When I began the Permaweb Journal in spring 2025, my aim was to bring a fresh perspective about the permaweb through longform writing that is a little technical, a little philosophical, sometimes irreverent but always original. I felt we had enough on the beat reporting the daily updates to cover our small internet community. I didn't want to be another shill preaching the gospel to a group that already gets it.

The journal started as a side project. I wrote articles and essays whenever I got time in between running comms for Bazar. Early ideas sparked in April while in Bangalore for the first Arweave event hosted in India. I was curious why this tech resonated with young people. Instead of following their peers striving to get in the door at a FAANG company, these students were eager to experiment with niche software. The mission of the permaweb spoke larger than a cushy big tech gig.

Then in June, during the Arweave anniversary party in Berlin, I met Pierre, a well-known writer and researcher in the community who once led Permaweb News. We bonded over history, philosophy and how the future of tech doesn't have to be as dystopian as the media would like us to believe.

I was also inspired by the early days of Wired magazine. In that era the tech was new, scary, cypherpunk, and Wired came at it from a different angle and helped shape how the early internet grew. If the permaweb is to succeed in democratizing cyberspace, there will need to be a place to hear from the thinkers and tinkerers making it happen.

I have a romantic view of media. I collect vinyl, have too many books to count, and when I had a car, CDs filled the center console. I am nostalgic for media I can feel. People want to hold, collect, own media. Now this happens in cyberspace in the form of NFTs, in-game assets and other digital collectibles.

Each journal has a digital asset on Arweave attached to it that owners can always verify, even when someday the physical print inevitably becomes tattered and worn.

This summer was all about bringing this to life. I gave myself a tight deadline to have this ready for Arweave Singapore in October. We managed to ship a proof of concept 90-page print journal just in time for the event. This wouldn't have happened without Saint Blue Design Studio, who transformed my scattered ideas into a clear visual identity. I'm also grateful to all the contributors who wrote articles, essays and technical deep dives covering a range of topics, many on short notice.

On the digital front, the easy route would have been to publish on a centralized platform like Wordpress or Substack, but that would go against everything we were trying to build. This past year the team behind Odysee was quietly building a decentralized publishing alternative called Portal. I had the chance to work with their team early on to test this new platform.

While at Arweave Singapore, I got the greenlight to launch the Permaweb Journal Portal. We were the first client to use the platform. This was a soft launch but huge for consumer-facing applications using the latest Arweave and HyperBEAM tech. Pierre and I proceeded to publish articles over the fall. 

Anyone building with AO this past year knows the infrastructure wasn't quite ready for consumer applications at scale yet. As AO founder Sam reflected in an Arweave keynote, these growing pains were necessary. He learned from building Arweave that it gets much harder to update a network that's established as opposed to newly launched. The devs buckled down this past year making the HyperBEAM transition possible. Eating glass, as they say. 

As for distributing the journal, I thought I had a clear way to distribute the print and raise money for future editions through a fair launch token and claim mechanism. I viewed this as essentially a Kickstarter, but participants get a stake in the project with a token and physical artifacts. The timing didn't work out. Critical updates had to be made on HyperBEAM and the fair launch mint mechanism, so the plan to announce distribution in Singapore didn't happen.

I went into this naive. I thought the hardest part would be gathering writings and putting together the print. Distribution proved most challenging since I didn't want to rely on centralized monetization and distribution processes.

We're coming with intensity. The portal is ready, the print is ready, collaborations are in the works. I dropped everything and moved to NYC to establish the journal as an outlet for the new age of the web. Prints will go on sale in early 2026 and owners will get exclusive Permaweb Journal perks for being early supporters.

This past year was about laying groundwork. The rollout was slow and messy, but I learned a lot. For the next phase we're going all out. 

The mission of the permaweb is still clear: to create a cyberspace worth living in. Someone needs to tell that story. That's why we're here.

Thank you for the support this past year. Looking forward to 2026.

-Alex

P.S. 

We're done blackpilling in 2026. Our social feeds are filled with AI slop and doomer content that is rotting our brains. 

As a break from the slop, we're starting a media club in 2026 to read books, watch films, and discuss ideas surrounding tech and philosophy. Topics will be loosely connected to the permaweb but with broader societal scope. First gathering announced early next year. Hope to see you there.

