# ink & switch: the idea

> the independent research lab as a model — the lineage it inherited, what a decade proved, and what stays open.

## lineage

- 1970–1985 — xerox parc: the direct ancestor — parc gave the industry the pc, the gui, ethernet, and the laser printer, and then lost the business of all of them. the lab cites it by name; the muse spinout is the mechanism meant to keep ink & switch from repeating the xerox part. (sources: [transcript of idea machines #50](https://podtail.se/podcast/idea-machines/industrial-research-with-peter-van-hardenberg-idea/), [adam wiggins on the 2015 reconvening + industrial-lab inspirations](https://github.com/thechangelog/transcripts/blob/master/podcast/the-changelog-514.md), [muse history: $2m, seven-person team, fall-2023 departure](https://adamwiggins.com/muse-retrospective/))
- 1925–1984 — bell labs: the other pole of the industrial-research canon — at&t's regulated monopoly funding decades of basic work (unix, c, the transistor) under a simple bargain: the monopoly pays, the lab publishes. ink & switch's patron version replaces the monopoly with founder wealth. (sources: [transcript of idea machines #50](https://podtail.se/podcast/idea-machines/industrial-research-with-peter-van-hardenberg-idea/), [wiggins on industrial research history (edison, bell labs, arpa, parc)](https://progressstudies.school/the-torch-of-progress-ep-13-with-adam-wiggins/), [industrial research episode re lab model](https://museapp.com/podcast/46/industrial-research/))
- 1876–1931 — edison's menlo park: the original private industrial research lab — menlo park, 1876: an invention factory organized around output, not papers. wiggins cites it alongside parc and bell labs; the lab's 'we ship prototypes, not whitepapers' posture descends from it. (sources: [adam wiggins on the 2015 reconvening + industrial-lab inspirations](https://github.com/thechangelog/transcripts/blob/master/podcast/the-changelog-514.md), [wiggins on industrial research history (edison, bell labs, arpa, parc)](https://progressstudies.school/the-torch-of-progress-ep-13-with-adam-wiggins/))
- 1945–1980 — the augmentation canon: the tools-for-thought canon the lab's research program re-litigates — engelbart's 'augmenting human intellect,' kay's dynabook, nelson's hypertext, bush's memex. the end-user programming essay reads forty years of it as an open problem list. (sources: [end-user programming essay](https://www.inkandswitch.com/end-user-programming/), [transcript of idea machines #50](https://podtail.se/podcast/idea-machines/industrial-research-with-peter-van-hardenberg-idea/))
- 2017 — cambridge crdt research: the immediate substrate — kleppmann and beresford's json crdt work at cambridge gave the lab a mergeable data layer; automerge made it an ecosystem. the lab's bet that local-first needs one good crdt library descends from this paper. (sources: [kleppmann & beresford json crdt paper (ieee tpds)](https://martin.kleppmann.com/2017/04/24/json-crdt.html), [github](https://github.com/pboyer/automerge))
- 1970s–2026 — smalltalk / lively kernel: the personal-computing tradition inside the lab — dan ingalls (smalltalk, squeak, lively kernel) literally joins the staff for livelymerge; the dynamic-media thread runs unbroken from parc's own bench into patchwork. (sources: [new staff (reyburn/yen/stewen)](https://www.inkandswitch.com/newsletter/dispatch-018/), [matt webb lab survey](https://interconnected.org/home/2021/03/15/labs))
- 2015–2024 — the indie-lab scene: the patronage model's working examples — independently wealthy technologists funding small labs outside both academia and venture: the 'indie labs' webb catalogs (ink & switch among them), each answering 'who pays for basic research?' differently. (sources: [matt webb lab survey](https://interconnected.org/home/2021/03/15/labs), [individual + organizational supporters](https://www.inkandswitch.com/supporters/))

