Attached: Guide to Retrospec and Related Issues

[matchbreaker]

Hello everyone. If you know or don't know me my name is Elda Marker (as you can see from the username) and I've been on this app since May. It's been increasingly frustrating to me to have to disseminate large amounts of information to people who weren't here for August or just explaining the basics of the basics to new people who are added to the app every other month.

And so I've taken upon myself to make a guide for Retrospec and the related information that we've amassed.

[ Guide ]
[ ICly this guide would be linked to in a Google Doc or something and have a download link for a pdf ]

Obviously though, I don't know everything. If you have information that I don't, if some of the information is confusing to you, or if some of my information is incorrect, please feel free to step forward with that information. For the time being I'm going to keep editing it personally just so that the information remains controlled in one spot (so as to not make conflicting narratives) but I highly recommend that you download this guide so that if I am removed from the app you can continue to edit it after I don't remember making it.

I hope that this guide will be helpful for those of you who are currently confused or for better informing new people added to the app in future. Obviously, this can't be just a link and forget type thing, as there is a *lot* of information, but the hope would be it could a resource.

Thank you for your time.

[ OOC: So I'll keep updating this guide over time, feel free to submit IC corrections/additions here and if there's a want for it I'll make a (real) Google Doc version too? Feel free to contact me OOC if you have any concerns you'd like to work out that way. The guide was amassed based on stuff Elda knows from various IC avenues like network discussions and her own experiences ]

Comments

[mincingminuet]

Okay.

I know horses vanished on Founder's Day. The day the app first appeared.

The freaky fruit started in March. Also that month, people's secrets started getting shared with the network at large. Either via the internet or via the paparazzi that would follow you around. There was also a city wide blackout in March.

April was pretty low key. I don't recall anything weird happening.

And then May happened and everyone shrunk. Also those weird flowers started cropping up. The Echo Flowers?

[matchbreaker]

Normal paparazzi? How do you mean secrets?

I remember the flowers, I got called to the woods by them.

[mincingminuet]

I guess so? I don't get them very often but it happens sometimes.

And I mean innermost thoughts and feelings. Things nobody else should know.

[matchbreaker]

How can paparazzi get that? And I think you're missing my point. Were they Retrospex employees to you think or people from the city suckered in by some narrative or another?

[mincingminuet]

I do not know how they could. What I do know is that some things I've never said out loud appeared in a video of me online.

I don't know if they were employees though. They looked like normal people to me, but they were asking questions related to the video that went up. Which, again, I never made. I don't want to assume they worked for the company, but the company definitely had a hand in sharing that secret.

[matchbreaker]

Was the video *of* you saying it?

[mincingminuet]

Yes. It was.

The video has been taken down, and I'm not sharing. I'm sorry, it's way, way too personal. But the fact remains that it existed at all.

[matchbreaker]

I wouldn't expect you (or anyone else) to, but I'd never heard of it. I want to try to confirm a few more details about the situation, if that's alright.

[mincingminuet]

Oh yeah. Sure.

[matchbreaker]

Was this you as you are now (or were then I suppose) or the other you from your memories? If there is a demonstrable difference to tell, of course.

Did anyone check to see if it was cgi or something?

[mincingminuet]

It was me, not the me from the past life. There's a huge difference since I'm not a magical pirate, I'm just a YouTuber.

And I did check it. Not fake.

[matchbreaker]

I meant visually, but I suppose you would carry yourself differently.

Huh.

[mincingminuet]

It was me, and yeah, I would.

[matchbreaker]

[ Fair enough. Mmm. ]

So Retrospec did more direct threats and actions against the userbase earlier on. I remember Halloway's odd photo-stalking as well.

[mincingminuet]

That's right.

I don't know if the intent was to embarrass us or upset us, but it certainly worked.

[matchbreaker]

Beyond merely the idea that Halloway is malicious, do you have a theory about why?

[mincingminuet]

I do not. Nothing solid. He could simply find it fun, and I don't have the information needed to speculate.

[matchbreaker]

Nor I, but I thought someone else might have an idea.

I still intend to press charges for the stalking.

[mincingminuet]

Do you now?

With the sleeper authorities?

[matchbreaker]

[ Oh.

That fucking term, "sleeper." ]

I'll be expecting your additional videos.

I think we're done.

[mincingminuet]

Okay...

[That last line seemed a little out of nowhere but whatever.]

[matchbreaker]

[ In maybe an hour or so she'll realize she snapped at the girl, already high strung from putting out the guide, thinking about the hanging concerns she has from August, and, of course, how many times (from Retrospec, from that Red kid, from other people looking into it, etc) she's had to see the idea that people not on the app - people like her son - are soulless. Perhaps even automatons or their own unreality or... whatever.

An hour's way too long for her to feel comfortable responding back on the open post though, so ... even if she knows it's childish she resolves, well, if the girl asks she'll explain herself next time. For now it's okay to sit there at that, she could have just had an errand or something. ]