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Visible styleguide and res hack to make relative stylesheets work

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Danny O'Brien 2024-01-12 11:48:40 -08:00
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<!DOCTYPE html>
<html xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml" lang="" xml:lang="">
<head>
<meta charset="utf-8" />
<meta name="generator" content="pandoc" />
<meta name="viewport" content="width=device-width, initial-scale=1.0, user-scalable=yes" />
<title>style-guide</title>
<style>
code{white-space: pre-wrap;}
span.smallcaps{font-variant: small-caps;}
div.columns{display: flex; gap: min(4vw, 1.5em);}
div.column{flex: auto; overflow-x: auto;}
div.hanging-indent{margin-left: 1.5em; text-indent: -1.5em;}
/* The extra [class] is a hack that increases specificity enough to
override a similar rule in reveal.js */
ul.task-list[class]{list-style: none;}
ul.task-list li input[type="checkbox"] {
font-size: inherit;
width: 0.8em;
margin: 0 0.8em 0.2em -1.6em;
vertical-align: middle;
}
.display.math{display: block; text-align: center; margin: 0.5rem auto;}
</style>
<link rel="stylesheet" href="/res/almanack.css" />
<script src="res/sidenotes.js" defer></script>
</head>
<body>
<center><h1 class="frontispiece">Almanack</h1></center>
<h1 id="the-conceit">&lt;&lt;&lt;The Conceit&gt;&gt;&gt;</h1>
<p>Almanack is regularly updated catalog of the modern calendar year,
serving folks who toil in the fields of tech, just as earlier Almanacs'
accompanied agriculturalists as they navigated the seasons. It contains
a miscellany of factual pieces, stories, reviews, predictions, annual
tech rituals, calendar items, puzzles, gossip, and hoary advice.</p>
<p>Like Ben Franklin's Poor Richard before it, our Almanack is also a
lightly fictionalised framing device: namely that the publication has
played this role for enthusiasts of technological progress (with mixed
results) for the last three centuries.</p>
<p>The goal of this conceit is to let us commission and publish essays,
criticism, fiction and code on the modern world – without falling into
the trap of taking ourselves , the present or the future too
seriously.</p>
<p>Almanack is compiled over the year, and commissioned works are added
to the web site regularly, with a printed anthology of last twelve
months' pieces published in December as the official Almanack for the
next year.</p>
<h1 id="rates-and-finances">Rates and Finances</h1>
<p>We earn money through Almanack sales, online subscriptions, and
non-behavioral advertising, handcrafted to fit the conceit. Our rates
for creators are currently $500 up for a single long piece (500-1000
words), $250 for artwork, $100 for smaller items.</p>
<p>We commission longer pieces in the form of serials (both non-fiction
and fiction), and pay per installment.</p>
<p>Our finances are transparent, and can <a href="./finances.org">be
viewed, live, online</a>. We budget a burn rate of $2K a month, and aim
to always have at least six months of runway assuming the above rates.
We hold a mid-year fundraiser to grow that runway and to raise money for
the hard-cover publication.</p>
<p>When we have 18 month of runway (i.e. $78,000), further revenue will
be used to increase these rates for future contributors.</p>
<p>Contributors also receive a royalty payment from the profits (ie
after costs) of the printed collection, proportional to their
contribution.</p>
<p>Payment is on week of publication. Kill fees are 33% of agreed rate.
You retain your copyright. We and many of our contributors prefer a
CC-BY-SA license, but we can negotiate a narrower right (for a lower
rate, weirdly).</p>
<h1 id="house-style">House Style</h1>
<p>Modern online writing can be disabling and dispiriting. To stand out,
we want our readers to be more energized <strong>after</strong> reading
a serving of Almanack than they were before. They should feel more
informed, more curious, more empowered, and optimistic about their
ability to change the world for the better.</p>
<h2 id="a-light-air-of-hard-won-optimism">A Light Air of Hard-Won
Optimism</h2>
<p>Everyone here has burned through snark, irony, rage, edutainment,
simple awe, and aloofness, so we're looking for something else. It's
early days, but so far, what we have is a sense of knowing foolishness:
not so much <strong>self</strong>-deprecation, but gentle deprecation on
behalf of the entire human race.</p>
<p>We are cautiously positive about the future (although it is always
unclear if this is just part of the Conceit). You don't have to be so
positive, but if you're going to be a downer, aim to make your readers
feel more complex emotions than simple despair.</p>
<p>Almanack also has a light tone, but don't feel you need to lean into
jokiness – or the Conceit. It is <strong>always</strong> fine to ignore
our setting or mood entirely for your own purposes.</p>
<h2 id="dont-new-york-times-it">Don't New York Times it</h2>
<p>Don't talk down to the reader or over-explain. Assume that the reader
is smart, and can look things up. Prefer density of information above
explanation. Link heavily.</p>
<h2 data-custom-id="use-of-footnotes"
id="avoid-side-arguments-defenses-apologies-or-overassertion-with-footnotestm.">Avoid
side-arguments, defenses, apologies, or overassertion with
footnotes(TM). <span class="tag" data-tag-name="FOOTNOTES"><span
class="smallcaps">FOOTNOTES</span></span></h2>
<p>If you're writing online these days, it's easy to get tied up in an
imaginary dialog with future commenters – either making fierce
assertions to chase away disagreement, long defenses to try and win over
stragglers, or apologies or justifications to prevent
misunderstanding.</p>
<p>Skip all that.</p>
<p>If there's something where you feel like you need to justify or evade
or confirm an attitude, palm off that obligation by citing Almanack's
300 year long archive.</p>
<p>While apparently a modern phenomenon, Almanack is heavily implied to
have been in continuous publication for the last three hundred years –
with an back catalog that covers many of the most contentious areas of
modern debate.</p>
<p>Here, you will find that the magazine has dealt (in meticulous and
entirely unavailable depth) with your most distracting side quests, as
well as those of your most cantankerous readers.</p>
<p>Sadly, this resource is often unavailable for temporary technical
reasons, but you can still refer to them, via a `footnote`.</p>
<p>Footnotes look this:</p>
<h1 id="serials">Serials</h1>
<p>We like serials, and would like to support them when we can. Some
guidance:</p>
<h2 id="we-accept-fiction-non-fiction-and-graphical-works">We accept
fiction, non-fiction, and graphical works</h2>
<p>By fictional serials, we mean webserials or multiple-part stories.
