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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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roam research: history

the company, sourced and dated — founding, funding, product, community, and the quiet years.

origins and founding (2008–2019)

localocracy, huffington post, the white house, five broke years — conaw spends a decade circling collective intelligence before roam exists in public.

2008 — localocracy: umass amherst anthropology students conor white-sullivan, adam white, and davis bucher found localocracy — 'everyone is an expert about something' — an online town common for verified-resident civic discussion. the obsession that becomes roam is already visible: structured deliberation, not another feed. (confirmed; sources: umass start-up website bought by huffington post, huffington post acquires localocracy)
2009 — the ignite talk: a five-minute ignite amherst talk — twenty slides, 'the reckless confidence of a 21 year old' — lays out tech, media, and political power. conaw reposts it a decade later: 'still stand by most of this.' (confirmed; sources: ignite amherst talk on tech, media, and political power)
2010-07-29 — tedxboston: localocracy: at tedxboston, conaw presents localocracy as civic infrastructure — the earliest surviving video of the founder's pitch style: earnest, fast, systems-level. (confirmed; sources: tedxboston — conor white-sullivan — localocracy)
2011-10-03 — the huffpost acquisition: aol's huffington post media group acquires localocracy. conaw is 23. he later describes the outcome as selling early and feeling 'like a fraud' — five broke years follow. (confirmed; sources: huffington post acquires localocracy, the conor mcgregor / 'i was broke' thread)
2012 — the white house years: conaw writes for the obama white house blog on participatory democracy — the archived author page survives. the through-line from localocracy to roam: build the medium, change the reasoning. (reported; sources: conor white-sullivan author archive)
2014 — the anthropology detour: between civic projects conaw spends roughly nine months embedded in evangelical communities — anthropological fieldwork on how belief systems organize. the religious-education themes in roam's cult framing start here. (reported; sources: networked thought with conor white-sullivan)
2016 — meeting joshua brown: at 42 (the coding school), conaw meets joshua brown and shows him a prototype. brown becomes the co-founder — 'if had been no @localocracy there would be no @roamresearch,' but josh builds the thing. (reported; sources: how i met my co-founder (origin thread))
2017 — conaw starts roam: conaw begins roam in clojurescript and datascript — a local-first, event-sourced architecture he will later describe candidly as 'changing the engine on an airplane in flight.' funding comes from ai-safety-community grants and contracts, not vc. (reported; sources: the local-first architecture thread, roam wefunder campaign page)
2018 — the white paper: 'we wrote this white paper in winter of 2017/2018': an online workspace for organizing and evaluating knowledge as a directed graph, built for 'collaborative reasoning, allowing groups to build shared mental maps.' co-authored with journalist richard meadows, who becomes roam's first investor. (confirmed; sources: the roam research white paper (mirror), the roam research white paper)
2018-07-18 — the first demos: the earliest dated public demo videos appear — a working product a full year before the public beta, while the company is still two people and a vision. (confirmed; sources: roam demo, july 18 2018)
2018-12-25 — 365 propositions: the '365 propositions' thread begins: hundreds of numbered daily propositions — 'the set of thinkable thoughts is vanishingly small,' on consent, communal living, attention. public thinking before the product, and the thread-as-publication form he will use for years. (confirmed; sources: 365 propositions)
2019-02-23 — the evernote rant: the 45-tweet evernote rant — 'writing isn't just a tool for communication. first and foremost, writing is a tool for thinking' — becomes the white paper's own 'related twitter thread' citation and the mission's most-quoted line. (confirmed; sources: why evernote is a terrible second brain, the roam research white paper (mirror))
2019-05-18 — the zettelkasten thread: the zettelkasten thread ties roam to luhmann — 'it's like the gtd for intellectual progress' — and opens the invite spigot. 'you can't put a deadline on insight though.' (confirmed; sources: the zettelkasten thread)
2019-09-05 — the origin thread: the origin thread: how he met josh, the prototype, the co-founder offer — 'just started bringing in users from the public a couple months ago.' (confirmed; sources: how i met my co-founder (origin thread))

breakout and the cult (2019–2020)

invite beta to public launch to full-blown #roamcult — the fastest belief a note-taking tool ever acquired.

2019-11-04 — hn finds roam: the first sizable hacker news thread on the roam beta — 123 points, mostly curiosity about what a 'tool for networked thought' even is. (confirmed; sources: roam: tool for thinking)
2019-12-17 — the forte interview: tiago forte interviews conaw — an hour of demo and debate on knowledge management and privacy. conor calls it 'first time i've publicly spoken about roam!' (confirmed; sources: interview with conor white-sullivan, founder of roam)
2020-01-10 — product hunt launch: product hunt launch: #2 product of the day, 363 upvotes — 'easy as a doc, powerful as a graph database.' (confirmed; sources: roam research on product hunt)
2020-01-18 — the nat eliason post: nat eliason's 'roam: why i love it and how i use it' becomes the canonical onboarding document — 288 hn points — and drives a visible sign-up wave. his effortless output course follows: the biggest business the hype produced. (confirmed; sources: roam: why i love it and how i use it, roam: why i love it and how i use it (discussion), effortless output in roam)
2020-03-30 — obsidian's first beta: obsidian ships its first beta — local-first, plain markdown, free — and begins absorbing the pragmatists roam's price and cloud alienate. days later org-roam ports the idea into emacs: the clones arrive before the pricing does. (confirmed; sources: obsidian — a private and flexible writing app, org-roam: rudimentary roam replica with org-mode)
2020-05 — the waitlist and the clones: a thomas frank video drives a sign-up surge; a data-loss incident follows; roam pauses sign-ups entirely — scarcity becomes distribution. logseq's first commits land the same month: free, open-source, local-first. (confirmed; sources: roam to pause new sign-ups, roam newsletter: gates reopening, logseq/logseq)
2020-06 — pricing and the believer plan: pricing goes live: $15/mo, $165/yr, and the $500 five-year 'believer' plan — rob litterst calls it 'the cult packaging playbook,' jack baty pays it while 'twitchy,' and foam takes 699 hn points as the open-source answer. (confirmed; sources: roam research's cult packaging strategy, so, i went with roam research and am a true believer, foam: open-source roam alternative)
2020-07-27 — $1m arr in six weeks: roam reportedly reaches ~$1m arr six weeks after paid plans launch — community-reported, never officially published. (reported; sources: roam reaches $1m arr in 6 weeks)
2020-11 — the roam book club: the roam book club: 1,700+ signups, ~200 simultaneous editors on how to take smart notes — multiplayer as community ritual and stress test. (reported; sources: a book club like no other)

the 200m seed (2020)

a ~$9m round at a ~$200m valuation makes roam the symbol of the tools-for-thought bubble — for believers and skeptics alike.

