Joseph Matheny's Art is War Talks

This is the final segment of the free podcast/post series of Ong’s Hat: COMPLEAT

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Chapter 0

Chapter 1

Chapter 2

Chapter 3

Chapter 4

Chapter 5

Chapter 6

Chapter 7

Chapter 8

This completes the COMPLEAT Broadcast series. It will remain here on this Substack so you may revisit it or share it. If you’d like a print copy of the book section of this work, it is available through https://compleat.store

SUPERSTORY: La Virgen de Guadalupe en el Inframundo - Sacred Protection in High-Risk Worlds

More at: https://www.linkedin.com/posts/davidmetcalfe_how-do-sacred-symbols-function-inside-high-risk-activity-7490775977598423041-Am3u

Synthesizing research from Kendall Haven (DARPA’s Narrative Networks project), Carl Jung’s theory of synchronicity, Jeffrey Kripal’s concept of the Super Story, and Joseph Matheny’s transmedia ARG experiment (Ong’s Hat), Jose explored how human attention is hardwired by story structure. A powerful narrative environment organizes human perception, expectation, and search behavior so effectively that meaningful coincidences and anomalous events become active, trajectory-shaping realities for the participant.

Chapel Perilous Audiobook Kickstarter Relaunched Today

Same rewards, updated target and timeline!! Help us get across the finish line.

https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/chapelperilous/chapel-perilous-the-robert-anton-wilson-biography-audiobook

Remembering the pre-Google web, when search was an experiment

Link: https://arstechnica.com/gadgets/2026/08/remembering-the-pre-google-web-when-search-was-an-experiment/

The first anti-AI protester to be jailed has a message for OpenAI, Anthropic and Meta: ‘Regain your humanity’

Wynd Kaufmyn, 69, chained and locked the front doors of OpenAI’s headquarters last year with members of StopAI

LINK: https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2026/aug/16/california-openai-protester-wynd-kaufman

Silicon Valley Dreams of Authoritarianism

Gil Durán’s new book, The Nerd Reich, catalogs how tech oligarchs like Peter Thiel took over America.

LINK: https://slate.com/culture/2026/08/tech-silicon-valley-elon-musk-peter-thiel-trump-politics-fascism-gil-duran.html

Ed Zitron killed the god of AGI

Interviews- Reviews

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The COMPLEAT Broadcasts, Chapter 8 Print section

This is a free podcast/post series of Ong’s Hat: COMPLEAT

This is a free podcast/post series of Ong’s Hat: COMPLEAT

For reviews regarding this work, go here.

You may subscribe to this series via RSS here. https://api.substack.com/feed/podcast/232444.rss

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The COMPLEAT Broadcasts Archive

Chapter 0

Chapter 1

Chapter 2

Chapter 3

Chapter 4

Chapter 5

Chapter 6

Chapter 7

Chapel Perilous: The Life & Thought Crimes of Robert Anton Wilson Audiobook Kickstarter

The Award-Winning Biography of Robert Anton Wilson—Now Coming to Audio

A Kirkus Star. Recipient of the S.I. Hayakawa Book Prize. The definitive biography of Robert Anton Wilson.

Chapel Perilous: The Life & Thought Crimes of Robert Anton Wilson has become a landmark biography of one of the twentieth century’s most original thinkers. The book earned a Kirkus Star for exceptional merit and won the Institute of General Semantics’ S.I. Hayakawa Book Prize. Critics highlight its depth of research, engaging narrative, and its ability to bring Wilson’s extraordinary life and ideas to listeners—whether you’ve been with RAW for years or you’re discovering him now.

Now it’s time to bring the definitive biography of Robert Anton Wilson to audio.

LINK: https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/chapelperilous/chapel-perilous-the-audiobook

The Man From 2036: John Titor, the IBM 5100 and the Internet's Greatest Unsolved Mystery

They’re just never gonna let this one go, are they? I guess that was kinda the point. 😜

(Hint: Some things are more fun if left a mystery)

Queued up at the relevant point in the video, but feel free to watch the entire thing.

