The milestone of 100: the Wave is starting to become real
Today, FreeWillWave has crossed the milestone of 100 Free Humans.
The hundredth is named jake black. He comes from Canada and joined the Wave on June 29 at 07:48 UTC.
I then saw his message on X. So, if you are reading this article: thank you, and congratulations.
Number 100 is an incredible number.
It’s not just a round figure on a counter. It marks the moment when one can no longer consider all this as just an idea launched on the Internet.
One hundred people have faced the same question and chosen to respond to it.
Last night, the last person to join was Brian Strong, Free Human #86.
Tonight, we are 104.
In just over a day, about 18 additional humans have joined the experience.
On a global population scale, 104 people is obviously not yet a revolution. But when you are building a project alone from your home and have seen the numbers appear one by one, I can assure you that the transition from 99 to 100 does not feel at all like the transition from 17 to 18.
Something is changing.
The humans around number 100
Around this milestone, several people arrived almost consecutively:
vasilaros vasileios, from the United Kingdom, became Free Human #98.
Alex, from New Zealand, received number #99.
Then came jake black, from Canada, with number #100.
He was followed by John Grasett in the United Kingdom, Quinlyn in the United States, frédéric in France, and Marguerite in Canada.
Frédéric, Free Human #103, is the second member to join the Wave from France, after Apolline, Free Human #3.
French speakers have actually been present from the beginning. There are currently seven who have declared French as their main language, in Belgium, France, Canada, Senegal, and Niger.
And while I was writing this article, I saw new French-speaking registrations appearing.
This is good news. And it is also proof that sometimes one can spend several hours analyzing a strategy before discovering that the solution was simply to talk to people in their language.
104 humans in 11 countries
The Wave now brings together 104 Free Humans spread across 11 countries.
Canada remains in the lead with 35 people, followed by the United States with 22 and the United Kingdom with 19.
Australia has 8, New Zealand 5, Belgium and France 2 each. The United Arab Emirates, Niger, Senegal, and Tanzania also have their first Free Human.
No new country has appeared today, but existing groups continue to grow.
And the map is alive.
29 different people have already sent their energy to the group, for a total of over 330 gestures.
It’s just a button. A very simple gesture.
But behind every click, there is someone who decided to come back, to participate, and to signal to others: I am still here.
On the financial support side, nothing new today. The first support remains that of Oddur Tom, in Australia, who sent 5 dollars yesterday.
Five dollars obviously do not fund a global campaign.
But they do something perhaps more important at the beginning: they prove that a human who arrived in the Wave can spontaneously decide to help it continue.
Two screens, way too many tabs, and a Wave that works at night
On my side, I am still working from home.
I start very early and finish very late, with the site, the code, the statistics, the ads, the maps, and a number of tabs that it’s probably better not to disclose publicly.
All of this is spread across two screens.
Two screens are a wonderful invention: they allow one to be overwhelmed in a perfectly organized way.
I watch the counters. I analyze the arrivals. I try to understand why one ad works, why another does not, why one person signs up and why a thousand others pass by.
I change a sentence.
I move a button.
I check a number.
I start over.
And in the meantime, the ads broadcast on X and Reddit attract many people living in time zones very far from mine.
This creates a rather peculiar situation: while I am awake and watching the counters, almost nothing may happen. Then I go to sleep, and several humans arrive.
The Wave has already understood one essential thing: it works very well without waiting for its creator to be available.
A campaign in French
Until now, advertising communication has mostly been in English.
Today, I launched a small campaign in French on X:
COMBIEN D’HUMAINS CHOISISSENT LA LIBERTÉ ?
The image remains the same: the real night map of the world, with its golden lights. But this time, the question is directly posed to French speakers.
And evidently, they are responding.
At the very moment I was writing this article, I saw them starting to arrive.
I am therefore very eager to discover what will happen tomorrow.
I must also acknowledge something: I had underestimated X at first.
I don’t know exactly why. Maybe because we hear so much about different platforms that we end up imagining their effectiveness before even testing them seriously.
For FreeWillWave, X seems to produce the best return.
With numbers that, for now, I don’t even dare to tell you about.
Not because they are bad.
Rather because I would first like to check several times that I am not dreaming in front of a bad column of statistics.
The moment when everything can change
I also know that there is still one event missing.
The moment when a person with a real audience, a journalist, a media outlet, or a public figure discovers FreeWillWave and decides to share it.
I know this moment.
I have already experienced it in the early 2000s when I created another site.
