we cut our list in half. here's the part we didn't tell you. | musing no. 121
the number wasn't the hard part. what we say no to, every day after, is.
***earned is live on Kindle.***
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the architecture of self → musing no. 101
the architecture of trust → musing no. 90
the architecture of control → musing no. 74
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we cut the email list in half.
on purpose.
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four hundred plus became just under two hundred
in one afternoon.
not because they left.
because i removed them.
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the harder part
is what happens every day after.
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there’s a pull.
toward the number that grows faster.
the post that performs.
the version of this
that would get picked up
by whatever the algorithm wants this week.
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it doesn’t argue.
it whispers.
wouldn’t this be easier
if you gave them what spreads
instead of what’s true?
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i say no.
not once.
not as a decision we made in the past.
every day.
as a decision
i keep making.
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that’s the weight.
not the number we cut.
the number we could have.
but didn’t.
over and over,
when no one
would know the difference.
knowing the difference is one thing.
staying on the right side of it, every day, is another.
that’s what red room no. 59 breaks down — the mechanism behind every “small” compromise, and how to catch it before it becomes who you are.
i know the difference.
and eventually,
that’s all you have.
because every compromise
is small enough
to justify.
just one post.
just one headline.
just one version
that’s a little easier to share.
nobody wakes up one morning
and decides to sell the truth.
they rent it out.
a little at a time.
until one day
they can’t remember
what they actually believed.
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if this ever becomes about the dollar
instead of the clarity — [archive link]
if it ever starts serving the algorithm
instead of the truth —
that’s the day it’s over.
not because it failed.
because i did.
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cuffed was never built
to become another account.
it was built
to become a place
where the truth
didn’t have to compete.
— author
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p.p.s. the architecture of intimacy opens in august.
what’s been built in these interlude musings
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