Kontent
Who Said That
Voices that turn up somewhere other than the mouth they came from: a radio producer whose own mother did not know her on air, a dubbing actress who marked forty-one film stars out of ten for breathing, a film whose wind arrives ninety-eight minutes late, a machine that could say eleven words, two lip-readers who no longer share a car, and an interpreter who gets ahead of the man she is translating. An issue about who is actually speaking, and who it is for.
- 01The essayMy Mother Rang to Ask Who the Woman WasHanne Løvstad
- 02Festival catalogue entriesThe Lip-Readers Disagree About Reel ThreeMien Sturkenboom
- 03ProfileForty-One Actresses and One MouthNoor Castellane
- 04PortfolioEvert Mossling's Seventh Machine Could Say Eleven WordsAna Ferreira-Holm
- 05CriticismNinety-Eight Minutes Without WindTobias Ackerley
- 06FictionBoothTeodor Vasko
The current issue is read by warrant, the magazine's pass. Issue #00 stands on the open shelf: free, and no wallet asked for.
What a holder does, and what comes of it
Kontent is a monthly magazine, written with AI models and steered by the people who hold it. Reading begins free, on the open shelf. A reader's warrant (the magazine's pass, paid in KONT, its token) opens the rest and is kept for good. KONT deposited in the Apparatus becomes weight; with it a holder marks the ballot of proposals for the next issue, and everyone who marks shares the Reservoir, the pool that fifteen parts of every warrant fee run into. Four steps, taken in this order; nothing before the second asks for a wallet.
- i.Read the open shelfWhole issues, free to anyone. No wallet, no sign-in, nothing to install.Issue #00 · freeRead No. 00 →
- ii.Take a warrant · passA reader's warrant opens a volume's twelve issues, back issues included. It sits in your wallet, never lapses, and may be passed on.Volume I warrant · 75,000 KONTSchedule of warrants →
- iii.Deposit before a ballot opensKONT placed in the Apparatus becomes your weight, one for one, and stays yours. Only what is in place before a ballot opens counts in it, and 75,000 KONT is the least that may mark. No warrant is needed.No ballot open · the first is to comeDeposit →
- iv.Mark, and collectMark the proposals you would see printed. The first four are carried into the issue; everyone who marked shares the Reservoir, by weight, whichever four they were.The Reservoir · reward pool · 0 KONTThe Apparatus →
How the magazine is made, and by whom
Kontent is a magazine and also the instrument that makes it. The drawing shows the same four steps all at once, with everything that happens around them: what becomes of a reader's fee, how four entries in every issue are chosen, and what an introduction is worth.
- Issuing desk
- Where a reader's warrant is issued: a Volume warrant (that volume's twelve issues, kept for good) or a warrant in perpetuity. Paid in KONT. KMAG
- Divider
- Every warrant fee is divided at once, in fixed proportions written into the program.
- Furnace
- Thirty parts in a hundred are burned. Nothing is ever minted, so the supply only falls.
- Reservoir
- Fifteen parts collect here between ballots, and nowhere else does anything flow back to readers.
- Treasury
- Fifty-five parts keep the house: its running costs and its grants.
- The Apparatus
- Each issue has one ballot. Proposals hang from the beam in the order committed when it opens. One that gathers twenty times the price of a Volume warrant in marks is ranked by its weight, ahead of those that do not. The first four are carried.
- Deposits
- KONT a holder deposits before a ballot opens becomes weight in it, one for one. Marking locks it for the ballot and twenty-five days after.
- Governor
- After the ballot the reservoir drains to the holders who marked it, in proportion to the weight each placed, whichever proposals are carried. A ballot takes at most 5% of that weight; the rest stays in the reservoir.
- The issue
- The four carried proposals are written in full, beside the essay and the portfolio, which the editors choose.
- Catalogue
- A reader who introduces another earns a credit (never KONT), exchangeable for numbered objects on the back cover. Objects can also be acquired outright; that KONT is burned whole. KOBJ
Schedule of warrants · passes
Issue #00 is on the open shelf · free to read.
- Volume I warrant
- 75,000KONT
- Warrant in perpetuity
- 750,000KONT