2020-09-11 — the $9m at $200m seed: sec form d confirms the round the information reported: roughly $9m at a ~$200m valuation — ~25x the median seed price. roam becomes the era's favorite example of both conviction and froth. (confirmed; sources: roam research form d, a $200 million seed valuation for roam, roam research could be the future of note-taking)
2020-09-19 — the ecosystem blueprint: the post-raise thread: new backend, api and multiplayer, the roam fellowship (first fellow dhrumil mehta), and $2m for a roam fund — $1m balance sheet, $1m option pool. ecosystem-builder mode at full throttle. (confirmed; sources: api, fellowship, and the roam fund)
2021-01-23 — roamgames: roamgames: $10,000 every two weeks for three months to community builders 'whose public work pushes the frontier the farthest' — the cult economy formalized. (confirmed; sources: roamgames announcement)

plateau and competition (2021–2023)

multiplayer, extensions, and mobile ship slowly while obsidian, logseq, and tana take the frontier — and the founder argues with his critics in public.

2021-04-08 — the architecture confession: the architecture thread admits the technical debt in public: the 2017 local-first, event-stream backend still underneath — 'like changing the engine on an airplane in flight.' (confirmed; sources: the local-first architecture thread)
2021-04-16 — the depot promise: roam depot 'this week, if god wills it, inshallah' — revenue share for plugin authors, a $10k e2ee bounty. the depot actually ships fifteen months later. (confirmed; sources: roam depot and the e2ee bounty)
2021-04-26 — the community round: the wefunder community round: $1,256,376 from 760 investors — customers as shareholders. the campaign page discloses crypto treasury and campus-buying plans under 'reasons not to invest.' (confirmed; sources: roam wefunder campaign page, roam research crowdfunding campaign oversubscribed)
2021-05-06 — no roadmaps: 'why i said no to roadmaps': the map-of-questions doctrine — plus an acknowledged dead roadmap page. 'dangers of link-rot.' (confirmed; sources: why i said no to roadmaps)
2021-10-04 — the subreddit bans: the subreddit bans thread: conor explains banning critics from r/roamresearch in long form. founder-as-moderator becomes the controversy the product can't ship past. (confirmed; sources: the subreddit bans thread)
2021-12-29 — the ceo confessional: the ceo confessional — 29 tweets: '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.' (confirmed; sources: the ceo confessional)
2022-01-29 — encrypted graphs: encrypted graphs ship — e2e for new graphs — after community pressure including alexander rink's public encryption work. (confirmed; sources: e2e-encryption for roam research, roam change log)
2022-02-12 — the fall of roam: dan shipper's 'the fall of roam' — the canonical departure essay by a former daily user: crufty links, slow velocity, weak mobile, 'well-documented community issues.' (confirmed; sources: the fall of roam)
2022-07-15 — roam depot ships: roam depot finally launches — the extension marketplace, fifteen months after 'this week, inshallah.' (confirmed; sources: roam change log, roam-research/roam-depot)
2022-10-13 — obsidian 1.0: obsidian 1.0 takes 1,329 hn points and 566 comments — larger than any roam thread ever. the market votes with its files. (confirmed; sources: obsidian 1.0, why note-taking apps don't make us smarter)
2023-02-08 — the 30-demos sprint: the 30-demos sprint with nikita prokopov: thirty tweet-sized demos of small improvements — the last public building-in-public burst. (confirmed; sources: the 30-demos sprint with nikitonsky)
2023-08-24 — the believer postmortems: casey newton's platformer postmortem — 'i waited for the insights to come. and waited. and waited.' — the definitive critical text by a believer. david pierce's same-titled verge piece follows two days later. (confirmed; sources: why note-taking apps don't make us smarter, why note-taking apps don't make us smarter)

the quiet years (2024–)

the product keeps running, the founder goes quiet, agents arrive, and the idea outlives the company that carried it.

2024-05-12 — the community postmortem: 'what comes after roam's renaissance?' on lesswrong: 'the hype was replaced by dramas, scandals, and rants' — and loyalists praising the 'lack of new features.' the post-peak community writes its own obituary. (reported; sources: what comes after roam's renaissance?)
2024-07-24 — the credential-stuffing attack: a credential-stuffing attack forces a password reset across the service — the quiet era's loudest incident. (confirmed; sources: roam change log)
2025-02-03 — the successor's raise: tana — built in part by figures from the roam community — raises $25m with a 160k waitlist: the demand roam created, monetized by a successor. (confirmed; sources: tana snaps up $25m with its ai-powered knowledge graph, tana — the all-in-one workspace with supertags)
2025-05-18 — the privacy exchange: the fall-of-roam repost cycle on hn surfaces the privacy exchange: a commenter claims an employee name in his graph's access logs; roam's engineer and co-founder josh brown respond — strict no-access policy since 2021, e2e graphs since january 2022. (confirmed; sources: the fall of roam (2022) repost, ghsa-q4ch-vxxv-mx3h — firebase storage exposure)
2026 — agents arrive: roam tools: roam tools — the official mcp server and cli — connects claude and cursor-style agents to a graph through the desktop app's local api: semantic search, extension-registered ai tools. the most substantive ai-era product line roam has shipped. (reported; sources: roam-research/roam-tools, roam-tools changelog)
2026-04-04 — the idea reopens: karpathy's llm-wiki gist restates the thesis for agents: an llm-maintained, interlinked markdown wiki as 'a persistent, compounding artifact' — 'the wiki is the codebase.' the idea reopens with a machine holding the links. (confirmed; sources: llm-wiki.md)

