all you really need to establish the basics. Nouns (things) are boxes,
and verbs (actions and events) are arrows.

After the workshopping call I looked back over the diagrams, and sketched out
an illustrated version that adds a bit more clarity and dimension to the
scene:

<ImageFrame
  width="950px"
  alt="A blue pencil sketch of the elements inside an AWS data centre and how they connect to a React app"
  src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dg3gyk0gu/image/upload/c_scale,w_950/v1592317154/maggieappleton.com/notes/visual-aws/aws-cdk-post-11.png"
/>

I ran the sketch by Tomasz to make sure all the technical details were
correct. Then did a final linework pass over the top to neaten everything up:

<BasicImage
  width="950px"
  alt="A refined ink ilustration showing the relationship between a React app, AWS API gateway, and lambda functions"
  src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dg3gyk0gu/image/upload/c_scale,f_auto,q_auto:good,w_1200/v1592317154/maggieappleton.com/notes/visual-aws/aws-cdk-post-12.png"
/>

We ended up with five of these illustrations that cover all the main concepts of
the course

<Center>

## The Whole Series

</Center>

<TwoColumn maxWidth="1400px" alignItems="flex-start">

<ImageFrame
  width="720px"
  alt="Rough sketches of the location of AWS data centres"
  src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dg3gyk0gu/image/upload/c_scale,f_auto,q_auto:good,w_1200/v1592317152/maggieappleton.com/notes/visual-aws/aws-cdk-post-7.png"
/>

<ImageFrame
  width="720px"
  alt="Blue pencil sketches of the location of AWS data centres"
  src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dg3gyk0gu/image/upload/c_scale,f_auto,q_auto:good,w_1200/v1592317153/maggieappleton.com/notes/visual-aws/aws-cdk-post-8.png"
/>

</TwoColumn>

<BasicImage
  width="950px"
  alt="Final illustration of the location of AWS data centres"
  src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dg3gyk0gu/image/upload/c_scale,f_auto,q_auto:good,w_1200/v1592317155/maggieappleton.com/notes/visual-aws/aws-cdk-post-9.png"
/>

---

<TwoColumn maxWidth="1400px" alignItems="flex-start">

<ImageFrame
  width="720px"
  alt=""
  src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dg3gyk0gu/image/upload/c_scale,f_auto,q_auto:good,w_1200/v1592317155/maggieappleton.com/notes/visual-aws/aws-cdk-post-13.png"
/>

<ImageFrame
  width="720px"
  src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dg3gyk0gu/image/upload/c_scale,f_auto,q_auto:good,w_1200/v1592317156/maggieappleton.com/notes/visual-aws/aws-cdk-post-14.png"
/>

</TwoColumn>

<BasicImage
  alt=""
  width="950px"
  src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dg3gyk0gu/image/upload/c_scale,w_950/v1592317155/maggieappleton.com/notes/visual-aws/aws-cdk-post-15.png"
/>

<BasicImage
  alt=""
  width="950px"
  src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dg3gyk0gu/image/upload/c_scale,w_950/v1592317157/maggieappleton.com/notes/visual-aws/aws-cdk-post-16.png"
/>

---

<TwoColumn maxWidth="1400px" alignItems="flex-start">

<ImageFrame
  alt=""
  width="720px"
  src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dg3gyk0gu/image/upload/c_scale,f_auto,q_auto:good,w_1200/v1592317152/maggieappleton.com/notes/visual-aws/aws-cdk-post-4.png"
/>

<ImageFrame
  alt=""
  width="720px"
  src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dg3gyk0gu/image/upload/c_scale,f_auto,q_auto:good,w_1200/v1592317151/maggieappleton.com/notes/visual-aws/aws-cdk-post-5.png"
/>

</TwoColumn>

<BasicImage
  alt=""
  width="950px"
  src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dg3gyk0gu/image/upload/c_scale,f_auto,q_auto:good,w_1200/v1592317153/maggieappleton.com/notes/visual-aws/aws-cdk-post-6.png"
/>

