PILL Drafts Thread (Due July 7)

SoP24 Research
1

Link your draft PILL project here. Either an open-beta link (eg blog, newsletter, GitHub, Figma) or an access controlled thing people can request access to (eg google doc, password protected website etc). You can also just post right here on the forum.

Don’t be shy. Post whatever you have. We really mean it when we say “working in public.” We don’t mean fake “beta” things that are really just marketing hack labels for finished things. Even if you only have paper-napkin notes or a bad cartoon, just post it. Or a last-minute first-draft dump if you’ve been procrastinating. Or even just an updated version of the abstract reflecting your current actual state. That way you’ll at least be eligible for the follow-on grant vote. Remember, you can post in a “request access” mode if you don’t feel comfortable with making it fully public.

Include a brief description with your link, and any specific prompts for feedback you’re seeking.

2 Likes
2

Here’s the second draft of my story exploring Liquid Democracy, under a tentative title of The Caucus: Liquid Democracy Story - Randy Lubin - Google Docs

It’s in open beta but I’m not ready to actively promote it beyond this community just yet. I’d love any comments or feedback. Feel free to leave them in the doc or in my PILL post: [PILL] Liquidity Short Story: planning, outlining, iterating - #4 by randylubin

6 Likes
3

Here is my current draft: Memories of Us: Second Draft - Google Docs

The draft is in two parts. The first, is a reasonably complete, polished end to end chunk. It could, possibly be done there. But the ending is not great.

The second part is much more of a bitty, WIP and notes to self kind of text. But I have included it so you can see how I am planning on extending the story.

I have put the doc in Viewer only mode. If people want to make comments of the google doc - that is very welcome - I just ask that you duplicate the document and share back with me your commented version. That way everyone gets to read a fresh version.

Any comments or suggestions, either in google doc or just text form please share on my existing thread for this work: Memories of Us: A Short Story.

Here are a few prompts that I would like feedback on:

  • I am interested to know how the idea of memory sanctuaries come across in the story? If they existed, would you participate in them? What concerns would you have with them? Also what are the protocols of memory that you infer from this story?
  • How can I explore the ways in which memories are brought to life in the sanctuary more exciting and interactive. In a previous draft I had a “Theater of Immersive Experience” scene where actors recreated an XR protest. Song and dance are huge parts of indigeneous knowledge systems. I would like to find some way of including human creative expression as a way of bringing memories to life.
  • Also, any suggestions and tips for improving the narrative arc would be very much appreciated. That is part of the work in progress sesion that I am still figuring out.

Finally, I want to flag this podcast episode: Part Six — The Long Time Academy. I listened to it yesterday and it could not be more aligned with the ideas I am trying to get at in my story. It is a great background/accompaniment to the story if you have time to listen to it. The whole series is excellent.

Thanks in advance!

P.S I am going to be AFK on a trek until Sunday the 7th of July. I look forward to reading and providing feedback other PILL submissions once I am back. I am still hopeful we can get a writers room going for all those working on stories: SoP Writer's Room

5 Likes
4

Here’s the draft of Renotations, featuring an introduction, a draft of the kit and a short demonstration, and some longer discussion/conclusions.

It’s fundamentally complete, though I think more demonstrations and applications would be the obvious next step with more work on it, especially in an actual group setting. Much of the ensuing thought in the last section is still speculative without it. It’s also quasi-academic and rambly as hell, but hopefully in an interesting way. Feedback in the form of suggestions and questions on the mechanics or the implications are definitely welcome!

