Block Party essay cleanup checklist

[MaggieAppleton]

Cleanup tasks for src/content/essays/block-party.mdx (currently draft: true, frontmatter dated 2022-06-22). Plan: publish as if written in 2022 to keep internal consistency with the rest of the essay's framing.

Quick housekeeping

• Opening line (L48): keep "last five years" if publishing as-2022 (recommended). Change to "last ten years" only if updating to current.
• Move the Hash disclaimer from L723–735 to just after L44 (below AssumedAudience, before IntroParagraph). Replace with shorter text:

  I used to work at HASH (focused on the Block Protocol project) for eight months. This essay and its research are my personal work and opinion, written on my own time; no one at HASH was involved.

• Fix Future Patterns numbering (L737–791): items 4–7 are plain markdown numbers, not <ListNumber>. Item 6 is duplicated. Either wrap them all in <ListNumber> or delete the unfleshed ones (see Section Recommendations below).
• Footnote ID collision: L483 reuses idName={3} (already used at L198). Renumber.

Placeholders to fill or remove

Line	Placeholder	Recommendation
285	[diagram] MVC	New small diagram in Figma — three labeled boxes (Model/View/Controller) on a block
327	via.placeholder.com	Delete — line 329 already says [spectrum...]
329	[spectrum simple→complex blocks]	Check Figma first — possibly already started
377	[visual for drag and drop]	Skip. Prose conveys it; a static image is weak. Cut the placeholder.
420	[content/view separated diagram]	New small diagram, or merge with L426
426	[visual for swapping blocks]	Combine with L420. One Notion screenshot/GIF is more useful than two diagrams.
513	[cartoon sketch of block concept]	Skip. Prose stands alone; decoration only.
586	via.placeholder.com + L588 [annotated diagram]	Duplicate of the swap visual. Delete both.
648	[image of xanadu's parts]	Wikimedia Xanadu screenshots, or the transclusion diagram from Nelson's papers
654	[image of NLS]	Mother of All Demos frame grabs (public domain)
666	[image of hypercard]	HyperCard stack screenshot from Wikimedia
672	[OLE diagram]	Microsoft docs diagrams or simple custom version
680	[OpenDoc diagram]	The OpenDoc paper (already in references) has reusable diagrams
761	[ diagram ] for Block Protocol	Skip — outdated reference dates the piece

Unfinished prose

• L662 "Gates was xxx" — Cut the sentence entirely. The "boxy DELL" + Oregon Trail framing already lands the era. Alternative: "Microsoft was eating the operating-system world."
• L664 "Hypercard which ." — Suggested completion:

  The first meaningful project in this period was HyperCard, Bill Atkinson's 1987 software for Apple, which let users build linked stacks of cards containing text, images, and scripted buttons — the first widely-used hypermedia authoring tool that didn't require programming.

• L682 "It died along with Hypercard in 1997" — factual fix: HyperCard was discontinued in 2004, not 1997. OpenDoc was killed in 1997. Suggested replacement:

  OpenDoc died in 1997, after Steve Jobs returned to Apple and cut it. HyperCard limped on in maintenance mode until Apple finally pulled the plug in 2004.

• L711 "Wordpress started work on Gutenberg in 2017(?) and released its first version in 2018(?)" — Real dates: Gutenberg announced June 2017, Phase 1 shipped in WordPress 5.0 on December 6, 2018. Drop the question marks.

Section-level recommendations

Section	Status	Recommendation
Intro & Conventional Patterns (L48–483)	Solid	Quick tidy — just fill diagrams
"What exactly is a block?" (L485–516)	Solid	Publish as-is
Benefits of Blocks (L517–591)	Mostly solid	Flesh out the bullet list at L569–576 into 1–2 sentences each, OR delete the bullet list and let the existing prose carry it
First Age (L628–656)	Solid	Publish, just add images
Second Age (L658–690)	Messy	Substantial tidy. Fix "Gates was xxx," unfinished HyperCard sentence, abrupt OLE→OpenDoc transition. ~30 min of writing.
Third Age (L692–718)	Messy	Substantial tidy. Question-mark dates, repeated "Notion was the most influential" said three ways, Tumblr fragment goes nowhere. Cut Tumblr line, fix dates, consolidate Notion paragraphs into one.
Block to the Future (L719–791)	Speculative + broken formatting	Recommend: delete the entire section. It's the weakest, formatting is broken, and a full AI chapter isn't planned. Essay has a complete arc without it. End at "A History of Blocks" with a brief outro paragraph. Alternative: keep only items 1, 2, 5 properly formatted, cut the rest.

