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conaw

This is @ben's profile revision 1. The original date and editorial confidence below are attributed to its publisher, not independent verification.

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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Published text

roam research: conaw

conor white-sullivan's early posting and writing, where he argued for the idea in public before roam was a company.

writings

2009 — ignite amherst talk (talk, ignite amherst): five minutes, twenty slides, on tech, media, and political power — the earliest surviving conaw talk. the thesis is already there: change the medium, change the polity. source

"an abundance of hope and the reckless confidence of a 21 year old. still stand by most of this."

2010-07-29 — tedxboston: localocracy (talk, tedxboston): localocracy as an online town common: verified residents, structured deliberation, collective intelligence for civic decisions — roam's thesis wearing civic clothes. source
2012 — the white house posts (document, whitehouse.gov): obama white house blog posts on participatory democracy under his own byline — the 'anthropology major who founded localocracy' era, before the medium-building turn. source
2018 — the roam research white paper (essay, roamresearch.com): roam's founding document, written winter 2017/2018 with journalist richard meadows: notes as a directed graph of linked thoughts, bidirectional links and block references as primitives, 'better thinking' as the product. source

"an online workspace for organizing and evaluating knowledge … built as a directed graph" "collaborative reasoning, allowing groups to build shared mental maps"

2018-07-18 — roam demo, july 2018 (video, youtube): the earliest dated public roam demo — block refs, bidirectional links, the daily page — a working product a year before the public beta. source
2018-12-25 — 365 propositions (thread, twitter): a living thread of numbered daily propositions — thinking, consent, communal living, attention — public thinking before the product, and the thread-as-publication form he never abandoned. source

"the set of thinkable thoughts is vanishingly small"

2019-02-23 — why evernote is a terrible second brain (thread, twitter): forty-five tweets against evernote as a second brain — 'twitter can actually be a better second brain than evernote.' the white paper links it as the related twitter thread. source

"writing isn't just a tool for communication. first and foremost, writing is a tool for thinking"

2019-05-18 — the zettelkasten thread (thread, twitter): the luhmann tie-in that gave roam its intellectual pedigree in public — and opened the invite spigot, naming joshua brown as co-builder. source

"the zettelkasten — it's like the gtd for intellectual progress" "you can't put a deadline on insight though"

2019 — welcome to roam (document, roam help graph): the founder introduction inside roam's own public help graph — ending with his personal gmail. the medium demonstrating itself: the docs were the product. source

"much love — conor"

2019-09-05 — how i met my co-founder (thread, twitter): the founding story in first person: meeting joshua brown at 42, the prototype, the co-founder offer — written as the beta was already moving. source

"just started bringing in users from the public a couple months ago"

2019-12-17 — interview with tiago forte (interview, forte labs): an hour with tiago forte: demo, debate, privacy, security — the first public interview, weeks before the hype wave crested. source

"first time i've publicly spoken about roam!"

2019-12-20 — the cannonical roam demo (video, youtube): the gtd-flavored walkthrough the help graph designated the canonical demo — roam selling roam in roam's own medium. source
2020-04-08 — mindful makers interview (interview, ness labs): the mindful makers interview: roam as compounding cognition — the friendliest framing of the mission in the hype window.

"compound interest on your thoughts"

2020-05-08 — conor white-sullivan on 20vc (podcast, the twenty minute vc): the mainstream-vc moment: low floors and high ceilings, hiring for grit and autodidacts, living with the team, the tesla go-to-market. source

"roam is not about taking better notes"

2020-05 — creating tools for networked thought (podcast, venture stories): the intellectual influences stated plainly: nielsen's reinventing discovery, adler's syntopicon reading as roam's actual origin, roam against twitter, github, notion. source
2020-09-19 — api, fellowship, and the roam fund (thread, twitter): days after the seed: new backend, api and multiplayer, the roam fellowship (first fellow dhrumil mehta), $2m for a roam fund — $1m balance sheet, $1m option pool. ecosystem-builder mode at full throttle. source
2021-01-22 — trust in the gatekeepers (thread, twitter): the continuity thread tying localocracy to roam across eleven years and 'a third of my life' — institutional decay as the problem, a new medium as the answer. source

"trust in the gatekeepers / all time low" "the answer is not a new channel. it's a new format, a new medium, with a new power structure" "if had been no @localocracy there would be no @roamresearch"

2021-01-23 — roamgames (thread, twitter): $10,000 every two weeks for three months to community builders — judged on intermediate packets, on growing the commons. the cult economy, formalized. source

"whose public work pushes the frontier the farthest"

2021-01-24 — the 'i was broke' thread (thread, twitter): the conor mcgregor thread: sold localocracy to aol at 23, five broke years, the roam v1 that convinced meadows to invest and josh to join. the autobiography as thread. source

"felt like a fraud"

2021-04-08 — the local-first architecture thread (thread, twitter): the candid admission that the 2017 local-first, event-stream architecture still ran underneath — technical debt confessed as a design philosophy defense. source

"like changing the engine on an airplane in flight"

2021-04-16 — roam depot and the e2ee bounty (thread, twitter): roam depot announced as imminent — revenue share for plugin authors, a $10k e2ee bounty. the depot shipped fifteen months later; the promise became the archetype of roam's velocity problem. source

"this week, if god wills it, inshallah"

2021-05-06 — why i said no to roadmaps (thread, twitter): 'why i said no to roadmaps': the map-of-questions doctrine — questions public, dates never — while acknowledging the roam-hosted roadmap page itself had gone dead. source

"dangers of link-rot"

2021-05-19 — the anti-college thread (thread, twitter): the flagship anti-college thread — lambda school over debt-shackled degrees — the credentialism controversy's source text, from the founder whose company sold belief. source

"strongly prefer my kids wind up going to ls vs debt-shackling college"

2021-05-26 — the #roamcult theology thread (thread, twitter): the #roamcult theology at its most sincere: the product as mirror — people love what they put in, not the tool itself. the most honest account of what the cult was actually for. source

"the thing people actually fall in love with with roam are the ideas, memories, and work they put into it"

2021-07-13 — the quest pod interview (interview, the quest pod): the two-part justin kan interview: the anthropology degree, nine months embedded in evangelical communities, collective intelligence — the fullest autobiographical record. source

"excel for thoughts"

2021-10-04 — the subreddit bans thread (thread, twitter): the long-form explanation for banning critics from r/roamresearch — the founder-moderation flashpoint, argued in the medium he controlled. source
2021-12-29 — the ceo confessional (thread, twitter): twenty-nine tweets: the hidden agenda of localocracy, the 'anti-role modal for roam culture,' the concession to the critics — the founder processing the company in public, in the medium the company sold. source

"three times i've written drafts of this thread in my roam, and three times i've failed to publish it" "the reddit revolutionaries were actually right"

2022-01 — the #roamcult disavowal reversal (thread, twitter): disavowing #roamcult, then un-disavowing it — the internal identity crisis documented in public, a month after the confessional. source

"one of my worst mistakes of 2021"

2022-07-10 — the local-first defense (thread, twitter): the technical-identity defense: in-memory frontend database, offline from day one — arguing the clones had the story wrong even as they took the market. source

"roam was literally built local first!"

