The placer accounts
Authoritative source, reproduced unchanged. Exact Markdown · Agent copy with resolved links · The files: data/users/. These instructions govern research runs, not checkpoint interviews. They keep the run's own words: a room is a community, a mark an artwork, the analyst the aggregator, the case lead the community coder and the global model the population model.
One file per account that placed at least one pixel and whose name
resolves: everything it wrote on Reddit from 2017-03-24 16:00 to
2017-04-17 17:00 UTC, posts and comments, as arctic-shift holds them,
unprojected, with kind (post or comment) and
segment (pre, during, after) added. The study holds
1,101,801 accounts, about 14 GB; half the heaviest placers wrote nothing
at all, so an empty file is a result, not a failure.
Build it:
python3 users/build_worklist.py: counts each hash's placements in the tile dump, resolves it through opl's table, writesusers/worklist.csv.gz, most placements first.python3 _lib/10_collect_authors.py --worklist users/worklist.csv.gz --out users/_collected: the collector. Resumable (a checkpoint after every 250 accounts), single instance, every failed request in_gaps.jsonl; its header explains each rule. Days for the full list.python3 users/organise_users.py: moves each file tousers/<bb>/<username>.jsonl(: the first two characters of the name) and writes users/_users.csv.
How the study's copy differs: it was collected in
passes (the 87,903 heaviest placers, a recovery pass, then the tail to
1,101,801) and repacked into this layout; its _users.csv
also records each pass and when each file was written.
Tested 2026-09-26: three real accounts collected
(477 records, no gaps), then laid out. build_worklist.py on
the full record, in 38 seconds: 1,166,924 hashed accounts, 1,101,801
resolved to a name, the study's count. Against Layer B's table of every
placer (W3_worklist_all_pareto, which counts only
placements on the canvas): the same 1,101,322 accounts and names, plus
479 whose only placements fell off the canvas; 18 accounts' counts
differ there for a reason not found. Order within tied counts differs,
as the script's note says.
The most identifying store. One file per real account name.
Codebook
Every text record is one Reddit item as the arctic-shift archive holds it, unprojected. The fields the study reads:
| Field | Meaning |
|---|---|
kind |
post or comment, added at collection |
id, name |
the item's id, and the same with its type prefix (t3_
post, t1_ comment) |
created_utc |
seconds since 1970, UTC |
author |
the account name; [deleted] when the account was gone
before the archive took the item |
subreddit, subreddit_id |
where it was written |
title, selftext |
a post's title and text |
body |
a comment's text |
link_id, parent_id |
a comment's thread and the item it answers |
score, ups, gilded,
stickied, distinguished,
edited |
as Reddit reported them when the archive took the item |
retrieved_on |
when the archive took it |
The other fields (flair, media, flags) are kept as served and not read.
Beside kind, each account's record adds
segment: pre, during or
after the canvas. _users.csv:
username, path, bucket,
bytes. worklist.csv.gz: order,
username, user_hash (base64 of the SHA-1 of
the name, as the pixel record writes it),
placements_total.