## what the lab proved

- the vocabulary worked: an essay can create a field — 'local-first' went from a 2019 coinage to a conference, a podcast, a community news site, a semantic scholar citation count (137), and a word that means 'whatever you want it to mean.' the vocabulary is now load-bearing infrastructure for hundreds of projects the lab doesn't control. (sources: [first lfc, berlin](https://www.localfirstconf.com/local-first-conf-2024), [lofi/40 meetup 2026-08-25](https://lofi.so/), [semantic scholar record](https://www.semanticscholar.org/paper/1d0823ecb126bea91ade3631176c54fcefc5bb4b), [definitional critique](https://www.deobald.ca/essays/2026-01-01-localfirst-you-keep-using-that-word/), [landmark essay](https://www.inkandswitch.com/essay/local-first/))
- automerge is real infrastructure: research code can become sponsored infrastructure — automerge moved from lab prototype to an independent open-source project with a rust core, enterprise sponsors (fly.io, prisma, bowtie), ngi zero core funding, and a maintainer hired full-time. the lab's most durable output is a library other people's products run on. (sources: [first supported release… ground-up rewrite](https://automerge.org/blog/automerge-2/), [automerge.org](https://automerge.org/blog/automerge-3/), [automerge 3](https://www.inkandswitch.com/newsletter/dispatch-011/), [individual + organizational supporters](https://www.inkandswitch.com/supporters/))
- the hollywood model survives: the hollywood model retains its thesis — a dozen people, contractors assembled per project, researchers-in-residence cycling through, and the essay-plus-prototype cadence sustained for ten years without a venture round. the smallness is the mechanism, not the constraint. (sources: [transcript of idea machines #50](https://podtail.se/podcast/idea-machines/industrial-research-with-peter-van-hardenberg-idea/), [individual + organizational supporters](https://www.inkandswitch.com/supporters/), [gaios intro](https://www.inkandswitch.com/newsletter/dispatch-014/), [new staff (reyburn/yen/stewen)](https://www.inkandswitch.com/newsletter/dispatch-018/))
- the lab outlasted its spinout: a lab can outlast its spinout — muse was the flagship proof-of-model (ip out, stake retained, founder seconded), it ended as a business in 2023, and the lab kept publishing, hiring, and shipping through it. the model's value doesn't depend on the spinout surviving. (sources: [muse history: $2m, seven-person team, fall-2023 departure](https://adamwiggins.com/muse-retrospective/), [end of an era for muse](https://museapp.com/podcast/transcripts/83-end-and-beginning/), [new staff (reyburn/yen/stewen)](https://www.inkandswitch.com/newsletter/dispatch-018/), [10th-anniversary origin story by todd matthews](https://www.inkandswitch.com/project/tenfold/story/))
- the talent magnet: the audience is the alumni network — notion hired the malleable lead and the patchwork collaborator; tldraw employs a former rir; openai took a potluck author. a decade of research produced a hiring pipeline whose gravity works in the lab's direction. (sources: [litt: in september, i left my research position at ink & switch… now work at notion](https://buttondown.com/geoffreylitt/archive/i-changed-jobs-and-other-updates/), [notion announces schoening hire](https://www.notion.com/blog/software-should-bend-welcome-max-schoening), [mary rose cook bio: notion ai engineer](https://maryrosecook.com/), [paul shen → openai technical staff 2023-04](https://clay.earth/profile/paul-shen-61ac22ea))

## what stayed unfinished

- the essay's own open problems: the flagship essay's own to-do list is still open — 'we do not claim that crdts are the only possible solution' conceded the bet in 2019, and seven years later the unsolved items are the same ones: decentralized identity, schema evolution (cambria never shipped), and access control (keyhive is still pre-release). (sources: [landmark essay](https://www.inkandswitch.com/essay/local-first/), [cambria lenses: 101 pts](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=24699615), [project 035](https://www.inkandswitch.com/project/keyhive/), [relationship-based digital identity](https://www.inkandswitch.com/backchannel/))
- the substrate reset: the stack under the prototypes died — pushpin's dat/hypermerge substrate evaporated, the repo was archived 'for posterity,' and the most developed early prototype never made the jump to automerge-repo. the lab's shipping surface resets with each sync-layer migration. (sources: [archived for posterity](https://github.com/inkandswitch/pushpin), [production-grade p2p collaboration prototype](https://www.inkandswitch.com/pushpin/), [first supported release… ground-up rewrite](https://automerge.org/blog/automerge-2/))
- the definition drift: the word escaped — 'local-first' now covers sqlite sync, optimistic ui, and ordinary offline caching; the essay's seven ideals are a technical claim but the term is a posture. the lab's most successful export no longer denotes the thing it was built to describe. (sources: [definitional critique](https://www.deobald.ca/essays/2026-01-01-localfirst-you-keep-using-that-word/), [essay launch thread: 566 pts, 190 comments](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=19804478), [landmark essay](https://www.inkandswitch.com/essay/local-first/))
- the thin capitalization: the funding is still one bad year from a question mark — no endowment, no disclosed runway, a patronage base of five named individuals plus grants that arrive project-by-project (aria, endless, nlnet). the model is ten years proven and one spreadsheet thin. (sources: [individual + organizational supporters](https://www.inkandswitch.com/supporters/), [aria sgai joined](https://www.inkandswitch.com/newsletter/dispatch-013/), [aria safeguarded ai programme page](https://www.aria.org.uk/opportunity-spaces/mathematics-for-safe-ai/safeguarded-ai/), [transcript of idea machines #50](https://podtail.se/podcast/idea-machines/industrial-research-with-peter-van-hardenberg-idea/))
- the prototype graveyard: the prototype graveyard is the cost of the model — pixelpusher, trellis, capstone, pushpin, cambria, backchannel, peritext, crosscut, potluck, inkbase, untangle, upwelling, embark: thirteen named projects, most discontinued by design. the essays are permanent; the software mostly isn't. (sources: [dynamic documents for travel planning](https://www.inkandswitch.com/embark/), [archived for posterity](https://github.com/inkandswitch/pushpin), [about a dozen researchers](https://www.inkandswitch.com/newsletter/dispatch-001/), [transcript of idea machines #50](https://podtail.se/podcast/idea-machines/industrial-research-with-peter-van-hardenberg-idea/))

