The Five Dimensions
A successful movement cannot rely on passion alone; it requires infrastructure across five key areas:
- Knowledge Infrastructure: Journals, conferences, and textbooks (like this wiki) that codify the canon.
- Institutional Anchors: Physical homes like university centers, labs, and degree programs.
- Professional Pathways: Clear career tracks so practitioners can make a living (from archivist to policy advisor).
- Public Visibility: Podcasts, documentaries, and books that make the problem of Platform Murder urgent to the general public.
- Policy Advocacy: Translating values into laws, such as the Right to Archive.
The Long Game
Discipline formation is a marathon. Digital Humanities took 40 years to stabilize; Data Science took 8 (driven by industry profit). Archaeobytology aims for a 20-year roadmap to achieve full institutional maturity without selling out to corporate interests.
Field Notes
The "Great Awakening": We are currently in Phase 1 (Emergence). The goal is to move from "Nobody knows we exist" to "Every major university has a Department of Digital Sovereignty." This requires us to avoid Disciplinary Capture by adjacent fields like History or Computer Science.