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/history

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.
roam: why i love it and how i use it · nat eliason · 2020-01-18 (day) · original ID: src-eliason-why-i-love-it · nat eliason
the article most often credited with triggering the 2020 sign-up wave; eliason later reported it drove meaningful referral revenue.
a $200 million seed valuation for roam · the information · 2020-09-11 (day) · original ID: src-information-200m
the scoop that fixed the public number: ~$9m at ~$200m, roughly 25x the median seed valuation. paywalled.
why note-taking apps don't make us smarter · platformer · 2023-09-11 (day) · original ID: src-newton-platformer · casey newton
the marquee postmortem by a believer: 'i waited for the insights to come. and waited. and waited.' notes designed for storage, not sparking insights.
obsidian — a private and flexible writing app · obsidian · 2020 (year) · original ID: src-obsidian
the local-first competitor that won the pragmatists while roam won the evangelists — first beta march 30, 2020, free, plain markdown.
logseq/logseq · github · 2020 (year) · original ID: src-logseq
the open-source outliner clone (agpl, local markdown/org files) that absorbed roam's most cost-sensitive users; its readme credits roam, org-mode, tiddlywiki, and workflowy.
tana — the all-in-one workspace with supertags · tana · 2023 (year) · original ID: src-tana
the supertag successor built by ex-roam-community figures, launched on the explicit promise of finishing what roam started.
llm-wiki.md · github gist · 2026-04-04 (day) · original ID: src-karpathy-llm-wiki · andrej karpathy
the agent-era restatement: an llm-maintained markdown wiki as 'a persistent, compounding artifact.' 'obsidian is the ide; the llm is the programmer; the wiki is the codebase.'
huffington post acquires localocracy · techcrunch · 2011-10-03 (day) · original ID: src-localocracy-acquisition
the acquisition that anchors conaw's pre-roam history: localocracy — 'everyone is an expert about something' — sold to aol's huffington post media group.
umass start-up website bought by huffington post · massachusetts daily collegian · 2011-10 (month) · original ID: src-localocracy-collegian
the student-paper record: umass amherst founders, ages, and lead engineer jay voice.
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.
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.
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.
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!'
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.'
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.
roam research on product hunt · product hunt · 2020-01-10 (day) · original ID: src-producthunt
the launch-channel record: #2 product of the day, 363 upvotes, 69 comments — 'easy as a doc, powerful as a graph database.'
roam to pause new sign-ups · medium · 2020-05-05 (day) · original ID: src-waitlist-pause · francesco d'alessio
the waitlist moment documented: a thomas frank video drove a sign-up surge, a data-loss incident followed, and the gates closed.
roam newsletter: gates reopening · roam newsletter (substack) · 2020-05-24 (day) · original ID: src-roam-newsletter-gates
the community newsletter's record of the gates reopening may 23 — paid users prioritized, beta users comped.
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.
roam reaches $1m arr in 6 weeks · indie hackers · 2020-07-27 (day) · original ID: src-indie-hackers-arr · rosie sherry
the ~$1m arr report — six weeks after paid plans launched. community-sourced; roam never officially published revenue.
roam research form d · sec edgar · 2020-09-11 (day) · original ID: src-sec-form-d
the official filing: roam research, inc. (cik 0001824172), form d filed september 11, 2020 — the hard anchor under the $200m story.
roam research could be the future of note-taking · the hustle · 2020-09-14 (day) · original ID: src-hustle-roam · trung t. phan
'roam research could be the future of note-taking': profitable, 11 staff, five yc rejections — the raise set beside notion's $2b and coda's $636m.
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).
roam-research/roam-depot · github · 2022-05-19 (day) · original ID: src-roam-depot-repo
the extension-marketplace plumbing, public since may 2022.
roam-research/roam-tools · github · 2026 (year) · original ID: src-roam-tools
the official mcp server and cli — @roam-research/roam-mcp and roam-cli connecting claude/cursor-style agents to a graph via the desktop app's local api. the most substantive ai-era product line roam has shipped.
roam-tools changelog · github · 2026 (year) · original ID: src-roam-tools-changelog
the rapid-cadence record: 0.3.x in february to 0.11.0 by late august 2026 — split packages, semantic search, extension-registered ai tools at local api 1.1.5.
what comes after roam's renaissance? · lesswrong · 2024-05-12 (day) · original ID: src-lesswrong-renaissance · itay dreyfus
the post-peak community's own postmortem: 'the hype was replaced by dramas, scandals, and rants' — and loyalists praising the 'lack of new features.'
a book club like no other · hey world · 2020-11 (month) · original ID: src-book-club · ash chedrin
the roam book club story: 1,700+ signups and ~200 simultaneous editors — multiplayer as community ritual and stress test.
roam: tool for thinking · hacker news · 2019-11-04 (day) · original ID: src-hn-tool-for-thinking
the earliest sizable hacker news discussion of the roam beta — 123 points, mostly curiosity.
roam: why i love it and how i use it (discussion) · hacker news · 2020-01-21 (day) · original ID: src-hn-eliason
the largest early hn thread — 288 points on the eliason essay, converts and skeptics arguing in the same thread.
foam: open-source roam alternative · hacker news · 2020-06-28 (day) · original ID: src-foam-hn
foam — the open-source roam-like for vs code — takes 699 hn points within weeks of the pricing launch: the biggest competitor-side thread of the era.
org-roam: rudimentary roam replica with org-mode · hacker news · 2020-04-03 (day) · original ID: src-org-roam-hn
org-roam: the emacs community clones roam inside weeks — early evidence the idea was bigger than the product.
why note-taking apps don't make us smarter · the verge · 2023-08-25 (day) · original ID: src-verge-pierce · david pierce
the verge's same-titled counterpart two days after newton's: roam 'a breakthrough' in 2021, development slowed, enthusiasm moved to obsidian and mem.
ghsa-q4ch-vxxv-mx3h — firebase storage exposure · github (roam-research advisory) · 2021 (year) · original ID: src-ghsa-firebase
the official advisory: firebase storage rules once allowed listing, downloading, and deleting uploaded files across graphs — patched to granular rules.
obsidian 1.0 · obsidian · 2022-10-13 (day) · original ID: src-obsidian-1
the market's verdict: obsidian 1.0 took 1,329 hn points and 566 comments — larger than any roam thread ever.
tana snaps up $25m with its ai-powered knowledge graph · techcrunch · 2025-02-03 (day) · original ID: src-tana-25m
tana's $25m and a 160k waitlist — the demand roam created, monetized by a successor.
the fall of roam (2022) repost · hacker news · 2025-05-18 (day) · original ID: src-hn-fall-repost
the fall-of-roam repost cycle plus the privacy exchange: a commenter claims an employee name in his graph's access logs; roam's engineer and co-founder josh brown respond — strict no-access policy since 2021, e2e graphs since january 2022.
e2e-encryption for roam research · goedel.io · 2022-01 (month) · original ID: src-rink-e2e · alexander rink
the community-built e2e pressure: media urls and firebase exposure documented, then roam shipped native encrypted graphs.
effortless output in roam · effortlessoutput.com · 2020 (year) · original ID: src-effortless-output · nat eliason
the biggest commercial artifact the hype produced: effortless output in roam — 4,400+ students self-reported, a course business built on one essay.
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

