Aristotle's School by Gustav Adolph Spangenberg

The term peripatetic is a transliteration of the ancient Greek word περιπατητικός (peripatētikós), which means "of walking" or "given to walking about"... Aristotle's school came to be so named because of the peripatoi ("walkways", some covered or with colonnades) of the Lyceum where the members met. The legend that the name came from Aristotle's alleged habit of walking while lecturing may have started with Hermippus of Smyrna.

Freedom Education

Greater truth is worth pursuing and progression toward truth is best undertaken by utilizing the wisdom and knowledge of past humans. This is Peripatos's One Commandment.

Groups differ on what they believe ultimate truth is, if it can be attained, and some doubt the existence of fundamental truths. Additionally, throughout history, evil has proliferated in the name of truth. However, when caught in the face of greater wisdom and technology, evil has sought recourse through the desemination of untruths and lies.

In pursuit of truth, humans have created models and maps of all kinds (technical, moral, and spiritual) which have given rise to beauty, prosperity, and progress. As long as we continue to build better models and draw better maps, humans will continue to tend toward greater prosperity.

The necessary moral consequence of this is education, which is best defined as the processs of passing wisdom and knowledge from one generation to the next. The educational process is facilitated via communication between teachers and students. This may seem rhetorical but when put in simple terms, the bloatware present in our modern education systems becomes blatantly obvious.

New Educational Paradigm

Education does not necessitate a state/board sealed stamp of approval on topics and textbooks. It also doesn't necessitate a six figure price tag. When it comes to resource allocation, a career bureaucrat often lacks the experience and incentive structure to make sound decisions. The best allocators are individuals driven by passion, interest, and unmet market demand.

Peripatos provides the marketplace whereby individuals can monetize their knowledge and wisdom by passing it on to others in the form of text, video, or in-person material. This frees educators to teach what they want and how they want at a price of their choosing.

Peripatos also provides a marketplace which allows property owners to monetize venues by renting out the space to educators. It is undeniable that in person education is often preferrable. Through the power of network effects, Peripatos allows for the organic formation of thriving campuses.

Network Effect Campus Vibes

Lastly, Peripatos acts as a marketplace whereby educators and property owners can sell partial ownership of their owned entities (educational material/venues) to investors. Partial ownership grants a proportional percentage of the revenue generated and possibly governance depending on the percentage of ownership and terms of sale.

Peripatos's marketplace gives way to a thriving educational environment through which high quality education is globally accessible.

Protocol Layer

Peripatos is built on established Ethereum Layer 2 solutions, initially focusing on Base, providing a secure and scalable foundation for our protocol-based educational marketplace. We plan to expand compatibility to other chains in the future to increase accessibility and interoperability.

The chosen L2 solution serves as the ledger and central database for marketplace transactions and access management. Peripatos initially charges a 0.5-1% platform fee on transactions, with plans to introduce a native token in the future to further incentivize ecosystem participation.

The marketplace features two types of NFTs: Ownership NFTs and Profile NFTs. Ownership NFTs represent educational material or venues, while Profile NFTs track user reputations as soulbound tokens. Access to content is managed through a sophisticated Access Control List (ACL) system.

Client-Side Layer

Clients are the user interfaces through which users interact with the protocol layer. Anyone can create and host a client. Different clients provide different user experiences, interface conventions, business models, and additional features. Using a different client may often feel like using a completely different application.

The competitiion between clients is fundamentally different from the competition between other educational/online platforms. This is because all clients have access to the underlying Peripatos protocol layer containing the network of users and content. This network of users and content is the most valuable asset many educational/online platforms have.

Switching from client to client is like switching from YouTube to another video sharing platform which has access to all of YouTube's content and your past activity (if you choose). This drastic decrease in friction in the user's ability to opt in or out of a given client's feature set, business model, and policies allows for greater competition between clients. This high degree of competition results in a highly differntiated and competitive client market.

This flexibile yet decentralized approach is important to maintain resilience in the face of information controversy and regulatory crackdown. In the case of information controversy each client's handling (or lack thereof) will be judged by users and the client's actions will cause the client to lose or gain activity at the margin as a consequence. This incentive structure has all clients competing for the approval of users in their moderation decisions.

This approach also lends itself to provide the "it just works!" moments everyone appreciates. Allowing for competing clients allows each client to provide a different user experience as well as additional features. Many of these features will provide conveniences which the protocol layer itself is incapable of providing (video hosting, on demand video streaming, interactive content modules, personalized feeds, fiat payment). Additionally, the competition of user interfaces allows for different clients to cater to different users. While many will prefer that the techno-mumbo-jumbo remain under the hood, some will opt for greater customization and clarity.

As the Peripatos user base expands, so will the incentive for new clients to enter the market and for existing clients to improve. Clients are free to operate under different business models to cover their operatonal costs and seek profit. To remain competitive, clients will choose their business model based on their structure and user preference.

Just Build It

Many think of an individual's levers on society's ailments as either Exit or Voice. However, when the exit alternative is only worse or requires the undertaking of immense discomfort, these tools leave the unsatisfied class impotent to peaceful change. In these scenarios, many (rightfully) unsatisfied with their institutions are emboldened to destructive violence resulting in chaos, leaving a power vacuum in their wake. Those who fill this vacuum are often charasmatic, idealistic, and power hungry. The institutions they create run the risk of becoming more dogmatic than what came before.

The only choice this leaves the unsatisfied but pragmatic class is Build. This means to build better and more easily accessible exit strategies to animate and empower others. The decrease in friction allows for peaceful but meaningful change.

Peripatos's goal is to build a thriving educational environment free from needless bureaucracy. The modern educational institutions are too often unhelpful, uninteresting, and expensive. However, for most it is still the best choice and the education it provides is undeniably important. Education's importance make the faults of the modern education system all the more dire.

The common exit strategies are also unsuitable to most; Homeschooling can be isolating and taxing on the parents and online courses are often less engaging than their state sponsored, in-person counterparts.

Peripatos's free marketplace for in-person and online education hopes to foster more potent and flexible exit strategies for those interested in the unabashed pursuit of truth. We are providing the protocol level tools for others to Build thriving alternatives. Whether it be as a educator, venue owner, client, investor, or student, we are reducing the friction to sustainably pursue this third path.

Just Build It.

- Cobe Liu