Patri Friedman and Brad Taylor have published an academic paper making the case for seasteading from a public choice perspective. Patri presented a working version of it via video to the Australasian Public Choice Conference held in New Zealand.
The paper can be read here. Feedback is much appreciated!
Here’s the abstract:
When the ball drops at midnight tonight, December 31st, it will not only close out the year, but mark the deadline for the Thiel Foundation's $250,000 matching grant.
Meeting this goal would be a huge accomplishment for the young seasteading movement.
Now that The Seasteading Institute has reached its $250,000 match goal, we'd like to take this opportunity to thank the key donors who helped make it happen. The list of our top donors who have agreed to have their names displayed publicly can be accessed by clicking here. The page is also accessible at the bottom of our Memberships & Donations Page.
TSI has published its first research paper on seastead governance. Written by economics intern and Thousand Nations author Brad Taylor, the paper covers a range of topics from policy models to structures of governance. From the paper's introduction:
We've had about 30 draft submissions to our Sink or Swim contest. Contestants now have until Dec 5th to submit their final revisions to us at sinkorswim@seasteading.org. Until then, we'd like to encourage everyone to join the discussion over at our Sink or Swim partner page on HumanIPO. HumanIPO is a novel way to collaborate on business plan and start-up creation.
(We'd like to apologize for the delay in formally making this announcement. Some of you who are in the Ephemerisle community may have already heard about it informally. We have been behind on our communications over the last couple of months.)
The Seasteading Institute has made the reluctant decision to table its Ephemerisle program at this time. We are not currently planning events for 2011 or beyond.
People often ask me how I spend my time. Seasteading, after all, is a complex and audacious goal, and it isn't immediately clear to most people exactly how someone would advance it. As it turns out, I've been tracking my time by project for the last couple months as an experiment in productivity enhancement. So while we're working on improving our strategy documentation and 2011 plans, which we'll of course share with you, I can actually tell you exactly what I spend most of my time on!
O. Shane Balloun has crafted an extremely comprehensive yet very readable 29-page essay on the legal ramifications of American maritime law jurisdiction as it applies to seasteading.
The Oceanographer position has been updated. Qualified candidates will have some academic education in oceanography or related disciplines. In addition, applicants should have a moderate level of knowledge and experience working with GIS. The position is also now a 6-month project (up from 3-month).
For more information about the Oceanography/GIS Researcher position, please visit the official job posting.
A recent article in Slate.com characterized seasteading thus:
Seasteading, a movement to create law-free floating communes based on voluntary association. Led by Milton Friedman's pajama-wearing grandson, this may be the most elaborate effort ever devised by a group of computer nerds to get invited to an orgy.
In Jody Shapiro’s documentary, How to Start Your Own Country, The Seasteading Institute discusses the importance of opening the oceans as a new frontier for the founding of autonomous communities. An eight-minute portion of the documentary is dedicated to interviews with executive director Patri Friedman and seasteading engineers, with examples of seastead designs from our design contest.
Just a quick reminder that if you'd like to read drafts of the seasteading book outline, book proposal (including sample chapters), and eventually the book itself, subscribe to the TSI Book Feedback Mailing List. Participants have already reviewed the first half: "Why Seastead?", and are about to review the second half: "How to Seastead". Your feedback can help make this book a success!
Subscribe to tsi-book-feedback
Email:
TSI is pleased to welcome its new Director of Engineering, George Petrie. George's ongoing presence will enable TSI to increase its engineering output, making this partnership a critical milestone toward realizing the seasteading vision.
The Seasteading Institute is still seeking an Oceanography Researcher who can identify specific regions best suited for the progression of seasteading. Here's our Executive Director with some thoughts on how we could scale down the project to make recruiting easier while still getting useful information:
On the floating-festival mailing-list - now turned mostly to a marine hackerspace / bay area seasteading community list - Matt Bell asks some basic questions. Really, all these questions should be answered in a book, or a "How To Seastead" guide, but our versions of those are about 8 years old and badly in need of update.
I've been working for over a year on a new version of the Seasteading book, incorporating all we've learned since starting TSI. Book progress has been very slow given my many duties at TSI, like raising the funds to keep the organization alive. However it has become increasingly clear from discussions how vital and urgent it is to have a detailed, up-to-date motivation and strategy compiled into one polished piece. We may do a good job of communicating our core vision - startup countries in international waters - but the full detail behind that vision basically lives in just one place right now - my head. This results in frequent misinterpretations of our strategy and me answering the same questions again and again, which is not effective.
The Seasteading Institute September 2010 Newsletter
Table of Contents
In the World
What’s New at The Seasteading Institute
Sponsor Profile: Kresten Buch, Sink or Swim Sponsor
Call to Action
Thanks to the generosity of our donors and the continued support of our 