Long Now Foundation

Challenges that feel impossible to tackle within a single human lifetime become conceivable when you have a longer timescale to work with. Today is a day to take the long view. Join our community of long-term thinking, 02026 is going to be a good one. na2.hubs.ly/H02frJ50

Happening tomorrow. A few tickets left here -> longnow.org/talks/02026-ak…

We are thrilled to host philosopher poet Bayo Akomolafe this Tuesday 5/5 for his Long Now Talk "The Untimely". His work “pushes us to think outside every narrative we take for granted." Tickets are almost sold out, don't miss a memorable, time-bending evening. This event is co-presented by @ayinpress, publisher of 𝘚𝘦𝘭𝘢𝘩: 𝘈 𝘉𝘢𝘺𝘰 𝘈𝘬𝘰𝘮𝘰𝘭𝘢𝘧𝘦 𝘙𝘦𝘢𝘥𝘦𝘳, and hosted by Ayin cofounder Eden Pearlstein. More info and tickets here: na2.hubs.ly/H05fbKp0

A small bird in the forests of Central America has been performing the same cooperative courtship dance for 2,000,000 years. Male manakins form lifelong partnerships between a senior alpha and a junior apprentice. The apprentice waits years before earning the chance to mate, yet he keeps dancing anyway. It may be the oldest collaborative performance on Earth. Read the full story on Long Now Ideas here: na2.hubs.ly/H05dRKV0

Yesterday we lost Craig Venter, best known for accelerating the mapping of the human genome. He was a maverick scientist who fundamentally altered how humanity understands existence. His 02008 Long Now Talk captured this visionary mindset. In it, he argued that synthetic biology wasn't about playing God or "re-doing Genesis," but rather sparking a modern Cambrian explosion of infinite possibilities. We're grateful he gave so much to long-term thinking and long-term understanding of our world. na2.hubs.ly/H05dRn00

Why haven’t we seen a photograph of the whole web yet? “I saw the whole earth as an icon, mainly,” he said, “one that did indeed replace the mushroom cloud as the main image for understanding our world.”

@tweet_phia this is so impressive, Sophia

What if we redefined “profit” as maximizing human flourishing? @ericries has seen the corrosive effects of shareholder primacy at every company he’s worked with. But some companies are outliers, demonstrating stronger profits, better talent, and deeper loyalty. What are they doing differently? And why doesn’t everyone follow their lead? Watch his full dialogue with Long Now’s Denise Hearn here: youtube.com/watch?v=WrGRom…

Congrats to the Long Now team on their new initiative! The Protocol Institute has partnered with the Long Now Foundation to help design its very first Lab – Protocols for the Long Now. It's a great time working with @denisehearn_ and @jameshome, who are bringing it to life.

Exciting announcement + opportunity to collaborate with @longnow! Today we are launching Long Now Labs. Our inaugural Lab, Protocols of the Long Now, is a collaboration with the Protocol Institute. Read more + apply here: longnow.org/labs/001

What does long-term thinking look like in practice? Introducing Long Now Labs, a collaborative space to test, prototype, and build long-term tools. Lab Series 001 is a collaboration with the Protocol Institute to investigate three aspects of civilizational durability that are being radically reshaped by frontier technologies. -> Lab 001.1: Book of Time - An open call to submit a concept for a new way of marking, experiencing, or making sense of time. -> Lab 001.2: Epistemic Cycles - Seeking an individual or team to investigate historical patterns of technological disruption that broke down society's ability to discern truth. -> Lab 001.3: Interspecies Protocols - Exploring the protocols needed to support interspecies ecologies. If you are a designer, researcher, writer, or technologist interested in the deep future, we want to hear from you. Submissions are now open. Learn more about Labs and how to apply: na2.hubs.ly/H059wn90

Bayo Akomolafe’s Long Now Talk is one week away. Tickets are running low, grab your spot here: longnow.org/talks/02026-ak… Posthumanist thinker, poet and teacher Bayo Akomolafe presents The Untimely, which challenges our assumptions about continuity and time. His post-activism lens illustrates how our “fixes” often reproduce the problem, and offers alternatives to linear progress narratives as the default crisis response. Co-presented with @AyinPress, publisher of Akomolafe's next book, Selah: A Báyò Akómoláfé Reader.

Ever tasted gin from a tree that lives 5,000 years? Our Bristlecone Gin, crafted by St. George Spirits, was developed exclusively for The Interval’s Bottle Keep. Its botanicals and juniper berries are wild foraged from Long Now’s Bristlecone Preserve in Nevada, home to some of the world’s oldest trees. St. George Spirits was founded in 01982, making them one of the first craft distilleries based in the USA, and we’re so lucky to collaborate with them. Their HQ is just across the Bay in Alameda, CA. Master Distiller Lance Winters says, “You can crack open a bottle of our stuff a hundred years from now and it’s going to smell the same way it did as when we distilled it. We’re able to capture an olfactory slice of time.” You can find more of their fine work on The Interval spirits menu: Botanivore and Terroir gin, green chile vodka, and single malt whiskeys. If you're interested in having your own bottle keep of bristlecone gin, learn more about the program here: na2.hubs.ly/H057XwP0

"That fact alone leaves us feeling like redwood trees trying to communicate with a hummingbird.” @stewartbrand talks to @ezraklein about maintenance, tech acceleration, AI, YouTube, and tug boats -> nytimes.com/2026/04/24/opi…

Scholar Melody Jue worked with musicians and divers to develop soundscapes that help us “smell” with our ears. Experience the moment in her Long Now Talk where she helped us remap chemosensation through synesthesia, using the density and flow of sound to mimic chemical gradients of seawater. Watch her full Talk here: na2.hubs.ly/H04-SLx0

Thank you to everyone who attended our Long Now Talk at The Interval with mathematician and machine learning researcher @ninamiolane and science historian @claire_i_webb. They explored the question of consciousness from an unexpected direction: geometry. Geometry is the most ancient branch of physics, Miolane said. It’s the language we use to describe the curvature of spacetime and the general relativity of the universe. Might it also map the universe inside us? Stay tuned, the full Talk will be released on YouTube next week. Huge thanks to our partners @berggruenInst @NoemaMag for a magical evening. Photos by Anthony Thornton.

For Earth Day 02026, we're thinking about 02114. That's the year Katie Paterson's @FuturelibraryNO will finally open: a library for readers who haven’t been born yet. Artist and Long Now council member Katie Paterson has spent the last decade building the Future Library in Oslo, Norway. Over the next 100 years one writer every year will contribute a text. The writings are held in trust, unread and unpublished, until the year 02114. A forest was planted to supply paper for the books when they’re ready to publish, a century from now. So far the library includes works from Margaret Atwood, David Mitchell, Sjón, Elif Shafak, Han Kang, Karl Ove Knausgård and more. More about the project here: na2.hubs.ly/H04-ml00