05 — INSTRUMENTS

Instruments

Not sources — radar. Raw-signal feeds we scan for convergence and anomalies, then read through the world-order lens.

05.0 — SOURCES vs INSTRUMENTS

Instruments are NOT sources. A source is someone we think with — a thinker with a worldview, tier-rated on signal quality. An instrument is a raw-signal feed we scan: no worldview, no interpretation. We watch instruments for convergence and anomalies, then apply the portfolio lens (the changing world order) to decide what matters. Sources tell us how to think; instruments tell us where to look.

This is the epistemic-infrastructure layer, distinct from the source portfolio.

World Monitor
SIGNAL RADARReal-time raw-signal firehose
01
L1 instrumentsL2 effectsL3 signals
HOW WE USE IT

Daily convergence pre-scan before the brief. On days without an obvious headline driver, it points us toward what is actually moving on the world-order map — so we lead with a real signal instead of defaulting to market noise. AGPL-3 open source; 56 live layers fused on one map with convergence scoring.

TRACKS
  • Conflict events (ACLED / UCDP) with escalation scoring
  • Shipping chokepoint transit counts (Hormuz, Bab el-Mandeb, Malacca, Suez, Taiwan Strait)
  • ADS-B military flight tracking + GPS jamming/spoofing zones
  • Submarine cables, pipelines, LNG terminals, outages
  • Sanctions, macro (FRED/IMF/BIS), markets, supply chain
ACCESS

Free public dashboard (no signup). Programmatic data (API/MCP) is paid. We currently run our own free-source convergence scan (GDELT + USGS + primary feeds) and consult the WM dashboard directly; we will evaluate WM Pro/API if the free pipeline proves too thin.

app ↗github ↗wired ↗
Signal Radar (internal)
CONVERGENCE SCANOur own free-source pre-scan
02
L1 dollarL1 instrumentsL1 militaryL1 infoL2 chokepointsL2 effectsL3 signals
HOW WE USE IT

Runs before each brief. Flags themes whose news volume is spiking above their own 7-day baseline (a convergence proxy), tagged by hierarchy layer. The brief author reviews the ranked spikes and picks a lead BEFORE falling back to markets. Read-only, no-key, free feeds.

TRACKS
  • GDELT news-volume trend per world-order theme (de-dollarization, sanctions, chokepoints, BRICS, mobilization, gold, info-warfare, capital controls, energy, Taiwan)
  • USGS major seismic events as infrastructure/disruption pings
ACCESS

Internal script (scripts/signal-radar.py). Free feeds only (GDELT DOC 2.0, USGS FDSN).

Country Watchlist (internal)
APERTURE WIDENERGeneral country-level watch aperture (list sourced from Prof. Jiang's Game Theory series)
03
L0 hegemony/forcesL1 instruments (dollar, military, sovereignty)L3 signals (cohesion, demographics, gold/BRICS rails)
HOW WE USE IT

Runs before each brief (STEP 3.45). Adds these countries to the GENERAL watch aperture beyond the US/China default — we look for ANY signal touching them within our world-order lens, not only signals that fit Jiang's framework. Jiang gave us the list; the list is the value, his reasoning is background. A country moving is a candidate thread pointer, NOT a lead — confirm against a portfolio-source take (Jiang is an S-tier source). Read-only, no-key. Degrades gracefully if GDELT throttles our egress IP.

TRACKS
  • GDELT news-volume per watched country vs its own 7d baseline (BROAD world-order query, not Jiang's narrow axes)
  • The list: Germany, Japan, Israel, Iran, China, US, Europe/EU, North Korea, Pakistan, Africa
  • Background rationale per country: Jiang's triad (Energy + Openness + Cohesion / Asabiyyah), humbling defeat, sovereignty, unifying leader, asymmetry
ACCESS

Internal script (scripts/jiang-country-watch.py). Watchlist in src/data/jiang-country-watch.json; research in research/jiang-game-theory.md. Free feed (GDELT DOC 2.0).