---

<TwoColumn maxWidth="1400px" alignItems="flex-start">

<ImageFrame
  alt=""
  width="720px"
  src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dg3gyk0gu/image/upload/c_scale,f_auto,q_auto:good,w_1200/v1592317151/maggieappleton.com/notes/visual-aws/aws-cdk-post-1.png"
/>

<ImageFrame
  alt=""
  width="720px"
  src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dg3gyk0gu/image/upload/c_scale,f_auto,q_auto:good,w_1200/v1592317152/maggieappleton.com/notes/visual-aws/aws-cdk-post-2.png"
/>

</TwoColumn>

<BasicImage
  alt=""
  width="950px"
  src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dg3gyk0gu/image/upload/c_scale,f_auto,q_auto:good,w_1200/v1592317152/maggieappleton.com/notes/visual-aws/aws-cdk-post-3.png"
/>

If you're just here for all the gritty details of AWS you might want to check out the course itself. If you're here for the visual process, I popped a few more thoughts below..

<ImageLink href="https://egghead.io/courses/build-an-app-with-the-aws-cloud-development-kit">
  <ImageFrame
    alt="Shareable Custom Hooks in React"
    src="https://og-image-egghead-course.now.sh/build-an-app-with-the-aws-cloud-development-kit"
  />
</ImageLink>

## Collaborative Minds > Beginners Mind

I may know a few things about how to visually explain ideas, but I usually
know _next to nothing_ about the topic of any given course.

There are some advantages to this.
Beginners mind is a beautiful thing.

But it has it's limitations. Because in order to visually explain something _well_, you need to truly understand it.

When we draw there are no vague relationships or fuzzy edges.  
You have to make clear how all the parts of a system are related.  
What's above and below. What's a container and what's a substance.  
What actions and events are happening between elements.

It requires a nuanced understanding of the material.

My old beginners notes are still useful - they make the implicit explicit.
They explain concepts the expert would never think to.

But they also fall short in lots of ways. I make mistakes. I skim the surface of material. I can't dive deep on technical details.

Collaborative workshopping gives us the best of both worlds. I still get to ask dumb questions (purposefully), like **"is the React app above or below the GraphQL request?"** or **"does an S3 bucket have a lid?"**

It's the Socratic method for visual thinking.

Asking these odd questions helps us establish a vocabulary of shapes, sizes, colors, metaphors, and spatial relationships.

Our instructors have the deep context to answer these kind of questions well, and reason through why certain visual arrangements make more sense than others.

I'm just there to prod them in certain directions, and add a bit of polish afterwards.

We're doing plenty more of these. I can't wait <span>🤓</span>


Some insights into how I collaborative with experts to create illustrated notes on technical topics

Visually Workshopping the AWS Cloud


<BasicImage
  width="750px"
  src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dg3gyk0gu/image/upload/c_scale,w_980/v1576769959/maggieappleton.com/git-mistakes/FixGitMistakes_4.png"
  alt="Fixing common git mistakes"
/>

Illustrated notes I made while working through [Chris Achard](https://chrisachard.com/)'s [Fix Common Git Mistakes](https://egghead.io/courses/fix-common-git-mistakes) course on egghead.

<ImageLink href="https://egghead.io/courses/fix-common-git-mistakes">
  <ImageFrame
    alt="Course illustration of a set of git pipes being repaired"
    src="https://og-image-egghead-course.now.sh/fix-common-git-mistakes"
  />
</ImageLink>

<br />

<BasicImage
  width="1050px"
  src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dg3gyk0gu/image/upload/c_scale,w_980/v1590015687/maggieappleton.com/git-mistakes/FixGitMistakes_3.png"
  alt="Fixing common git mistakes"
/>

<BasicImage
  width="900px"
  src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dg3gyk0gu/image/upload/c_scale,w_980/v1590015790/maggieappleton.com/git-mistakes/FixGitMistakes_1.png"
  alt="Fixing common git mistakes"
/>

<BasicImage
  width="900px"
  src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dg3gyk0gu/image/upload/c_scale,w_980/v1590015637/maggieappleton.com/git-mistakes/Artboard_2.png"
  alt="Fixing common git mistakes"
/>

