These projects obviously have limited success. I found it interesting to learn about a couple that were very successful, though.
1) the Republic of Venice from 7th to 18th centuries, basically a merchant-run state controlled by a tight circle of wealthy traders. Its whole setup revolved around safeguarding trade and property and staying clear of the Catholic church and European kings.
2) the Republic of Ragusa from 14th to 19th centuries, in what’s now Dubrovnik, run by a small group of merchant families. Strong focus on open commerce and neutrality, made early advances in public health and infrastructure and had its own privately funded healthcare and insurance, all paid for by trade profits
This article is about a project called "Destiny" (https://destiny.com), an economic zone to be created in an undeveloped region of Nevis (of St. Kitts & Nevis)
The project goal is to become like Dubai with a 50m dollar investment, which I don't think is an admirable goal btw.
St Kitts & Nevis has had a history of being friendly to crypto and there was an initiative to make bitcoin cash legal tender, although don't think it ever actually happened.
I been to St. Kitts & Nevis. The only thing I can remember is the very stark contrast between the commercialized beaches versus where the locals lived, and the roaming cows everywhere.
Nevis (the baseball) was only boat accessible, and St. Kitts (the bat) is mostly hills of national park.
Vast majority of things must be flown or shipped in. I am hard pressed to see some "techno libertarians" doing techno without Amazon/Temu/Walmart/<insert fav vendor> in 24h drop ship.
I have my doctor on WhatsApp. America is trash and its SOOOOO easy to live without Amazon when you have a fixer / emissary. We have AGI interfaces to everything.
As someone with no plans to live or vacation in the caribbean, I'm curious. Is there a specific notable reason, or is it just a combination of littler things (cost, convenience, politics, weather, etc.)?
I've spend a total of about 2 months in the Carribean. One of those being an entire month straight.
It's the convenience really, and the fact that nobody is in a hurry. Island time is real. You cannot be demanding. You can't really be upset at service. Most people are there to chill out, even if they are doing a job. Life is just slower.
This is good, IMO. But if you are a hedonically adapted/burned out western metropolis dweller, this culture shock could be distressing.
There's nothing wrong with living in the Caribbean. Tons of people live there for a reason. Biggest issue with the Caribbean is the price of property, susceptibility to climate disasters and susceptibility to external political forces which means constant securit threat.
In 2014 it was Chile, in 2017 it was Honduras, then Colombia and El Salvador in the early 2020s. In Chile and Colombia they were coasting on tax authorities not pursuing them and relying on the cultural cachet of being thought-leading risk takers who were forward-thinking enough to take on a new frontier (remember this is when they started flying south for ayahuasca ceremonies). In the case of Honduras and El Salvador, they were setting up in tax-free zones (which is effectively a transfer of wealth from those outside of the zone to those inside). Notable that the periods of Chilean and Salvadorian history that these “libertarians” tend to celebrate were periods of political repression. I can’t imagine these ventures will be any different.
"Grafton got worse. Recycling rates went down. Neighbor complaints went up. The town’s legal costs went up because they were constantly defending themselves from lawsuits from Free Towners. The number of sex offenders living in the town went up. The number of recorded crimes went up. The town had never had a murder in living memory, and it had its first two, a double homicide, over a roommate dispute."
"And meanwhile, the town that would ordinarily want to address these things, say with a robust police force, instead found that it was hamstrung. So the town only had one full-time police officer, a single police chief, and he had to stand up at town meeting and tell people that he couldn’t put his cruiser on the road for a period of weeks because he didn’t have money to repair it and make it a safe vehicle."
> Did you sincerely believe that the parent poster was suggesting bear-overrun as a probable outcome?
Gee, maybe they should have written a comment explaining their point of view that we could then discuss, instead of a quippy, dismissive one-liner! Then, we could be discussing the likely pitfalls of this endeavor instead of circlejerking over a Vox piece.
> If you understood correctly, then your response is an example of the same thing you're complaining about.
Do you not understand the process of abstracting a situation one small step to consider it at a higher level than its surface details? Or are you pretending not to? Which do you think makes you look better?
1) the Republic of Venice from 7th to 18th centuries, basically a merchant-run state controlled by a tight circle of wealthy traders. Its whole setup revolved around safeguarding trade and property and staying clear of the Catholic church and European kings.
2) the Republic of Ragusa from 14th to 19th centuries, in what’s now Dubrovnik, run by a small group of merchant families. Strong focus on open commerce and neutrality, made early advances in public health and infrastructure and had its own privately funded healthcare and insurance, all paid for by trade profits
This article is about a project called "Destiny" (https://destiny.com), an economic zone to be created in an undeveloped region of Nevis (of St. Kitts & Nevis)
The project goal is to become like Dubai with a 50m dollar investment, which I don't think is an admirable goal btw.
St Kitts & Nevis has had a history of being friendly to crypto and there was an initiative to make bitcoin cash legal tender, although don't think it ever actually happened.
https://www.investing.com/news/cryptocurrency-news/bitcoin-c...
So you're effectively paying US taxes from the get go, before you even get to the point of anything at all going towards basic services.
Nevis (the baseball) was only boat accessible, and St. Kitts (the bat) is mostly hills of national park.
Vast majority of things must be flown or shipped in. I am hard pressed to see some "techno libertarians" doing techno without Amazon/Temu/Walmart/<insert fav vendor> in 24h drop ship.
Or
Bitcoin, cash legal.
It's the convenience really, and the fact that nobody is in a hurry. Island time is real. You cannot be demanding. You can't really be upset at service. Most people are there to chill out, even if they are doing a job. Life is just slower.
This is good, IMO. But if you are a hedonically adapted/burned out western metropolis dweller, this culture shock could be distressing.
Bears were hardly the only problem.
"Grafton got worse. Recycling rates went down. Neighbor complaints went up. The town’s legal costs went up because they were constantly defending themselves from lawsuits from Free Towners. The number of sex offenders living in the town went up. The number of recorded crimes went up. The town had never had a murder in living memory, and it had its first two, a double homicide, over a roommate dispute."
"And meanwhile, the town that would ordinarily want to address these things, say with a robust police force, instead found that it was hamstrung. So the town only had one full-time police officer, a single police chief, and he had to stand up at town meeting and tell people that he couldn’t put his cruiser on the road for a period of weeks because he didn’t have money to repair it and make it a safe vehicle."
Did you sincerely believe that the parent poster was suggesting bear-overrun as a probable outcome?
> but don't let that stop you from making le heckin' reddit quips
If you understood the ironic subtext, then your response is an example of the same trends you're complaining about.
Gee, maybe they should have written a comment explaining their point of view that we could then discuss, instead of a quippy, dismissive one-liner! Then, we could be discussing the likely pitfalls of this endeavor instead of circlejerking over a Vox piece.
> If you understood correctly, then your response is an example of the same thing you're complaining about.
You reap what you sow.