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Philosophy of Pen has no presence on any social media platforms.
No Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, Youtube tutorials or content posted by me outside of the site. There's nothing that would drive traffic to the site in a "get lots of eyeballs on it" kind of way. We do use Buy Me A Coffee solely for the recurring membership option because there doesn't seem to be anything better yet, but we don't actively advertise there.
I call it being intentionally social media dark.
Dark social media refers to the sharing of content through private and encrypted communication channels, such as messaging apps, email, or closed forums, rather than on public social media platforms. These private shares are harder to track and measure due to limited access to data and the lack of referral information (I take privacy quite seriously). Making a site in this manner from the beginning is an interesting experiment in how information gets spread, among other things.
We prefer a gentler, more mycelium-like approach.
Have you ever been to a website and wondered, "where did this come from? How did it get to the place it's at now?" and felt... mysteriously alienated or disconnected? Like a face in a sea, with no one really caring if you stayed or went? By choosing social media darkness, you know with a reasonable amount of certainty that if you're here at Philosophy of Pen, it's because this is where you were supposed to end up.
If people aren't getting here through conventional social media, then how else? The site is in its infancy: I published this project at Psychedelic Science 2023, so thus consider that conference the fertile birthplace of Philosophy of Pen as a business/charitable endeavor. The ways you could have gotten here, to my knowledge anyway, are countable on one hand:
Maybe you typed "ayahuasca pen" into a search engine and it led you here.
Maybe I made a post seeking advice on penturners.org, which you found and followed the unassuming link in my signature.
Maybe you're one of the people I spoke with at Psychedelic Science 2023, wondering what this hand-burned business card is about.
You may have come here through my RN-based psychedelic sitting services, which I offer to terminal/hospice patients and adventurous explorers alike.
My favorite story - you came here referred directly by someone you love, someone meaningful to you in the way where you want to share with each other something unknown, exclusive, yet electric with energy and potential.
It's up to you, dear reader, where this goes from here.
Why social media darkness?
We've all been part of or seen online communities that suffered from explosive growth, who crumbled under the indelible weight of their own success. I enjoy communities made and grown slowly. They end to be more tightly-knit, generous with their insights, and overall more fun to be a part of. And I want to do it with others who find value in these ideas too. Such places are getting fewer and farther between to find. You've found one here at Philosophy of Pen.
It lets us ask some fascinating questions.
How does something on the internet grow organically nowadays, undriven by the pressures of monetization?
Does Philosophy of Pen ever get a "big break"? Who does the discovering, and how do they tell others? Is that what we, those who found this project through all these almost comical coincidences, even want?
How did I get here, to this site? What events and coincidences transpired to lead me to read these words, and what are the lessons inherent in those as someone who is now looking back on the path?
Turning these woods and vines is far too close to my heart for me to want to go through what some content creators do: doing and mastering everything except the actual hobby that fires them up. I want to turn pens, not hustle for whatever attention I can get from whoever is looking. It'd be a tragedy to burn out on the things I love because the stuff adjacent to it saps my energy.
Finally, and most importantly: these pens find who they're supposed to go to, and thus I deeply desire to respect whatever ineffable machinations are happening beyond my view. :)
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