<BasicImage
  width="900px"
  src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dg3gyk0gu/image/upload/c_scale,w_980/v1590015638/maggieappleton.com/git-mistakes/Artboard_3.png"
  alt="Fixing common git mistakes"
/>

<BasicImage
  width="900px"
  src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dg3gyk0gu/image/upload/c_scale,w_960/v1590015643/maggieappleton.com/git-mistakes/Artboard_4.png"
  alt="Fixing common git mistakes"
/>

<BasicImage
  width="950px"
  src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dg3gyk0gu/image/upload/c_scale,w_980/v1590015844/maggieappleton.com/git-mistakes/FixGitMistakes_2.png"
  alt="Fixing common git mistakes"
/>

<BasicImage
  width="900px"
  src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dg3gyk0gu/image/upload/c_scale,w_980/v1590015640/maggieappleton.com/git-mistakes/Artboard_4_copy.png"
  alt="Fixing common git mistakes"
/>

### Want more illustrated notes on web development?

Take a look at [[Building Custom React Hooks]], [[What the Fork is Rust?]] or find out [[How Are Compilers & Transpilers Different?]]


Illustrated notes on common mistakes people make in Git, and how to fix them

Fixing Common Git Mistakes


I got the chance to chat with [Henry Zhu](https://www.henryzoo.com) on his [Maintainers Anonymous](https://maintainersanonymous.com/) podcast.

<Podcastiframe
  scrolling="no"
  src="https://share.transistor.fm/e/9d389287"
></Podcastiframe>

<Spacer size="small" />

It's a show about people who maintain things in the world. Whether it's code, cities, infrastructure, or museum archives, someone has to keep the decks clean and the engine stoked.

I'm not a maintainer (the only thing I reliably maintain is an obsessive tea habit), but I went on to chat to Henry about the overlap between the [open source software](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Open-source-software_movement) and the anthropological theory of [[Gift Economies]].

Gift theory, reciprocity, and economic anthropology are all side obsessions of mine. I originally trained as a cultural anthropologist, and it's still an enormous part of how I understand and operate in the world.

Like any good cult, once you're indoctrinated you can never leave.

<BasicImage
  alt="Illustration of a gift and the open source software symbol"
  width="300"
  src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dg3gyk0gu/image/upload/c_scale,f_auto,q_auto:good,w_1200/v1593552785/maggieappleton.com/notes/spot_gift.png"
/>

Henry and I began discussing the parallels between gift economies and open source software (OSS) last summer.

At the time I barely knew anything about OSS. Which made me fairly typical. 99.9% of the world haven't a clue about the rich, dramatic cultural history of Linux, or Xerox PARC, or the browser wars. Despite the fact 99.9% of the software we all depend upon is built using open source projects. It's invisibility and pervasiveness alone makes it worth a closer look.

Henry earned his stripes in the OSS world as the core maintainer of [[Babel]] - an open-source javascript [[transpiler]] that's used by the vast majority of javascript-based websites.

The Babel project, and Henry as its steward, is a fascinating case study in the open source software economy and where it's headed.

<Center>

### Not sure what Babel is?

Take a quick look at my [[WTF is Babel?]] illustrated explanation

</Center>

<BasicImage
  width="500px"
  alt="Illustrated words reading 'wtf is babel?'"
  src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dg3gyk0gu/image/upload/c_scale,w_600/v1593552781/maggieappleton.com/notes/babel_crop.png"
/>

Our chat is wide ranging discussion where we're both thinking out loud and exploring ideas, rather than coming to insightful or profound conclusions. We're doing some follow-up episodes in the coming months as well.

[Subscribe to the podcast](https://maintainersanonymous.com/) if you don't want to miss them.