For a while, we work, improve, seek visitors, and observe slow progress.
Then a newspaper or a media outlet publishes something.
And suddenly, people arrive all at once.
We haven’t changed anything that day. We haven’t found a new magic button. Someone simply decided to carry the information to others — to transmit the vibration — and that person had the means to do so on a large scale.
Everything then changes in a few hours.
I know I will relive this moment with FreeWillWave.
I don’t know when. I don’t know who will trigger it. But I know how to recognize the period that precedes it: the one where we prepare everything, where we correct every detail, and where we feel that something is still looking for its entrance.
What is quite extraordinary this time is that I will be able to share this moment with you.
You will see the numbers beforehand.
You will see the day they change pace.
And you may see, almost live, the precise moment when the Wave stops advancing human by human to begin to spread.
In the meantime, the site continues to evolve
The site obviously needs to be ready when that happens.
Today, the personal invitation page has been completely redesigned.
It now starts as a real conversation between two people would: with a question.
This invitation is now correctly available in the 15 languages of the site. Until now, some languages were reverting to English. This issue has been corrected, and all translations have been checked by a second artificial intelligence.
This proofreading has also allowed us to detect a meaning error.
Even artificial intelligences need a second opinion. This should reassure part of humanity.
The Join page also now starts directly with the question. The expression « expérience sociale mondiale » is now used consistently in all 15 languages.
The Wave page has also been improved, especially on mobile.
The blocks take up less space so that the button « Send us energy » is visible without having to scroll halfway down the page.
The list of supports can be sorted by date or amount. The name of a supporter leads to their profile. The counters now know how to correct themselves automatically when a tab misses a live update.
The invitation window immediately displays the QR code, and its close button remains visible.
This may seem trivial, until the day you open a window on a phone and the button to close it has decided to move outside the screen.
The support form has also been redesigned, with clearer amounts, more visible selections, and a more polished send button.
Finally, the numbers on the homepage are now large, readable, and capable of adapting automatically.
Today, they display 104.
But they are already ready for 100,000 or 1,000,000.
It is always a bit strange to prepare the display for a million when you are personally monitoring the arrival of number 104.
But the work is precisely to be ready before it is needed.
I would like to tell all this live
I am also starting to seriously think about creating a regular show dedicated to FreeWillWave.
The idea would be to meet to observe the map, comment on new arrivals, follow the countries, talk about invitations, recount the improvements of the site, and gradually receive participants.
A show that would not just comment on a project, but on an event that is happening.
I could obviously present it alone.
But I would really like to share this appointment with another person.
Someone to exchange with, react, welcome guests, and give more life to what is happening behind the numbers.
A global Wave probably deserves better than a computer scientist alone in front of two screens, even if that computer scientist has a lot of tabs.
The idea is launched.
We will now see who it meets.
The project needs resources to accelerate
I sincerely believe that FreeWillWave can become a success.
The first results show that the question resonates with people. Registrations are progressing. Campaigns are starting to find their audience. The map is slowly filling up, and the first humans are coming back to participate.
But to send this energy further, reach more countries, produce content, organize regular communication, and open the right doors, resources will be needed.
I am therefore ready to listen to any serious proposal for support, funding, partnership, or collaboration.
The goal is not to turn FreeWillWave into a commercial product.
The goal is to use this money as additional energy to carry the question further and launch the Wave around the world.
An ad can reach a few thousand people.
A media outlet can reach hundreds of thousands.
A properly funded campaign can cross several continents.
And somewhere among all these people are those who may simply be waiting for the question to be asked of them.
The milestone of 100 now exists
There is still a lot to do.
The site still needs improvement, the right messages need to be found, the right people attracted, the propagation financed, and that first real large-scale relay triggered.
But today, a step has been taken.
FreeWillWave is no longer the project of a single human.
It is no longer an empty page with a counter at 1.
There are now 104 Free Humans, 11 countries, several languages, hundreds of gestures sent to the group, a first financial support, and a number 100 who himself spoke about his arrival on X.
The Wave is starting to produce its own story.
Tomorrow morning, I will obviously look at the counters.
Maybe they will have moved little.
Maybe the French campaign will have brought several new humans.
Maybe someone I don’t know yet will have decided to carry the question much further.
That is precisely what makes this adventure exciting.
We know where we stand tonight.
We have absolutely no idea what we will discover tomorrow.
The milestone of 100 has been crossed.
And now, the real question becomes:
how far can this Wave go?
— Serge