Project Description:

A text-only 'folk philosophy' forum whose primary subforum will be O.I.O., or 'original insights only'. 'Original' is defined here as any idea whose origin and primary argumentation is derived entirely outside of external sources by the ideator, and whose format conforms to the following: 1) A short explanation of the inspiration for the idea or insight/origin of the idea or insight, 2) An argument given in standard form concretely explaining the idea and the implications of that idea, as well as any possible conclusions that can be drawn from that idea. 3) all gathered evidence for/against/contextualizing the above argument (this will be given under the assumption that if the author doesn't do his due diligence, his ideas will be exhaustively taken apart in the comments), and 4), a new, standard form argument remade in the context of the above evidence.

Note that OIO is in no way attempting to be empirical. It is a methodology designed to give the average man a formal platform to reason for himself, and where other users of the forum will hold him accountable for presenting a well-thought out and organized critique of his own argument and research. This format will be strictly enforced by moderators, and OIO is the only subsection of the forum where a standard of both rigor and form will be expected.

Supplementing OIO will be a plethora of subforums with general topics such as: Meditation, Journaling, Lucid Dreaming, Dream Journaling, Nutrition, Exercise, Martial Arts, Sleep Optimization, Physical Exploration, Altered States of Consciousness and others, all of which are centered around a praxis of "awareness"-- in this context, awareness can be defined alongside its more well known counterpart, 'mindfulness'; mindfulness is the conscious experience of becoming aware of one's own discrete sensations of thought, emotion and the self, while 'awareness' is a set that contains mindfulness and is the conscious experience of becoming aware of one's internal states, as well as the internal states of others and patterns of behavior in the external world. Awarness is Neo seeing the machine code. Awareness is the precursor to wisdom, and awareness is what Socrates refers to when he says 'the unexamined life is not worth living'. In these subforums users will be able to post anything they want so long as their posts are topical to the subforum they're posting in.

Finally, there will be four meta-sections of the forum: Ban appeals, user suggestions, the Mollusk Trench (a text-only general discussion area with no rules other than basic internet etiquette-- i.e., no calls to violence, etc.), and the Agora, which will be explained below.

There are two aspects of this forum that make it unique: 1) Lineage Belts, and 2) an annually published collection of essays called 'Back into the Cave Vol. n++' published through my subsidiary Predryas Publishing. The latter will be comprised of essays written by users whose posts have been voted as 'most insightful' during an end of year review. Selected users will be given the option to rewrite their post into a formal essay with the intention of incorporating both their own retrospectives as well as any discussion in the comment section that the writer deems worthwhile.

Lineage Belts, the former, are social engagement Macguffins. A 'belt' is simply an object that a user can 'build' by completing certain achievements, for example, posting once per week for six months. Once an achievement has been completed the belt is built, and the user can either keep the belt (nothing happens) with the option of displaying it on their profile, gift the belt (gifting can happen at any time) or sell the belt in a digital marketplace called 'the Agora' (can also happen at any time). A belt's history will always be kept and cannot be erased, including who had it, for how long, whether or not it was given or sold when/if it changes owners, and hyperlinks of up to three posts per user that both former owners and the current owner are most proud of.

Lineage belts solve three problems: how to encourage frequent posters to keep posting by potential monetary rewards (i.e., another user enjoys reading their philosophy, and so decides to purchase one of their belts to support them), how to encourage older users to engage with newer users in a healthy manner (i.e., an older user gifts a newer user his belt to encourage him to keep posting), and how to encourage well-known internet personalities and influencers to join the forum (as they now have a profit mechanism). In the extreme case of older users mentoring new users, Lineage Belts which are exclusively given can become tokens of actual philosophical lineages as multiple schools of thought can develop across the forum. A lineage belt that has only been given between users, and specifically, between known and respected users, will give the reciever a sense of duty and responsibility to keep posting high quality thought, and the longer a belt goes without being sold, the more it will be worth on the marketplace.

PROFIT MODEL:

Books published by Predryas will be sold for profit. Each user who volunteers their essay for the annual volume will be given 2-5% of net profits depending on how many users are featured in the volume. 10% of the profit generated through the sale of lineage belts will be exacted by Cloud in Head Studios, the website publisher, another subsidiary. Users can sign up for free, however there will be a 'premium' option for $5/month that will remove ads from the site. Ads will be delivered via Google adsense in both skyscraper and inline form, although inline ads will be sparse as too many will drive users away from the site.