origins and founding · roam-eras · 2008–2019 (approximate)

Original location

Original structured fields

{
  "id": "origins",
  "range": "2008–2019",
  "summary": "localocracy, huffington post, the white house, five broke years — conaw spends a decade circling collective intelligence before roam exists in public.",
  "title": "origins and founding"
}

breakout and the cult · roam-eras · 2019–2020 (approximate)

Original location

Original structured fields

{
  "id": "breakout",
  "range": "2019–2020",
  "summary": "invite beta to public launch to full-blown #roamcult — the fastest belief a note-taking tool ever acquired.",
  "title": "breakout and the cult"
}

the 200m seed · roam-eras · 2020 (year)

Original location

Original structured fields

{
  "id": "seed",
  "range": "2020",
  "summary": "a ~$9m round at a ~$200m valuation makes roam the symbol of the tools-for-thought bubble — for believers and skeptics alike.",
  "title": "the 200m seed"
}

plateau and competition · roam-eras · 2021–2023 (approximate)

Original location

Original structured fields

{
  "id": "plateau",
  "range": "2021–2023",
  "summary": "multiplayer, extensions, and mobile ship slowly while obsidian, logseq, and tana take the frontier — and the founder argues with his critics in public.",
  "title": "plateau and competition"
}

the quiet years · roam-eras · 2024– (approximate)

Original location

Original structured fields

{
  "id": "quiet",
  "range": "2024–",
  "summary": "the product keeps running, the founder goes quiet, agents arrive, and the idea outlives the company that carried it.",
  "title": "the quiet years"
}

localocracy · roam-timeline · 2008 (year) · confirmed (original editorial confidence)

Original location · source-8f31f37975b2c680474a · source-1d515c37bc5029e3bc20

Original structured fields

{
  "confidence": "confirmed",
  "date": "2008",
  "detail": "umass amherst anthropology students conor white-sullivan, adam white, and davis bucher found localocracy — 'everyone is an expert about something' — an online town common for verified-resident civic discussion. the obsession that becomes roam is already visible: structured deliberation, not another feed.",
  "era": "origins",
  "id": "evt-localocracy",
  "sourceIds": [
    "src-localocracy-collegian",
    "src-localocracy-acquisition"
  ],
  "title": "localocracy"
}

the ignite talk · roam-timeline · 2009 (year) · confirmed (original editorial confidence)

Original location · source-92808b8fa27d7dbec27a

Original structured fields

{
  "confidence": "confirmed",
  "date": "2009",
  "detail": "a five-minute ignite amherst talk — twenty slides, 'the reckless confidence of a 21 year old' — lays out tech, media, and political power. conaw reposts it a decade later: 'still stand by most of this.'",
  "era": "origins",
  "id": "evt-ignite-amherst",
  "sourceIds": [
    "src-ignite-amherst"
  ],
  "title": "the ignite talk"
}

tedxboston: localocracy · roam-timeline · 2010-07-29 (day) · confirmed (original editorial confidence)

Original location · source-65dd63222af38c34b805

Original structured fields

{
  "confidence": "confirmed",
  "date": "2010-07-29",
  "detail": "at tedxboston, conaw presents localocracy as civic infrastructure — the earliest surviving video of the founder's pitch style: earnest, fast, systems-level.",
  "era": "origins",
  "id": "evt-tedxboston",
  "sourceIds": [
    "src-tedx-localocracy"
  ],
  "title": "tedxboston: localocracy"
}

the huffpost acquisition · roam-timeline · 2011-10-03 (day) · confirmed (original editorial confidence)

Original location · source-1d515c37bc5029e3bc20 · source-1241ebaa5f5fd362d595

Original structured fields

{
  "confidence": "confirmed",
  "date": "2011-10-03",
  "detail": "aol's huffington post media group acquires localocracy. conaw is 23. he later describes the outcome as selling early and feeling 'like a fraud' — five broke years follow.",
  "era": "origins",
  "id": "evt-localocracy-exit",
  "sourceIds": [
    "src-localocracy-acquisition",
    "src-mcgregor-broke"
  ],
  "title": "the huffpost acquisition"
}

the white house years · roam-timeline · 2012 (year) · reported (original editorial confidence)

Original location · source-fc7e061cc9cc7a343821

Original structured fields

{
  "confidence": "reported",
  "date": "2012",
  "detail": "conaw writes for the obama white house blog on participatory democracy — the archived author page survives. the through-line from localocracy to roam: build the medium, change the reasoning.",
  "era": "origins",
  "id": "evt-white-house",
  "sourceIds": [
    "src-whitehouse-archive"
  ],
  "title": "the white house years"
}

the anthropology detour · roam-timeline · 2014 (year) · reported (original editorial confidence)

