Recap of Week 2 at Lanna

Hi all, Timber here again! I just wrapped up a second week of Tensions Games here in Chiang Mai. The word tension has already become a staple in people's sensemaking toolkits here. Based on some anecdata, the use of this frame and common language seems to prompt deeper thinking in a couple of ways. First, it slows the natural tendency to rush into problem-solving mode. Curiosity about what tensions exist in a system naturally leads to more thoughtful choices. Second, it increases one's frame of reference by revealing more of the spannungsfeld (field of tensions) surrounding a single decision. If you can hold tensions by default and heighten your situational awareness, you're well on your way to improved protocol engineering skills. Practice asynchronously by sharing and discussing tensions on the forum.

In week 3 of Edge City Lanna, the focus of the game will shift from deep dives into single tensions to exercises in holding multiple tensions at once. The ramp-up to Protocol Week is almost over, so stay tuned for more details coming soon, including schedule and content.

With over twelve pop-up cities in the area, there are a ton of areas for interesting cross pollination. I'll highlight two here, one past and one upcoming. On Friday, I went to the Seapunk Studio to host a workshop on protocols for un-empires in collaboration with Sam Chua. Teams each chose a growing community, then used tensions as an analytical tool. They examined dynamics within movements and tensions between communities and incumbent sovereign powers. Teams then had to come up with protocols to manage those tensions in a way that would increase the sovereignty of their chosen community.

Later this week, I visit the Funding the Commons pop-up residency to apply the Tensions Game to an ongoing effort at mapping the ecosystem of public goods funding mechanisms. The thesis of this workshop is that having a portfolio of diverse funding tools will always outperform a single funding mechanism. However, this requires sufficient situational awareness to balance the tensions between the trade-offs engineered into different mechanisms. It will be great. Reach out to Laura for more information about attending!

SoP24 Showcase

For their summer protocol improvement project, Celeste LeCompte and Danielle Butler laid the groundwork for a more integrated approach to flood management. Between changing flood patterns and increasing metropolitan populations, protocols for managing the flow of water have never been more important. In the below video, Celeste and Danielle present their work from this summer. They challenge the risk-first perspective typical of urban planners, offering a collection of protocols that strike a balance between defense and quality of life.

Plus, surf the web and the tides of tech with this week's Protocol PILL highlights:

Meet me on the deep net by Lizz Thabet

Inspired by how secure rendezvous points are established in the Tor network to allow websites to be visited and hosted anonymously. Using the visual language of the web, it finds drama and wonder in the rituals of request<>response that our devices make.

All just fresh-off-the-boat or floating by Hua Xi Zi

This project is about making art with protocols that are “always already,” pondering on tactics of resistance that are from within the protocol, as well as among the discussions of technological advancement and “protocol entrepreneurship.”