Techno-libertarians are flocking to the Caribbean

aandsoitis about 6 hours ago 44 commentsRead Article on economist.com

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Animats•about 4 hours ago

What, again? Neither of the "Bitcoin island" schemes ever happened. The seasteading people failed to convince anybody that living on an old anchored cruise ship just for a tax break was worth it. The Sea Pod didn't look survivable in a storm.

Red Rock Island in San Francisco Bay [1] is apparently for sale again. It was supposedly sold in 2025, but that deal may have fallen through. Nobody built anything on it. Five acres of rock with cliffs. It's basically a mountain peak sticking out of water. It would take a lot of money and work to do something with it. At least as much as the Eagle's Nest [2], plus the costs of operating on an island. Which means there are about a dozen people in the Bay Area who could afford it.

[1] https://www.latitude38.com/lectronic/red-rock-island-isan-fr...

[2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kehlsteinhaus

m0llusk•about 3 hours ago

Casting seasteading as a tax avoidance strategy because some loud self proclaimed Libertarians were briefly involved is really sad. Some people really are entranced with the idea of living on the seas and building communities there. Given what goes on with cruise ships and aircraft carriers this isn't even a particularly challenging goal. Put down your aggressively critical politics for a moment and let yourself enjoy that others can dream.

Shalomboy•30 minutes ago

Great username. I too wished to live at sea once, but I gotta be honest with you; hang around any of the big submariner/shipwright/offshore groups for long enough and it will shock you how few people with money in those circles are not Andrew Ryan wannabes. As an avid Cousteau and Earle fan all my life, it broke my heart. If you're uber-wealthy, seeking recognition for that success makes enough sense; that recognition typically comes from people who inevitably live on shore someplace. They might commission a big yacht like Gaben or Zuck, but it serves multiple purposes, not the least of which being "hey, look at me!" But there is a particular type of personality for whom keeping to themselves is the height of luxury, and a couple folks of this persuasion are incredibly wealth. These dragons hoard their keep because, philosophically, it is theirs to do with as they please and not anybody else's. For them, the inherent eroticism of the sea calls their name. I swear to God, it happens every time.

p1necone•about 4 hours ago

I'm eternally disappointed that none of these libertarian projects even manage to survive long enough to hit the "oops we just reinvented government and taxes" stage.

Avicebron•about 4 hours ago

They don't want to actually create anything for anyone else or the messaging would be different.

It's the same energy of a kid running away from home to the tree house in the yard. All they want is to have all the benefits of society (imagine if they were barred from reentering their home country or traveling anywhere else because Pirate-Monaco-Dubai-island(tm) doesn't have real passports) and not be held responsible for their destructive behavior and impulses.

arcfour•about 3 hours ago

Libertarianism is a spectrum. The majority believe in some form of government, just limited in what it can do to varying degrees. The are also anarchists, yes, but that's not all libertarians.

mothballed•about 4 hours ago

Libertarians did make an actual island, Republic of Minerva, but the Australian/western and Polynesian governments were so scared shitless of a tiny island of libertarians that they concocted a story about it being "Tongan fishing lands" (despite the fact being way out of Tongan waters and Tonga basically ~never having mentioned it until some other people decided to put an island there). Then they sent the Tongan Navy to take it by force.

http://www.queenoftheisles.com/HTML/Republic%20of%20Minerva....

vovavili•about 3 hours ago

Nothing scares a cartel of coercive monopolies extracting rent from trivial administrative work more than competition.

MichaelZuo•about 4 hours ago

What exactly is the argument for why their credibility should be taken as higher than the Tonga government claims?

Because there clearly could be ulterior motives involved on both sides.

mothballed•about 4 hours ago

From "might makes right" is Tongan because the Tongans were able to take it. From the perspective of homesteading, owning the fruit of your labor, etc I think you can argue since the Minervans both made the island, homesteaded, "discovered" (didn't exist until they made it), and claimed and were actively using it they have senior property rights (you can argue any of these individually but in summation it's quite weighty over any Tongan claim).

Of course might make right ultimately trumps everything else, it is just interesting that you so often hear that if libertarians want to escape society they shouldn't use force to make others follow their ideals, they should just go off into the woods or their own island or some such. But then when they actually make their own island, actually "society" decides they will just take their shit under the auspices of a military force that will kill them if they defend themselves (although the only homicide on Minerva was one Tongan killing another Tongan).

Right now Fiji and Tonga are fighting over it and in reality neither one actually gives much a shit about the actual property rights to hold the island and as a fiji/tongan dispute suddenly the Navy is not so interested anymore. The Tongan claims were initiated after a conference with Polynesian countries and Australia where the goal was not to preserve some Tongan fishing but to smack down the libertarians using it -- Polynesian claims were never an actual reason for the invasion, only kicking the libertarians off the island.

m348e912•about 5 hours ago

https://archive.is/gWfRv

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...

WaitWaitWha•about 5 hours ago

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.

_3u10•about 5 hours ago

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.

sampton•about 5 hours ago

Without a proper supply chain 50m is just a fart in the wind.

mothballed•about 4 hours ago

A glance at their website shows 25% of the profit being paid out between the government, residents, scholarship funds, etc.

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.

a_paddy•about 5 hours ago

Bitcoin Cash, legal.

Bitcoin, cash legal.

schlap•about 5 hours ago

They'll figure out soon enough why people vacation instead of live there

hatthew•about 5 hours ago

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.)?

rjbwork•about 4 hours ago

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.

lacy_tinpot•about 5 hours ago

At some point people will also figure out why these people are fleeing.

CGMthrowaway•about 5 hours ago

These are billionaires, pretty sure they will only do 183 days and being on your boat probably counts.

krisboyz781•about 5 hours ago

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.

CGMthrowaway•about 4 hours ago

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

lurk2•about 5 hours ago

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.

supertroop•about 4 hours ago

Remember the scene in Blow when Johnny Depp’s character goes to Columbia to make a withdrawal from the millions he’s been sending to their banks and they are like like “huh, we don’t remember you creating an account here. Good day sir. Please leave.”

mohamedkoubaa•about 5 hours ago

A fool and his wealth is soon parted

taivare•about 2 hours ago

I just wrote about this https://open.substack.com/pub/greggbarbers/p/the-productive-...

thatmf•about 4 hours ago

> The Veritas Villages claim to have an education and health-care charity called Help Them Help Themselves.

These people could not be more comically despicable if they tried.

Also one of their "executives" is seemingly a teenager [0]

[0] https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/6866a3346a2532...

zabzonk•about 5 hours ago

Makes for a target-rich environment, I guess.

almostdeadguy•about 5 hours ago

Guess a lot of these guys heard about Little Saint James from the news.

Avicebron•about 5 hours ago

https://archive.is/gWfRv

nephihaha•about 4 hours ago

This reminds me of New Utopia and Lazarus Long. I think he wanted to build it on an unclaimed seamount in the western Caribbean.

skeledrew•about 5 hours ago

Way things are looking, Cuba will soon be on the table for a dime. Right after Trump razes it to get rid of the "undesirables".