The Hottest New Thing in Seasteading Is Land • Hacker News Board

Re: The Hottest New Thing in Seasteading Is Land

#111

Post by patrissimo1976 » Mon, Dec 23, 2019, 11:19 PM UTC

munk-a wrote: post #105

darawk wrote: post #84

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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.

I'd love to actively prevent people from moving to these places because it'll continue offshoring domestic wealth into tax havens. Honestly, this is the huge problem of our time - globalization has happened and the concepts of tax laws and taxation of value production haven't properly adapted. The US should be taxing all the value legitimately made in the US - if a designer in the US makes something that is then mass…

There is no shortage of tax havens. Anyone who wants one will just move to the Bahamas. They already do, as you point out. Charter cities are thus totally orthogonal to this (despite the article's misleading implications).

The point is to improve life for the 99% of the world who can't just move to a tax haven, by building prosperous cities they can move to. This is not just a theory - China lifted 500,000,000 out of poverty using Special Economic Zones to transform their economy over decades. Many countries aspire to the same advance in prosperity for their people.

Re: The Hottest New Thing in Seasteading Is Land

#112

Post by munk-a » Mon, Dec 23, 2019, 11:23 PM UTC

patrissimo1976 wrote: post #111

munk-a wrote: post #105

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'd love to actively prevent people from moving to these places because it'll continue offshoring domestic wealth into tax havens. Honestly, this is the huge problem of our time - globalization has happened and the concepts of tax laws and taxation of value production haven't properly adapted. The US should be taxing all the value legitimately made in the US - if a designer in the US makes something that is then mass…

There is no shortage of tax havens. Anyone who wants one will just move to the Bahamas. They already do, as you point out. Charter cities are thus totally orthogonal to this (despite the article's misleading implications). The point is to improve life for the 99% of the world who can't just move to a tax haven, by building prosperous cities they can move to. This is not just a theory - China lifted 500,000,000 out of…

As much as I like embracing the statement "Don't let the perfect be the enemy of the good" I think we really need to solve tax havens before we can make more places that can serve as them.

Re: The Hottest New Thing in Seasteading Is Land

#113

Post by dbspin » Mon, Dec 23, 2019, 11:24 PM UTC

patrissimo1976 wrote: post #106

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…

Just stay in Manchester or whatever, and pay your god damned taxes to the king. Moving to the New World is bleak, bleak stuff. Just stay on Earth or whatever, and fix your god damned environment. Settling the Solar System - how dare you? Tell me one of those space ships won't get hit by an asteroid. I mean, heck, the idea of doing a startup of any kind is dangerously transgressive. If you make new things, something b…

Startups aren't remotely transgressive. They're heavily promoted, financed and supported by virtually every state government and have been for decades (centuries if you count the startups behind colonial enterprises).

Settling the solarsystem would be neat. It won't do anything to fix climate changes or overpopulation. It's not even possible in principle, let alone practice to remove significant quantities of people from the gravity well.

Creating lawless zones for the specific purpose of fiefdom isn't new, entrepreneurial or even particularly imaginative. Unless you count the villains of Connery era James Bond as novel entrepreneurs.

Just where do you think these marvelously useful, livable but mysteriously uninhabited "vacant tracts of land in developing countries" will come from.

Re: The Hottest New Thing in Seasteading Is Land

#114

Post by 52-6F-62 » Mon, Dec 23, 2019, 11:30 PM UTC

CoryAlexMartin wrote: post #100

52-6F-62 wrote: post #90

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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.

The Sidewalks Labs Toronto waterfront project. There’s a plethora of articles and a wealth of information on the subject...

Edit: it’s one of the first items returned in a search of the subject— https://www.theglobeandmail.com/business/article-sidewalk-la...

Re: The Hottest New Thing in Seasteading Is Land

#115

Post by 52-6F-62 » Mon, Dec 23, 2019, 11:38 PM UTC

52-6F-62 wrote: post #5

This is as suspicious and creepy to me as the unbridled control Alphabet sought with Sidewalk Labs’ Toronto experiment.

Because of other comments and my inability to edit my original comment I wanted to link this to my own parent note for context:

https://www.theglobeandmail.com/business/article-sidewalk-la...

Re: The Hottest New Thing in Seasteading Is Land

#116

Post by lopmotr » Mon, Dec 23, 2019, 11:41 PM UTC

munk-a wrote: post #112

patrissimo1976 wrote: post #111

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There is no shortage of tax havens. Anyone who wants one will just move to the Bahamas. They already do, as you point out. Charter cities are thus totally orthogonal to this (despite the article's misleading implications). The point is to improve life for the 99% of the world who can't just move to a tax haven, by building prosperous cities they can move to. This is not just a theory - China lifted 500,000,000 out of…

As much as I like embracing the statement "Don't let the perfect be the enemy of the good" I think we really need to solve tax havens before we can make more places that can serve as them.

Solve them internally in your own country instead of the near-impossible task of trying to bend the whole world to accommodate your interests.

Re: The Hottest New Thing in Seasteading Is Land

#117

Post by rozab » Mon, Dec 23, 2019, 11:42 PM UTC

patrissimo1976 wrote: post #106

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…

Just stay in Manchester or whatever, and pay your god damned taxes to the king. Moving to the New World is bleak, bleak stuff. Just stay on Earth or whatever, and fix your god damned environment. Settling the Solar System - how dare you? Tell me one of those space ships won't get hit by an asteroid. I mean, heck, the idea of doing a startup of any kind is dangerously transgressive. If you make new things, something b…

The New World was a bleak dystopia for a few hundred years. Preserving the Earth is a better option than colonising other planets, although less sexy.

Re: The Hottest New Thing in Seasteading Is Land

#118

Post by walshemj » Mon, Dec 23, 2019, 11:44 PM UTC

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.

And in a similar vein John Company taking over India

Re: The Hottest New Thing in Seasteading Is Land

#119

Post by jrobn » Mon, Dec 23, 2019, 11:46 PM UTC

patrissimo1976 wrote: post #106

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…

Just stay in Manchester or whatever, and pay your god damned taxes to the king. Moving to the New World is bleak, bleak stuff. Just stay on Earth or whatever, and fix your god damned environment. Settling the Solar System - how dare you? Tell me one of those space ships won't get hit by an asteroid. I mean, heck, the idea of doing a startup of any kind is dangerously transgressive. If you make new things, something b…

I don't see humanity doing anything but descending into self-destruction. I'm sure tax-haven offshore city states will prove once again that humans, taken as a whole, are craven ruthless creatures. It's the reason we are the dominate species on this planet.

Re: The Hottest New Thing in Seasteading Is Land

#120

Post by seibelj » Mon, Dec 23, 2019, 11:53 PM UTC

munk-a wrote: post #107

seibelj wrote: post #99

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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 US…

Ah, so you're an actual libertarian, not a Libertarian. I tend to agree with libertarian principles but often times they just get co-opted by Libertarians.

Do you mean the Libertarian Party? I am not a member because I don’t want to be a member of any political party out of principle. As an independent I have voted for candidates of different parties depending on the situation. It’s impossible that 2 parties (or 3) capture all of someone’s views.