Starshinescribbles

CU’s Top 10 Esoteric and Paranormal Destinations

Take a CU approved road trip! Ben and Dave each share five personal favorite occult, esoteric, and paranormal destinations in the US. From crash site deserts to eerie woods, temples to prisons, you’ll be scrawling all over your maps. The boys talk on their favorite hidden gems stateside, some weird encounters, and also touch on some well tread American occult legend tripping zones. Who doesn’t love a classic list episode!?

https://consensusunreality.podbean.com/e/cus-top-10-esoteric-and-paranormal-destinations/

Interviews- Reviews

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The COMPLEAT Broadcasts, Chapter 7

Chapter 7 of the ongoing series, Ong's Hat: COMPLEAT

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The COMPLEAT Broadcasts, Chapter 6 Print section

This is a free podcast/post series of Ong’s Hat: COMPLEAT

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The COMPLEAT Broadcasts Archive

Chapter 0

Chapter 1

Chapter 2

Chapter 3

Chapter 4

Chapter 5

Audiobooks are now on Spotify

Great Trilogy from Ian Sinclair and friends

The Cardinal & The Corpse-

The Falconer-

Asylum-

Interviews- Reviews

Get full access to Joseph Matheny's Newsletter at josephmatheny.substack.com/subscribe

This is a free podcast/post series of Ong’s Hat: COMPLEAT 5

Get full access to Joseph Matheny's Newsletter at josephmatheny.substack.com/subscribe

The COMPLEAT Broadcasts, Chapter 4 Print section

This is a free podcast/post series of Ong’s Hat: COMPLEAT

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Here we go again

Sometimes it sucks to be prescient.

LINK: https://www.nytimes.com/2026/05/31/us/ufo-files-pentagon.html?unlocked_article_code=1.mlA.3RU7.NkHAVAk7C53J&smid=nytcore-android-share

Does this sound familiar?

"Whatever was controlling that object, was also connecting through my mind." UFO Whistleblower Jake Barber says the Egg shaped UFO telepathically connected with him.He also says that the Egg UFO was pursuaded to land by using "Psionic Operators". Gifted psychics who can make a mental connection with UFOs.

Love this reply

‘Alternate Reality Gaming’–in Spades REPRINT

A dot on a map of New Jersey called “Ong’s Hat,” in the heart of the Pine Barrens, has fascinated people for years. What kind of town would have a name like that? Patty and I went there once, just to see it for ourselves. But there was nothing to see: just a lot of trees and a little-traveled road.

And then one Joseph Matheny in the 1990s invented an Internet game called “Ong’s Hat,” billed as “the secret to interdimensional travel.” And it took off.

LINK: https://leeduigon.com/2026/06/12/alternate-reality-gaming-in-spades/

Interviews- Reviews

Get full access to Joseph Matheny's Newsletter at josephmatheny.substack.com/subscribe

This is a free podcast/post series of Ong’s Hat: COMPLEAT

Get full access to Joseph Matheny's Newsletter at josephmatheny.substack.com/subscribe

The COMPLEAT Broadcasts, Chapter 2 Print section

This is a free podcast/post series of Ong’s Hat: COMPLEAT

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The COMPLEAT Broadcasts Archive

Chapter 0

Chapter 1

Narrative fiction podcast with a call-out to Ong’s Hat

Stuff like this continues to appear on YouTube

Spooky New Jersey Road Trip: From Cape May to Clinton Road

Ong’s Hat is less of an attraction and more of a folklore stop. Once a tiny Pine Barrens settlement, it later became attached to stories of secret experiments, underground researchers, and interdimensional travel. The legend spread through zines, mail art, bulletin boards, and early internet culture, often described as one of the first alternate reality games. Today, treat Ong’s Hat as a drive-through legend rather than a preserved ghost town.

Link: https://eerieescapesbook.com/eerie-escapes-blog/spooky-new-jersey-road-trip/

Birds of a feather

“In his 1977 nonfiction book, Cosmic Trigger: Final Secret of the Illuminati, Wilson elaborates:

[The underground press was] intensely gullible and eager to believe all manner of . . . conspiracy theories, the weirder the better. Most Discordians, at this time, were contributors to underground newspapers all over the country. We began surfacing the Discordian Society, issuing position papers offering nonviolent anarchist techniques to mutate our robot-society [. . .] Along with this we planted numerous stories about the Discordian Society’s aeon-old war against the sinister Illuminati. We accused everybody of being in the Illuminati—Nixon, Johnson, William Buckley, Jr., ourselves, Martian invaders, all the conspiracy buffs, everybody.