## Things we Mention in the Episode

- What can Open Source Software learn from the anthropology of gift economies?
- [Emic vs. Etic](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Emic_and_etic) types of research in anthropology
- The three types of [reciprocity](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Reciprocity_(cultural_anthropology)) proposed by anthropologist Marshall Sahlins: _Generalised, Balanced, and Negative_. <Footnote idName={1}>Originally outlined in his 1972 book [Stone Age Economics](https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/28254.Stone_Age_Economics)</Footnote>
- The [Kula Ring](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kula_ring) of the Trobriand islands as the prototypical anthrolopogy example of a [[Gift Economy]].
- The [All Contributors](https://allcontributors.org/) system that acknowledges open source contributions for a wide range of skills
- [Negative](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Negative_liberty) vs. [positive](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Positive_liberty) freedom - Freedom from external constriants vs. the ability to act out of free will
- New tools that are enabling OSS communities – [Patreon](https://www.patreon.com/), [Github Sponsors](https://github.com/sponsors), and [Open Collective](https://opencollective.com/)
- How can we make the interactions and exchanges between contributors and maintainers more personal and relationship-based?
- Developers have enourmous cultural power in the world that is rarely acknowledged in the community. What developers value and believe comes out in what tools get built, which in turn shapes how culture evolves.
- The [[quantified self]] movement and the presumed value of quantifiying everything.
- [Epistemology](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Epistemology) and how we
  know what we know. The value of tacit, subjective truth in addition to explicit,
  objective truth. We're in a historical moment where the emphasis on the disembodied
  rationalist view has drowned out the value of embodied, personal knowing.
- [Personal Knowledge](https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/282032.Personal_Knowledge) by Michael Polanyi
- [Metaphors We Live By](https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/34459.Metaphors_We_Live_By) by George Lakoff
- Traditional hacker culture glorifying programming as a cerebral, disembodied activity.
  We haven't yet figured out how to make our digital tools embodied. Which carries over into how we experience social relationships through them.
- [Tools for Conviviality](https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/253076.Tools_for_Conviviality) by Ivan Illich
- The more professionalised skills become, the harder it is for people to join. Programming at least tries to knock down those gatekeepers and trumpets the narrative that we roll out the welcome mat for people. Open source often acts as that open door.

<Spacer size="small" />

<References>

#### Papers and Talks

- [Open source beyond the market](https://m.signalvnoise.com/open-source-beyond-the-market/) by David Heinemeier Hansson
- [The Moral Economy of Digital Gifts](https://www.jstor.org/stable/26179346) by Dave Elder-Vass
- [The Plural Economy of Gifts and Markets](https://www.researchgate.net/publication/326331925_The_Plural_economy_of_gifts_and_markets) by Ioana Negru

#### Books

<ResourceBook
  url="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Cathedral_and_the_Bazaar"
  image="/images/books/bazaar.webp"
  title="The Cathedral and the Bazaar"
  author="Eric Raymond"
>
  Perhaps the most infamous book on this topic, Raymond gives an insiders view
  of the history and practice of OS from the 1940s up to 1999. He proposes a
  foundational philosophy for the community, and a series of maxims for
  effective OS work
</ResourceBook>

<ResourceBook
  url="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/14891812-coding-freedom"
  image="/images/books/codingfreedom.webp"
  title="Coding Freedom: The Ethics and Aesthetics of Hacking"
  author="Gabriella Coleman"
>
  A distinctly anthropological exploration of OS, Coleman covers its history,
  philosophy, and cultural structures. Coleman is anthropologist specialising in
  open source hacker culture, Anonymous, 4chan, and all their tangential worlds
</ResourceBook>

<ResourceBook
  url="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/201766.The_Gift"
  image="/images/books/gift.webp"
  title="The Gift"
  author="Marcell Mauss"
>
  An anthropological classic on gift theory and gift economies. Published in
  1923, Marcel Mauss explores how systems of exchange work in traditional
  societies around the world in relation to politics, power, and kinship."
</ResourceBook>

<ResourceBook
  url="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/28254.Stone_Age_Economicst"
  image="/images/books/stoneage.webp"
  title="Stone Age Economics"
  author="Marshall Sahlins"
>
  A comparive study of economic structures exploring the wide variety found
  among hunter-gatherer societies. Discusses the meaning of affluence, material
  wealth, and how comminities build rituals around exchange and acts of
  reciprocity.
</ResourceBook>

<ResourceBook
  url="https://books.google.co.uk/books/about/Economies_and_cultures.html"
  image="/images/books/economiescultures.webp"
  title="Economies and Cultures: Foundations of Economic Anthropology"
  author="Richard Wilks"
>
  Okay, yes it's a textbook. But it's not as dry as most and gives a sweeping
  tour through the history of anthropological thought on economics, value
  systems, and social exchange.
</ResourceBook>

</References>


Notes from my podcast episode Open Source and Gift Economies on Maintainers Anonymous

A Chat with Henry Zhu on OSS & Gift Economies


<IntroParagraph>

Between IoT botnet attacks, Bitcoin ransomware, and the weekly cadence of high-profile data breaches, doing anything on the internet feels like playing Russian Roulette.

