You are the Digital Czar. Every round, a statement lands on your desk. You have tokens, power cards, and a vote. The Splinter Index is watching.
The Situation
You are the senior digital policymaker of a large, post-colonial democracy of 900 million people. The internet your citizens use was built on a liberal, open architecture. That architecture is under simultaneous pressure — from states, platforms, and the quiet accumulation of governance decisions that each seem reasonable in isolation.
You will face 8 statement cards — real internet governance questions, drawn from the 16 policy categories that define the digital economy. Each round, you'll manage your token economy, decide whether to purchase a power card, cast your vote, and live with the outcome. The Splinter Index tracks the fragmentation of the global internet in real time.
You are not a progressive reformer. You are a czar. Your options are never perfect.
Population
~900M · 55% rural · digitally fast-growing
Internet penetration
52% · highest mobile growth rate globally
Annual shutdowns
World's highest count — active political debate
Data localisation
Proposed · contested · partially enacted
Platform regulation
IT Rules in force · constitutional challenges pending
Starting tokens
2 tokens · earn +1 each round you read statements
Choose your role. Your role determines your token economy — how you earn, extract, or protect tokens — and which power cards are available to you each round.
Eight rounds. Eight decisions. Let's see who you are.
Round 1 of 8
Phase 1 — Power Purchase
You have 2 tokens. Purchase one power card to activate before or after this round's vote — or pass.
Pass — hold tokens for future rounds
Phase 2 — Statement
From the news
Agenda Progress — 0/6 fulfilled
Phase 3 — Debate
As Digital Czar, you hear both arguments. Neither is simply right. Your vote will reflect your current priorities and any power cards in play.
Phase 4 — Vote
✓
Vote Pro
Support this statement
✗
Vote Anti
Oppose this statement
Phase 5 — Outcome & Token Distribution
Splinter Index change
Running total
⚠ Approaching threshold
Why this might surprise you
Real-world precedents
Agenda Progress — 0/6 fulfilled
⚡
Tipping Point Reached
The Splinternet is now irreversible.
Your accumulated decisions have passed 50% fragmentation. Separate technospheres are consolidating — each with its own rules, its own stack, its own version of the internet.
This happened gradually — through moderation mandates, localisation clauses, and security exceptions that each seemed reasonable in isolation. No single czar caused this. But you were one of them.
Your Digital Governance Profile
What your decisions reveal
The four tensions you navigated
For the debrief: The internet was never fully open — it was built on infrastructure controlled by states and corporations, governed by standards bodies dominated by wealthy democracies. Every decision in this game has a real-world equivalent. None were made by people who thought they were fragmenting the internet. How did we get here?