lament for hic et nunc

it feels like we're grieving, for the loss of a website/system, though it was more than just a website; it was an idea and some say, a movement. hic et nunc [now a broken link], designed and built by Brazilian developer, Rafael Lima, was|is a generic architecture|system|platform for exploring decentralised blockchain uses that morphed into an art focused obkjt|NFT collection space|lab|dApp on the more eco-friendly Proof of Stake based Tezos blockchain. it came with a warning — This is an experimental dApp, use it at your own risk. Lima's design is an elegant architecture that works on multi levels — the objkt (NFT/art work) level, the platform (single site/front-end) level and the network|multisite|eco system level. hic et nunc brought beauty into the tech; art into the tech; the aesthetic into the tech; art and elegance into the architecture. it felt more feminine than many of the tech-bro developed platforms that surround it in the crypto landscape. the UI design was|is simple and clean, focusing on the art, as a flat plane, that allows the eye to flow across and above and below the page|space viewing art within the webpage frame. there were no popup menus invading|colonising your space|view|frame. everything was within — a plane of immanence (Davis 2021; RainDropUp 2008; Wikipedia 2021), with simple, flat navigation, subtley showing via collections and presentation, that everything is connected to something (Haraway 2016a; Haraway 2016b; Rose 2008; van Dooren 2014*), one art work led to the next, one artist connected to another, links between them all, point to point, peer to peer. there were no leaderboards, no transcendency, everyone and every piece of art was equalised by the immanent design — by the OBJKT and the SUBJKT (RainDropUp 2008).

a wash of emotions this past week, after hearing the news that Rafael had discontinued hicetnunc.xyz on November 11, 2021 (Nov 12 in Australia/Sydney). many articles have been posted about this (plus a few posts for context):
::: Hic Et Nunc is evolving: its biggest challenge & opportunity — decentralization. H=N is dead (NOT so fast) long live H=N -- by Lance Weiler
::: Founder of Hic et Nunc pulls the plug on the leading digital art marketplace—but its half a million NFTs live on -- via The Art Newspaper
::: Hicetnunc and the Merits of Web3 - experimental protocols in decentralization and distributed hosting -- by Matt Desl
::: hic et nunc timeline -- by i3games / @crcdng via github
::: HEN Statement -- by Violet Forest, one of the main team members working with Rafael Lima: I believe that Hicetnunc, Rafael's project and name, was hijacked by the "community", which led to lots of sadness, guilt and reflection after reading this [change to 'day' / light mode to read, not dark mode]
::: Rafael shared this article: Uncommoning Nature by Marisol de la Cadena, in the greenNFT discord in April, prior to #hicathon, others have recently shared similar: Digital colonialism is threatening the Global South by Michael Kwet
::: [for me, #hicathon was an exhilarating, heady event - the possibilities! loved the open source parts/discussions, and coming-together by the community (including Rafael & members of his team); everyone united and wanting to be a part of building something special. such creative energy to pull it together so quickly (~within 1-2 weeks) and discuss ideas. #hicathon was held online during the weekend of 22-23 May 2021, using text, voice and video chat systems with breakout groups for various feature-ideas and sub-projects; recordings available via hicetnunc2000 youtube channel (& elsewhere)]
::: plus many tweets (one of the central places for h=n community), and posts on the hic et nunc discord, the cleanNFT discord, and the hen_community discord where community members (hens) try and work out what if any are the next steps
::: art objkts are safe in artists' and collectors' wallets and accessible via mirror sites such as those tweeted by @hen_community:

:::

tweets, one day after hicetnunc.xyz was discontinued (it looked like the DNS entry was removed, the site is likely still available via IP), realising that by shutting down the main site, hicetnunc.xyz, this proved decentralisation works, as mirror sites popped up and objkts (NFTs) were all shown intact, as they are safely stored in users' wallets, not tied to the site (front end) itself (AliaK 2021):

::: he's done it. he's decentralised the infra
::: distributed at very least
::: multiple mirrors fulfills Raf's original architecture design (at least how I interpret it, see (Hicetnunc2000 2020b)). he's decentralised the infra & frontend/dApps by shutting down .xyz, it forced the mirrors to popup, sharing the load. with hen.core software. in time new feature modules will be added
::: went back to his last posts prior to shutdown .xyz & original design. to me it seems he's done it. also why I think the S/C should remain as is. it's Raf's IP/design

::: hen [h=n] could become hen.core + user-contributed modules, each community/site/dApp choosing which modules to enable. some get folded back into core. (like Drupal type model for frontend)
::: I think the multi-site model what Raf originally designed eg https://hicetnunc2000.medium.com/hicetnunc-microfunding-protocol-e270a63...
::: not sure if I've interpreted your orig design correctly @crzypatchwork (thread above^^) but what's happening now with h=n mirrors seems to fit your multi-site architecture. thank you so much. you did it. I hope you come back to continue it. best of luck for future in any case

Reference List
AliaK. 2021. "he's done it. he's decentralised the infra." Twitter. https://twitter.com/AliaK/status/1459636303398506500.
Davis, Erik. 2021. “Ask Dr. D 10 (Comments).” Burning Shore. https://www.burningshore.com/p/ask-dr-d-10/comments. (Private website post for subscribers).
Haraway, Donna J. 2016a. Staying with the Trouble: Making Kin in the Chthulucene (Experimental Futures). Durham and London: Duke University Press. Kindle eBook version.
Haraway, Donna. 2016b. “Tentacular Thinking: Anthropocene, Capitalocene, Chthulucene.” e-flux Journal. https://www.e-flux.com/journal/75/67125/tentacular-thinking-anthropocene....
Hicetnunc2000. 2020a. "Hiicetnunc2000lab Presentation." Medium. https://hicetnunc2000.medium.com/ungrund-e4ac3e30de9e.
Hicetnunc2000. 2020b. "Hicetnunc Microfunding Protocol." Medium. https://hicetnunc2000.medium.com/hicetnunc-microfunding-protocol-e270a63....
Hicetnunc2000. 2020c. "Ungrund Oracle." Medium. https://hicetnunc2000.medium.com/ungrund-oracle-34d1fe0659a3.
RainDropUp. 2008. "Plane of Immanence." Everything2.com. https://everything2.com/title/Plane+of+immanence.
Rose, Deborah Bird. 2008. “Judas Work: Four Modes of Sorrow.” Environmental Philosophy. 5 (2): 51-66. http://www.jstor.org/stable/26167984.
van Dooren, Thom. 2014. Flight Ways - Life and Loss at the Edge of Extinction. New York: Columbia University Press. Kindle eBook version.
Wikipedia. 2021. "Plane of Immanence." Wikipedia. Acccessed on October 21, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Plane_of_immanence.

* coincidently an interview with Thom van Dooren came on the radio (radio national) whilst I was thinking of these ideas; also my uni art project involves these ideas from Haraway, Bird, Davis so these are currently top of mind ::: exploring string figures, the blockchain and endangered/extinct species + some imaginary ones