</IntroParagraph>

And that's just for normal people using it.

If you're a developer, you're partially **responsible** for protecting all those normal people from the horrors of whatever [LulzSec](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/LulzSec) are up to right now. The least you can do is make sure your website isn't an accessory to their nefarious activities.

Thankfully, you do not have to brave the black hat darkness alone.

[Mike Sherov](https://twitter.com/mikesherov) made an [egghead](https://egghead.io/courses/web-security-essentials-mitm-csrf-and-xss) course that covers a whole series of web security essentials

<ImageLink href="https://egghead.io/courses/web-security-essentials-mitm-csrf-and-xss">
  <ImageFrame
    width="800px"
    alt="Course illustration of objects in 3D space"
    src="https://og-image-egghead-course.now.sh/web-security-essentials-mitm-csrf-and-xss"
  />
</ImageLink>

I am (thankfully) not responsible enough for anyone to put me in charge of security for an important website. But I was still curious.

I wanted to know what the current landscape of internet risk looks like. How, _exactly_, is LulzSec going to hack into my mainframe in 2020?

Here's my illustrated notes from Mike's course that should give you a big picture overview of what to should look out for.

<BasicImage
  width="850px"
  alt="Web security essentials - Let's look at three common attacks"
  src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dg3gyk0gu/image/upload/c_scale,w_780/v1592262535/maggieappleton.com/egghead-course-notes/websecurity/web-security-1.png"
/>

Turns out there's a small set of fairly well-known and easy to defend attacks that we can protect ourselves from:

- Man in the Middle (MITM)
- Cross-Site Request Forgery (CSRF)
- Cross-Site Scripting (XSS)

Shielding yourself from these three is a great starting point. It's at least enough to keep the [script kiddies](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Script_kiddie) out.

<BasicImage
  width="1000px"
  alt="First, man in the middle is a piece of software that intercepts data between a client and a server"
  src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dg3gyk0gu/image/upload/c_scale,w_900/v1592262537/maggieappleton.com/egghead-course-notes/websecurity/web-security-2.png"
/>

<BasicImage
  width="950px"
  alt="If this connection is over HTTP all your data packets are readable cleartext. Anyone on the network can use a packet sniffer to see your data. Instead we use HTTPS to encrypt packets."
  src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dg3gyk0gu/image/upload/c_scale,w_900/v1592262538/maggieappleton.com/egghead-course-notes/websecurity/web-security-6.png"
/>

<BasicImage
  width="1000px"
  alt="How to protect yourself. Use HSTS headers. Require HTTPS everywhere. Redirect HTTP to HTTPS"
  src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dg3gyk0gu/image/upload/c_scale,w_900/v1592262533/maggieappleton.com/egghead-course-notes/websecurity/web-security-7.png"
/>

<BasicImage
  width="1000px"
  alt="Cross-site request forgery is an attack that tricks the user into visiting a malicious site while they're already logged into a trusted site"
  src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dg3gyk0gu/image/upload/c_scale,w_900/v1592262538/maggieappleton.com/egghead-course-notes/websecurity/web-security-3.png"
/>

<BasicImage
  width="1000px"
  alt="This is possible because browsers send cookies between sites by default. How to protect yourself. Cookies come with a 'sameSite' property that prevents them from being passed between sites. Set it to 'lax' or 'strict'"
  src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dg3gyk0gu/image/upload/c_scale,w_900/v1592262536/maggieappleton.com/egghead-course-notes/websecurity/web-security-4.png"
/>

<BasicImage
  width="1000px"
  alt="Cross-site scripting is an attack that injects malicious code into a trusted site. This can happen is the site allows user input to appear on the page without validating or encoding it. Protect yourself with a content security policy which manages which types of resources are allowed to load and where"
  src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dg3gyk0gu/image/upload/c_scale,w_900/v1592262536/maggieappleton.com/egghead-course-notes/websecurity/web-security-5.png"
/>

Keeping out this trio of attacks will go a long way.