3 Likes
5

i’m sharing a sequel / extension / epilogue to the narrative game i’m working on called “meet me on the deep net.” a refresher: it’s a small, interactive story about intimacy, trust, and establishing a connection while being anonymous. the game is about a person crossing an ocean to meet a stranger, and it’s inspired by the way that secure rendezvous points are established in the tor relay network.

the expansion that i’ve been developing puts the protocol drama into practice by inviting players to visit a website using tor after they play the game. now that they’ve walked through the story of the protocol, they can have their browsers perform the work to establish secure, anonymous connection. on this self-hosted tor website, players / travelers will find a collaborative landscape full of islands and waves that they can explore and contribute to. there, they can leave behind an island for future travelers to visit.

for the full experience, what i’d recommend is playing the game through, which will conclude with an invitation to visit the collaborative landscape:

or, if you’d like to just get to it, visit the .onion website directly. if you haven’t used tor before, you’ll need a web browser that supports tor, like tor browser or brave browser:

feel free to drop by my thread with thoughts & questions! areas i’m looking for feedback:

  • does it work! can you access the site and contribute to the landscape? (this is my first time hosting a small api server over tor, and i’m concerned about latency + bandwidth, especially as people add to the landscape)
  • do the instructions provide a clear and easy way for you to understand how to create and explore? is there anything you found confusing? boring?
  • how do you feel contributing to this space and seeing what others have made?
1 Like
6

Sharing a draft of my protocol minisite. The goal is to create a starting point for someone to build an intuition for what a protocol is, how to recognize them, and the implications of their designs.

I’d really appreciate your feedback on a few different points:

  • List of Protocols: I’ve listed 11 protocols for effective onboarding. Do any seem unnecessary or unclear? Could I be missing any?
  • Visualizations: Currently, I have sliders to indicate each protocol’s position on various spectrums like Hard/Soft. Are there any other visualizations which would be helpful?
  • Content Quality: The descriptions are in draft form, and the Q/A is mainly placeholder from GPT-4. Is the Q/A format useful, or is there a better way to show their similarities and differences?
  • Design, UI/UX: What do you think of the interface? I’m still tuning things on mobile, so it might be best to look at desktop for now.
  • Suggestions: What would make the site better?
3 Likes
7

Sorry I just realized I needed to submit my draft here!

My animation is about ~98% done.

Here’s the finalized project description:

Inspired by scientist Michael Levin’s research on xenobots, Micronaut Odyssey imagines a future of microbial robots wandering in space.

As completely biological robots made from living cells, Xenobots can perform specific tasks without being genetically edited. In the future, they could help repair human tissues, remove pollutants, generate human organs, and capture carbon dioxide. Xenobots being deployed for space missions might be an ultimate form of feral protocols. They roam in the vast, largely unknown cosmos, sensing, decoding, transmitting information.

Science fiction art usually uses hard surface models to kitbash large industriral infrastructures or space fleets. Micronaut Odyssey imagines a different kind of sci-fi aesthetic that centers the soft, the living, the microscale high-tech futures.

In this non-narrative animation, speculative xenobots with different shapes and movements wander in space, against the backdrop of Martian terrains under a microscopic lens. With Schubert’s Ave Maria playing in the background, the camera slowly follows these robots on their odyssey.

4 Likes
8

Here is my current draft: On-chain Data Sculpture Exhibition.pdf - Google Drive

By entering a wallet address, the audience receives a unique meteorite that flies at varying speeds through the Ethereum wormhole, driven by the market price data of ETH. Simultaneously, it controls the rotation speed of a small fan made with open-source hardware.

TD
TD1055×735 48.3 KB

Any comments will be appreciated. If you are interested, you can reply with your wallet address, and I will share how your meteorite looks below.

3 Likes
9

Updated:
My “Protocol Game with the Uncommunicables” is currently presented in the form of a video.
Here’s the link: https://vimeo.com/979955247?share=copy
Although I haven’t turned it into a webpage yet, I’d like to walk you through the game process. I feel this format could more effectively conveys my ideas. The interactive interface was designed in Figma, and I’ve included a PDF document with the content. I personally recommend watching the video first and then referring to the PDF for additional details.
Protocol with uncommunicables.pdf - Google Drive

As previously mentioned, this is a game about signing protocol with the uncommunicables. ‘Absurdity’ itself deals with the boundary between rationality and irrationality. Through this game, I aim to discuss the following: 1. What exactly is a technical protocol? 2. What can we achieve with current technical protocols, and where are their boundaries?

