For Kim · draft for review · October 2026
Crescent Compass, in one page
Crescent Compass is a public map of verified places and activities for families in Del Norte County, with a guide called Lumen for members. People check everything before it goes public, and every change is recorded.
What each part does
| Part | What it does, in plain words |
|---|---|
| Public map and listings | Shows verified places on a map and as a list, with filters for age, cost, access and community. Each listing shows its source and when it was last checked. |
| Lumen | The guide for members. It reads a question, looks up published listings, decides what it can recommend, writes a short answer and shows its sources. It cannot publish anything. |
| Joining | An optional account with an adult confirmation. Members choose age bands, budget and access needs, or skip. Nothing is asked about children. |
| Pending | A waiting room for everything new: places, photos, corrections, changed websites and calendar events. Nothing in Pending is public. |
| Stewards | Stewards add or amend the map at any time by telling Lumen what changed. Once a month they also ask Lumen "what needs approving?", read one line per item with its evidence and a suggestion, and tap Approve, Reject or Ask for more. |
| Evidence and the sealed log | Every published fact is tied to a checked source. Every approval, change and Lumen answer goes into a log that shows any later tampering. |
| Freshness | Each listing's confidence fades as time passes since its last check. Lumen recommends a place only while it is more than 75 percent likely to be current. |
| Review queue | Tells stewards which listings most need a re-check, so a few checks a week keep the whole map trustworthy. |
| Monthly checks | The server re-reads each listing's official website. Pages that changed go into Pending, with the old and new text side by side. |
| Photos | Hidden GPS data is removed on arrival. The member confirms the place by hand. A photo goes public only after a steward approves it. |
| The Quadruplicate | Daniel Friedman's civic snapshot of Crescent City. Its community calendar feeds Pending, and its safety and meeting pages are linked. |
| Map files | Our own copy of the map from public data. Browsing sends nothing to Google or other map companies. |
| Permissions | The server checks who is allowed to do what on every action. No AI can change that. |
How an update reaches the map
- Something new arrives. A member adds a place or photo or sends a correction. A website changes, or a calendar event appears.
- It is tidied and held. GPS data is stripped, duplicates are flagged, and the item waits in Pending.
- It is pre-checked overnight. Lumen's specialist model looks at photos, compares changed pages and drafts a one-line summary with a suggested action.
- A steward decides, at any time through Lumen or at the monthly round: approve, reject, or ask the member for more.
- It goes live and is sealed. The map updates, the listing's freshness clock starts, and the decision is written to the log.
- It is watched. As time passes the listing's confidence fades, and the review queue brings it back for a re-check before Lumen stops recommending it.
Onboarding and stewards
Who stewards the map
Founding stewards
- Kim, Sasha, Daniel and Bill
- Add or amend the map at any time, through Lumen
- Run the monthly round for general updates
- Invite new stewards and agree system changes
How a new steward joins
- Joins as a member and starts contributing
- Builds a reliable record, then becomes an editor
- Is invited by at least three of the four founding stewards
- Signs the steward agreement, spends three months alongside a mentor, and is recorded in the log
Later, once there are more stewards, an invitation needs a majority of all stewards, with care for which communities are under-represented.
Stewards can add or amend the map at any time through Lumen. A steward simply tells Lumen what changed, for example "Story time at the main library has moved to Thursdays at 10." Lumen drafts the change with its source, the steward confirms with one tap, and it is live and sealed in the log straight away. The monthly round is only for general updates: members' suggestions, changed websites and new calendar events.
The full ladder
Responsibility grows with a track record, never with popularity, and only by invitation. The figures decide who may be invited; stewards invite, the member accepts, and the server records it.
| Step | Can do | May be invited when |
|---|---|---|
| Member | Ask Lumen, add places and photos, send corrections | Joins with an adult confirmation |
| Contributor | Draft listings straight into the review queue | At least 5 approved items, with a reliable track record |
| Editor | Check evidence and mark it verified; cannot publish | At least 20 approved items over 6 months, across at least 3 kinds of place |
| Steward | Approve publication, run the monthly round, propose rule changes | An editor for a year, invited by the stewards, with care for which communities are under-represented, and signs the steward agreement |
"Reliable" uses a cautious estimate of how often a person's contributions are approved: 20 approvals and no rejections scores 0.87; with 2 rejections, 0.75. Old results fade over a year. Details are in the repository, in research/11_stewardship_pathway.md.
Events and coordinating groups
Every event has a time, a place and an end, and past events archive themselves automatically. Lumen can do more than list events: it can help a group be at the right place at the right time.
Coordinating a group event
The group does
- An organiser asks Lumen: "Set up a tide-pool walk for our playgroup on Saturday"
- Picks a public meeting place from the map
- Members tap "I'm coming"
- Everyone adds it to their phone calendar, with directions
Lumen does
- Checks the meeting place is public and verified, never a home
- Suggests a time using official tide times and alerts
- Sends reminders only to people who asked for them
- Tells everyone if the time or place changes, then archives the event afterwards
- Public community events, such as library programmes, city events or entries from The Quadruplicate's calendar, appear only after a steward approves them.
- Group meetups are visible only to the people invited, and never appear on the public map.
- Meeting places are always public, verified places. Only a count of people coming is shown, never names or children's details.
- Every time carries its time zone, and a changed time or cancelled event reaches everyone who said they were coming.
- Reminders are opt-in by email or phone calendar. Lumen never messages anyone who has not asked.
Built today: events with times, places, repeats and automatic archiving, and the This week page. To build: group meetups, "I'm coming", calendar downloads, reminders and tide-time suggestions.
Built today, and still to build
Built
- Public map, list, listings and filters
- Joining and saved settings
- Lumen's rules-based guide with all trust checks and the sealed log
- Moderated suggestions and the review queue
- The public preview on GitHub Pages
To build
- Lumen's Haiku and Opus language layer, members only
- Photo upload and the overnight photo check
- Monthly website checks and the steward digest with Approve buttons
- The Quadruplicate calendar feed and a safety alert banner
- Spending caps and the stewardship invitations