2022-07-28 — the apple notes quip (tweet, twitter): the most-quoted conaw provocation of the plateau era — read as elitism by critics, as mission by believers. source

"if you're smart enough to solve all your problems in apple notes, i question your ambition"

2023-02-08 — the 30-demos sprint (thread, twitter): thirty tweet-sized demos of small improvements and experiments with nikita prokopov — the last sustained building-in-public burst before the quiet. source
2023-03-02 — metamuse: collective intelligence (podcast, metamuse): the late retrospective: severe adhd, roam as working-memory extension, 'program your own mind' — the founder framing the product as the tool his own brain needed. episode page now 404s; date verified via mirrors. source

controversies

2020-06 — the believer plan: the $500 five-year believer plan — conaw claimed roam earned more in its first 48 hours of paid plans than in its first two years. read by analysts as ltv genius and by critics as monetizing devotion before the product was proven. reaction: jack baty paid it while 'twitchy'; rob litterst decoded it as 'the cult packaging playbook'; the sticker shock never fully wore off. (sources: roam research's cult packaging strategy, so, i went with roam research and am a true believer, customers grow business: roam's cult-of-personality flywheel)
2020–2022 — cult engineering: #roamcult was engineered, not accidental: the fertility-cult jokes, the tattoos, the golden-kitty mobilization threads, then a 2021 disavowal conaw reversed months later as 'one of my worst mistakes.' reaction: believers quote the theology thread — 'the ideas, memories, and work they put into it'; critics saw a founder manufacturing attachment as distribution. (sources: the #roamcult theology thread, the #roamcult disavowal reversal, why roam is cool)
2021-04 — no roadmaps, missed dates: roam depot promised 'this week, inshallah' shipped fifteen months later; the no-roadmaps doctrine — 'map of questions,' never dates — made every missed window a philosophical position rather than a bug. reaction: the base loved the doctrine; everyone waiting on mobile, offline, or api parity read it as permission to under-deliver. (sources: roam depot and the e2ee bounty, why i said no to roadmaps, roam change log)
2021-10-04 — the subreddit bans: conaw banned critics from r/roamresearch and defended it in a long thread — founder-as-moderator of the community where criticism lived. he conceded the point two months later in the ceo confessional: 'the reddit revolutionaries were actually right.' reaction: the single most-cited founder-conduct incident — shipper's 'the fall of roam' folded it into 'well-documented community issues.' (sources: the subreddit bans thread, the ceo confessional, the fall of roam)
2021-05-19 — the credential threads: the anti-college threads — 'strongly prefer my kids wind up going to ls vs debt-shackling college' — extended the critique of credentials into a position many users with degrees found glib. reaction: consistent with the autodidact hiring he described on 20vc; read against a $15/mo tool sold to knowledge workers, it landed as provocation. (sources: the lambda school / anti-college thread, conor white-sullivan on 20vc)
2021–2022 — customers as investors: the wefunder round let 760 customers buy ~$1.26m of the company — on a page whose 'reasons not to invest' section disclosed crypto treasury and plans to buy a campus. devotion became a securities offering. reaction: oversubscribed in under an hour; later looks like the apotheosis — and the risk — of selling belief. (sources: roam wefunder campaign page, roam research crowdfunding campaign oversubscribed)
2022-07-28 — the apple notes quip: 'if you're smart enough to solve all your problems in apple notes, i question your ambition' — the quip that crystallized the elitism critique at exactly the moment the product's lead was gone. reaction: screenshotted into every 'roam founder' thread for years — the persona outliving the roadmap. (sources: the apple notes quip, the local-first defense)