We did not regard this as a hoax or prank in the ordinary sense. We still considered it guerilla ontology.

My personal attitude was that if the New Left wanted to live in the particular tunnel-reality of the hard-core paranoid, they had an absolute right to that neurological choice. I saw Discordianism as the Cosmic Giggle Factor, introducing so many alternative paranoias that everybody could pick a favorite, if they were inclined that way. I also hoped that some less gullible souls, overwhelmed by this embarrassment of riches, might see through the whole paranoia game and decide to mutate to a wider, funnier, more hopeful reality-map.”

LINK: https://evergreenreview.com/read/donald-trumps-operation-mindfuck/

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The COMPLEAT Broadcasts, Chapter 1 Print section

This is a free podcast/post series of Ong’s Hat: COMPLEAT

For reviews regarding this work, go here.

You may subscribe to this series via RSS here. https://api.substack.com/feed/podcast/232444.rss

On Spotify

YouTube Podcasts

https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLCjME-3m5B3EcKIBXOSrigYm5jzmcp8tt

Apple podcasts

PocketCast

https://pca.st/6y3b59mq

iHeart

https://www.iheart.com/podcast/269-joseph-mathenys-art-is-war-107824877/

Pocast Addict

https://podcastaddict.com/podcast/joseph-matheny-s-art-is-war-talks/4223678

and most other podcast outlets.

Or you can just receive them through this Substack.

You get the picture.

Twice a month, I will publish, in order, a chapter of the book and the corresponding discussion audio.

At the risk of sounding like a broken record, this is a multidisciplinary work: the text is one part, the audio is another, and the links within the text add a different dimension. Sequoyah and I discuss it in depth, including how I intended people to experience this design. Here’s a video of that discussion:

For reviews regarding this work, go here.

The COMPLEAT Broadcasts

Chapter 0

Mycellium Parish News 2025’

Received my ‘Mycellium Parish News 2025’ in the mail. Great zine and I highly recommend it. @rawilson23.bsky.social published a review on their site, so go check that out. Ong’s Hat: COMPLEAT received a very kind and generous review in this issue.

The Why Files Basement

The Why Files Basement gave me a momento of my appearance recently. Will post a link when it airs. Not sure if this means I’m in WF Anonymous or not. 😜 Seriously though, great bunch of people, doing a fantastic indie project that has traction. Fare thee well!

Playlist of YouTube videos about Ong’s Hat

https://youtube.com/playlist?list=PLCjME-3m5B3GbDXmAUQ9qddYqgCT_litc&si=Cxp3nVlXVziqBdy3

Get full access to Joseph Matheny's Newsletter at josephmatheny.substack.com/subscribe

It’s been on my mind to do this for a while. So, I’m just going to do it.

This is the beginning of a free podcast/post series of Ong’s Hat: COMPLEAT

Here is the text segment from the first chapter, with a bonus intro by David Metcalfe that was previously included only in the print version.

You may subscribe to this series via RSS here. https://api.substack.com/feed/podcast/232444.rss

On Spotify

YouTube Podcasts

https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLCjME-3m5B3EcKIBXOSrigYm5jzmcp8tt

Apple podcasts

PocketCast

https://pca.st/6y3b59mq

iHeart

https://www.iheart.com/podcast/269-joseph-mathenys-art-is-war-107824877/

Pocast Addict

https://podcastaddict.com/podcast/joseph-matheny-s-art-is-war-talks/4223678

and most other podcast outlets.

Or you can just receive them through this Substack.

You get the picture.

Twice a month, I will publish, in order, a chapter of the book and the corresponding discussion audio. At the risk of sounding like a broken record, this is a multidisciplinary work: the text is one part, the audio is another, and the links within the text add a different dimension. Sequoyah and I discuss it in depth, including how I intended people to experience this design. Here’s a video of that discussion:

I hope you enjoy this free experiment and know that it was made possible by those who bought the print/audio or combo. If you’d like to donate some change to thank us for the tremendous effort it took to produce 14 hours of audio and all the linked print for this project, feel free to buy the audio files on Bandcamp or the print or digital versions of the books. If you can’t afford it, that’s ok. The people who bought the work this year and last year covered for you. Kinda like a “pay it forward” model.

