The Editors have contributed 5 articles to Contents.

Instead of interviewing one person in this issue, we bring you seven, each focused on three simple questions about the principles that underlie their work.

Argo is a public experiment in developing technical and editorial frameworks for thoughtfully managed topical content projects that don’t require a huge team or a big budget.

We don’t often have time to consider all the underlying stuff that gives our work shape, character, and meaning, and that time won’t ever appear on its own. But we can choose it. Even in the crazy spells—and maybe especially then, when we’re making so many important decisions.

As we end the year—and our first issue—we offer a final meditation on the information we inherit, along with this, our first set of topical annotations. Thanks for reading, and we’ll see you in 2012.

It’s time to recognize that many of us in nominally separate fields and industries are working on the same problem from slightly different angles.