Writing from north of the noise
Essays, fiction, and protocol notes.
Speculative fiction, field notes, and experiments in open publishing. Exploring signals vs. noise, portable identity, and the future we can build together.
About my writing36 entriessite.standard.document
labJun 23, 2026
The importer: WXR, dry-run, idempotency, and why slugs are sacred
A practical guide to migrating WordPress content to an AT Protocol PDS
labJun 16, 2026
Why AT Protocol, and Where WordPress Ran Out of Road
The architecture call behind the rebuild: what a decade on a CMS taught me, and what I'm betting on instead.
journeyJun 14, 2026
Thirty Years Online, and I Never Owned the Ground
From Windows 95 to the AT Protocol, and why this is the last time I rebuild this site (at least the backend).
writingJun 6, 2026
The Win Was Never Bluesky. It Was the Protocol.
The better question is whether we can stop rebuilding the same landlord model with a different logo on the door. Right now, our social graphs are corporate hostage files. One model lets you leave a platform and take your world with you; the other forces you to download your history as a static zip file and start over from zero.
labMay 24, 2026
Testing a Plugin by Writing About Not Knowing What to Write About
There’s something beautifully recursive about installing a publishing plugin… then immediately not knowing what to publish with it.
essayMay 10, 2026
Behind the Pages of Pejorative: With the Author
Every story starts with a spark. For Pejorative: Echoes of a Nation, that spark was a question I asked on my blog, just a few “what if” scenarios about Alberta leaving Canada. At the time, it felt like speculative fiction. But the more I followed the rhetoric, the clearer it became that the lines between reality and fiction were blurring. What started as a thought experiment grew into something much deeper, a layered story about propaganda, memory, and the quiet erasure of national identity. In ...
labApr 3, 2026
The Gander Passport: Why a Sovereign Node Beats a Digital Bunker
Why is Gander connected to Bluesky, and why should you care? Explore the architectural shift of the AT Protocol and how Wingspan is building a "Third Way" for Canadian data residency. This is an early adopter’s take on the infrastructure required for true digital land back and the end of vendor lock-in for the human experience.
BlogFeb 20, 2026
Gander Social Community Based New User Guide
This is a community-created guide, not official, not corporate, just here to help new folks get oriented and get comfortable faster. Gander Social is a Canadian-built social platform focused on Canadian conversation, civic literacy, and community-first interaction. It is currently in a closed BETA.
BlogJan 2, 2026
Rage Bait Disguised as Patriotism
How It Spreads, Why It Works, and Why It Hurts Canada
BlogDec 18, 2025
Wearing Too Many Hats (and Writing Anyway)
There’s a specific kind of exhaustion that comes from context switching—jumping from writing fiction to analyzing sales dashboards to scheduling posts.
AlbertaNov 15, 2025
The Alberta Sovereignty Crisis
Alberta’s sovereignty movement has entered a new and more dangerous phase. What began as political rhetoric has evolved into legislation, policy, and a coordinated challenge to the foundations of Canadian federalism. With the passage and repeated use of the Alberta Sovereignty Act, ideas once confined to activist manifestos are now shaping real governance.
BlogOct 28, 2025
I’m not a Patriot
Why don’t Canadians call ourselves patriots? Because our pride sounds different. Born from Loyalists, peacekeepers, and quiet builders, Canada’s strength has never been in shouting, it’s in showing up. From Confederation to Canada 150, our patriotism has stayed humble, civic, and collective. In an age of loud nationalism, that restraint isn’t weakness, it’s wisdom.
BlogOct 22, 2025
Chronicle #011: Post-Launch Signal Drift
It’s been a month since Pejorative left my desk and entered the noise. The algorithms have already decided who should see it and who should not. Every click feels like a vote of confidence, or a funeral rite.
essayOct 13, 2025
Pejorative: Echoes of a Nation
Pejorative: Echoes of a Nation is a hauntingly plausible speculative novel told through a fractured archive of testimonies, smuggled documents, corrupted broadcasts, and the reflections of a vanished resistance archivist. Set in a near-future Canada quietly annexed under the banner of continental “unity,” the story unfolds through recovered files curated by the last person who tried to remember out loud—Jason Butterfield.
disinformationOct 7, 2025
The Grievance Gateway
When outrage is the invitation, manipulation is the goal. The Campus “Conversation” Defence Guide helps students and educators recognise emotional hijacking — how frustration, fear, and belonging are used to turn dialogue into recruitment. Learn how to spot the playbook before it plays you.