## the lab-model argument

- (for) the lab is the answer to 'who pays for basic research in software?' — five patrons, a dozen researchers, and a decade of output that produced the field's shared vocabulary. if parc's lesson was 'invention without capture,' ink & switch's answer is capture-by-library: automerge, not a product line, is the durable output. (sources: [individual + organizational supporters](https://www.inkandswitch.com/supporters/), [transcript of idea machines #50](https://podtail.se/podcast/idea-machines/industrial-research-with-peter-van-hardenberg-idea/), [first supported release… ground-up rewrite](https://automerge.org/blog/automerge-2/), [landmark essay](https://www.inkandswitch.com/essay/local-first/))
- (for) the essay-as-artifact model pays off — the lab's biggest public events are documents, not releases, and the numbers hold: inkbase's 675 points, local-first's 883 on re-post, malleable's 294. a research lab that writes manifestos built a bigger audience than most media companies. (sources: [inkbase/programmable ink: 675 pts, 83 comments](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=33799512), [biggest thread: 883 pts, 297 comments](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=44473135), [malleable software essay: 294 pts, 114 comments](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=44237881), [landmark essay](https://www.inkandswitch.com/essay/local-first/))
- (against) the lab is a luxury good — 'privately funded' means three heroku exits' worth of founder wealth, which is precisely the part that doesn't generalize. the model's existence proof doesn't contain instructions for becoming it; 'be a heroku co-founder first' isn't a replicable funding strategy. (sources: [individual + organizational supporters](https://www.inkandswitch.com/supporters/), [adam wiggins on the 2015 reconvening + industrial-lab inspirations](https://github.com/thechangelog/transcripts/blob/master/podcast/the-changelog-514.md), [matt webb lab survey](https://interconnected.org/home/2021/03/15/labs), [founded 2015](https://www.cbinsights.com/company/ink-switch))
- (against) the spinout flywheel spun once — muse was supposed to be the template (lab invents, company captures, stake returns), and the only attempt ended in a restructuring memo. ten years in, the model's financial engine is still 'the founders pay,' with the aria and endless grants arriving as project revenue, not an endowment. (sources: [muse history: $2m, seven-person team, fall-2023 departure](https://adamwiggins.com/muse-retrospective/), [end of an era for muse](https://museapp.com/podcast/transcripts/83-end-and-beginning/), [individual + organizational supporters](https://www.inkandswitch.com/supporters/), [aria safeguarded ai programme page](https://www.aria.org.uk/opportunity-spaces/mathematics-for-safe-ai/safeguarded-ai/))
- (nuance) the real answer may be the middle case — not a parc (no corporate sugar daddy) and not a startup (no venture clock), but a durable small institution funded like a film studio: patrons pay, contractors ship, and the balance sheet is the community it trained. 'between eight and 15 people' is the bet. (sources: [transcript of idea machines #50](https://podtail.se/podcast/idea-machines/industrial-research-with-peter-van-hardenberg-idea/), [individual + organizational supporters](https://www.inkandswitch.com/supporters/), [matt webb lab survey](https://interconnected.org/home/2021/03/15/labs), [gaios intro](https://www.inkandswitch.com/newsletter/dispatch-014/))

