aron
@aronshelton
aron
@aronshelton
Seven thoughts on ritual:
Rituals are the feedback loops we construct to construct ourselves.
Rituals shape the medium of time.
Rituals orient us.
Rituals are protocols.
Ritual is a form of play.
Rituals take place in a world set apart.
Rituals make meaning.
We need ritual technology. Technology designed for ritual use. Why? Most of the software we use daily is designed to engagement-max. Social media feeds, loot boxes, compulsion loops, gang gang yes yes yes ice cream so good. You’re caught in a feedback loop with the algorithm, and you are the squishiest part of that loop. Ritual technology operates on a different timescale. Underneath the fast twitch of compulsion loops is the slow thrum of ritual. Elder feedback systems. An antidote to algorithmic engagement addiction?
design is the embodiment of values. Design is the ultimate commitment to or compromise of one’s values.
And this is how we go about the world. We make sense of the world through interaction. Which ultimately means - we make sense of the world through objects, interfaces, landscapes of other people’s values.
Taste Community and why curation...
Our situation resembles that of 18th century England. At the eve of a new Industrial Revolution, inundated by foreign products, lacking the central authority of an Elite to dictate and inspire mimesis, we are left wandering in endless store aisles and webpages, wondering how to properly consume.

A Future In Sync and

Animating Questions and Humans In The Loop
The questions become less like, “What will technology do in the future?" and more like, "What does human sensing do now?"