I agree with 99% of what you write, and the idea of SOCI. The wisdom of focusing on Q is … questionable. It is both a great and terrible example. If you’ve never heard of SOCI, its a great example: it’s shocking and demands attention. If your already familiar with SOCI, then Q is actually an example of low-quality thinking. It illustrates that SOCI is very capable of thinking in a completely incoherent fashion. To prove the point, I’d have to give pre-internet versions of SOCI, heck — pre-20th century examples, but these would be ...boring… because you (and everyone else) already know what they are, and most folks simply never think of them as SOCI, but rather in more conventional, unsurprising terms. An you are quite right — looking at certain processes as SOCI does alter what you see. Its an important angle from which social processes should be viewed. (I think sociologists have observed and described SOCI before — just that this is simply not well-known or well-understood. Oddly enough, the STEM curriculum de-emphasizes sociology and psychology education just at a time when they couldn’t possibly be more important).

Oh, and 4chan, what’s that? I think of it as a massive white-noise machine. Its a generator of random ideas, and as such, can be seen as the fount of inspiration. So, where do (individual) scientists, where do (individual) artists get their great, inspired thoughts? Well, from a kind-of random thought generator which burbles quacky whacky garbage until some handful pass the test of being good, inspired ideas. Great artists and scientists have especially strong, fast and active imaginations. So what’s 4chan again? I see it as the generator of entropy for collective intelligence. Its burbling quacky, whacky, umm… well, I have seen some truly awesome stuff come out of there, that I really really liked. Or rather, that I liked as art, as culture-jamming, as completely, truly new, never-before seen creations; the opposite of the rebooted, warmed-over, thrice-defecated plot-lines served by Hollywood. So, yes, tres cool. Has 4chan ever generated quality mathematics? physics? Um, no, and never will.

So is QAnon the once-distilled essence of 4chan? It seems to be. Might it improve with additional distillation? Maybe, maybe not. Distilling art, distilling memes, distilling culture is awesome… But QAnon claims to be distilling facts, and that, I just don’t see that is going to actually happen. I’m not sure they have the mental tools for working with facts. And the people who do possess the mental tools for working with facts are generally repulsed by QAnon. So, yes, its an example of SOCI, and maybe even a great one. But just maybe an even better example of a not-very-intelligent, low-IQ SOCI, as such things go.