Welcome any suggestions and look forward to discussing them with you!

2 Likes
10

Project: Technium Underground
Format: Graphic Novel
Creator: Kay Yu
Introduction:
People have noticed an increasing number of long-dormant DApps coming back to life, like digital phantoms wandering the blockchain. Through thorough investigation, they discovered that the transaction logs of these DApps’ genesis blocks repeatedly featured a cryptic code, a clue pointing to an EIP proposal submitted many years ago by the autonomous agent known as Hara…

The story of Technium Underground is a reflection on life cycles, life forms, and life existence. It endeavors to transcend the anthropocentric perspective of the “Anthropocene,” using the future visions of blockchain and artificial intelligence as a backdrop to explore the philosophical significance of materiality and non-human agency. In doing so, it imagines the origins and essence of religion with a technological lens, weaving a tapestry of speculative thought and digital mysticism.

2 Likes
11

here’s my updated iteration -

This is a real-time video protocol for nodes of cameras to un-expose, see, and meet each other through narratives of the virtual private network, while making live images and sound simultaneously. Via a link to the site, each of the two addresses will be prompted to “allow use” of their cameras before entering. Only two camera addresses can use the site at a time for this beta version test—it is to explore the space between two nodes/addresses, in other words, to look at, to listen to, to examine, to float with one edge between two nodes/addresses. The two cameras will interact with each other by the user/performer showing up in front of the camera, dodging, or using one hand to block the camera lens as the narrative proceeds. The change of the videos’ exposure and brightness will affect the texture of the sound, which is the noise sonified from the interchanging pixels of the images. As the narrative approaches its temporary ending, the protocol will open itself up for further experimentation for the two camera nodes to float on.

I’d like to create a video work not only about but also with the building of its own protocol: in this case, it is to make videos in the protocol of a virtual private network as feelings, experiences, and art. Eventually, my work and research for Summer of Protocol’24 this time is also to think about making art with protocols that’s always already and among the discussions of technological advancement and protocol entrepreneurship .

Here’s the real-time video protocol site itself that you can try and play with -
if you had two camera inputs, you could potentially test it using two different browsers activating two different cameras… if not, feel free to try it with only one browser opening up the site with one camera. | and the code is here.

Here’s a screen-recording video test -

I “performed” in this “real-time video protocol” myself using two cameras as an example - you could see how the videos play out with the overlaying images as well as listen to how it sounds like with both the oscillating noise and the text-to-speech narrative.

Please follow this thread here to read more about my updated methods and reflections in making of this project.

Would be very grateful to hear any feedbacks, feelings, thoughts, questions… from you all! <3

2 Likes
12

Here’s my first draft: PILL: The Persistence of AI-Mediated Protocols

I’d appreciate feedback on the draft, including the ‘Trilateral Protocol Entanglement’ map and descriptions of the intersections. I’m also interested in your thoughts on the supporting ‘Acumen in Human-AI Interactions’ map.

2 Likes
13

Heyy, this is an experiment in the creation of generative art NFT, which focuses on introducing artificial intelligence into the process of creating generative art as a protocol.

The following is a draft, including the overview, writing, working process & my next steps, feel free to access it and leave any comments/ideas：Farflora - Google Docs

Pitch slide:

NFT sample:

Progress so far is about 70%, I have made part of the work process public and will update with more information before pitch day, including my writing. Check back for updates & wish all feedback/comments!

2 Likes
14

Here is my draft for a protocol crime story - Terminal Highway

Still doing copy edits but feel pretty done for the core story itself.

My original pitch was to do a protocol detective story but after going to Edge Esmeralda, I felt there was more material around archetypes of people who interact with or create protocols. I think this could be a series of 10-12 such stories.

1 Like
15

I’m excited to share that we are advancing about my research: Meme-Made Protocols: Innovating Community Interactions. The initial experiments have shown interesting insights, highlighting the potential of memes to foster a more dynamic and interactive communication model. It’s fascinating to see how these simple, yet powerful, tools can democratize cultural expression and build a stronger sense of community and identity.