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

Canonical page: https://hraness.com/roam-research/conaw

Original source occurrences

the roam research white paper · roam research · ~2020 (approximate) · original ID: src-roam-whitepaper · roam research
roam's own statement of the thesis: a directed graph instead of a file tree, with bayesian and collaborative ambitions that mostly never shipped. the page lives inside roam's js-rendered help graph; a readable export sits at heckler.roam.garden/@white-paper.
getting compound interest on your thoughts with conor white-sullivan · ness labs · 2020 (year) · original ID: src-nesslabs-conor-interview · anne-laure le cunff
conor's own framing in interview: compound interest on your thoughts; good ideas come from ideas having sex.
conor white-sullivan author archive · obamawhitehouse.archives.gov · 2012 (year) · original ID: src-whitehouse-archive · conor white-sullivan
conaw's obama-era white house blog archive — participatory democracy writing under his own name: 'an anthropology major … in 2008 founded localocracy.'
tedxboston — conor white-sullivan — localocracy · tedxboston / youtube · 2010-07-29 (day) · original ID: src-tedx-localocracy · conor white-sullivan
the earliest surviving conaw talk video: localocracy as an online town common — collective intelligence a decade before roam.
ignite amherst talk on tech, media, and political power · ignite amherst (shared via twitter) · 2009 (year) · original ID: src-ignite-amherst · conor white-sullivan
fall 2009, five minutes and twenty slides: 'an abundance of hope and the reckless confidence of a 21 year old. still stand by most of this.'
how i met my co-founder (origin thread) · threadreader app · 2019-09-05 (day) · original ID: src-conaw-origin-thread · conor white-sullivan
the first-person founding story: meeting joshua brown at 42, the prototype, the co-founder offer — and 'just started bringing in users from the public a couple months ago.'
the roam research white paper (mirror) · roam garden (mirror) · 2018 (year) · original ID: src-whitepaper-mirror · conor white-sullivan
the readable export of the white paper — 'we wrote this white paper in winter of 2017/2018'; co-authored with journalist richard meadows, who became roam's first investor.
welcome to roam — founder introduction · roam garden (mirror) · 2019 (year) · original ID: src-welcome-to-roam · conor white-sullivan
the founder introduction inside roam's own public help graph — ending with his personal gmail and 'much love — conor.' the medium demonstrating itself.
365 propositions · threadreader app · 2018-12-25 (day) · original ID: src-365-propositions · conor white-sullivan
the living thread-as-publication: hundreds of numbered daily propositions on thinking, consent, communal living, and the limits of thinkable thoughts — public thinking before the product.
why evernote is a terrible second brain · threadreader app · 2019-02-23 (day) · original ID: src-evernote-rant · conor white-sullivan
the 45-tweet thesis the white paper itself links as 'related twitter thread': 'writing isn't just a tool for communication. first and foremost, writing is a tool for thinking.'
the zettelkasten thread · threadreader app · 2019-05-18 (day) · original ID: src-zettelkasten-thread · conor white-sullivan
'the zettelkasten — it's like the gtd for intellectual progress' — the thread that tied roam to luhmann and opened invites, naming joshua brown as co-builder.
trust in the gatekeepers / all time low · threadreader app · 2021-01-22 (day) · original ID: src-gatekeepers-thread · conor white-sullivan
the continuity thread: 'trust in the gatekeepers / all time low' — 'the answer is not a new channel. it's a new format, a new medium, with a new power structure.' 'if had been no @localocracy there would be no @roamresearch.'
api, fellowship, and the roam fund · threadreader app · 2020-09-19 (day) · original ID: src-post-raise-thread · conor white-sullivan
the peak ecosystem-builder thread days after the seed: new backend, api and multiplayer, the roam fellowship (first fellow dhrumil mehta), and $2m for a roam fund — $1m balance sheet, $1m option pool.
roamgames announcement · threadreader app · 2021-01-23 (day) · original ID: src-roamgames-thread · conor white-sullivan
$10,000 every two weeks for three months to community builders 'whose public work pushes the frontier the farthest' — judged on intermediate packets and growing the commons.
the conor mcgregor / 'i was broke' thread · threadreader app · 2021-01-24 (day) · original ID: src-mcgregor-broke · conor white-sullivan
the autobiographical thread: sold localocracy to aol at 23, 'felt like a fraud,' then five broke years building roam v1 — the thing that convinced meadows to invest and josh to join.
the ceo confessional · threadreader app · 2021-12-29 (day) · original ID: src-ceo-confessional · conor white-sullivan
the 29-tweet capstone: 'three times i've written drafts of this thread in my roam, and three times i've failed to publish it' — the hidden agenda of localocracy, 'anti-role modal for roam culture,' and 'the reddit revolutionaries were actually right.'
why i said no to roadmaps · threadreader app · 2021-05-06 (day) · original ID: src-roadmaps-thread · conor white-sullivan
'why i said no to roadmaps' — the map-of-questions doctrine, plus an acknowledged dead roadmap page: 'dangers of link-rot.'
the local-first architecture thread · threadreader app · 2021-04-08 (day) · original ID: src-architecture-thread · conor white-sullivan
the candid 2017-architecture thread: roam still ran the local-first, event-stream backend he built at the start — 'like changing the engine on an airplane in flight.'
roam depot and the e2ee bounty · threadreader app · 2021-04-16 (day) · original ID: src-depot-e2ee-thread · conor white-sullivan
roam depot 'this week, if god wills it, inshallah' — revenue share for plugin authors and a $10k e2ee bounty. the depot shipped fifteen months later.
the subreddit bans thread · threadreader app · 2021-10-04 (day) · original ID: src-subreddit-bans · conor white-sullivan
conor's own long-form explanation of banning critics from r/roamresearch — the founder-moderation flashpoint.
the local-first defense · threadreader app · 2022-07-10 (day) · original ID: src-localfirst-defense · conor white-sullivan
'roam was literally built local first!' — the 2022 technical-identity defense against the clone narrative: in-memory frontend database, offline from day one.
the apple notes quip · threadreader app · 2022-07-28 (day) · original ID: src-apple-notes · conor white-sullivan
'if i was intelligent enough to accomplish my goals with apple notes i would never have needed to build roam. … if you're smart enough to solve all your problems in apple notes, i question your ambition.'
the lambda school / anti-college thread · threadreader app · 2021-05-19 (day) · original ID: src-lambda-thread · conor white-sullivan
the flagship anti-college thread: 'strongly prefer my kids wind up going to ls vs debt-shackling college' — the credentialism controversy's source text.
the #roamcult theology thread · threadreader app · 2021-05-26 (day) · original ID: src-roamcult-love · conor white-sullivan
'the thing people actually fall in love with with roam are the ideas, memories, and work they put into it' — the cult theology at its most sincere.
the #roamcult disavowal reversal · threadreader app · 2022-01 (month) · original ID: src-disavowal-reversal · conor white-sullivan
conor calls disavowing #roamcult 'one of my worst mistakes of 2021' — the internal identity crisis documented in his own words.
interview with conor white-sullivan, founder of roam · forte labs · 2019-12-17 (day) · original ID: src-forte-interview · tiago forte
december 2019: an hour of demo and debate on knowledge management, privacy, and security — conor called it 'first time i've publicly spoken about roam!'
conor white-sullivan on 20vc · the twenty minute vc · 2020-05-08 (day) · original ID: src-20vc · harry stebbings
'roam is not about taking better notes'; low floors and high ceilings; hires for grit and autodidacts; lives with the team; the tesla go-to-market.
creating tools for networked thought · venture stories (village global) · 2020-05 (month) · original ID: src-venture-stories · erik torenberg
the influences stated plainly: nielsen's reinventing discovery, adler's syntopicon reading as roam's origin, roam versus twitter/github/notion.
networked thought with conor white-sullivan · the quest pod · 2021-07-13 (day) · original ID: src-quest-pod · justin kan
the two-part autobiographical interview: the anthropology degree, nine months embedded in evangelical communities, collective intelligence, 'excel for thoughts.'
collective intelligence with conor white-sullivan · metamuse (muse) · 2023-03-02 (day) · original ID: src-metamuse · adam wiggins & mark mcgranaghan
the late retrospective: severe adhd, roam as working-memory extension, 'program your own mind.' episode page 404s now; date verified via podcast mirrors.
roam demo, july 18 2018 · youtube · 2018-07-18 (day) · original ID: src-demo-2018 · conor white-sullivan
the earliest dated public roam demo found — a working product a year before the public beta.
the cannonical roam demo — complete version · youtube · 2019-12-20 (day) · original ID: src-canonical-demo · conor white-sullivan
the flagship gtd-flavored demo the help graph called best-of.
roam research's cult packaging strategy · good better best (substack) · 2020-06 (month) · original ID: src-cult-packaging · rob litterst
the definitive decode of trial/pro/believer pricing as deliberate cult mechanics — syndicated to paddle as 'the cult packaging playbook.'
so, i went with roam research and am a true believer · baty.net · 2020-06-10 (day) · original ID: src-baty-believer · jack baty
the believer's ambivalence in one post: the $30/mo rumor made him 'twitchy' — then he paid the $500 anyway.
why roam is cool · every (divinations) · 2020-04-10 (day) · original ID: src-why-roam-cool · nathan baschez
the 'culty' appeal and the learning curve as status marker — embeds conor's 'not quite culty enough' tweet.
the fall of roam · every (superorganizers) · 2022-02-12 (day) · original ID: src-fall-of-roam · dan shipper
the canonical departure essay by a former daily user: crufty links, slow velocity, weak mobile, 'well-documented community issues.'
roam wefunder campaign page · wefunder (wayback) · 2021 (year) · original ID: src-wefunder-archive
the campaign page, archived: $1,256,376 from 760 investors, leeds ut hq, ai-safety-community bootstrapping, and a 'reasons not to invest' section disclosing crypto treasury and campus-buying plans.
roam research crowdfunding campaign oversubscribed · business insider · 2021-04 (month) · original ID: src-bi-wefunder
the customer-investor moment: $500k target oversubscribed in under an hour, ~$1.6m committed in a day, open only to pre-2021 users.
roam change log · roamdocs.fyi (mirror) · 2021–2026 (approximate) · original ID: src-roamdocs-changelog
the dated feature history — depot, encryption, apis, mobile, the 2024 attack — mirrored from roam's own help graph (not roam's domain).
customers grow business: roam's cult-of-personality flywheel · strategy in process · 2021-07 (month) · original ID: src-strategy-flywheel
the analyst read of the believer/customer-investor model as a cult-of-personality flywheel.
the 30-demos sprint with nikitonsky · threadreader app · 2023-02-08 (day) · original ID: src-30-demos · conor white-sullivan
the february 2023 shipping sprint with nikita prokopov: '30 tweet sized demos of small improvements and experiments' — the last public building-in-public burst.