Each episode should be 500-1500 words. We anticipate these serials to be
weekly or monthly. Our arbitrary maximum is twelve installments.</p>
<p>By non-fiction we mean long-form pieces, broken down into smaller
pieces (think a true crime podcast). We're still experimenting with this
form, and anticipate daily or weekly episodes.</p>
<p>By graphical works, a short comic series. Under 8 episodes,
please.</p>
<p>We don't at this time accept unbounded serials (i.e. traditional
webcomics, sprawling Ra-like webserials, or columns).</p>
<h2 id="show-your-priors">Show your priors</h2>
<p>We're unlikely to commission someone who hasn't already completed a
webserial or other long-running piece. Please include links to them when
you approach us.</p>
<h2 id="the-pitch">The pitch</h2>
<p>Include a general idea of an arc, and how many episodes you expect
the piece to take. Some flexibility is fine, but the pay rate will be
based on this number. We expect to have three episodes in hand before we
begin publication.</p>
<h2 id="cliff-hangers">Cliff-hangers!</h2>
<p>It's a lost art! Give your readers a reason to come back.</p>
<h2
id="use-footnotes-to-refer-back-to-previous-events-in-your-serial.">Use
<a href="#use-of-footnotes">footnotes</a> to refer back to previous
events in your serial.</h2>
<h1 id="code">Code</h1>
<h2 id="our-weird-stack">Our Weird Stack</h2>
<p>Online publications don't usually accept or commission code, but
we're weird.</p>
<p>We're <em>really</em> weird, though.</p>
<p>Part of the Conceit is that we are heavy advocates, for somewhat
arbitrary reasons, for a eldritch stack of tools. We see ourselves as
part of the tech community that work this stack, and seek to contribute
back to it. You don't have to use this stuff in your own work, but code
that uses it will be particularly welcomed.</p>
<p>We avoid proprietary (i.e. closed or non-free) software where
possible.</p>
<p>Our stack is:</p>
<h3 id="gnu-project-tooling">GNU Project tooling</h3>
<p>Yeah, it's ugly in lots of ways, but we're making a bet that when all
of this other stuff is buried under its own technical debts, GNU –
because of its historical persistence, semi-religious adherence, and
sheer doggone orneriness – will remain. We also see our work as an opportunity to
nudge GNU into the 22nd century, by being an enthusiastic advocate for
its continuation, and elaboration. That means we also use:</p>
<h3 id="guix">Guix</h3>
<p>Guix is the GNU-flavored version of Nix, implemented in Guile Scheme.
We use this as the basis for our operations.</p>
<h3 id="object-capabilities">Object Capabilities</h3>
<p>We are devoted advocates for capability-based security, and use
Spritely Goblins under the hood for our toys and infrastructure. We use
Ocapn to communicate.</p>
<h3 id="ipfs-ucans-and-the-extended-filecoin-cinematic-universe">IPFS,
UCANs and the Extended Filecoin Cinematic Universe</h3>
<p>We :heart: decentralization, and a bunch of us work in this
space. You can use other decentralized tools, but IPFS, LibP2P, UCANs,
and Filecoin are our defaults. Talking of which:</p>
<h3 id="cryptographycurrencynomics">Crypto(graphy|currency|nomics)</h3>
<p>Whaaat, that blockchain nonsense? HOW DARE YOU SIR, HOW DARE YOU.
More seriously, in a continuing vein of holding a candle for
technologies we believe cannot die (no matter how much they may deserve
to), we hold a place for crypto, both for financing/securing Almanack,
and for the stream of innovative new work, including zero-knowledge and
so on.</p>
<h3 id="django-and-python">Django and python</h3>
<p>Of course, sometimes you just have to get some actual work done. For
that, we use Django.</p>
</body>
</html>