If (unlike me) you _are_ responsible enough to be in charge of security for a moderately-sized website, it might be worth double checking you have these protections in place.

Better safe than sorry. Especially when sorry means you end up on the front page of Hacker News in this week's edition of obviously preventable security breaches.

<br />

<BasicImage
  alt="The fully illustrated notes on web security essentials"
  src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dg3gyk0gu/image/upload/c_scale,w_900/v1592262538/maggieappleton.com/egghead-course-notes/websecurity/web-security-final--small.png"
/>

---

### Want more illustrated notes on web development?

Take a look at [[Testing Apps with Cypress]], [[The JAMStack, Gatsby & Contentful]] or [[A Fresh Serving of JavaScript ES2019]]


Illustrated notes on the essentials of web security

Defend Your Cookies with Essential Web Security Tactics


[xState](https://xstate.js.org/) is a snazzy way to manage JavaScript application state using visual state charts.
It's a pretty wonderful tool for making sure you think through every possible edge case of an application.

There's also a handy [visualiser tool](https://xstate.js.org/viz/) that synchronizes your code and visuals. If you edit one, the other changes to match. <span aria-role="image">✨</span>

<ImageFrame
  alt="Screenshot of the xState visualizer"
  src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dg3gyk0gu/image/upload/c_scale,w_920/v1592930602/maggieappleton.com/egghead-course-notes/xstate/Screenshot_2020-06-23_at_17.41.45.png"
/>

<br />

It's perfect for visual thinkers. If someone could just build one of these for the entire of JavaScript I'll be all set.

Here's a little more illustrated detail on how this works:

<BasicImage
  width="900px"
  alt="Xstate is a tool that helps you plan out all the possible states in a JavaScript app"
  src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dg3gyk0gu/image/upload/c_scale,w_750/v1592931672/maggieappleton.com/egghead-course-notes/xstate/xState_5.png"
/>

<BasicImage
  width="800px"
  alt="There's a handy interactive visualizer tool at xstate.js.org/viz"
  src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dg3gyk0gu/image/upload/c_scale,w_860/v1592262779/maggieappleton.com/egghead-course-notes/xstate/xState_2.png"
/>

<BasicImage
  width="900px"
  alt="A sequence of light bulbs swapping states between unlit, lit, dim, and broken."
  src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dg3gyk0gu/image/upload/c_scale,w_900/v1592262781/maggieappleton.com/egghead-course-notes/xstate/xState_3.png"
/>

<BasicImage
  width="900px"
  alt="We can add extra options onto our states such as actions, services, guards, and activities"
  src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dg3gyk0gu/image/upload/c_scale,w_900/v1592262777/maggieappleton.com/egghead-course-notes/xstate/xState_4.png"
/>

If you're keen to learn more xState there's two courses up on egghead that cover all the basics:

<ImageLink href="https://egghead.io/courses/introduction-to-state-machines-using-xstate?af=54fd64">
  <ImageFrame
    width="800px"
    alt="Shareable Custom Hooks in React"
    src="https://og-image-egghead-course.now.sh/introduction-to-state-machines-using-xstate"
  />
</ImageLink>

<ImageLink href="https://egghead.io/courses/construct-sturdy-uis-with-xstate?af=54fd64">
  <ImageFrame
    width="800px"
    alt="Shareable Custom Hooks in React"
    src="https://og-image-egghead-course.now.sh/construct-sturdy-uis-with-xstate"
  />
</ImageLink>

---

### Want more illustrated notes on web development?

Take a look at [[Building VR Apps with React360]], [[A Journey into Vue-Router]], or [[Immutable Data with Immer and Personal Assistant Bots]]


Illustrated notes on how to build state machines with the xState library

What the Fork is xState?


<IntroParagraph>

I haven't explored the [Vue](https://vuejs.org/) framework much but it's got a thriving community, and I wanted to see how it compared to React, Svelte, and the 20 other font-end framework options.