Original location · source-e2e315aa497dc7343d8d

Original structured fields

{
  "confidence": "reported",
  "date": "2014",
  "detail": "between civic projects conaw spends roughly nine months embedded in evangelical communities — anthropological fieldwork on how belief systems organize. the religious-education themes in roam's cult framing start here.",
  "era": "origins",
  "id": "evt-anthropology",
  "sourceIds": [
    "src-quest-pod"
  ],
  "title": "the anthropology detour"
}

meeting joshua brown · roam-timeline · 2016 (year) · reported (original editorial confidence)

Original location · source-57e2b496f83a9c53037b

Original structured fields

{
  "confidence": "reported",
  "date": "2016",
  "detail": "at 42 (the coding school), conaw meets joshua brown and shows him a prototype. brown becomes the co-founder — 'if had been no @localocracy there would be no @roamresearch,' but josh builds the thing.",
  "era": "origins",
  "id": "evt-meets-josh",
  "sourceIds": [
    "src-conaw-origin-thread"
  ],
  "title": "meeting joshua brown"
}

conaw starts roam · roam-timeline · 2017 (year) · reported (original editorial confidence)

Original location · source-e67b64e4e6122815ebaf · source-435656174334bdf3f6e1

Original structured fields

{
  "confidence": "reported",
  "date": "2017",
  "detail": "conaw begins roam in clojurescript and datascript — a local-first, event-sourced architecture he will later describe candidly as 'changing the engine on an airplane in flight.' funding comes from ai-safety-community grants and contracts, not vc.",
  "era": "origins",
  "id": "evt-roam-begins",
  "sourceIds": [
    "src-architecture-thread",
    "src-wefunder-archive"
  ],
  "title": "conaw starts roam"
}

the white paper · roam-timeline · 2018 (year) · confirmed (original editorial confidence)

Original location · source-d4d1bd555f5c7a731d75 · source-5305d6d4254f81e31976

Original structured fields

{
  "confidence": "confirmed",
  "date": "2018",
  "detail": "'we wrote this white paper in winter of 2017/2018': an online workspace for organizing and evaluating knowledge as a directed graph, built for 'collaborative reasoning, allowing groups to build shared mental maps.' co-authored with journalist richard meadows, who becomes roam's first investor.",
  "era": "origins",
  "id": "evt-white-paper",
  "sourceIds": [
    "src-whitepaper-mirror",
    "src-roam-whitepaper"
  ],
  "title": "the white paper"
}

the first demos · roam-timeline · 2018-07-18 (day) · confirmed (original editorial confidence)

Original location · source-b3178232df3e7fcf6275

Original structured fields

{
  "confidence": "confirmed",
  "date": "2018-07-18",
  "detail": "the earliest dated public demo videos appear — a working product a full year before the public beta, while the company is still two people and a vision.",
  "era": "origins",
  "id": "evt-first-demo",
  "sourceIds": [
    "src-demo-2018"
  ],
  "title": "the first demos"
}

365 propositions · roam-timeline · 2018-12-25 (day) · confirmed (original editorial confidence)

Original location · source-8c2e01b550dff7a79209

Original structured fields

{
  "confidence": "confirmed",
  "date": "2018-12-25",
  "detail": "the '365 propositions' thread begins: hundreds of numbered daily propositions — 'the set of thinkable thoughts is vanishingly small,' on consent, communal living, attention. public thinking before the product, and the thread-as-publication form he will use for years.",
  "era": "origins",
  "id": "evt-365-propositions",
  "sourceIds": [
    "src-365-propositions"
  ],
  "title": "365 propositions"
}

the evernote rant · roam-timeline · 2019-02-23 (day) · confirmed (original editorial confidence)

Original location · source-439919c3214788640c82 · source-d4d1bd555f5c7a731d75

Original structured fields

{
  "confidence": "confirmed",
  "date": "2019-02-23",
  "detail": "the 45-tweet evernote rant — 'writing isn't just a tool for communication. first and foremost, writing is a tool for thinking' — becomes the white paper's own 'related twitter thread' citation and the mission's most-quoted line.",
  "era": "origins",
  "id": "evt-evernote-rant",
  "sourceIds": [
    "src-evernote-rant",
    "src-whitepaper-mirror"
  ],
  "title": "the evernote rant"
}

the zettelkasten thread · roam-timeline · 2019-05-18 (day) · confirmed (original editorial confidence)

Original location · source-0dcd4567f6bef69a9d28

Original structured fields

{
  "confidence": "confirmed",
  "date": "2019-05-18",
  "detail": "the zettelkasten thread ties roam to luhmann — 'it's like the gtd for intellectual progress' — and opens the invite spigot. 'you can't put a deadline on insight though.'",
  "era": "origins",
  "id": "evt-zettelkasten-thread",
  "sourceIds": [
    "src-zettelkasten-thread"
  ],
  "title": "the zettelkasten thread"
}

the origin thread · roam-timeline · 2019-09-05 (day) · confirmed (original editorial confidence)

Original location · source-57e2b496f83a9c53037b

Original structured fields

{
  "confidence": "confirmed",
  "date": "2019-09-05",
  "detail": "the origin thread: how he met josh, the prototype, the co-founder offer — 'just started bringing in users from the public a couple months ago.'",
  "era": "origins",
  "id": "evt-origin-thread",
  "sourceIds": [
    "src-conaw-origin-thread"
  ],
  "title": "the origin thread"
}

hn finds roam · roam-timeline · 2019-11-04 (day) · confirmed (original editorial confidence)

Original location · source-6167d071446b3aae39b3

Original structured fields

{
  "confidence": "confirmed",
  "date": "2019-11-04",
  "detail": "the first sizable hacker news thread on the roam beta — 123 points, mostly curiosity about what a 'tool for networked thought' even is.",
  "era": "breakout",
  "id": "evt-hn-discovery",
  "sourceIds": [
    "src-hn-tool-for-thinking"
  ],
  "title": "hn finds roam"
}

the forte interview · roam-timeline · 2019-12-17 (day) · confirmed (original editorial confidence)

