The Graph Mind

…is a shorthand term for the giant social computer in the cloud, invented by Venkatesh Rao. It encapsulates a theory about what it means to be online when everyone is online.

• It is an emergent thing, comparable to “the market”.
• It isn’t good or evil.
• Hanlon’s razor applies: the graph mind isn’t the product of a conspiracy, and no entity or group can be said to manipulate it in any meaningful way.
• Its main superpower is telling the future.
• When you participate, you give up some amount of identity and first-brain agency in exchange for some amount of oracular foresight.
• In the Graph Mind, what you do matters, but who you are doesn’t.