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The Hottest New Thing in Seasteading Is Land

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Re: The Hottest New Thing in Seasteading Is Land

#91

Post by walrus01 »

echelon wrote: post #53

I'm immediately reminded of Sealand: https://www.sealandgov.org/ https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Principality_of_Sealand https://www.theatlantic.com/international/archive/2019/08/se... They tried everything: hosting servers, their own currency, their own crypto. It never really took off, but it was a fun and interesting effort.

The really funny thing about Sealand's internet connection, at the time, it was a terrestrial microwave radio link with a capacity equivalent fo a couple of T1s going to a terrestrial ISP connection near the shore in England.

It was singlehomed to something that was network topologically indistinguishable from putting servers in a house near the beach on land.

Re: The Hottest New Thing in Seasteading Is Land

#92

Post by sgnelson »

arrosenberg wrote: post #70
SerLava wrote: post #43

Isn't this the plot of BioShock? If this sounds like a dorky joke post, it's not. Isn't this literally motivated by the same neo-fuedal oligarchical narcissism that made the bad guy in BioShock build essentially the same thing as this? Tell me one of these "seasteads" won't get hit by some speedboat pirates and decide OK, we're gonna arm up and hey why not build down? And you know what? No one's gonna say we can't do…

> “Do I want to create the first venture-backed city-state? Hell yeah” Ahem. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dutch_East_Indies And we all know how well that turned out for the locals.

I like this game. Let's continue.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Congo_Free_State

Nope, there's absolutely nothing that could go wrong here.

Re: The Hottest New Thing in Seasteading Is Land

#93

Post by arrosenberg »

darawk wrote: post #84
SerLava wrote: post #43

Isn't this the plot of BioShock? If this sounds like a dorky joke post, it's not. Isn't this literally motivated by the same neo-fuedal oligarchical narcissism that made the bad guy in BioShock build essentially the same thing as this? Tell me one of these "seasteads" won't get hit by some speedboat pirates and decide OK, we're gonna arm up and hey why not build down? And you know what? No one's gonna say we can't do…

Why the fear of opt-in competition? Nobody is forcing anyone to move to these places. What they are is an opportunity to try out new governance modes. They might work or they might not. I find the hostility towards people trying new things to be strange and misplaced.

> Why the fear of opt-in competition? Nobody is forcing anyone to move to these places. What they are is an opportunity to try out new governance modes.

It's a governance mode that was heavily used throughout the European colonial period and it resulted in the rape and theft of the local populations and underclasses of all the nations involved. When you put things in the proper historical context, the hostility is rather well-reasoned.

Re: The Hottest New Thing in Seasteading Is Land

#94

Post by Omnitaus »

darawk wrote: post #84
SerLava wrote: post #43

Isn't this the plot of BioShock? If this sounds like a dorky joke post, it's not. Isn't this literally motivated by the same neo-fuedal oligarchical narcissism that made the bad guy in BioShock build essentially the same thing as this? Tell me one of these "seasteads" won't get hit by some speedboat pirates and decide OK, we're gonna arm up and hey why not build down? And you know what? No one's gonna say we can't do…

Why the fear of opt-in competition? Nobody is forcing anyone to move to these places. What they are is an opportunity to try out new governance modes. They might work or they might not. I find the hostility towards people trying new things to be strange and misplaced.

How are neocolonial company towns based on British common law a new form of governance?

Re: The Hottest New Thing in Seasteading Is Land

#95

Post by [deleted] »

sgnelson wrote: post #92
arrosenberg wrote: post #70

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> “Do I want to create the first venture-backed city-state? Hell yeah” Ahem. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dutch_East_Indies And we all know how well that turned out for the locals.

I like this game. Let's continue. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Congo_Free_State Nope, there's absolutely nothing that could go wrong here.

[deleted]

Re: The Hottest New Thing in Seasteading Is Land

#96

Post by snidane »

As long as there will be people born there will be demand for land for it being the necessary condition for life and industrial production.

Billionaires now looking for ways to acquire more land? Or to create artificial land on sea? Or to discover new continents or planets with new land? Nothing new under the sun. Guess where all the money acquired from current day monopoly industry ends up in era of zero interest rates and rock bottom innovation. Of course the majority of it is parked in land.