Original location · source-5d2886b129de2cfd7576

Original structured fields

{
  "confidence": "confirmed",
  "date": "2019-12-17",
  "detail": "tiago forte interviews conaw — an hour of demo and debate on knowledge management and privacy. conor calls it 'first time i've publicly spoken about roam!'",
  "era": "breakout",
  "id": "evt-forte-interview",
  "sourceIds": [
    "src-forte-interview"
  ],
  "title": "the forte interview"
}

product hunt launch · roam-timeline · 2020-01-10 (day) · confirmed (original editorial confidence)

Original location · source-bfac7105c7310a30891f

Original structured fields

{
  "confidence": "confirmed",
  "date": "2020-01-10",
  "detail": "product hunt launch: #2 product of the day, 363 upvotes — 'easy as a doc, powerful as a graph database.'",
  "era": "breakout",
  "id": "evt-producthunt",
  "sourceIds": [
    "src-producthunt"
  ],
  "title": "product hunt launch"
}

the nat eliason post · roam-timeline · 2020-01-18 (day) · confirmed (original editorial confidence)

Original location · source-8ceab050f29d28a53c94 · source-eb0303aef6050c0b057c · source-99dba43a1964f96c416a

Original structured fields

{
  "confidence": "confirmed",
  "date": "2020-01-18",
  "detail": "nat eliason's 'roam: why i love it and how i use it' becomes the canonical onboarding document — 288 hn points — and drives a visible sign-up wave. his effortless output course follows: the biggest business the hype produced.",
  "era": "breakout",
  "id": "evt-eliason-post",
  "sourceIds": [
    "src-eliason-why-i-love-it",
    "src-hn-eliason",
    "src-effortless-output"
  ],
  "title": "the nat eliason post"
}

obsidian's first beta · roam-timeline · 2020-03-30 (day) · confirmed (original editorial confidence)

Original location · source-f400a3fe790109abee42 · source-89b49f5a29d85ad56590

Original structured fields

{
  "confidence": "confirmed",
  "date": "2020-03-30",
  "detail": "obsidian ships its first beta — local-first, plain markdown, free — and begins absorbing the pragmatists roam's price and cloud alienate. days later org-roam ports the idea into emacs: the clones arrive before the pricing does.",
  "era": "breakout",
  "id": "evt-obsidian-beta",
  "sourceIds": [
    "src-obsidian",
    "src-org-roam-hn"
  ],
  "title": "obsidian's first beta"
}

the waitlist and the clones · roam-timeline · 2020-05 (month) · confirmed (original editorial confidence)

Original location · source-6693d5895ffb31f55261 · source-95c652e7528cf2803649 · source-92753eeaf7c825faedf5

Original structured fields

{
  "confidence": "confirmed",
  "date": "2020-05",
  "detail": "a thomas frank video drives a sign-up surge; a data-loss incident follows; roam pauses sign-ups entirely — scarcity becomes distribution. logseq's first commits land the same month: free, open-source, local-first.",
  "era": "breakout",
  "id": "evt-waitlist",
  "sourceIds": [
    "src-waitlist-pause",
    "src-roam-newsletter-gates",
    "src-logseq"
  ],
  "title": "the waitlist and the clones"
}

pricing and the believer plan · roam-timeline · 2020-06 (month) · confirmed (original editorial confidence)

Original location · source-d5666eefab15e93d7726 · source-401f2974c34b6d5da547 · source-572fc5962fabda54fc4c

Original structured fields

{
  "confidence": "confirmed",
  "date": "2020-06",
  "detail": "pricing goes live: $15/mo, $165/yr, and the $500 five-year 'believer' plan — rob litterst calls it 'the cult packaging playbook,' jack baty pays it while 'twitchy,' and foam takes 699 hn points as the open-source answer.",
  "era": "breakout",
  "id": "evt-pricing",
  "sourceIds": [
    "src-cult-packaging",
    "src-baty-believer",
    "src-foam-hn"
  ],
  "title": "pricing and the believer plan"
}

$1m arr in six weeks · roam-timeline · 2020-07-27 (day) · reported (original editorial confidence)

Original location · source-e2bfbe45301ec32a8c9d

Original structured fields

{
  "confidence": "reported",
  "date": "2020-07-27",
  "detail": "roam reportedly reaches ~$1m arr six weeks after paid plans launch — community-reported, never officially published.",
  "era": "breakout",
  "id": "evt-arr-milestone",
  "sourceIds": [
    "src-indie-hackers-arr"
  ],
  "title": "$1m arr in six weeks"
}

the roam book club · roam-timeline · 2020-11 (month) · reported (original editorial confidence)

Original location · source-d01acbb6ec6537c9c46c

Original structured fields

{
  "confidence": "reported",
  "date": "2020-11",
  "detail": "the roam book club: 1,700+ signups, ~200 simultaneous editors on how to take smart notes — multiplayer as community ritual and stress test.",
  "era": "breakout",
  "id": "evt-book-club",
  "sourceIds": [
    "src-book-club"
  ],
  "title": "the roam book club"
}

the $9m at $200m seed · roam-timeline · 2020-09-11 (day) · confirmed (original editorial confidence)

Original location · source-16b178497d682c0d760b · source-1e603ccb9f648f5552a2 · source-53200aa61b2333774e76

Original structured fields

{
  "confidence": "confirmed",
  "date": "2020-09-11",
  "detail": "sec form d confirms the round the information reported: roughly $9m at a ~$200m valuation — ~25x the median seed price. roam becomes the era's favorite example of both conviction and froth.",
  "era": "seed",
  "id": "evt-200m-seed",
  "sourceIds": [
    "src-sec-form-d",
    "src-information-200m",
    "src-hustle-roam"
  ],
  "title": "the $9m at $200m seed"
}

the ecosystem blueprint · roam-timeline · 2020-09-19 (day) · confirmed (original editorial confidence)

