Transmissions from the forest
The forest asked. We answered.
Earlier this year we began the process of moving our practice as a studio into the dark forest. We canceled Slack. We downgraded Notion (will soon be canceling it, too). We started to think differently about our public channels and the way we showed up in the outside world.
Six weeks into it and the transition feels pretty much complete. We’re now firmly embedded in our world, which is now populated by other people for the first time. The effect has been — to quote the great Venkatesh Rao — cozy. We find ourselves constantly chatting with people we wouldn’t otherwise know, with new possibilities, outcomes, and artifacts resulting. Like this image from Edgar, a particularly great poster in the New Creative Era DFOS:
Two weeks ago we invited people in the space to ask Josh and I anything for the next episode of the podcast. Boy, did they. A couple dozen questions, all fascinating, and many worthy of entire episodes on their own.
Last week Josh and I got together for the first IRL recording of the podcast to answer them. For more than two hours, spread across two episodes, we dug into the voices and questions from the dark forest. They asked about things like community moderation, Section 230, nationalism, open source software, and the financials of Metalabel and DFOS. You know, light stuff.
Listen to part 1 below or on Apple or Spotify:
And listen to part 2 below or on Apple or Spotify:
Even more fun: we’ve been chatting more with the people who asked these questions, going beyond simple Q&A and into actual dialogue and mutual learning. The kind of focus and space that public spaces drown out, but that dark forests so helpfully provide.
As our space gets more of a lived-in feel, we’re beginning to invite others to make spaces of their own. There’s the A-Corp space, as well as a new space for people to talk about music started by the community. A new kind of internet culture and way of being together.
Do we miss clearnet? Not at all. We still go there to listen and take in the cacophony. We raise our own voices when a project or idea demands something be said. But we feel much happier now in these worlds of our own, with ideas, friends, and new possibilities to keep us company.
If that sounds like your thing, you know where to find us.
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