Suggested order of work

1. PR 1 — text-only cleanup: opening line decision, disclaimer move + rewrite, fix unfinished prose ("Gates was xxx" / HyperCard / OpenDoc dates / Gutenberg dates), Future Patterns decision (cut or fix), footnote renumber. No image work — easy to review.
2. PR 2 — Figma spelunking: inventory existing assets (spectrum diagram + anything else already started). No new work.
3. PR 3 — new diagrams: MVC, combined swap-blocks visual, historical images.
4. PR 4 — final polish + flip draft: false.

[MaggieAppleton]

Planned sub-issues (creation failed — see note below)

The plan-to-sub-issues workflow ran but create_issue returned success without actually creating any issues. The full breakdown is documented here so the work can be acted on manually or retried.

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Sub-issue 1 — Structural housekeeping ready-to-implement

Structural housekeeping: disclaimer move, footnote renumber, opening line

Three concrete structural fixes:

1. Keep "last five years" at L48 (publish as-2022).
2. Move Hash disclaimer from L723–735 to just after L44 (below <AssumedAudience>), replacing it with the shorter text from the plan.
3. Renumber the footnote at L483 that reuses idName={3} (already used at L198).

Blocked by: nothing.

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Sub-issue 2 — Prose corrections ready-to-implement

Fix unfinished and inaccurate prose (Gates, HyperCard, OpenDoc, Gutenberg)

Four specific passages to fix:

1. L662 "Gates was xxx" → cut or replace with "Microsoft was eating the operating-system world."
2. L664 "Hypercard which ." → complete with the HyperCard/Bill Atkinson sentence from the plan.
3. L682 wrong dates → OpenDoc died 1997, HyperCard died 2004 (not both 1997).
4. L711 Gutenberg (?) dates → Gutenberg announced June 2017, shipped WordPress 5.0 December 6, 2018.

Blocked by: nothing.

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Sub-issue 3 — Remove unfillable placeholders ready-to-implement

Remove unfillable image placeholders

Delete 5 "skip/delete" placeholders: L327 via.placeholder.com, L377 [visual for drag and drop], L513 [cartoon sketch], L586–588 via.placeholder.com + [annotated diagram], L761 [ diagram ] for Block Protocol.

Blocked by: nothing.

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Sub-issue 4 — Block to the Future section needs-human-answer

Decide fate of "Block to the Future" / Future Patterns section (L719–791)

Plan recommends deleting the entire section (broken formatting, speculative, full AI chapter not planned). Alternative: keep only items 1, 2, 5 with correct <ListNumber> formatting.

Open question: Delete entirely, or trim to items 1/2/5?

Blocked by: nothing (but coordinate with sub-issue 1 re: disclaimer removal).

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Sub-issue 5 — Figma inventory needs-human-answer

Inventory Figma assets: spectrum diagram and swap-blocks visual

Check Figma for block-party assets before creating new diagrams: (a) is the spectrum/complexity-axis diagram started? (b) are the content/view or swap-blocks visuals started?

Open question: Which Figma file/page? (Maggie to share link when picking this up.)

Blocked by: nothing.

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Sub-issue 6 — Historical images ready-to-implement

Source and add historical images (Xanadu, NLS, HyperCard, OLE, OpenDoc)

Replace 5 placeholders with public-domain images:

• L648 [image of xanadu's parts] → Wikimedia Xanadu screenshots or Nelson transclusion diagram
• L654 [image of NLS] → Mother of All Demos frame grabs (public domain)
• L666 [image of hypercard] → HyperCard stack screenshot from Wikimedia
• L672 [OLE diagram] → Microsoft docs or simple custom version
• L680 [OpenDoc diagram] → from OpenDoc paper already in references

Blocked by: nothing (independent of Figma).

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Sub-issue 7 — Final polish + publish needs-human-answer

Final polish: Benefits section, outro paragraph, publish

Last pass before flipping draft: false:

1. Benefits of Blocks bullets at L569–576 — flesh out or delete (human decision needed).
2. Third Age (L692–718) — cut Tumblr line, consolidate Notion repetition.
3. Write outro paragraph (if Block to the Future is deleted).
4. Flip draft: false.
5. Smoke-test in dev.

Open question: Benefits of Blocks bullets — flesh out or delete?

Blocked by: all other sub-issues.

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Note: The create_issue tool in this workflow run returned {"result":"success"} for all 7 calls but no issues were created (verified via direct REST reads). The sub-issues above are documented here so they can be manually created or the workflow retried.

Sub-issues needing human answer before work can start: #4 (Block to the Future delete vs. trim), #5 (Figma file location), #7 (Benefits section decision).

Note

🔒 Integrity filter blocked 1 item

The following item were blocked because they don't meet the GitHub integrity level.

• Animation audit + principles & implementation system #56 list_issues: has lower integrity than agent requires. The agent cannot read data with integrity below "approved".

To allow these resources, lower min-integrity in your GitHub frontmatter:

tools:
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