Organize
Start where the decisions are made: city councils, county boards, school boards. Ask for one ordinance: an automation may act, but a person decides — and that person is accountable. Then carry it to the state house.
organizing nowA movement for ethical automation
A human makes the decision.
Cameras watch your street. Machines answer your insurance claim. Data centers rise at the edge of town. None of them can be held accountable — only a person can. We want one rule, everywhere it matters: a human makes the decision, and answers for it.
The laws are being written right now — 45 states are debating them this session. The rulebook gets set with you, or without you.
The loom did not remove the weaver. A person still chose the pattern, punched the cards, examined the cloth, and signed the bolt.
Why now
The anger is real. Aim it at the rulebook.
You are right to be angry. The cameras went up without asking you. The data center got its permits before you heard about it. The machine denied the claim, and no one's name was on the denial.
But a data center is a totem. Block one, and the machines it served move one county over. The win that lasts is a law: wherever an automated system touches your life, a person decides — and that person answers for it.
Machines cannot take responsibility. Companies will not volunteer it. Rules change when neighbors organize — city by city, then state by state. That is how it has always worked.
Right now
The clock is the rulebook
None of this is hypothetical. It is already on your street, your power bill, and your legislature's calendar.
6,000
communities watched by one company's license-plate cameras,
across 49 states
Stateline, Aug 2026
426 TWh
projected US data-center electricity by 2030 — more than double
2024, and nearly half of all US demand growth
IEA, Energy and AI
1,561
AI bills introduced in 45 states this session — the rules are
being written with you or without you
multistate.ai, Mar 2026
It can go the right way: more than 50 communities have already paused or canceled camera contracts since January (NPR), and Montana already requires a human to review AI-driven agency decisions. Facts checked Aug 2026 — sources and our correction policy live in the open at FACTS.md.
The work
Three pillars, one principle
Build ethically
Policy asks people to behave. Software can make the rule physical. We build tools where accountability is enforced by the build itself — a machine can propose, but it cannot sign.
software belowRetrain
The honest answer to "there will always be more work" is a coordination layer that helps people learn the next field while they still have this job — from the office, from home, before the pink slip. Without that layer, optimism becomes cruelty.
comingBuilt on these principles
Proof, in working code
jacquard
Version control where a decision is an object in the graph. An agent can draft a decision and propose it.
Only a person can settle it — with a few sentences in their own words, under their own name.
in developmentphantom-thread
A careful review and a rubber stamp leave the same green check. phantom-thread makes them distinguishable — and rewards the careful one.
Preview at jdetle.com/phantom-thread (invite-gated today).
request an inviteThe thinking behind these tools lives at jdetle.com.
The movement
Don't hate the player. Change the rulebook.
We intend to form a registered political committee. Until that exists, we are neighbors, builders, and organizers — and we are not asking for money.
Get involved
Your town writes rules this year. Be in the room.
It starts with one email: your city, and what you can do. An hour a month is enough — most ordinances pass in rooms with ten people in them.
“Physics was the easy part. Everyone still has to become different at the same time, and everyone has a reason to go last.”