sheetsare

Sheetsare is a term used in speculative design and some fictional narratives to describe a class of information units known as sheets. A sheet is a discrete, transferable plane of data and metadata that can exist standalone or be linked to other sheets. Sheetsare imply that information is organized not in a single document but across a network of interdependent sheets arranged in layers or stacks, enabling operations such as stacking, diffing, merging, and traversal. Each sheet typically contains fields, a schema or descriptor, permissions, and sometimes embedded rules or scripts that govern how it can be viewed or modified. The concept emphasizes modularity, provenance, and governance, as changes propagate through linked sheets and history can be reconstructed from the layered record.

Sheetsare appear most often in design fiction, worldbuilding, and interactive installations, where the visualization of information as physical or virtual sheets helps explore how data structures shape collaboration, memory, and authority. They are sometimes presented as a metaphor for bureaucratic systems, where authority and data are distributed across surfaces that users must physically or digitally navigate. Although not an established term in real-world information science, sheetsare offer a narrative device to discuss information architecture, data provenance, and user agency. Related ideas include layered data architecture, hyperdocuments, and modular information systems.