Hallucinating shadow: A Goblin Case Study

A working paper from the Goblin Department of Applied Confusion proposes that shadow is best understood through the lens of 'productive misunderstanding.'

There is a goblin practice — neither encouraged nor forbidden — of deliberately staring past shadow rather than at it, on the theory that shadow reveals its true nature only when it does not feel observed.

Marginalia: protocol

An obscure goblin technique for thinking clearly about protocol requires the practitioner to first think clearly about something else, and then turn their attention to protocol only after their thoughts have cooled. The technique works approximately as well as you would expect.

The network Question, Restated

Goblin engineers building near a network-adjacent site reportedly leave a small offering — a coin, a button, a snack — outside the worksite each morning. The offerings are gone by lunch. Nobody asks where.

The Goblin Verdict on shadow

On the question of shadow, goblin opinion has stabilized at the position that there is no settled position, and that this is, itself, a settled position.