Original location · source-9ce5a6057c0c5a814a26

Original structured fields

{
  "confidence": "confirmed",
  "date": "2020-09-19",
  "detail": "the post-raise thread: new backend, api and multiplayer, the roam fellowship (first fellow dhrumil mehta), and $2m for a roam fund — $1m balance sheet, $1m option pool. ecosystem-builder mode at full throttle.",
  "era": "seed",
  "id": "evt-post-raise",
  "sourceIds": [
    "src-post-raise-thread"
  ],
  "title": "the ecosystem blueprint"
}

roamgames · roam-timeline · 2021-01-23 (day) · confirmed (original editorial confidence)

Original location · source-c690f83e22b8137649a1

Original structured fields

{
  "confidence": "confirmed",
  "date": "2021-01-23",
  "detail": "roamgames: $10,000 every two weeks for three months to community builders 'whose public work pushes the frontier the farthest' — the cult economy formalized.",
  "era": "seed",
  "id": "evt-roamgames",
  "sourceIds": [
    "src-roamgames-thread"
  ],
  "title": "roamgames"
}

the architecture confession · roam-timeline · 2021-04-08 (day) · confirmed (original editorial confidence)

Original location · source-e67b64e4e6122815ebaf

Original structured fields

{
  "confidence": "confirmed",
  "date": "2021-04-08",
  "detail": "the architecture thread admits the technical debt in public: the 2017 local-first, event-stream backend still underneath — 'like changing the engine on an airplane in flight.'",
  "era": "plateau",
  "id": "evt-architecture-thread",
  "sourceIds": [
    "src-architecture-thread"
  ],
  "title": "the architecture confession"
}

the depot promise · roam-timeline · 2021-04-16 (day) · confirmed (original editorial confidence)

Original location · source-54986655cede7684e1ae

Original structured fields

{
  "confidence": "confirmed",
  "date": "2021-04-16",
  "detail": "roam depot 'this week, if god wills it, inshallah' — revenue share for plugin authors, a $10k e2ee bounty. the depot actually ships fifteen months later.",
  "era": "plateau",
  "id": "evt-depot-promise",
  "sourceIds": [
    "src-depot-e2ee-thread"
  ],
  "title": "the depot promise"
}

the community round · roam-timeline · 2021-04-26 (day) · confirmed (original editorial confidence)

Original location · source-435656174334bdf3f6e1 · source-6049f25e51e149d64dbf

Original structured fields

{
  "confidence": "confirmed",
  "date": "2021-04-26",
  "detail": "the wefunder community round: $1,256,376 from 760 investors — customers as shareholders. the campaign page discloses crypto treasury and campus-buying plans under 'reasons not to invest.'",
  "era": "plateau",
  "id": "evt-wefunder",
  "sourceIds": [
    "src-wefunder-archive",
    "src-bi-wefunder"
  ],
  "title": "the community round"
}

no roadmaps · roam-timeline · 2021-05-06 (day) · confirmed (original editorial confidence)

Original location · source-2ddabec2f6749bff4303

Original structured fields

{
  "confidence": "confirmed",
  "date": "2021-05-06",
  "detail": "'why i said no to roadmaps': the map-of-questions doctrine — plus an acknowledged dead roadmap page. 'dangers of link-rot.'",
  "era": "plateau",
  "id": "evt-no-roadmaps",
  "sourceIds": [
    "src-roadmaps-thread"
  ],
  "title": "no roadmaps"
}

the subreddit bans · roam-timeline · 2021-10-04 (day) · confirmed (original editorial confidence)

Original location · source-eed8e2557d8acaa6dddf

Original structured fields

{
  "confidence": "confirmed",
  "date": "2021-10-04",
  "detail": "the subreddit bans thread: conor explains banning critics from r/roamresearch in long form. founder-as-moderator becomes the controversy the product can't ship past.",
  "era": "plateau",
  "id": "evt-subreddit-bans",
  "sourceIds": [
    "src-subreddit-bans"
  ],
  "title": "the subreddit bans"
}

the ceo confessional · roam-timeline · 2021-12-29 (day) · confirmed (original editorial confidence)

Original location · source-26bd97f76a31b9587dbd

Original structured fields

{
  "confidence": "confirmed",
  "date": "2021-12-29",
  "detail": "the ceo confessional — 29 tweets: '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.'",
  "era": "plateau",
  "id": "evt-ceo-confessional",
  "sourceIds": [
    "src-ceo-confessional"
  ],
  "title": "the ceo confessional"
}

encrypted graphs · roam-timeline · 2022-01-29 (day) · confirmed (original editorial confidence)

Original location · source-0fee16710ad2d2ff5e41 · source-d9730589d1d19ebe28b5

Original structured fields

{
  "confidence": "confirmed",
  "date": "2022-01-29",
  "detail": "encrypted graphs ship — e2e for new graphs — after community pressure including alexander rink's public encryption work.",
  "era": "plateau",
  "id": "evt-encrypted-graphs",
  "sourceIds": [
    "src-rink-e2e",
    "src-roamdocs-changelog"
  ],
  "title": "encrypted graphs"
}

the fall of roam · roam-timeline · 2022-02-12 (day) · confirmed (original editorial confidence)

Original location · source-0d00890920d27407944a

Original structured fields

{
  "confidence": "confirmed",
  "date": "2022-02-12",
  "detail": "dan shipper's 'the fall of roam' — the canonical departure essay by a former daily user: crufty links, slow velocity, weak mobile, 'well-documented community issues.'",
  "era": "plateau",
  "id": "evt-fall-of-roam",
  "sourceIds": [
    "src-fall-of-roam"
  ],
  "title": "the fall of roam"
}

roam depot ships · roam-timeline · 2022-07-15 (day) · confirmed (original editorial confidence)

