This episode deviates slightly from the stories of ghosts and demons featured in most episodes to discuss one of the internet’s earliest conspiracy theories. This story contains travel to alternate Earths, encounters with paranormal phenomena, mysticism and chaos magic, shadowy government agents bent on stripping humanity of freedom, and lots of drugs and sex. It can also teach us a lot about how paranormal folklore develops and spreads online. Also, it explains how a pulp science fiction writer popular with the hippies is connected to Reaganomics and Q-Anon. So, listen and learn about Ong’s Hat and the Incunabula.
https://soundcloud.com/user-64125934/103-sidetracked-ongs-hat-incunabula-and-online-legend-trips
LOUD AUDIBLE SIGH
“Ong’s Hat” might be the most bizarre early internet story that’s ever existed.
It’s a mystery named after a ghost town called Ong’s Hat in New Jersey—a mystery revolving around mad science experiments in the woods, a portal to another world, and a trail of leaked information online that some believe reveals the truth of all that’s secretly gone on there.
Who’s behind it? Or is there anything behind it at all?
Rob Counts dived into the history of Ong’s Hat to trace it back to the source, and tasked remote viewer John Vivanco to help get to the bottom of what really happened in the Pine Barrens of New Jersey.
The strange saga of Ong’s Hat is one of the earliest and most enduring legends of the internet — an elaborate blend of fact, fiction, and possibility. Born in the early days of online bulletin boards, the “Ong’s Hat” story told of a secret interdimensional travel project hidden deep in the New Jersey Pine Barrens, accessible only to those who could find the right clues.
Was it an Alternate Reality Game before the term even existed? An experimental art piece? Or something more? We explore its origins, the ideas behind the mysterious Incunabula Papers, and the strange way it spread like a meme through the early digital underground.
In this video, we’ll uncover how the story took root, why it captured so many imaginations, the ethics behind its creation, and — just for a moment — we’ll ask: What if it was real?
p. 27 I Read It On The Internet So It Must Be True w. Joseph Matheny. Joseph joins us to discuss Ong’s Hat, and how the Internet caused his social experiment to have a life of it’s own. A fun little interview I did with EarMobPodcast 08/11/25, just having some fun and reliving some memories. The host is a nice guy and was pleasant to talk to. Audio version on all major podcast platforms.
LINK: https://polypores.bandcamp.com/album/ongs-hat-compleat-official-soundtrack
Also, a great write-up of this project: https://moonbuilding.substack.com/p/issue-73-1-august-2025
The soundtrack to the audiobook version of Ong’s Hat: Compleat
New addition: Hat Complete soundtrack! The dl now includes a PDF of the text version of the book, kindly provided by Joseph Matheny. It’s full of links to take you down that rabbithole. If you’ve already got it, just dl it again to get the PDF.
Back in the early 1990s, a conspiracy theory/urban legend was doing the rounds on internet messageboards, about a group of scientists and mystics who opened a portal to an alternative dimension in the New Jersey Pine Barrens. In Ong’s Hat:Compleat, the creator of this fascinating piece of living, infinite art, Joseph Matheny, talks to podcaster and AI wizard Sequoya Kennedy about its intentions and origins, and all manner of highly weird shit that happened in the process.
It’s a tale that intertwines early AI, paranormal encounters, emergent phenomena, and the nascent Internet culture of the late 1980s and early 1990s. The story is a rich tapestry woven from diverse cultural threads:
Psychedelic and avant-garde art movements
Punk rock and industrial music scenes
Experimental theater and method acting
Hermetic magick and beat literature
The Esalen Institute’s influence
Philip K. Dick’s literary works
This narrative is a modern spiritual quest that blends these eclectic elements into a compelling journey.
— — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — –
I’m super-thrilled to be involved with this, as a big fan of both Matheny and Kennedy’s previous work. Those who are watching carefully might remember that Matheny’s Ong’s Hat project was a big inspiration behind my album “There Are Other Worlds”, so it really means a lot to be onboard.
The soundtrack was created using a modular synthesizer I put together for the occasion, relying on a number of techniques including (but not limited to) chaos, random generation, feedback loops, tarot, the I Ching, cybernetic systems, trance, self-generation, mind-altering chemicals, The Gateway Tapes, and automatic writing.
I hope some of you will check this out, it’s a fascinating story, weirder than most fiction, and somehow still self-perpetuating…
Check it out here: josephmatheny.com/ongs-hat-compleat/
(Also available on Amazon/Google Play etc)
I’d highly recommend either paperback or audiobook “Ong’s Hat: The Beginning” as a good place to start.
Or the audiobook/podcast “This Is Not A Game” by Marc Fennell — which offers a good intro to the whole thing,
credits
released July 28, 2025
Written and performed by Stephen James Buckley — October 2024
Thanks to Joseph and Sequoya for having me onboard, and to Peter C Hine and his part in making these connections happen.
From an interview-
CH: The most surprising insight I found was in terms of examining the concept of ‘conspiracy’ itself. I was pretty heavily researching things like ‘Ong’s Hat,’ which was one of the first well-known internet-based conspiracy theories.
Love this from the AMA:
Callie: Fun Fact — no one knew it was a Blair Witch remake until we were already attached. To be honest, I did not understand how we were supposed to recreate one of the most conspiratorial films of all time, especially since such a huge part of why the original was so terrifying was due to the fact that there was all this folklore around it. Ong’s Hat was a reference for INVENTION when we first started to explore the conspiratorial themes in the film. I weirdly feel like there are a lot of similarities between Ong’s Hat and the origin stories of how the original Blair Witch came to be…
https://www.reddit.com/r/movies/comments/1lx8haf/comment/n2lq9st/
