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Tapes

On Main's World, a post is called a tape. (The whole app has a 90s home-video feel — tapes, not posts.) A tape is a moment: a photo or a video with a short label, recorded where you are and when you are.

Every tape has a place and a time​

Two things make a tape different from an ordinary post:

  • Where. A tape is anchored to the spot on the map where it was recorded.
  • When. A tape remembers its moment in time, not just its place.

That's why Main's World is a map you can travel through. The rewind button at the bottom of the screen unfolds a tape deck — playback controls for the map itself. Drag the dial (or press anywhere on its timeline) to scrub back through time, skip from tape to tape, or jump straight back to the very first tape; eject and you're back at now. The app calls all of this time travel, marked ◀◀: revisit what happened somewhere at an earlier moment — your own story, and the shared story of a place.

Browsing a busy corner of the map​

Where several tapes share a spot, the map gathers them into a small stack of photo cards with a count of how many are inside. Tap a stack and the map glides closer while the feed opens, listing just the tapes in that stack. One more tap opens a tape itself, and the map flies to where it was recorded behind it; closing the tape returns you to the list. Browsing a busy corner feels like flipping through a box of photos, not scrolling a feed.

How long a tape stays on the map​

The map shows what's current, not everything that ever happened. A tape stays on the map for two weeks, and appreciation keeps it around longer: each thumbs up a tape collects adds about half a day to its stay, up to a maximum of four weeks for the most loved tapes.

A tape never dims early. It looks just as bold on its last day as on its first, and only in its final half hour does it quietly fade out.

Leaving the map is not being deleted — the tape keeps its place and its moment, and time travel will always find it. Rewind to when it was fresh, and it's right there again.

Throwbacks​

Not every moment gets recorded the instant it happens. A throwback is a tape you post from your photo gallery after the fact. It keeps the moment honest: the tape's timestamp is when the photo was actually taken, not when you posted it, and the tape wears a small ◀◀ THROWBACK marker so no one mistakes it for a live moment. Time travel to the day it happened and it's there, in its place.

Appreciation, not likes​

Instead of "likes," Main's World has appreciation. Giving a tape a thumbs up is a genuine gift to the person who made it — it's the one and only way anyone earns the community's currency. There is no downvote: if a tape isn't for you, you simply move on. You can take a thumbs up back at any time and give it again later, and you can even give one to your own tape — though appreciating your own work never pays you anything.

You can also comment on a tape, and comments can collect a thumbs up of their own. Comments follow the tape's world, so a comment on a private moment stays as private as the moment itself.

To learn what a thumbs up actually gives someone, read The economy.

Sharing a tape outside​

Every tape can be shared as a link. A public (SKY) tape's link opens for anyone, since the tape was public to begin with.

For a tape in LAND or DEEP, sharing it as its author creates a special link — a web link that lets anyone watch that one tape in any browser, no World App and no account needed. It's view-only, and you can revoke it whenever you like from the tape's edit screen, which instantly kills every copy of the link. The details live in the worlds & privacy.

Next: Vibes — when moments become a gathering.