When I began the Permaweb Journal in spring 2025, my aim was to bring a fresh perspective about the permaweb through longform writing that is a little technical, a little philosophical, sometimes irreverent but always original. I felt we had enough on the beat reporting the daily updates to cover our small internet community. I didn't want to be another shill preaching the gospel to a group that already gets it.

The journal started as a side project. I wrote articles and essays whenever I got time in between running comms for Bazar. Early ideas sparked in April while in Bangalore for the first Arweave event hosted in India. I was curious why this tech resonated with young people. Instead of following their peers striving to get in the door at a FAANG company, these students were eager to experiment with niche software. The mission of the permaweb spoke larger than a cushy big tech gig.

Then in June, during the Arweave anniversary party in Berlin, I met Pierre, a well-known writer and researcher in the community who once led Permaweb News. We bonded over history, philosophy and how the future of tech doesn't have to be as dystopian as the media would like us to believe.

I was also inspired by the early days of Wired magazine. In that era the tech was new, scary, cypherpunk, and Wired came at it from a different angle and helped shape how the early internet grew. If the permaweb is to succeed in democratizing cyberspace, there will need to be a place to hear from the thinkers and tinkerers making it happen.

I have a romantic view of media. I collect vinyl, have too many books to count, and when I had a car, CDs filled the center console. I am nostalgic for media I can feel. People want to hold, collect, own media. Now this happens in cyberspace in the form of NFTs, in-game assets and other digital collectibles.

Each journal has a digital asset on Arweave attached to it that owners can always verify, even when someday the physical print inevitably becomes tattered and worn.

This summer was all about bringing this to life. I gave myself a tight deadline to have this ready for Arweave Singapore in October. We managed to ship a proof of concept 90-page print journal just in time for the event. This wouldn't have happened without Saint Blue Design Studio, who transformed my scattered ideas into a clear visual identity. I'm also grateful to all the contributors who wrote articles, essays and technical deep dives covering a range of topics, many on short notice.

On the digital front, the easy route would have been to publish on a centralized platform like Wordpress or Substack, but that would go against everything we were trying to build. This past year the team behind Odysee was quietly building a decentralized publishing alternative called Portal. I had the chance to work with their team early on to test this new platform.

While at Arweave Singapore, I got the greenlight to launch the Permaweb Journal Portal. We were the first client to use the platform. This was a soft launch but huge for consumer-facing applications using the latest Arweave and HyperBEAM tech. Pierre and I proceeded to publish articles over the fall. 

Anyone building with AO this past year knows the infrastructure wasn't quite ready for consumer applications at scale yet. As AO founder Sam reflected in an Arweave keynote, these growing pains were necessary. He learned from building Arweave that it gets much harder to update a network that's established as opposed to newly launched. The devs buckled down this past year making the HyperBEAM transition possible. Eating glass, as they say. 

As for distributing the journal, I thought I had a clear way to distribute the print and raise money for future editions through a fair launch token and claim mechanism. I viewed this as essentially a Kickstarter, but participants get a stake in the project with a token and physical artifacts. The timing didn't work out. Critical updates had to be made on HyperBEAM and the fair launch mint mechanism, so the plan to announce distribution in Singapore didn't happen.

I went into this naive. I thought the hardest part would be gathering writings and putting together the print. Distribution proved most challenging since I didn't want to rely on centralized monetization and distribution processes.

We're coming with intensity. The portal is ready, the print is ready, collaborations are in the works. I dropped everything and moved to NYC to establish the journal as an outlet for the new age of the web. Prints will go on sale in early 2026 and owners will get exclusive Permaweb Journal perks for being early supporters.

This past year was about laying groundwork. The rollout was slow and messy, but I learned a lot. For the next phase we're going all out. 

The mission of the permaweb is still clear: to create a cyberspace worth living in. Someone needs to tell that story. That's why we're here.

Thank you for the support this past year. Looking forward to 2026.

-Alex

P.S. 

We're done blackpilling in 2026. Our social feeds are filled with AI slop and doomer content that is rotting our brains. 

As a break from the slop, we're starting a media club in 2026 to read books, watch films, and discuss ideas surrounding tech and philosophy. Topics will be loosely connected to the permaweb but with broader societal scope. First gathering announced early next year. Hope to see you there.