{"id":44917060,"user":"NoGravitas","time":1755290661,"time_ago":"6 months ago","type":"comment","content":"

Presumably the fake magic is stage magic, while the black magic in question is what we would now distinguish as "magick", and it's silly that they didn't use that spelling.","comments":[{"id":44919442,"user":"nashashmi","time":1755309701,"time_ago":"6 months ago","type":"comment","content":"

Never knew that spelling existed. But yes. That is what was meant.","comments":[],"comments_count":0,"level":0,"url":"item?id=44919442"},{"id":44919293,"user":"balamatom","time":1755308444,"time_ago":"6 months ago","type":"comment","content":"

Is SEO occult?","comments":[{"id":44921841,"user":"DANmode","time":1755338016,"time_ago":"6 months ago","type":"comment","content":"

Only if you work at Google.","comments":[{"id":44929182,"user":"balamatom","time":1755409550,"time_ago":"6 months ago","type":"comment","content":"

More like only if you don't?","comments":[{"id":44936435,"user":"DANmode","time":1755479667,"time_ago":"6 months ago","type":"comment","content":"

Depends on if you view Occult as mysterious,

or obvious, and sketchy.","comments":[{"id":44940847,"user":"balamatom","time":1755526401,"time_ago":"6 months ago","type":"comment","content":"

More like anti-memetic. Dark forest full of things that actively resist being learned about, you know? And studying them by whatever little info can be gleaned from their outside manifestations.

Beyond the original PageRank algo (which should've been baked into browsers by now, if decentralization was more than a buzzword) Google's rankings work by being secret, no? Also things like app store acceptance criteria - also under the somewhat flimsy excuse that people would game them if they knew what they were. (Some rankings if they're that gamable, lol.) It's there that I draw a strong connection. (Personally I find it a little silly to comply with this modus operandi but the compute vendors are also mysteriously powerful, so that's what we have, complete with cottage industry of SEO ninjas, Agile facilitators, and similar technoshamans.)

Also copy protection and crackers, lol, all "informational arms race" scenarios, or ones where transparency has come to paradoxically erode instead of fortify trust, have a trace of what I've come to refer to as occult. That's why there's quite a bit of superficial similarities between hackery and occultism, and an overlap in aesthetics. But when there's also a conceptual overlap people usually tend to look away, lest they see a fnord or some other wild shit. There are not literal 17th century demons in there (unless someone is particularly fond of the goth out button), but the collective disavowal can occasionally be harnessed to work a lil magicks ;P","comments":[],"comments_count":0,"level":4,"url":"item?id=44940847"}],"comments_count":1,"level":3,"url":"item?id=44936435"}],"comments_count":2,"level":2,"url":"item?id=44929182"}],"comments_count":3,"level":1,"url":"item?id=44921841"}],"comments_count":4,"level":0,"url":"item?id=44919293"}],"comments_count":6,"url":"item?id=44917060"}

Comment by NoGravitas