# Watershed vs CookieBlob — WaterStorage v2 Proposal

Source: Discord feedback, 2026-06-29, proposal #2.

## The proposed rename

| Current | Proposed | Why |
|---|---|---|
| CookieBlob | Watershed | "Visitor's terrain. Every visitor develops a unique watershed. No two browsers become identical. That feels alive." |

## Why this is a big move, not a cosmetic one

Cookieblob describes a **mechanism** (cookie-based local storage). Watershed describes a **place** (the visitor's hydrological zone).

This is the difference between:
- "this is a JSON file in localStorage" (mechanism)
- "this is the unique hydrological region your browser builds over time" (place)

The third layer of the Triad, under the new name, becomes:

- **Local** = the lake (your house)
- **Cloud** = the sky (the shared atmosphere)
- **Watershed** = the visitor's terrain (where what falls from the sky lands)

## What changes

The Triad diagram becomes:

```
                   ATMOSPHERE
                   (transient computation — proposed v2)
                          │
                          │  precipitation
                          ▼
              ☁️  CLOUD    ░░░░░░░░░░░░░░░░░░░
              (zo.pub / shared sky)
                          ▲
                          │  evaporation
                          │
🏠 LOCAL  ⇄  🌊 WATERSHED  (visitor's terrain — was CookieBlob)
(your lake)   (per-visitor shedding zone)
```

## The Tribble test

Does the rename survive the **tribble test** — replacing the technical noun with the conceptual noun everywhere, and seeing if the conceptual noun still reads cleanly?

- "CookieBlob room" → "Watershed room" ✅
- "CookieBlob world" → "Watershed world" ✅
- "CookieBlob state" → "Watershed state" ✅
- "CookieBlob export" → "Watershed export" ✅
- "CookieBlob layer" → "Watershed layer" ✅
- "CookieBlob rules" → "Watershed rules" ✅

All survive. The rename is clean.

## What this rename COST me (the friction list)

- Existing published rooms on tenchimedia.com still say "cookieblob" in their URLs and titles.
- The `triad-push.py` script publishes cookieblob HTML files; no rename needed there (they're files, not the layer concept).
- The AGENTS.md / PLAN.md need to be updated to reflect the new vocabulary.

## Recommendation

**Adopt the rename for the v2 framework**, but keep "CookieBlob" as the **implementation noun** in code/publishing contexts. The framework says "watershed"; the implementation says "cookieblob".

This is the same pattern as "cloud" (concept) vs "zo.pub" (implementation).

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*This is a proposal. See `README.md` for the full set.*