Tpot
Tpot (short for "This Part of Twitter") is a loosely self-identified online community that emerged on Twitter, now X, characterized by its interest in philosophy, epistemology, rationalism and post-rationalism, art, and unconventional intellectual discourse. The term is deliberately vague — "this part of Twitter" implies an in-group without specifying its boundaries — and functions less as a defined community than as a floating label for a social graph of mutually aware accounts. Tpot has significant overlap with rationalist Twitter, effective altruism–adjacent circles, Dimes Square cultural discourse, and crypto-native intellectual culture.
Origins and naming
The phrase "this part of Twitter" circulated as self-referential shorthand within a loosely connected set of accounts — primarily based in New York, San Francisco, and London — who shared sensibilities around unconventional ideas, irony, philosophical curiosity, and a certain detachment from mainstream online discourse. The abbreviation "tpot" emerged as shorthand and became a stable in-group identifier by the early 2020s.
The name's deliberate vagueness is part of its character. Tpot has no founding document, no central account, no formal membership, and no agreed definition — attempts to define it from the inside are frequently met with ironic deflection or disagreement. This self-undermining quality is itself considered characteristic of the community.
Character and demographics
Tpot is broadly defined by a set of shared sensibilities rather than a shared ideology:
- An interest in philosophy, epistemology, and the philosophy of mind
- Engagement with rationalism, post-rationalism, and adjacent intellectual traditions (effective altruism, LessWrong, the "rationalist-adjacent" scene)
- A tolerance or appetite for heterodox and taboo ideas
- Ironic and self-aware communication styles
- Overlapping interest in art, aesthetics, and online culture
The community is disproportionately composed of writers, artists, programmers, researchers, and people working in or adjacent to tech. Geographic concentration is heaviest in New York City and the San Francisco Bay Area, though it is primarily an online phenomenon.
Relationship to rationalism and post-rationalism
Tpot overlaps significantly with rationalist Twitter — the network of accounts associated with LessWrong, the effective altruism movement, and figures such as Scott Alexander (Slate Star Codex / Astral Codex Ten). Post-rationalism, a loosely defined tendency that accepts much of the rationalist epistemological toolkit while critiquing its cultural assumptions and blind spots, is especially prevalent in tpot. Where rationalist Twitter tends toward systematic argument and quantitative reasoning, tpot accommodates more aesthetic, intuitive, and irony-aware modes of discourse.
The relationship between the two communities is ambivalent: there is significant personnel overlap, mutual awareness, and shared intellectual reference points, alongside genuine friction over norms, values, and sensibility.
Relationship to Remilia and crypto culture
Tpot has significant overlap with crypto-native intellectual culture on X, particularly the network of accounts associated with Remilia Corporation, Milady Maker, and related projects. The aesthetic and philosophical sensibilities of tpot — heterodox ideas, irony, interest in online culture and subcultural formation, skepticism of mainstream institutions — map closely onto those of the Remilia-adjacent scene. A number of accounts participate in both communities, and figures associated with Remilia have been active in tpot discourse.
The overlap is social and aesthetic rather than organizational. Tpot has no formal relationship with Remilia, but both communities occupy adjacent positions in the broader landscape of crypto-native, intellectually unconventional, and culturally self-aware online culture on X.
Decline and fragmentation
The Tpot label became less prominent after Twitter's acquisition by Elon Musk in 2022 and the subsequent disruption of the platform's social graph through algorithm changes, account migrations to alternatives such as Mastodon and Bluesky, and shifting community dynamics. Some participants moved partially or fully to other platforms; others remained on X while the coherence of the community as a distinct scene diminished. The term continues to circulate but with less of the in-group definitional weight it carried at its peak in 2020–2022.