disinformationOct 4, 2025
Shadow Diplomacy and the Slow Erosion of Democracy
The Alberta Prosperity Project isn’t a gov’t. Yet it claims “cabinet-level” U.S. talks on independence. No names. No proof. This is theatre, not statecraft. Shadow diplomacy like this erodes trust and feeds disinfo. Democracy leaks by a thousand cuts.
disinformationSep 27, 2025
Why Information Literacy Matters in 2025
“Canada is broken.” “Project 2025 will save America.” “Memes are the new news.” Those lines have probably flashed across your feed in the last few months. They’re not just headlines, hashtags, or jokes — they’re weapons.
BlogSep 11, 2025
Memoir Fragment #010: Uneven Dystopias
Dystopia isn’t arriving, it’s already here, just unevenly distributed. For some, it’s daily survival; for others, a new shock. This memoir fragment explores how silence becomes complicity, why endurance is not apathy, and how writing can stand as witness.
BlogAug 23, 2025
Dispatch #009: Guardrails
The road wound higher than I remembered, climbing through high hills with just enough guardrail to suggest safety. On one side, forested hills stretched into layers of green and shadow. On the other, a drop, sharp and unforgiving, reminded me of gravity’s patience. Above it all, a clear sky stretched like a promise.
BlogAug 7, 2025
Memoir Fragment #008: While the Cottage Slept
Coffee in one hand, edits in the other, the rest of the cottage still asleep.
BlogJul 29, 2025
Transmission #007: Red Marks & Heatwaves
Proof copy in hand. Red pen out. Beta readers circling. This book’s a risky one, fractured timelines, testimonies, and media scraps stitched into a story I hope makes sense outside my skull.
BlogJul 19, 2025
Dispatch #006: Chapter One, Take Two
Hit a wall, and tore it down. After finalizing layout and hitting the halfway point in edits for Pejorative, I circled back to Chapter One and knew it had to go.
BlogJul 11, 2025
Transmission #005: Between Edits and Empires
BlogJun 27, 2025
Dispatch #004: Signal Received, Doubt Pending
BlogJun 5, 2025
Dispatch #003: Smoke, Slogans, and the Signal Beneath
BlogMay 24, 2025
Memoir Fragment #002: Fall-in-May, Discipline-in-Chaos
May dressed up as November. Damp chill, grey skies, and the scent of fall. I stayed knee-deep in Chapter 20 edits while coffee pulled double duty, fuel and hand warmer. The world spun loud, but I stayed quiet. Some weeks, discipline isn’t loud. It’s just the act of showing up. One page. One fix. One sentence straighter than the last.
BlogMay 15, 2025
Chronicle #001: Fog Over the Week – Dispatches from the Threshold
Somewhere in the blur between code and fiction, I launched something small but personal: a direct storefront for my books. No noise, no gatekeepers, just my work, finally on my terms.
BlogMay 9, 2025
Fractured Futures - Alberta Conundrum
What happens when provincial frustration turns into separatist ambition? In this piece, I explore three stark what-if scenarios for Alberta’s future, each rooted in real grievances, legal limits, and the fragile fabric of Canadian unity. From constitutional brinkmanship to foreign interference, these aren’t predictions, they’re warnings. And they all point to the same truth: Canada holds together only if we choose dialogue over division, clarity over chaos.
BlogMar 29, 2025
Hope in the Code: Love, Loss, and Disunity
I wanted to write a story that tackled what it means to be human—when the person asking that question isn't one.
BlogJan 26, 2025
The Poet, the Soldier, and the Haggis: A Legacy of Resilience
The connection between Burns and the military isn’t merely philosophical. At its core, it reflects shared values such as resilience, loyalty, and a belief in the power of collective identity. Burns’ works often touch on themes of unity and human dignity, ideals that resonate deeply in the military ethos before transitioning into the practical examples.
My BooksNov 12, 2024
Echoes of Redemption: 4 Short Stories of Sacrifice & Redemption
FictionDec 9, 2017
Short Fiction: Hyperopic Dissidence
FictionNov 9, 2017
Short Fiction: Dust off
AISep 9, 2017
Short Fiction: A.D.A.M.
It's all a ruse or is it real /end program. You decide. Do we actually live in a computer simulation?
FictionAug 14, 2017