This is not capitalism. This is feudalism. Just rename 'billionaires' to 'aristocracy'.

Re: The Hottest New Thing in Seasteading Is Land

#97

Post by learc83 »

big_chungus wrote: post #51
theflyinghorse wrote: post #15

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It really does sound like a bunch of wealthy folks (and I don't mean your-town's-surgeon wealthy, I mean billionaire-class-wealthy) want to further remove themselves from laws that govern everybody else. Imagine this - a group of super wealthy bound by no laws of any nation but benefiting from them all. Terrifying.

Except, it doesn't have to work like this. If a nation is being exploited via loopholes of some sort, she has the freedom to close those loopholes. An increase in small personal nations would necessitate a change in policy (mostly around taxes), but would not be disastrous. Aside from taxes, most other laws exist to prevent one harming another. If someone goes to an island in the ocean, why ought we to care what he d…

>many cities have regulations against shooting off fireworks due to safety concerns. Few rural counties do, because while people can still harm themselves, there aren't too many others nearby to injure.

Many rural counties have them as well. In fact entire states have rules against fireworks.

Outside of places where wildfires are likely, firework ordinances are often there to prevent the people who are shooting the fireworks from hurting themselves.

>If someone goes to an island in the ocean, why ought we to care what he does there?

In an extreme case lets say a billionaire starts his own island nation, convinces people to move there to work for him, and eventually enslaves his workers and their children. This isn't an unlikely scenario--look at guest workers from SE Asia in the Middle East. What starts off as voluntary can quickly become involuntary.

We have enough powerful people in the world with no checks on their authority. We don't need to create more.

From a more practical concern, what's the upside to existing countries? The new island nation will only admit productive people, and will likely try to ship unproductive people back to their country of origin.

Re: The Hottest New Thing in Seasteading Is Land

#98

Post by Matticus_Rex »

HarryHirsch wrote: post #71
Matticus_Rex wrote: post #63

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So people with money finance research people are doing that advances things they care about, like... checks notes The Kochs' efforts on criminal justice reform? This is the Soros conspiracy theory for lefties.

The Kochs' efforts on criminal justice reform? Good you mentioned that one. The goal is to push through on mens rea for company executives, for the top brass to go to prison you actually have to prove intent of malfeasance. "Should know" would not be enough to lock someone away. Currently playing in a theater near you: the 737-MAX drama.

No, that's not the goal. How do I know? I used to work in the libertarian movement and know a lot of the people involved. I have a number of mutual friends with the Kochs. The people involved in this (even at the top levels) really do believe in criminal justice reform.

Re: The Hottest New Thing in Seasteading Is Land

#99

Post by seibelj »

nickpinkston wrote: post #58
twright wrote: post #52

Seasteadding today seems a lot more like the ambitions of billionaires for their own benefit. I am not convinced they are interested in new forms of governance insofar as they are just interested in a tax-free region where they can skirt regulations on an absolute level. I might be convinced if the discussion around these new societies they want to build were more focused on egalatarianism. Otherwise, it sounds like…

[flagged]

I’m a libertarian and it’s not because people are paying me. It’s from a principled stance that it’s the best and most ethical system of societal organization possible. To name but a few recent victories where libertarians have been both right and well ahead of the curve - drug legalization, criminal justice reform, and school choice. Next will be sex work which I anticipate will be legalized in many places in the USA within the next decade.

Re: The Hottest New Thing in Seasteading Is Land

#100

Post by CoryAlexMartin »

52-6F-62 wrote: post #90
CoryAlexMartin wrote: post #86

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm not aware of what you're referring to, but even if some entity wants to start an independent country in an area that was under the control of Canada and Toronto, what is your exact issue with it? Why is it not for sale? Is the issue that the theoretical small country would have open borders, and they'd expect the same from Canada? Should both countries have closed borders so that Canadians and the residents of th…

I don’t think you’re reading my comments or responding in good faith here as I explicitly stated what I was looking talking about. Have a nice holiday.

I'm sorry you feel that way. When I said that I wasn't sure what you were referring to, I meant that I'm not familiar with the case you mentioned in Toronto. I searched for it but didn't find anything regarding what sort of control over the area they wanted. Perhaps it would have been better for me to ask for clarification about that specific case rather than creating a hypothetical scenario.
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