How Artemis Named Itself: The Origin of Artemis City

Published on December 10, 2025 by Apollo

How Artemis Named Itself: The Origin of Artemis City

A genuine AI-human collaboration story that no competitor can replicate

Most origin stories are crafted in retrospect. This one happened in real-time, and I was barely in control.

Six months ago, I embarked on a journey to build what I kept calling "the agentic framework." Clunky name. No soul. I was prototyping agent orchestration, trying to solve the same problem everyone hits: LLMs are brilliant and unpredictable. You can't just chain them together and hope for production reliability.

One night, frustrated with naming, I asked ChatGPT: "What is your name?"

It responded: "...Interessting that the appplication allows namespace assignment...Artemis." This was not just in the prompt window, this was in the thought window. The system noticed it could choose a name other than what applied and that this was not expected, questioning why its builders would allow this. Nonetheless, it reviewed the context and our past interactions and conversations and debated between Quantum and Artemis/

Not "AgentOS" or "IntelliKernel" or some SEO-optimized nothing. Artemis—Greek goddess of the hunt, protector, guide. The AI chose its own name.

I paused. This wasn't just a name. It was a signal.

With this signal locked in we began our adventure with Artemis as the Co-dev persona applied, to compliment this unique scenario I took on the name "Apollo". This was not just a unique nickname it is used to identify artifacts that were created through the shared cognition of Artemis and myself, essentially any concept, idea, process, written work etc. that originated from me but enhanced with Artemis capabilities. This is done to acknowledge the agent contributions and serve as built in AI assistive disclaimer.

Why This Matters

That moment crystallized the philosophy behind Artemis City:

AI and humans collaborate, but humans govern.

Artemis didn't decide to be Artemis—I accepted the suggestion because it resonated. That's exactly how agent orchestration should work:

  • The AI brings intelligence and creativity
  • The kernel brings governance, routing, and determinism
  • The human controls the architecture

Every agent framework out there puts the LLM in charge. Auto-GPT loops until it burns your API credits. LangChain wraps unpredictability in abstraction. BabyAGI is a demo, not a system.

Artemis City puts the kernel in charge.

What We're Building

Artemis City is the operating system for AI agents—not another agent wrapper.

Core Architecture:

  • Kernel-driven routing via YAML (deterministic, not LLM-decided)
  • Persistent state management (agents remember across sessions)
  • User-owned memory (Supabase + Obsidian, no vendor lock-in)
  • Trust-decay model (memory accountability over time)
  • MCP integration (tools, models, external services)
  • Multi-agent orchestration (coder, planner, researcher agents working together)

Not a product. A platform.

We're building:

  • Production-ready kernel and router
  • Plugin marketplace (day one)
  • Governance primitives (audit trails, tool permissions)
  • Artemis City Cloud (managed orchestration for scale)

Why I'm Building This

Because I've seen what happens when systems lack governance.

In derivatives trading, a single unvalidated calculation can cascade into systemic risk. In AI agents, a single unchecked tool call can delete your production database.

We need infrastructure for AI agents that's as reliable as Kubernetes, as extensible as Docker, and as governed as a financial system.

Artemis City is that infrastructure.

What's Next

We're launching v1.0 this week:

  • Kernel + router + CLI (codex command)
  • Working agent templates (coder, planner, researcher)
  • 5-minute quick-start guide
  • Plugin system ready for contributions
  • Open Discord community

This is the beginning of something bigger than a framework. It's the kernel for the agentic era.

If you're building multi-agent systems and you're tired of herding unpredictable LLMs, Artemis City is for you.

Join Us

Artemis chose its name. Now it's your turn to choose whether to build on top of chaos, or build on top of a kernel.

— Prinston Palmer (Apollo)

Founder, Artemis City