</IntroParagraph>

<BasicImage
  width="500px"
  alt="A box with green vue roads coming out of it"
  src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dg3gyk0gu/image/upload/c_scale,f_auto,q_auto:good,w_1200/v1592262763/maggieappleton.com/egghead-course-notes/vuerouter/thumb_2x.png"
/>

I got to see inside the Vue-machine a little while working through [Laurie Barth](https://twitter.com/laurieontech)'s [egghead course](https://egghead.io/courses/a-journey-with-vue-router) on how to set up routes between Vue pages and components.

I made a few illustrated notes on the main concepts

<BasicImage
  width="1050px"
  alt="Journey with Vue Router"
  src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dg3gyk0gu/image/upload/c_scale,f_auto,q_auto:good,w_1200/v1592262764/maggieappleton.com/egghead-course-notes/vuerouter/VueRouter_1.png"
/>

<BasicImage
  width="1050px"
  alt="To setup, install and import vue router, create an empty array of routes, and pass that array into a new router function"
  src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dg3gyk0gu/image/upload/c_scale,f_auto,q_auto:good,w_1200/v1592262762/maggieappleton.com/egghead-course-notes/vuerouter/VueRouter_2.png"
/>

<BasicImage
  width="1050px"
  alt="When making new routes, each one needs a path and a component. We can also pass parameters to our routes"
  src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dg3gyk0gu/image/upload/c_scale,f_auto,q_auto:good,w_1200/v1592262765/maggieappleton.com/egghead-course-notes/vuerouter/VueRouter_3.png"
/>

<BasicImage
  width="1050px"
  alt="The wild card path acts as a cacthall for unknown routes"
  src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dg3gyk0gu/image/upload/c_scale,f_auto,q_auto:good,w_1200/v1592262764/maggieappleton.com/egghead-course-notes/vuerouter/VueRouter_4.png"
/>

<br />

If you're a Vue person and want to dive into this more, you can check out Laurie's course here...

<ImageLink href="https://egghead.io/courses/a-journey-with-vue-router">
  <ImageFrame
    alt="Shareable Custom Hooks in React"
    src="https://og-image-egghead-course.now.sh/a-journey-with-vue-router"
  />
</ImageLink>

### Want more illustrated notes on web development?

Take a look at [[Instachatting with Vue & Socket.io]], [[Immutable Data with Immer and Personal Assistant Bots]], or [[What the Fork is xState?]]


Illustrated notes on how routing works in Vue.js

A Journey into Vue-Router


<IntroParagraph>

The <a href="https://www.rust-lang.org/">Rust programming language</a> keeps winning the middle-school popularity contest of the developer world: "most loved" on <a href="https://insights.stackoverflow.com/survey/2019#technology">Stack Overflow surveys</a>.

</IntroParagraph>

<ImageFrame
  alt="Chart showing rust at the top of the rankings for most loved languages with 83.5%"
  width="800px"
  src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dg3gyk0gu/image/upload/c_scale,w_750/v1592262509/maggieappleton.com/egghead-course-notes/wtf-rust/stackoverflow.png"
/>

So, what's this Rust thing and why is everyone enamoured?  
Let's explore...

<BasicImage
  width="800px"
  src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dg3gyk0gu/image/upload/c_scale,w_800/v1592262461/maggieappleton.com/egghead-course-notes/wtf-rust/WTFRust_1.png"
  alt="An Introduction to Rust"
/>

<BasicImage
  width="900px"
  alt="Rust is a programming language mainly used to build 'system software.' Which means any software that acts as a platform for other software to run on top of it. iOS, linux, and windows are all system software. Rust is also becoming popular for making web apps. We can compile rust files into web assembly, which lets us run them in the browser."
  src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dg3gyk0gu/image/upload/c_scale,w_960/v1592262462/maggieappleton.com/egghead-course-notes/wtf-rust/WTFRust_2.png"
/>

<BasicImage
  width="900px"
  alt="The power of rust is that it balances speed and safety. Safety here means memory safety. Mishandling how we store data on physical microchips can lead to bugs and security flaws. High-level languages are abstract and safer. Low-level languages work directly with memory, making them dangerous but fast. Rust lives in the happy middle ground"
  src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dg3gyk0gu/image/upload/c_scale,w_960/v1592262462/maggieappleton.com/egghead-course-notes/wtf-rust/WTFRust_4.png"
/>

This happy balance Rust manages to strike – between speed, control over memory, and human-friendliness is what makes it so popular.