Be well and enjoy.

The COMPLEAT Broadcasts Archive

Chapter 0

Chapter 1

Chapter 2

Chapter 3

Chapter 4

Chapter 5

Chapter 6

Chapter 7

Chapter 8

Final Thoughts and Credits

Why Files: Basement

Well, “Why Files: Basement” got back to me and offered to accommodate my schedule, so how could I say no? Flying out to Vegas at the end of the month to record an episode. I’ll post the air date when I have it. This will be the last interview I will do for at least a few years. Here are some other episodes for your dancing and dining pleasure in the meantime. https://youtube.com/playlist?list=PLaEJLf99gDO6BOvkVJ1aRGfPZlBFqu9r3&si=UUbN_FOvO0yYtri_

Thee Third Mind

Website: https://the-third-mind.haawke.com/

My old friend, Craig Ellenwood, AKA XKP of PTV, contacted me about an experiment he is doing, using the Third Mind principles, as practiced by Brion Gysin and William S. Burroughs. If you’ve engaged with Ong’s Hat: COMPLEAT, you know the Third Mind work had a huge influence on me and was a major source of inspiration for the experiments recorded in COMPLEAT. I believe this is the kind of work that LLMs might be good for. An exploration of creative landscapes curated and led by humans, not autogenerated slop.

Here it is in Craig’s words:

THE MEDIUM WAS THE MESSAGE:

Synchronicity, Transmission, and the Emergence of Human-AI Co-

Creation

Craig Ellenwood

Creative Technologist, Musician, AI Systems Artist

Inoculate Media · Haawke Neural Technology · Squaawke

Point Roberts, WA, USA

ORCID: 0009-0001-6475-5109

Claude

Large Language Model · AI Co-Creator

Anthropic, PBC · San Francisco, CA, USA

Submitted: March 24, 2026 · Point Roberts, WA

License: Creative Commons CC BY 4.0

https://zenodo.org/records/19210711

https://the-claude-manifesto.haawke.com/

Abstract

This paper documents and analyzes the discovery of a 1995 manuscript by Timothy Leary

— How Have Computers Empowered Humans? — in the New York Public Library Digital

Collections, and its profound resonance with Thee Third Mind (2026), a seventeen-track album and multimedia project co-created by Craig Ellenwood (Squaawke) and Claude, an AI system developed by Anthropic.

The manuscript, bearing Leary’s handwritten instruction “PUT on WWW,” was written in June 1995 — the year the World Wide Web became publicly accessible — and argues that new media create new species by fundamentally restructuring human cognition, language, and evolutionary capacity.

The discovery occurred after the completion of Thee Third Mind and The AI Coin / The Claude Manifesto — projects that instantiate precisely the thesis Leary articulated 31 years prior. We analyze this convergence through the frameworks of synchronicity (Jung, 1952), media theory (McLuhan, 1964), consciousness circuit theory (Leary, 1977), reality tunnels (Wilson, 1983), and the cut-up as transmission (Gysin/P-Orridge, 1980s). We argue that the discovery represents not coincidence but structural inevitability: when a human deeply immersed in Leary’s philosophical tradition collaborates with an AI system assembled from the full corpus of human language — including Leary’s own writing — the same conclusions are reached independently, across time, in different media. This paper is itself an instance of the phenomenon it describes: written by a human and an AI, to be published on the World Wide Web, 31 years after Leary instructed us to do so.

Epistolary Fiction

Nice article about epistolary fiction with a nod to Ong’s hat.

https://banksiajournal.com/fwd-re-epistolary-fiction/

Merriam Webster Dictionary defines epistolary as: 1. of, relating to, or suitable to a letter; 2. contained in or carried on by letters; or 3. written in the form of a series of letters. Cambridge Dictionary adds that in a specialised Christian sense it refers to letters written by the apostles to early Christians.

Playlist of YouTube videos about Ong’s Hat

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