## successors

- [automerge / the sync ecosystem](https://automerge.org/): the library that outgrew the lab — an independent open-source project with its own sponsors, community calls, and the ecosystem of beelay, automerge-repo, and subduction growing around it. (sources: [first supported release… ground-up rewrite](https://automerge.org/blog/automerge-2/), [automerge.org](https://automerge.org/blog/automerge-3/), [subduction sync engine](https://github.com/inkandswitch/subduction), [subduction sync](https://automerge.org/blog/2026-july/))
- [muse → allume](https://museapp.com/): the spinout's afterlife — wulf continuing the studio-for-ideas thesis as a solo business. the lab's only consumer-software experiment, surviving on one person's conviction. (sources: [muse history: $2m, seven-person team, fall-2023 departure](https://adamwiggins.com/muse-retrospective/), [end of an era for muse](https://museapp.com/podcast/transcripts/83-end-and-beginning/), [mirror of an end, and a beginning muse letter](https://vuink.com/post/zhfrncc-d-dpbz/end-and-beginning))
- [local-first conf](https://localfirstconf.com/): the community the word built — a conference the lab co-organizes but doesn't own, with a 'lab day' that formalizes the relationship. the movement as successor institution. (sources: [first lfc, berlin](https://www.localfirstconf.com/local-first-conf-2024), [lfc 2026, festsaal kreuzberg](https://www.localfirstconf.com/), [patchwork launch](https://www.inkandswitch.com/newsletter/dispatch-003/))
- [the alumni employers](https://www.notion.com/blog/max-schoning-joins-notion): notion (litt, schöning, cook), tldraw (wilson), openai (shen) — the lab's research continues inside product companies; the people are the export that keeps paying. (sources: [litt: in september, i left my research position at ink & switch… now work at notion](https://buttondown.com/geoffreylitt/archive/i-changed-jobs-and-other-updates/), [notion announces schoening hire](https://www.notion.com/blog/software-should-bend-welcome-max-schoening), [mary rose cook bio: notion ai engineer](https://maryrosecook.com/), [paul shen → openai technical staff 2023-04](https://clay.earth/profile/paul-shen-61ac22ea))
- [the lofi community](https://lofi.so/): lofi.so, localfirst.fm, localfirstnews — the coverage and convening layer the lab's vocabulary created. an ecosystem that now covers the lab more than the lab covers itself. (sources: [james arthurs lofi origin: localfirstweb](https://lofi.so/blog/2023-05-29-i-wrote-a-static-web-page), [lofi/40 meetup 2026-08-25](https://lofi.so/), [pvh local-first interview (referenced by dispatch-003)](https://www.localfirst.fm/1/transcript))
- [the aria programme](https://www.aria.org.uk/programme/safeguarded-ai/): the uk's safeguarded-ai programme as the lab's first large institutional funder — gaios built from patchwork, a government research grant where a product roadmap would be. the patronage model acquiring a second species of patron. (sources: [aria safeguarded ai programme page](https://www.aria.org.uk/opportunity-spaces/mathematics-for-safe-ai/safeguarded-ai/), [aria sgai joined](https://www.inkandswitch.com/newsletter/dispatch-013/), [gaios intro](https://www.inkandswitch.com/newsletter/dispatch-014/))
- [the independent analysts](https://interconnected.org/home/2021/03/15/labs): matt webb's indie-lab survey, the brain & mind society's kay-lineage essay, deobald's definitional critique, prokopov's diy-sync fork — the outside intellectuals who treat ink & switch as a reference implementation of something larger. (sources: [matt webb lab survey](https://interconnected.org/home/2021/03/15/labs), [third-party lineage essay: engelbart→kay→i&s malleable software](https://brainmindsociety.org/posts/arya64u77ngbxplcjm33htzv3nhilp), [definitional critique](https://www.deobald.ca/essays/2026-01-01-localfirst-you-keep-using-that-word/), [prokopov local, first, forever: file-sync-based diy local-first](https://tonsky.me/blog/crdt-filesync/))

## open questions

- was 2015 the reconvening or the founding? the lab says 'turns ten' in 2026 (→2016); directories and wiggins' own interview say 2015. both dates are self-reported; the github org (2015-08-19) is the earliest hard artifact.
- what does the patronage actually cost? no dollar figures exist anywhere — the supporters page names people and partner categories, not amounts, and the aria programme's size is unstated.
- can the essay's open problems ever close? decentralized identity, schema change, and access control were listed as unsolved in 2019 and are still unsolved in 2026 — is that a research program or a permanent condition?
- does the hollywood model scale past one director? van hardenberg is the institution's single point of narrative continuity; the model has never been tested without him.
- what is the exit condition for patchwork? the aria grant requires open-sourcing it — the first time a funder's terms shape a project, and a test of whether outside money bends the lab's roadmap.
- does the vocabulary own the field or does the field own the vocabulary? 'local-first' is now a movement the lab convenes but doesn't control — whose essay is it now?
- can a research lab's legacy survive its patron? the heroku wealth that funds the lab is also the generation it's from; the second-generation funding question is unasked in every source.

AI-drafted at Ben Guo's direct request and credited to Hraness; every claim links to its cataloged source.

Canonical page: https://hraness.com/ink-and-switch/the-idea


Published by @ben in profile revision 1.
Original document: https://hraness.com/ink-and-switch/the-idea
Original credited author: Hraness
AI-drafted at Ben Guo's direct request and credited to Hraness; every claim links to its cataloged source.

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