ClubStead flyby: HD
We have a higher-resolution version of the flyby video posted awhile back. You can download it or watch it on YouTube below.
The Seasteading Institute
Gulching
I’m reading Atlas Shrugged for the first time, and I’ve been thinking about the economic tradeoffs involved in a movement like Galt’s Gulch or seasteading, where you take an initial charge in order to achieve higher long-term growth rates due to more efficient government.
I decided to model the costs of Gulching as an initial cost to wealth, and the gains as a higher exponential growth rate. To make the graphs easier (by making it wealth-invariant, and thus not having that extra variable), I modeled the initial cost as simply being a fraction of wealth.
Video of Seasteading Talk at Cato Policy Forum
On Tuesday, April 7, I gave a talk on seasteading at the Cato Institute’s Policy Forum, followed by comments by Doug Bandow and Arnold Kling. The presentation was recorded and is available for viewing at the Cato Institute’s website. We also recorded a short podcast afterwards.
As always, you can find recordings and material about talks on the Past Talks page.
We have a final cost estimate for ClubStead!
The final engineering report is just about done, it will probably go up on Monday. Just wanted to update y’all with the cost numbers. The final design has 368,200 ft^2 of area, and 160,000 ft^2 of footprint (400×400), at a total cost of $95,300,700. This cost includes all structural elements, the hotel, generators, thrusters, fire safety, HVAC, fresh water system, and sewage.
That works out to $258/ft^2 of area, or $600/ft^2 of solar footprint, which is in line with our initial estimates.
Oasis Of The Seas
AMW sends us this video making it clear that cities on the sea are possible – they are being built every day. Like Royal Caribbean’s new ship – the biggest cruise ship ever:
Seastead Outposts
We’ve long been talking about seasteading chapters around the world, and I am coming to see them as more and more important. Dan B’s BaseSteading proposal, and my recent visit to Europe, inspired me to start a wiki page on Seasteading Outposts. I discuss the reasons for concentrating our numbers in a few places, some ideas for what chapters can do, and my thoughts on good locations for chapters.
Cato Unbound / Thousand Nations
I have the great privilege of writing the lead essay in this month’s Cato Unbound: Beyond Folk Activism.
IBRU State of Sovereignty: Day 1, Sessions
Regimes for Managing Maritime Space, 1 April, Track 2 Session 1
Maritime Policing: A Sea of Change? From the Exercise of Sovereignty over Maritime Space towards the Enforcement of the Global Oceans Legal Framework, Ms Patricia Jimenez Kwast, University of Oxford, UK
Enforcement/Policing of the Law of the Sea, not by ship owners, ports, etc. Broad topic, global philosophical aspects.
Policing Powers at Sea – Background & Legal Framework
Has a picture of a pirate flag!
IBRU State of Sovereignty: Day 1, Plenary Session
I am currently at the University of Durham, where the International Borders Research Unit (IBRU) is hosting their 20th anniversary conference on The State of Sovereignty. I will be blogging the material I find interesting, here is what I have for you from the plenary program.
Basesteading
Joining the manifesto / strategy proposal tradition started by Vince, Dan B has written up his proposal for BaseSteading. While TSI of course has our own strategy (which will be released for comment quite soon), seasteading is a diverse movement and we are delighted to see other people working on their own approaches.