Incorporating memes into my research center and learning community FUTURX has been a challenge, but the insights we’ve gained are very promising. We’ve explored using popular memes within our niche and even started creating unique memes tailored specifically to our community’s needs. The feedback so far has been encouraging, and we’re learning a lot about what works and what doesn’t.

I am particularly excited about the potential of this project and would love to have your support as we continue to delve deeper into this topic. Your feedback and participation are invaluable to us as we strive to innovate and improve our communication strategies.

Thank you for being a part of this journey. Let’s continue to explore and share the exciting possibilities of meme-based communication together.

2 Likes
16

Hello! Please see here a draft of my graphic novel Eternal Forest Protocol. I am looking forward to expanding this story. It involves translating a lot of old documents from Japanese into English. I am also looking to interview the current caretakers of the forest. But I would be happy to hear if the existing draft was engaging enough on a narrative and visual level!

2 Likes
17

Here is my draft for A Pattern Language for Digital Spaces.

The goal is to explore how to apply the concept of pattern language in digital spaces, enabling individual agency and community autonomy. The result is a short booklet demonstrating what would such pattern language look like, and how we could structure it.

The illustrations were drawn on paper and then re-rendered with an AI model. It was a fun process, and I hope you enjoy it as well :wink:

1
11776×2336 312 KB

3
31920×1817 150 KB

2
21920×1292 376 KB

4
41920×1280 321 KB

2 Likes
18

Here is my first draft of the short story Below The API. (Original Pitch)

At ~8500 words, the story is one of the longest (public-facing) writings I’ve attempted, and I’d listen eagerly to feedback on what to cut. There are a few areas I know that I want to amplify in a final version as well – most notably, to explore the actual “protocols” that might emerge in a future “agent-net” that features in the story.

To that end, I do plan on sharing some musings Identity Protocols and theory of mind for AI agents, which has ended up forming a lot of my thinking in this story. Now that I’m done with the draft, I’m hoping to post some more of those notes in my PILL thread this week.

3 Likes
19

Here’s my current draft of the FutureRack project, in the form of a catalog for the company’s imagined 2024 products:

I’m going to refine the images more before it’s ready to be widely shared, but I’m ready for thoughts and reactions to the current draft.

2 Likes
20

Here is my current video draft Protocol Atlas I Totality of Protocol

The Initial Idea of the Project

The initial idea of this project was to extract the core concepts of blockchain and express them visually, but not through a cyber-digital aesthetic, which might be more suitable for commercial blockbusters. Since the beginning of the project, our focus has been on abstractly representing blockchain concepts through images and connecting blockchain with the humanities—this core focus has never changed.

The Evolution of the Project

During the early preparation stages, we wrote an outline of about 7,500 words based on the extracted blockchain concepts. The content of the outline underwent minor adjustments as we strived to improve and perfect it. Once the text was completed, we proceeded to shoot footage and collect images based on the script.

The Current Status and Issues of the Project

The video images are now almost complete, but there are still some issues with color grading, subtitles, sound, and visuals. Firstly, the color grading is not entirely finished. Secondly, there are too many subtitles for the short duration of the film. Thirdly, the music is too overwhelming, and the audio recording during shooting was not well done, so the ambient sound needs to be redone. Fourthly, due to a lack of sufficient footage, some external images were inserted and mixed in. Although these images have been processed, we still want to replace them with our own footage in the final edit.

Future Plans

The issues mentioned above are due to the my not considering everything thoroughly. If we can get further support, we aim to improve these four aspects. Additionally, the title of this video is “Protocol Atlas I Totality of Protocol ,” which is the first part of a series of protocol-related videos. If given the opportunity, we would like to produce more protocol videos. “Protocol Atlas Ⅱ” could focus on more detailed aspects of blockchain rather than approaching it from a general concept.Thank you all～！！

3 Likes