Structured research records

the believer plan · conaw-controversies · 2020-06 (month)

Original location · source-9c47011972477abdb3c1 · source-afcf8f46ac059aeb992d · source-7c9b2c6658552dc65d1c

Original structured fields

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  "date": "2020-06",
  "detail": "the $500 five-year believer plan — conaw claimed roam earned more in its first 48 hours of paid plans than in its first two years. read by analysts as ltv genius and by critics as monetizing devotion before the product was proven.",
  "id": "cty-believer-plan",
  "reaction": "jack baty paid it while 'twitchy'; rob litterst decoded it as 'the cult packaging playbook'; the sticker shock never fully wore off.",
  "sourceIds": [
    "src-cult-packaging",
    "src-baty-believer",
    "src-strategy-flywheel"
  ],
  "title": "the believer plan"
}

cult engineering · conaw-controversies · 2020–2022 (approximate)

Original location · source-83c689c8a1bad43ad54e · source-006738499f9948b1d945 · source-95ffac1a650b3b030b7d

Original structured fields

{
  "date": "2020–2022",
  "detail": "#roamcult was engineered, not accidental: the fertility-cult jokes, the tattoos, the golden-kitty mobilization threads, then a 2021 disavowal conaw reversed months later as 'one of my worst mistakes.'",
  "id": "cty-cult-engineering",
  "reaction": "believers quote the theology thread — 'the ideas, memories, and work they put into it'; critics saw a founder manufacturing attachment as distribution.",
  "sourceIds": [
    "src-roamcult-love",
    "src-disavowal-reversal",
    "src-why-roam-cool"
  ],
  "title": "cult engineering"
}

no roadmaps, missed dates · conaw-controversies · 2021-04 (month)

Original location · source-7b43bc6191dbef20e4d7 · source-1af4e279038e025a5d8a · source-fedb3eb40545d8e3c4a9

Original structured fields

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  "date": "2021-04",
  "detail": "roam depot promised 'this week, inshallah' shipped fifteen months later; the no-roadmaps doctrine — 'map of questions,' never dates — made every missed window a philosophical position rather than a bug.",
  "id": "cty-roadmaps",
  "reaction": "the base loved the doctrine; everyone waiting on mobile, offline, or api parity read it as permission to under-deliver.",
  "sourceIds": [
    "src-depot-e2ee-thread",
    "src-roadmaps-thread",
    "src-roamdocs-changelog"
  ],
  "title": "no roadmaps, missed dates"
}

the subreddit bans · conaw-controversies · 2021-10-04 (day)

Original location · source-93f170e02209c6deda0b · source-2b674749339951c954c0 · source-846e7953dea8d3303f83

Original structured fields

{
  "date": "2021-10-04",
  "detail": "conaw banned critics from r/roamresearch and defended it in a long thread — founder-as-moderator of the community where criticism lived. he conceded the point two months later in the ceo confessional: 'the reddit revolutionaries were actually right.'",
  "id": "cty-subreddit-bans",
  "reaction": "the single most-cited founder-conduct incident — shipper's 'the fall of roam' folded it into 'well-documented community issues.'",
  "sourceIds": [
    "src-subreddit-bans",
    "src-ceo-confessional",
    "src-fall-of-roam"
  ],
  "title": "the subreddit bans"
}

the credential threads · conaw-controversies · 2021-05-19 (day)

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  "date": "2021-05-19",
  "detail": "the anti-college threads — 'strongly prefer my kids wind up going to ls vs debt-shackling college' — extended the critique of credentials into a position many users with degrees found glib.",
  "id": "cty-anti-college",
  "reaction": "consistent with the autodidact hiring he described on 20vc; read against a $15/mo tool sold to knowledge workers, it landed as provocation.",
  "sourceIds": [
    "src-lambda-thread",
    "src-20vc"
  ],
  "title": "the credential threads"
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customers as investors · conaw-controversies · 2021–2022 (approximate)

Original location · source-f856c14e9c071689f440 · source-6c095e04b288d6af095c

Original structured fields

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  "date": "2021–2022",
  "detail": "the wefunder round let 760 customers buy ~$1.26m of the company — on a page whose 'reasons not to invest' section disclosed crypto treasury and plans to buy a campus. devotion became a securities offering.",
  "id": "cty-customer-investors",
  "reaction": "oversubscribed in under an hour; later looks like the apotheosis — and the risk — of selling belief.",
  "sourceIds": [
    "src-wefunder-archive",
    "src-bi-wefunder"
  ],
  "title": "customers as investors"
}

the apple notes quip · conaw-controversies · 2022-07-28 (day)

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  "date": "2022-07-28",
  "detail": "'if you're smart enough to solve all your problems in apple notes, i question your ambition' — the quip that crystallized the elitism critique at exactly the moment the product's lead was gone.",
  "id": "cty-apple-notes",
  "reaction": "screenshotted into every 'roam founder' thread for years — the persona outliving the roadmap.",
  "sourceIds": [
    "src-apple-notes",
    "src-localfirst-defense"
  ],
  "title": "the apple notes quip"
}

networked thought · conaw-themes
Original location
Original structured fields
```
{
  "text": "networked thought"
}
```
tools for thought · conaw-themes
Original location
Original structured fields
```
{
  "text": "tools for thought"
}
```
low-friction capture · conaw-themes
Original location
Original structured fields
```
{
  "text": "low-friction capture"
}
```
the graph · conaw-themes
Original location
Original structured fields
```
{
  "text": "the graph"
}
```
collective intelligence · conaw-themes
Original location
Original structured fields
```
{
  "text": "collective intelligence"
}
```
education and credentials · conaw-themes
Original location
Original structured fields
```
{
  "text": "education and credentials"
}
```
cities and community · conaw-themes
Original location
Original structured fields
```
{
  "text": "cities and community"
}
```
the cult · conaw-themes
Original location
Original structured fields
```
{
  "text": "the cult"
}
```

ignite amherst talk · conaw-writings · 2009 (year)