Original location · source-d9730589d1d19ebe28b5 · source-7f045a8429b963cf77e5

Original structured fields

{
  "confidence": "confirmed",
  "date": "2022-07-15",
  "detail": "roam depot finally launches — the extension marketplace, fifteen months after 'this week, inshallah.'",
  "era": "plateau",
  "id": "evt-depot-launch",
  "sourceIds": [
    "src-roamdocs-changelog",
    "src-roam-depot-repo"
  ],
  "title": "roam depot ships"
}

obsidian 1.0 · roam-timeline · 2022-10-13 (day) · confirmed (original editorial confidence)

Original location · source-5f46af928494a7fef749 · source-39a1b3f5c60ef94b598f

Original structured fields

{
  "confidence": "confirmed",
  "date": "2022-10-13",
  "detail": "obsidian 1.0 takes 1,329 hn points and 566 comments — larger than any roam thread ever. the market votes with its files.",
  "era": "plateau",
  "id": "evt-obsidian-1",
  "sourceIds": [
    "src-obsidian-1",
    "src-verge-pierce"
  ],
  "title": "obsidian 1.0"
}

the 30-demos sprint · roam-timeline · 2023-02-08 (day) · confirmed (original editorial confidence)

Original location · source-54aa117bfa17c6bb2e56

Original structured fields

{
  "confidence": "confirmed",
  "date": "2023-02-08",
  "detail": "the 30-demos sprint with nikita prokopov: thirty tweet-sized demos of small improvements — the last public building-in-public burst.",
  "era": "plateau",
  "id": "evt-30-demos",
  "sourceIds": [
    "src-30-demos"
  ],
  "title": "the 30-demos sprint"
}

the believer postmortems · roam-timeline · 2023-08-24 (day) · confirmed (original editorial confidence)

Original location · source-b4f66f76bc9b0182f96b · source-39a1b3f5c60ef94b598f

Original structured fields

{
  "confidence": "confirmed",
  "date": "2023-08-24",
  "detail": "casey newton's platformer postmortem — 'i waited for the insights to come. and waited. and waited.' — the definitive critical text by a believer. david pierce's same-titled verge piece follows two days later.",
  "era": "plateau",
  "id": "evt-newton-postmortem",
  "sourceIds": [
    "src-newton-platformer",
    "src-verge-pierce"
  ],
  "title": "the believer postmortems"
}

the community postmortem · roam-timeline · 2024-05-12 (day) · reported (original editorial confidence)

Original location · source-3d0d9920806b2dea6702

Original structured fields

{
  "confidence": "reported",
  "date": "2024-05-12",
  "detail": "'what comes after roam's renaissance?' on lesswrong: 'the hype was replaced by dramas, scandals, and rants' — and loyalists praising the 'lack of new features.' the post-peak community writes its own obituary.",
  "era": "quiet",
  "id": "evt-renaissance-postmortem",
  "sourceIds": [
    "src-lesswrong-renaissance"
  ],
  "title": "the community postmortem"
}

the credential-stuffing attack · roam-timeline · 2024-07-24 (day) · confirmed (original editorial confidence)

Original location · source-d9730589d1d19ebe28b5

Original structured fields

{
  "confidence": "confirmed",
  "date": "2024-07-24",
  "detail": "a credential-stuffing attack forces a password reset across the service — the quiet era's loudest incident.",
  "era": "quiet",
  "id": "evt-credential-attack",
  "sourceIds": [
    "src-roamdocs-changelog"
  ],
  "title": "the credential-stuffing attack"
}

the successor's raise · roam-timeline · 2025-02-03 (day) · confirmed (original editorial confidence)

Original location · source-f1d6470ea002fbd3c489 · source-e2fb63078315f8054589

Original structured fields

{
  "confidence": "confirmed",
  "date": "2025-02-03",
  "detail": "tana — built in part by figures from the roam community — raises $25m with a 160k waitlist: the demand roam created, monetized by a successor.",
  "era": "quiet",
  "id": "evt-tana-raise",
  "sourceIds": [
    "src-tana-25m",
    "src-tana"
  ],
  "title": "the successor's raise"
}

the privacy exchange · roam-timeline · 2025-05-18 (day) · confirmed (original editorial confidence)

Original location · source-6a7b3a23e909e9a8bca7 · source-92ff267b6a87ebabbc9e

Original structured fields

{
  "confidence": "confirmed",
  "date": "2025-05-18",
  "detail": "the fall-of-roam repost cycle on hn surfaces the privacy exchange: a commenter claims an employee name in his graph's access logs; roam's engineer and co-founder josh brown respond — strict no-access policy since 2021, e2e graphs since january 2022.",
  "era": "quiet",
  "id": "evt-privacy-exchange",
  "sourceIds": [
    "src-hn-fall-repost",
    "src-ghsa-firebase"
  ],
  "title": "the privacy exchange"
}

agents arrive: roam tools · roam-timeline · 2026 (year) · reported (original editorial confidence)

Original location · source-11a35adaf6a987bfdd90 · source-97ff8d2f9c19a6285c9a

Original structured fields

{
  "confidence": "reported",
  "date": "2026",
  "detail": "roam tools — the official mcp server and cli — connects claude and cursor-style agents to a graph through the desktop app's local api: semantic search, extension-registered ai tools. the most substantive ai-era product line roam has shipped.",
  "era": "quiet",
  "id": "evt-roam-tools",
  "sourceIds": [
    "src-roam-tools",
    "src-roam-tools-changelog"
  ],
  "title": "agents arrive: roam tools"
}

the idea reopens · roam-timeline · 2026-04-04 (day) · confirmed (original editorial confidence)

Original location · source-f8953e205a20d5968e7b

Original structured fields

{
  "confidence": "confirmed",
  "date": "2026-04-04",
  "detail": "karpathy's llm-wiki gist restates the thesis for agents: an llm-maintained, interlinked markdown wiki as 'a persistent, compounding artifact' — 'the wiki is the codebase.' the idea reopens with a machine holding the links.",
  "era": "quiet",
  "id": "evt-karpathy-wiki",
  "sourceIds": [
    "src-karpathy-llm-wiki"
  ],
  "title": "the idea reopens"
}