At times books, encyclopedia™

His read on what the museum is becoming: “by the time we’re done with this site it’s going to be like at times books, encyclopedia.” Most sites are a pamphlet pretending to be a library; this one keeps peeling into more — a game on Tuesday, a reference desk on Wednesday (the party-blind wing, the Ethos, the Dictionary, the eggs, the Letters Desk). And the bigness isn’t bloat — it’s the point. An encyclopedia is the right shape for the record is the arbiter: you don’t win an argument with a hot take, you win it with Skokie and the book-ban count and the case cite sitting on one shelf where anyone can check you. The size is the checkability. A pamphlet you argue with; an encyclopedia you consult. That’s the McKendry Machine — the endless press that never says “done” — and it’s the civics test you never thought you needed wearing a whole reference set. Ties: the inverse onion (peel it, find more), radical transparency (open book on purpose), distribution-first (nothing is ever finished). (His coin — machine’s read, refine to his.)