Original location · source-c3438925187ba19669af

Original structured fields

{
  "date": "2009",
  "id": "wrt-ignite",
  "kind": "talk",
  "quotes": [
    {
      "sourceId": "src-ignite-amherst",
      "text": "an abundance of hope and the reckless confidence of a 21 year old. still stand by most of this."
    }
  ],
  "sourceIds": [
    "src-ignite-amherst"
  ],
  "summary": "five minutes, twenty slides, on tech, media, and political power — the earliest surviving conaw talk. the thesis is already there: change the medium, change the polity.",
  "themes": [
    "collective intelligence",
    "cities and community"
  ],
  "title": "ignite amherst talk",
  "traction": "reposted a decade later as the through-line proof.",
  "url": "https://twitter.com/conaw/status/1265893478321385473",
  "venue": "ignite amherst"
}

tedxboston: localocracy · conaw-writings · 2010-07-29 (day)

Original location · source-90210aae299662a382c2

Original structured fields

{
  "date": "2010-07-29",
  "id": "wrt-tedx",
  "kind": "talk",
  "quotes": [],
  "sourceIds": [
    "src-tedx-localocracy"
  ],
  "summary": "localocracy as an online town common: verified residents, structured deliberation, collective intelligence for civic decisions — roam's thesis wearing civic clothes.",
  "themes": [
    "collective intelligence",
    "cities and community"
  ],
  "title": "tedxboston: localocracy",
  "traction": "the canonical pre-roam talk.",
  "url": "https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Xb6PMb-cL5o",
  "venue": "tedxboston"
}

the white house posts · conaw-writings · 2012 (year)

Original location · source-0208efb02eb80b719c87

Original structured fields

{
  "date": "2012",
  "id": "wrt-white-house",
  "kind": "document",
  "quotes": [],
  "sourceIds": [
    "src-whitehouse-archive"
  ],
  "summary": "obama white house blog posts on participatory democracy under his own byline — the 'anthropology major who founded localocracy' era, before the medium-building turn.",
  "themes": [
    "collective intelligence"
  ],
  "title": "the white house posts",
  "traction": "survives only as an archive author page.",
  "url": "https://obamawhitehouse.archives.gov/blog/author/conor-white-sullivan",
  "venue": "whitehouse.gov"
}

the roam research white paper · conaw-writings · 2018 (year)

Original location · source-9dac4fab6215d82fdab3 · source-5d44b7192e8e80eaacfd

Original structured fields

{
  "date": "2018",
  "id": "wrt-white-paper",
  "kind": "essay",
  "quotes": [
    {
      "sourceId": "src-whitepaper-mirror",
      "text": "an online workspace for organizing and evaluating knowledge … built as a directed graph"
    },
    {
      "sourceId": "src-whitepaper-mirror",
      "text": "collaborative reasoning, allowing groups to build shared mental maps"
    }
  ],
  "sourceIds": [
    "src-whitepaper-mirror",
    "src-roam-whitepaper"
  ],
  "summary": "roam's founding document, written winter 2017/2018 with journalist richard meadows: notes as a directed graph of linked thoughts, bidirectional links and block references as primitives, 'better thinking' as the product.",
  "themes": [
    "networked thought",
    "the graph",
    "low-friction capture"
  ],
  "title": "the roam research white paper",
  "traction": "the document every early user was pointed to first; the mirror survives where the roam-hosted original link-rots.",
  "url": "https://heckler.roam.garden/@white-paper/",
  "venue": "roamresearch.com"
}

roam demo, july 2018 · conaw-writings · 2018-07-18 (day)

Original location · source-0eb97f9c1cdf2d3b40d4

Original structured fields

{
  "date": "2018-07-18",
  "id": "wrt-first-demo",
  "kind": "video",
  "quotes": [],
  "sourceIds": [
    "src-demo-2018"
  ],
  "summary": "the earliest dated public roam demo — block refs, bidirectional links, the daily page — a working product a year before the public beta.",
  "themes": [
    "the graph",
    "tools for thought"
  ],
  "title": "roam demo, july 2018",
  "traction": "proof the product predated the pitch.",
  "url": "https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WwI5mu39U3w",
  "venue": "youtube"
}

365 propositions · conaw-writings · 2018-12-25 (day)

Original location · source-6f184e4e1b50a71577a9

Original structured fields

{
  "date": "2018-12-25",
  "id": "wrt-365-propositions",
  "kind": "thread",
  "quotes": [
    {
      "sourceId": "src-365-propositions",
      "text": "the set of thinkable thoughts is vanishingly small"
    }
  ],
  "sourceIds": [
    "src-365-propositions"
  ],
  "summary": "a living thread of numbered daily propositions — thinking, consent, communal living, attention — public thinking before the product, and the thread-as-publication form he never abandoned.",
  "themes": [
    "networked thought",
    "cities and community"
  ],
  "title": "365 propositions",
  "traction": "hundreds of entries over months; the clearest pre-product writing.",
  "url": "https://threadreaderapp.com/thread/1077392657494593537.html",
  "venue": "twitter"
}

why evernote is a terrible second brain · conaw-writings · 2019-02-23 (day)

Original location · source-4333ff1a240aa84479c7 · source-9dac4fab6215d82fdab3

Original structured fields

{
  "date": "2019-02-23",
  "id": "wrt-evernote-rant",
  "kind": "thread",
  "quotes": [
    {
      "sourceId": "src-evernote-rant",
      "text": "writing isn't just a tool for communication. first and foremost, writing is a tool for thinking"
    }
  ],
  "sourceIds": [
    "src-evernote-rant",
    "src-whitepaper-mirror"
  ],
  "summary": "forty-five tweets against evernote as a second brain — 'twitter can actually be a better second brain than evernote.' the white paper links it as the related twitter thread.",
  "themes": [
    "networked thought",
    "low-friction capture",
    "tools for thought"
  ],
  "title": "why evernote is a terrible second brain",
  "traction": "the mission's most-quoted line; canonized by the white paper itself.",
  "url": "https://threadreaderapp.com/thread/1099181050045952006.html",
  "venue": "twitter"
}

the zettelkasten thread · conaw-writings · 2019-05-18 (day)

Original location · source-089f83a687297628a24e

Original structured fields

{
  "date": "2019-05-18",
  "id": "wrt-zettelkasten",
  "kind": "thread",
  "quotes": [
    {
      "sourceId": "src-zettelkasten-thread",
      "text": "the zettelkasten — it's like the gtd for intellectual progress"
    },
    {
      "sourceId": "src-zettelkasten-thread",
      "text": "you can't put a deadline on insight though"
    }
  ],
  "sourceIds": [
    "src-zettelkasten-thread"
  ],
  "summary": "the luhmann tie-in that gave roam its intellectual pedigree in public — and opened the invite spigot, naming joshua brown as co-builder.",
  "themes": [
    "networked thought",
    "tools for thought",
    "the graph"
  ],
  "title": "the zettelkasten thread",
  "traction": "the thread that converted the productivity intelligentsia.",
  "url": "https://threadreaderapp.com/thread/1129788853189955584.html",
  "venue": "twitter"
}

welcome to roam · conaw-writings · 2019 (year)

