Hacker Post

Human-routed postcard mail for the hacker scene.

Courier Runbook

A courier is anyone who moves a postcard closer to where it is going. There is no sign-up, no badge, no shift schedule. You were going somewhere anyway; the mail just rides along. (The networking people call this opportunistic routing. We call it “I’m headed that way, give me a couple.”)

This page is a runbook, not a rulebook. Skim the box, do the obvious thing, do not overthink it.

Procedure: Volunteer to carry

When: you are traveling somewhere, or know someone closer to a destination.

  1. Check with your local postmaster or pickup point.
  2. Tell them your direction or destination, for example:
    • I’m going to HOPE.
    • I can take mail toward NYC.
    • I’m driving from Chicago to Detroit. Anything heading that way?
  3. Accept the sorted mail they offer for your route.
  4. Take only what you are comfortable carrying. You do not have to take everything.

Procedure: Accept and deposit promptly

When: you have accepted one or more postcards.

  1. Carry the mail toward its destination.
  2. When you get there, drop it with a postmaster or receiving point promptly. You are a store-and-forward node, and the “store” part is supposed to be short. A card forgotten in your bag for three months has effectively left the network.
  3. If your plans change or the destination becomes unreachable, hand the mail to another courier or drop it at the nearest post office without delay.

Procedure: Complete delivery

When: you have reached the destination scene.

“Delivered” is generous here. Any of these counts—getting the card to anyone who knows, recognizes, or is likely to bump into the recipient is enough to keep it moving:

  1. Hand the postcard to the intended recipient.
  2. Give it to someone who knows the recipient.
  3. Drop it at the named hackerspace or meetup.
  4. Pass it to a local postmaster.
  5. Leave it with a relevant scene, table, or group.

Good drop points: hackerspaces, con villages and tables, university hacker clubs, meetups, maker spaces, community bulletin boards, the info desk if it seems game. You do not have to know the recipient. Get the card into the right scene and let the locals handle the last mile—they know who solders the cursed LEDs.

Procedure: If you cannot deliver

When: you struck out. (Happens constantly. No big deal.)

Find it a new home. Work down the list:

  1. A local Hacker Post postmaster
  2. A hackerspace or maker space
  3. A relevant meetup or club
  4. A trusted local hacker
  5. Another courier heading in a better direction

Still stuck? Boomerang it—carry it back the way it came. There is no return address on a postcard, so this only works because you remember where you picked it up. That is why boomeranging is a courier move: a postmaster has no idea where a given card started. A card that makes it home beats a card that vanishes into a drawer.

Procedure: Deputize a new courier or postmaster

When: someone is heading a useful direction, or wants to run a post office at their space.

There is no central authority to ask, so you are it. Any courier can swear in a new courier or a new postmaster. Trust just propagates peer to peer—a web of trust, if you want to be fancy about it. The ceremony is short and ideally a little ridiculous:

“Do you solemnly swear to carry this mail in good faith, not eat it, and deliver it closer to where it wants to go?”

“I do.”

“Then by the power vested in me by absolutely no one, I hereby deputize you as a Hacker Post courier.”

Variations are encouraged. Formality is optional. A fist bump counts.

The short list of don’ts

Reference: Courier marks

If there is room, leave a little note when you hand a card on. Totally optional, but the trail of marks is half the charm—it turns the card into a record of where it has been.