there’s this kernel of a thing i can begin to see emerging: a big knowledge graph of citable thoughts inside a human-centric long-form content farm. it sounds pretty sick, and valuable in the new internet.
people like to say “data is the new oil.” but maybe content is the new agriculture.
walled human gardens are becoming increasingly walled. new paywall systems are emerging for:
- AI labs, through licensing agreements like the one between OpenAI and Reddit
- cyborgs, like humans chatting with personal recommendation AIs grounded in Reddit
protocols for the second are still TBD. but it’s clear that an individual should generally be able to harvest more, with AI assistance, from the raw material they already have gated access to.
human content platforms need to adapt to build this new AI surface. basically, it’s a recommendation engine that you can talk to.
there’s something here that’s taking shape and is new and interesting. it’s a new kind of industrialization of content gardens, with Reddit as the canonical example. i can talk to Reddit’s chatbot today. that’s kind of interesting if it becomes my new way of searching Reddit. it becomes super interesting in a future where chat is the UI between browsing, searching, and creating.
it gets even more complex when:
- ⌁ some of the content you have is gated
- ⌁ if you can read it, can your personal AI read it and write with it?
we could build some hydroponics for these farms: general-purpose tools that help people work with the content they can access, wherever it lives.
backing up
- there is something interesting happening on the internet.
- i want to witness it, which means working near it.
- i want to influence it because it feels important for human flourishing.
- that means i should probably optimize for influence.