Original location · source-a9ff696d29853e38c6fc

Original structured fields

{
  "date": "2019",
  "id": "wrt-welcome",
  "kind": "document",
  "quotes": [
    {
      "sourceId": "src-welcome-to-roam",
      "text": "much love — conor"
    }
  ],
  "sourceIds": [
    "src-welcome-to-roam"
  ],
  "summary": "the founder introduction inside roam's own public help graph — ending with his personal gmail. the medium demonstrating itself: the docs were the product.",
  "themes": [
    "the graph",
    "tools for thought"
  ],
  "title": "welcome to roam",
  "traction": "every new user's first page.",
  "url": "https://bardia.roam.garden/",
  "venue": "roam help graph"
}

how i met my co-founder · conaw-writings · 2019-09-05 (day)

Original location · source-a8263ae9701a2bda0345

Original structured fields

{
  "date": "2019-09-05",
  "id": "wrt-origin",
  "kind": "thread",
  "quotes": [
    {
      "sourceId": "src-conaw-origin-thread",
      "text": "just started bringing in users from the public a couple months ago"
    }
  ],
  "sourceIds": [
    "src-conaw-origin-thread"
  ],
  "summary": "the founding story in first person: meeting joshua brown at 42, the prototype, the co-founder offer — written as the beta was already moving.",
  "themes": [
    "tools for thought"
  ],
  "title": "how i met my co-founder",
  "traction": "the canonical origin story, in his own words.",
  "url": "https://threadreaderapp.com/thread/1176276601048199168.html",
  "venue": "twitter"
}

interview with tiago forte · conaw-writings · 2019-12-17 (day)

Original location · source-cee9c5b4893456cdc88b

Original structured fields

{
  "date": "2019-12-17",
  "id": "wrt-forte",
  "kind": "interview",
  "quotes": [
    {
      "sourceId": "src-forte-interview",
      "text": "first time i've publicly spoken about roam!"
    }
  ],
  "sourceIds": [
    "src-forte-interview"
  ],
  "summary": "an hour with tiago forte: demo, debate, privacy, security — the first public interview, weeks before the hype wave crested.",
  "themes": [
    "networked thought",
    "tools for thought"
  ],
  "title": "interview with tiago forte",
  "traction": "the interview the early community passed around.",
  "url": "https://fortelabs.com/blog/interview-with-conor-white-sullivan-founder-of-roam/",
  "venue": "forte labs"
}

the cannonical roam demo · conaw-writings · 2019-12-20 (day)

Original location · source-795e54a133d8e7993359

Original structured fields

{
  "date": "2019-12-20",
  "id": "wrt-canonical-demo",
  "kind": "video",
  "quotes": [],
  "sourceIds": [
    "src-canonical-demo"
  ],
  "summary": "the gtd-flavored walkthrough the help graph designated the canonical demo — roam selling roam in roam's own medium.",
  "themes": [
    "tools for thought",
    "the graph"
  ],
  "title": "the cannonical roam demo",
  "traction": "the product's own pick for best demo.",
  "url": "https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YcNW-eidDJk",
  "venue": "youtube"
}

mindful makers interview · conaw-writings · 2020-04-08 (day)

Original location · source-cbbb2bbb846e0e88d314

Original structured fields

{
  "date": "2020-04-08",
  "id": "wrt-ness-labs",
  "kind": "interview",
  "quotes": [
    {
      "sourceId": "src-nesslabs-conor-interview",
      "text": "compound interest on your thoughts"
    }
  ],
  "sourceIds": [
    "src-nesslabs-conor-interview"
  ],
  "summary": "the mindful makers interview: roam as compounding cognition — the friendliest framing of the mission in the hype window.",
  "themes": [
    "networked thought",
    "tools for thought"
  ],
  "title": "mindful makers interview",
  "traction": "the community's favorite pull-quote source.",
  "url": null,
  "venue": "ness labs"
}

conor white-sullivan on 20vc · conaw-writings · 2020-05-08 (day)

Original location · source-18d1322a650e85989e3c

Original structured fields

{
  "date": "2020-05-08",
  "id": "wrt-20vc",
  "kind": "podcast",
  "quotes": [
    {
      "sourceId": "src-20vc",
      "text": "roam is not about taking better notes"
    }
  ],
  "sourceIds": [
    "src-20vc"
  ],
  "summary": "the mainstream-vc moment: low floors and high ceilings, hiring for grit and autodidacts, living with the team, the tesla go-to-market.",
  "themes": [
    "tools for thought",
    "education and credentials",
    "the cult"
  ],
  "title": "conor white-sullivan on 20vc",
  "traction": "the interview the investor class heard.",
  "url": "https://www.thetwentyminutevc.com/conorwhitesullivan",
  "venue": "the twenty minute vc"
}

creating tools for networked thought · conaw-writings · 2020-05 (month)

Original location · source-2960615ca20d7028d2d8

Original structured fields

{
  "date": "2020-05",
  "id": "wrt-venture-stories",
  "kind": "podcast",
  "quotes": [],
  "sourceIds": [
    "src-venture-stories"
  ],
  "summary": "the intellectual influences stated plainly: nielsen's reinventing discovery, adler's syntopicon reading as roam's actual origin, roam against twitter, github, notion.",
  "themes": [
    "networked thought",
    "tools for thought"
  ],
  "title": "creating tools for networked thought",
  "traction": "the deep-cut interview for the tft scene.",
  "url": "https://podcastnotes.org/venture-stories/conor-white-sullivan/",
  "venue": "venture stories"
}

api, fellowship, and the roam fund · conaw-writings · 2020-09-19 (day)

Original location · source-8063d65515713fc2bb2d

Original structured fields

{
  "date": "2020-09-19",
  "id": "wrt-post-raise",
  "kind": "thread",
  "quotes": [],
  "sourceIds": [
    "src-post-raise-thread"
  ],
  "summary": "days after the seed: new backend, api and multiplayer, the roam fellowship (first fellow dhrumil mehta), $2m for a roam fund — $1m balance sheet, $1m option pool. ecosystem-builder mode at full throttle.",
  "themes": [
    "the graph",
    "collective intelligence",
    "the cult"
  ],
  "title": "api, fellowship, and the roam fund",
  "traction": "the peak-ambition thread.",
  "url": "https://threadreaderapp.com/thread/1307107745397604354",
  "venue": "twitter"
}

trust in the gatekeepers · conaw-writings · 2021-01-22 (day)

