Conversations #26 - Visakan Veerasamy

Focus on what you want to see more of - Ebook Author - The Godfather of Twitter

Apr 06, 2023

The ‘Godfather of Twitter’ and Author of Friendly Ambitious Nerd & INTROSPECT, Visakan Veerasamy—

Hello Eclectic Spacewalkers,

Last month we had the pleasure of finally speaking with the ‘Godfather of Twitter’ himself, Visakan Veerasamy. This conversation was a long time coming, as Visa was one of the first eclectic voices that we interacted with after starting our Twitter account.

Visakan is a prolific writer and InterIntellect salon host (here he is with another former Conversations guest Tiago Forte); and has an online presence that few can match. Visa’s use of Twitter is S-Tier and he has to be considered one of the people who popularized threading, and of course threads of threads.

He is also online famous for two distinct and unique memes - ‘ayy lmao’ & ‘Dominoes’. Both illustrations speak to Visa’s multi-faceted and measured view of life, first through a perfect encapsulation of riding in between the forces of opposite extremes, while the second showcases potentiality and how we really could create and cultivate the golden age of humanity.

‘ayy lmao’ meme

🐉 everything is my fault; 🌀 nothing is anybody’s fault; ⛵️ ayy lmao
🐉 care very deeply; 🌀 don’t care at all; ⛵️ ayy lmao
🐉 everybody owes everybody everything; 🌀 nobody owes anybody anything; ⛵️ ayy lmao

‘Dominoes’ meme

Love + Curiosity —> Friendly Ambitious Nerds —> High-Trust + High-Openness scene of exploration —> Nourishing and supportive meta-scenes —> Shift in global consciousness —> Golden age of humanity —> ?

—

These lessons can be encapsulated into a few simple, but powerful, maxims: focus on what you want to see more of, make friends, practice good reply game, do 100 things 100 times, inhabit questions, and introduce the best people you know to each other.

Visa went on to write about all of these maxims in two E-books: ‘INTROSPECT’ & ‘Friendly Ambitious Nerd’. The books even have their own twitter handles: @INTROSPECT & @FANswitchboard; as well as their own Spotify playlists: INTROSPECT & Friendly Ambitious Nerd. These are special books for anyone with a creative spirit. Go buy them and support an active artist in the making!

Visakan’s writing is lucid and exciting to read, and not just in E-book format. Here are a few essay examples that I have thoroughly enjoyed reading multiple times:

The Library Ethos

“We are not mere individuals struggling in isolation. We are part of a vast unbroken chain of explorers, academics, thinkers, orators, artists, musicians – people who have wanted to keep the light of human consciousness alive, people who have lovingly tended to that flame, for themselves and for others. You too can be a Keeper of the Flame. There is no one single Order or Temple or Church or Authority. It’s a wonderfully complex, loose assemblage of hundreds of millions of people throughout space and time. I am never truly alone, for I have the light of human consciousness pulsing through my nerves. I am a verse in a song that echoes through millennia. I am Feynman and Archimedes, I am laughter and joy, curiosity and awe, discovery and delight. We have always been here, trying to keep hope alive for ourselves and for future generations.”
“What magical, intoxicating, mind-altering things books are – little packages of paper full of ordered squiggles, messages from one mind to another, sometimes across vast distances of time and space.”
“And for the rest of my life, I’m always going to look for my fellow under-table readers. The kids with the twinkle in their eyes, burning with curiosity that refuses to be extinguished; not by authority, not by bureaucracy, not by anyone.”

We were voyagers

“After arguing about it for years, both with myself and with others, I’ve come to truly realize that it’s just straightforwardly true I’m part of a much bigger tapestry of human curiosity than myself. And the more I investigate, the obvious it becomes that these ancient, rhizomatic trade routes of knowledge spans thousands of years; earnest beacons of light speckled across the entire planet.
a switchboard for earnest nerds
to know ourselves; we need history, for the past flows on within us in a hundred waves
We are the dreams of our predecessors made flesh.”

Are you serious?

“We do live in a world that’s full of unserious people.
If you’re serious, you will optimize for survival, because you can’t keep playing if you’re dead.
Serious people do exist. Let me tell you about some of them.
Hokusai was serious.
On the problem of stolen valor polluting the commons
You can’t demand seriousness from other people.
Seriousness is love and curiosity expressed earnestly.”

—

Visa also believes in the power of building in public and taking notes, notes, and more notes. He has cultivated multiple non-private ways to interact with people, network, and build lasting relationships. You can dive deep into his public roam, memex garden, and shared google doc below.

“Here lies Visa. He was almost finished sorting his notes.” - On Visa’s Gravestone

Our conversation was wide-ranging about curiosity, scenes, cultivating relationships, and writing. We thank Visa for their time, research, and eclectic mind. Enjoy the conversation, and until next time - Ad Astra!

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