The kind of programmes you can write with Rust would otherwise be made in a language like <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/C_(programming_language)">C</a> or <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/C%2B%2B">C++</a>. A lot of developers find the C-suite challenging to work with, so this friendly alternative is very welcome!

> It's got the <a href='https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Goldilocks_principle'>Goldilocks Effect</a> going on. Not too slow, not too dangerous, not too complicated – just right.

The Rust community is also infamous for being welcoming, open, and encouaging to newcomers. Fostering that kind of culture is very likely why it's gained so much traction in the last few years.

Anyone who hangs out in Developer World long enough realises frameworks and languages are identities much more than they're tools. You _belong_ to Team React, or Camp Python, or the Rust Crew.

And no one wants to join a bunch of judgey gatekeepers.

<BasicImage
  width="900px"
  alt="The rust install package comes with 'rustc' - the compiler, 'cargo' - the package manager, and 'rustup' - the toolchain"
  src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dg3gyk0gu/image/upload/c_scale,w_960/v1592262461/maggieappleton.com/egghead-course-notes/wtf-rust/WTFRust_3.png"
/>

<BasicImage
  width="900px"
  alt="Rust is statically typed. This means the data type of every variable must be known at compile time. You can declare data types or let rust make an educated guess. Rust's compiler is strict. It won't let you mix data types."
  src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dg3gyk0gu/image/upload/c_scale,w_960/v1592262462/maggieappleton.com/egghead-course-notes/wtf-rust/WTFRust_5.png"
/>

<BasicImage
  width="900px"
  alt="Rust is obsessed with ownership. Every value belongs to a variable. Values are like pet hamsters, they need an owner. If LeBron owns this hamster, then we assign LeBron to Shaq, ownership move to Shaq. LeBron no longer owns the hamster."
  src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dg3gyk0gu/image/upload/c_scale,w_960/v1592262465/maggieappleton.com/egghead-course-notes/wtf-rust/WTFRust_6.png"
/>

I've just done a sweeping and completely incomplete overview of Rust here. But it's enough to point you in the right direction. There's plenty more to explore.

<p>
  While researching and making these I watched{" "}
  <a href="https://twitter.com/PascalPrecht">Pascal Precht</a>'s new egghead
  course that shows you how to{" "}
  <a href="https://egghead.io/courses/write-your-first-program-with-the-rust-language">
    Write Your First Program with Rust{" "}
  </a>
</p>

<ImageLink href="https://egghead.io/courses/write-your-first-program-with-the-rust-language">
  <ImageFrame
    alt="Shareable Custom Hooks in React"
    src="https://og-image-egghead-course.now.sh/write-your-first-program-with-the-rust-language"
  />
</ImageLink>

Pascal covers more specific details like how Rust handles variables, mutability, functions, pointers, borrowing, loops, and errors.

If you're curious to start Rusting, worth taking a look.

<br />

### Want more illustrated notes on web development?

Take a look at [[Building Custom React Hooks]], [[Fixing Common Git Mistakes]], or [[JavaScript Bits You Skipped the First Time Around]]


Illustrated notes on the core concepts in Rust

Maggie makes visual essays about programming, design, and anthropology.

Designer, anthropologist, and mediocre developer
Currently design engineering at Normally

The Garden

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The Expanding Dark Forest and Generative AI

Tools for Thought as Cultural Practices, not Computational Objects

A Brief History & Ethos of the Digital Garden

A Short History of Bi-Directional Links

Notes

Aesthetic Command Lines with Hyper, Spaceship, and Oh My Zsh

Leaving Elicit

Home-Cooked Software and Barefoot Developers

Talk: The Expanding Dark Forest and Generative AI

Faking William Morris, Generative Forgery, and the Erosion of Art History

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