Original location · source-a584141a32af5b6ba88f

Original structured fields

{
  "date": "2021-01-22",
  "id": "wrt-gatekeepers",
  "kind": "thread",
  "quotes": [
    {
      "sourceId": "src-gatekeepers-thread",
      "text": "trust in the gatekeepers / all time low"
    },
    {
      "sourceId": "src-gatekeepers-thread",
      "text": "the answer is not a new channel. it's a new format, a new medium, with a new power structure"
    },
    {
      "sourceId": "src-gatekeepers-thread",
      "text": "if had been no @localocracy there would be no @roamresearch"
    }
  ],
  "sourceIds": [
    "src-gatekeepers-thread"
  ],
  "summary": "the continuity thread tying localocracy to roam across eleven years and 'a third of my life' — institutional decay as the problem, a new medium as the answer.",
  "themes": [
    "collective intelligence",
    "education and credentials",
    "networked thought"
  ],
  "title": "trust in the gatekeepers",
  "traction": "the manifesto of the mature phase.",
  "url": "https://threadreaderapp.com/thread/1352457087230480384.html",
  "venue": "twitter"
}

roamgames · conaw-writings · 2021-01-23 (day)

Original location · source-60929d381aca8fa10015

Original structured fields

{
  "date": "2021-01-23",
  "id": "wrt-roamgames",
  "kind": "thread",
  "quotes": [
    {
      "sourceId": "src-roamgames-thread",
      "text": "whose public work pushes the frontier the farthest"
    }
  ],
  "sourceIds": [
    "src-roamgames-thread"
  ],
  "summary": "$10,000 every two weeks for three months to community builders — judged on intermediate packets, on growing the commons. the cult economy, formalized.",
  "themes": [
    "the cult",
    "collective intelligence"
  ],
  "title": "roamgames",
  "traction": "turned community building into a funded sport.",
  "url": "https://threadreaderapp.com/thread/1352824113019056129.html",
  "venue": "twitter"
}

the 'i was broke' thread · conaw-writings · 2021-01-24 (day)

Original location · source-68a1edce6016f4da2304

Original structured fields

{
  "date": "2021-01-24",
  "id": "wrt-mcgregor",
  "kind": "thread",
  "quotes": [
    {
      "sourceId": "src-mcgregor-broke",
      "text": "felt like a fraud"
    }
  ],
  "sourceIds": [
    "src-mcgregor-broke"
  ],
  "summary": "the conor mcgregor thread: sold localocracy to aol at 23, five broke years, the roam v1 that convinced meadows to invest and josh to join. the autobiography as thread.",
  "themes": [
    "tools for thought"
  ],
  "title": "the 'i was broke' thread",
  "traction": "the founder myth in his own telling.",
  "url": "https://threadreaderapp.com/user/Conaw",
  "venue": "twitter"
}

the local-first architecture thread · conaw-writings · 2021-04-08 (day)

Original location · source-67afb3ae23343ffd774e

Original structured fields

{
  "date": "2021-04-08",
  "id": "wrt-architecture",
  "kind": "thread",
  "quotes": [
    {
      "sourceId": "src-architecture-thread",
      "text": "like changing the engine on an airplane in flight"
    }
  ],
  "sourceIds": [
    "src-architecture-thread"
  ],
  "summary": "the candid admission that the 2017 local-first, event-stream architecture still ran underneath — technical debt confessed as a design philosophy defense.",
  "themes": [
    "the graph",
    "tools for thought"
  ],
  "title": "the local-first architecture thread",
  "traction": "the thread engineers cite when explaining roam's scaling problems.",
  "url": "https://threadreaderapp.com/thread/1380087612652675073",
  "venue": "twitter"
}

roam depot and the e2ee bounty · conaw-writings · 2021-04-16 (day)

Original location · source-7b43bc6191dbef20e4d7

Original structured fields

{
  "date": "2021-04-16",
  "id": "wrt-depot-e2ee",
  "kind": "thread",
  "quotes": [
    {
      "sourceId": "src-depot-e2ee-thread",
      "text": "this week, if god wills it, inshallah"
    }
  ],
  "sourceIds": [
    "src-depot-e2ee-thread"
  ],
  "summary": "roam depot announced as imminent — revenue share for plugin authors, a $10k e2ee bounty. the depot shipped fifteen months later; the promise became the archetype of roam's velocity problem.",
  "themes": [
    "the graph",
    "tools for thought"
  ],
  "title": "roam depot and the e2ee bounty",
  "traction": "the most-cited broken date in roam history.",
  "url": "https://threadreaderapp.com/thread/1371019347355783173.html",
  "venue": "twitter"
}

why i said no to roadmaps · conaw-writings · 2021-05-06 (day)

Original location · source-1af4e279038e025a5d8a

Original structured fields

{
  "date": "2021-05-06",
  "id": "wrt-no-roadmaps",
  "kind": "thread",
  "quotes": [
    {
      "sourceId": "src-roadmaps-thread",
      "text": "dangers of link-rot"
    }
  ],
  "sourceIds": [
    "src-roadmaps-thread"
  ],
  "summary": "'why i said no to roadmaps': the map-of-questions doctrine — questions public, dates never — while acknowledging the roam-hosted roadmap page itself had gone dead.",
  "themes": [
    "the graph",
    "tools for thought"
  ],
  "title": "why i said no to roadmaps",
  "traction": "beloved by the base; infuriating to everyone waiting on mobile.",
  "url": "https://threadreaderapp.com/thread/1390228109140574208.html",
  "venue": "twitter"
}

the anti-college thread · conaw-writings · 2021-05-19 (day)

Original location · source-8359bbbe3be5eddaae6a

Original structured fields

{
  "date": "2021-05-19",
  "id": "wrt-lambda",
  "kind": "thread",
  "quotes": [
    {
      "sourceId": "src-lambda-thread",
      "text": "strongly prefer my kids wind up going to ls vs debt-shackling college"
    }
  ],
  "sourceIds": [
    "src-lambda-thread"
  ],
  "summary": "the flagship anti-college thread — lambda school over debt-shackled degrees — the credentialism controversy's source text, from the founder whose company sold belief.",
  "themes": [
    "education and credentials"
  ],
  "title": "the anti-college thread",
  "traction": "the most-argued-with conaw position.",
  "url": "https://threadreaderapp.com/thread/1394873575543382018.html",
  "venue": "twitter"
}

the #roamcult theology thread · conaw-writings · 2021-05-26 (day)

Original location · source-83c689c8a1bad43ad54e

Original structured fields

{
  "date": "2021-05-26",
  "id": "wrt-cult-theology",
  "kind": "thread",
  "quotes": [
    {
      "sourceId": "src-roamcult-love",
      "text": "the thing people actually fall in love with with roam are the ideas, memories, and work they put into it"
    }
  ],
  "sourceIds": [
    "src-roamcult-love"
  ],
  "summary": "the #roamcult theology at its most sincere: the product as mirror — people love what they put in, not the tool itself. the most honest account of what the cult was actually for.",
  "themes": [
    "the cult",
    "networked thought"
  ],
  "title": "the #roamcult theology thread",
  "traction": "the defense believers still quote.",
  "url": "https://threadreaderapp.com/thread/1397428552790908933.html",
  "venue": "twitter"
}

the quest pod interview · conaw-writings · 2021-07-13 (day)

