Joining the #RoamCult
Within the digital altars of the Internet, new religions have begun to emerge. The Beta Testers eagerly awaiting their next TestFlight. Nightly devotionals are held behind the closed sacred doors of Clubhouse. And the once politically persecuted TikTokers participate in algorithmically coordinated rituals together.
Another group of tinkerers, scholars, and explorers have claimed to be a part of another religion: the #roamcult . These “Believers” — as they’ve ordained themselves — shun the glossy services that have become the standard for other new religions. Roam Research, where the #roamcult exists, eagerly welcomes its new members with a blank white space and a single bullet beckoning to be loaded.
“Be patient,” the Believers whisper, “and soon you will see...”
However, despite the soothsayers, new members are left gazing at Roam, trying to decipher how to use it. Is this a doc? Where are the folders? In self-inflicted complexity, it is here that many are lost and never fully embrace Roam’s ideals. A smaller cohort continues forward in their exploration, only to come to their moment of enlightenment and what seals their lifetime membership to the #roamcult.
A realization that thought, knowledge, and understanding do not have to exist in carefully curated linear structures to be understood.
“Down with the Hierarchy!” the Believers chant louder.
A Block for Your Thoughts
When opening Roam, an empty page with the current date and a bullet greets new members. The simplicity causes the uninitiated to overcomplicate the system. They desperately try to model Roam in the context of pages, folders, and structure. However, Roam challenges us to see and curate our digital world with a new understanding.
At Roam’s molecular level is a Block, similar to a simple atom at the center of the Universe or a single sticky note on a desk. A collection of Blocks form a Page. A Block can consist of text, images, or even more complex elements like diagrams, Kanban Boards, and Pomodoro Timers.
In Roam, every Block can live within another Block, and every Block can link to another Block or set of Blocks through references. It is this tangled, interconnected series of Blocks that start to form more coherent and recognizable forms. Over time, free flowing thoughts begin to connect, scraps of thoughts take shape, and deeper enlightenment begins to occur. The basic tenant that the #roamcult espouse becomes more clear: by tearing down the hierarchy we can set Knowledge and Truth free.
Connecting Truth
Knowing thoughts are not linear, we still convinced ourselves for generations to build cathedrals and rituals to support our false two-dimensional reality and called it “productivity.” By consequence of linear structures of understanding, the rites of the #roamcult are to think outside of systems dictated in hierarchies, tables, and rows. The invitation is to lean into the serendipity of connected thought and let go of trying to force order in the already connected Universe.
After all the truth is that since before humankind, between the step from 0 to 1 exists infinity in all directions.
“Down with the Hierarchy!”