Original location · source-f21de648a47288d1ab95

Original structured fields

{
  "date": "2021-07-13",
  "id": "wrt-quest-pod",
  "kind": "interview",
  "quotes": [
    {
      "sourceId": "src-quest-pod",
      "text": "excel for thoughts"
    }
  ],
  "sourceIds": [
    "src-quest-pod"
  ],
  "summary": "the two-part justin kan interview: the anthropology degree, nine months embedded in evangelical communities, collective intelligence — the fullest autobiographical record.",
  "themes": [
    "collective intelligence",
    "the cult",
    "cities and community"
  ],
  "title": "the quest pod interview",
  "traction": "the long-form autobiography.",
  "url": "https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=polm57MvmRE",
  "venue": "the quest pod"
}

the subreddit bans thread · conaw-writings · 2021-10-04 (day)

Original location · source-93f170e02209c6deda0b

Original structured fields

{
  "date": "2021-10-04",
  "id": "wrt-subreddit-bans",
  "kind": "thread",
  "quotes": [],
  "sourceIds": [
    "src-subreddit-bans"
  ],
  "summary": "the long-form explanation for banning critics from r/roamresearch — the founder-moderation flashpoint, argued in the medium he controlled.",
  "themes": [
    "the cult"
  ],
  "title": "the subreddit bans thread",
  "traction": "the thread that converted skeptics into critics.",
  "url": "https://threadreaderapp.com/thread/1445301361994833920.html",
  "venue": "twitter"
}

the ceo confessional · conaw-writings · 2021-12-29 (day)

Original location · source-2b674749339951c954c0

Original structured fields

{
  "date": "2021-12-29",
  "id": "wrt-ceo-confessional",
  "kind": "thread",
  "quotes": [
    {
      "sourceId": "src-ceo-confessional",
      "text": "three times i've written drafts of this thread in my roam, and three times i've failed to publish it"
    },
    {
      "sourceId": "src-ceo-confessional",
      "text": "the reddit revolutionaries were actually right"
    }
  ],
  "sourceIds": [
    "src-ceo-confessional"
  ],
  "summary": "twenty-nine tweets: the hidden agenda of localocracy, the 'anti-role modal for roam culture,' the concession to the critics — the founder processing the company in public, in the medium the company sold.",
  "themes": [
    "the cult",
    "collective intelligence",
    "networked thought"
  ],
  "title": "the ceo confessional",
  "traction": "the capstone of the public-founder era.",
  "url": "https://threadreaderapp.com/thread/1476090219321380865.html",
  "venue": "twitter"
}

the #roamcult disavowal reversal · conaw-writings · 2022-01 (month)

Original location · source-006738499f9948b1d945

Original structured fields

{
  "date": "2022-01",
  "id": "wrt-disavowal",
  "kind": "thread",
  "quotes": [
    {
      "sourceId": "src-disavowal-reversal",
      "text": "one of my worst mistakes of 2021"
    }
  ],
  "sourceIds": [
    "src-disavowal-reversal"
  ],
  "summary": "disavowing #roamcult, then un-disavowing it — the internal identity crisis documented in public, a month after the confessional.",
  "themes": [
    "the cult"
  ],
  "title": "the #roamcult disavowal reversal",
  "traction": "the cult's schism, narrated by its founder.",
  "url": "https://threadreaderapp.com/thread/1477190770897653761.html",
  "venue": "twitter"
}

the local-first defense · conaw-writings · 2022-07-10 (day)

Original location · source-5938b811029b075c0a2b

Original structured fields

{
  "date": "2022-07-10",
  "id": "wrt-local-first-defense",
  "kind": "thread",
  "quotes": [
    {
      "sourceId": "src-localfirst-defense",
      "text": "roam was literally built local first!"
    }
  ],
  "sourceIds": [
    "src-localfirst-defense"
  ],
  "summary": "the technical-identity defense: in-memory frontend database, offline from day one — arguing the clones had the story wrong even as they took the market.",
  "themes": [
    "the graph",
    "tools for thought"
  ],
  "title": "the local-first defense",
  "traction": "true on architecture; lost on narrative.",
  "url": "https://threadreaderapp.com/user/Conaw",
  "venue": "twitter"
}

the apple notes quip · conaw-writings · 2022-07-28 (day)

Original location · source-1d77056440f029bdc870

Original structured fields

{
  "date": "2022-07-28",
  "id": "wrt-apple-notes",
  "kind": "tweet",
  "quotes": [
    {
      "sourceId": "src-apple-notes",
      "text": "if you're smart enough to solve all your problems in apple notes, i question your ambition"
    }
  ],
  "sourceIds": [
    "src-apple-notes"
  ],
  "summary": "the most-quoted conaw provocation of the plateau era — read as elitism by critics, as mission by believers.",
  "themes": [
    "tools for thought",
    "the cult"
  ],
  "title": "the apple notes quip",
  "traction": "screenshotted forever.",
  "url": "https://threadreaderapp.com/user/Conaw",
  "venue": "twitter"
}

the 30-demos sprint · conaw-writings · 2023-02-08 (day)

Original location · source-6ea9a117f8edf8a1d527

Original structured fields

{
  "date": "2023-02-08",
  "id": "wrt-30-demos",
  "kind": "thread",
  "quotes": [],
  "sourceIds": [
    "src-30-demos"
  ],
  "summary": "thirty tweet-sized demos of small improvements and experiments with nikita prokopov — the last sustained building-in-public burst before the quiet.",
  "themes": [
    "tools for thought",
    "the graph"
  ],
  "title": "the 30-demos sprint",
  "traction": "the faithful's last rally.",
  "url": "https://threadreaderapp.com/user/Conaw",
  "venue": "twitter"
}

metamuse: collective intelligence · conaw-writings · 2023-03-02 (day)

Original location · source-79b00533a97f46542c0c

Original structured fields

{
  "date": "2023-03-02",
  "id": "wrt-metamuse",
  "kind": "podcast",
  "quotes": [],
  "sourceIds": [
    "src-metamuse"
  ],
  "summary": "the late retrospective: severe adhd, roam as working-memory extension, 'program your own mind' — the founder framing the product as the tool his own brain needed. episode page now 404s; date verified via mirrors.",
  "themes": [
    "networked thought",
    "tools for thought"
  ],
  "title": "metamuse: collective intelligence",
  "traction": "the most personal of the interviews.",
  "url": "https://museapp.com/podcast/75-collective-intelligence/",
  "venue": "metamuse"
}