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Much of the commentary on seasteading is underinformed. It doesn't have to be "libertarian", as the concept can just as equally be used to build states for prog

Much of the commentary on seasteading is underinformed. It doesn't have to be "libertarian", as the concept can just as equally be used to build states for progressives, or North Korean refugees, or any displaced or oppressed people. The engineering issues exist, but cruise ships are a pretty good proof-of-concept. Cruise ships show that we can get stable, luxurious accomodations at a per-day cost that is on par with an expensive hotel (2-3X SF Bay Area daily rent). The only question is the extent to which we can improve on that. Hacker News will get a lot out of the full Seasteading book, which anticipates most arguments and goes through many interesting details, from structural engineering through power, water, food, and cost. http://seasteading.org/book_beta/full_book_beta.html http://seasteading.org/book_beta/full_book_beta.html

jotm 15y ago
But WHY not build it on land? Find a remote piece of land and build your progressive city or refugee center at a quarter of the cost, with much easier access to food, building materials and other stuff. There are thousands of acres of land around the world that are perfect for establishing a new settlement, far away from any civilization, if that's your thing. It'd be easier to create a sort of enclave state (like Lesotho, but smaller, for example) than a seastead...
- ArtemZ 15y ago
  because there is no land which is not under some state control
- throwaway64 15y ago
  all land on earth is claimed by a state in some fashion, its much easier to sea stead than to deal with the politics of claiming political independence.
  - jotm 15y ago
    But that's exactly it - if you build a seastead, you will also have to abide by some country's laws. Otherwise you'll most likely find it very difficult to do business and acquire anything from anywhere, and if you do anything illegal in say, the United States or Spain, they'll send a vessel to take you into custody... so what's the point of spending a ton of money on a ship that is always in the same location?
    - sausagefeet 15y ago
      Perhaps I'm ignorant, but the major problem with seasteading I find is when you have your first pirate attack or your first natural disaster. Defense/rescue are expensive and would increase the daily costs significantly. In my biased opinion, seasteading sounds neat until you let reality get in the way.
      - tryitnow 15y ago
        Please refer to the book linked to above, the seasteaders are pretty good at anticipating every possible critique and presenting the counterargument, which is often pretty well thought out. Off the top of my mind, I would say the pirate attacks wouldn't be a big deal. Advanced detection and defense systems could be put in place to warn of uninvited vessels approaching. Remember piracy is a big deal precisely in those places least likely to have seasteads (why would someone build a resort, hospital, or tech incubator off the shores of Somalia?). Natural disaster is of course and issue, but I don't know if the probability of natural disaster would be any higher on a seastead versus on land. Natural disasters frequently aren't natural at all, at least the consequences aren't. Just compare the consequences of the Haiti earthquake versus Fukushima. When there are incentives to protect property, it will be protected. The probability of a disaster is uncontrollable anywhere you live, the extent of devastation is controllable.
        sausagefeet 15y ago
        I will look into the book linked above. > Natural disaster is of course and issue, but I don't know if the probability of natural disaster would be any higher on a seastead versus on land. It's not the probability of a natural disaster happening that is a problem, it's the impact. One of the main reasons for a seastead from what I've heard of seasteaders is to avoid paying taxes they don't believe in. But it costs money to rebuild these things and/or to have another nation-state evacuate them. My impression, admittedly not based on in-depth research, is that seasteaders are after all the benefits that nation-state can offer without paying the taxes for it. But I'll be happy to be proven wrong because I think the idea is really cool.
      - 15y ago
kstenerud 15y ago
I just read the whole book. Here are my comments: 1. "Pilgrims." The author consistently makes comparative references to pilgrims to the American continent. This is disingenious. For the homesteaders, the cost of expansion was very low. Their technological advantage allowed them to drive out the native inhabitants with relative ease. Their infrastructure requirements were minimal, but most importantly, there was fruitful land to be taken at very low cost. Not so with seafaring. Your "land" must be planned and built up-front at substantial cost. Once you've built your "land", you're stuck with that design. You can't just take more "land", since it would require building an entire new platform, once again at substantial cost. What happens when your platform capable of supporting 1000 people can no longer support its growing population? Do you kick people off? Who decides who stays and who leaves? And who would be willing to live with the sword of Damocles over their heads, knowing that at some point in the future, they could be ousted by the council of elders, forced to leave their home and friends, to fend for themselves? 2. Maintenance. The author is very opposed to taxation, and yet the very nature of seafaring incurs substantial maintenance costs. Who will bear those costs? Who will collect the funds? How will you handle disputes over the taxation rate, or people who refuse to pay? 3. Wealth generation. This one was particularly poorly thought out. Tourism? The amount of space dedicated to tourism would have to be so huge to offset the living costs that I don't see this contributing in any meaningful way to economic surplus. Manufacturing dangerous goods? Space ports? Who would want to live near such places? All of the possibilities offered were of small economic value. Any balance of trade would tilt massively in favor of land based economies. 4. Expulsion. How and when do you expel members of the community? Do you write a set of laws, with the more severe prescribing exile? How about people who fall behind in their financial obligations (i.e. taxation) for one reason or another (for example, someone gets sick and can't pay their bills on their salary)? That works well for those on the top, but for those at the bottom of the totem pole, it would be intolerable. 5. Government. I realize that the author is a libertarian, but this worship of the "corporate" government as some sort of panacea is really naive. A corporation is a despotic form of government. Despotism is very well suited to small communities, but still suffers from the flaws of all governments: tyranny. Anyone who has spent time dealing with corporate politics will know how much it resembles swimming in shark infested waters. Political rot builds up, and is all but impossible to remove. Psychopaths make their way to the top and rule with an iron fist, making the company financially profitable, but a nightmare for those who work there. 6. War. The author glosses over arguments of war by hand waving that it might not be as bad as with historical autonomous governments, or that "war drives away trade". Historically, this has not deterred those who bear a grudge. Furthermore, outright armed conflict is unlikely to be the norm. Far easier to simply sabotage the rival platform, since damage to a sea platform is orders of magnitude more devastating than damage to land. 7. "You can just leave if you don't like it." This always makes me laugh. Leaving is not something simple like changing washing powder brands. Leaving involves uprooting your entire life, leaving friends & family, giving up all agreements, titles and numerous other intangible benefits, and then starting over with only whatever money you have in a new place where you don't know other people. The barrier is actually quite huge, especially when the community is small. It's even worse for people who are born on the platform, but don't agree with its politics. You know, just like libertarians who are born in a country but don't like its politics. You can always just leave, right?
a3camero 15y ago
I'd take this book with a grain of salt. I don't think they've consulted with an IL/maritime lawyer (or a lawyer at all?). Seasteading might sound like a hacker's dream but there are a lot of issues not explored in this book that would be incredibly important for anyone considering investing in this idea. 1. EEZ is not 200nm from the territorial sea. It's 200nm from land, they didn't read the UNCLOS definition properly "The exclusive economic zone shall not extend beyond 200 nautical miles from the baselines from which the breadth of the territorial sea is measured." (Article 57, UNCLOS). 2. The contiguous zone is not "pretty much the same" as the territorial sea. 3. They don't really seem to understand what sovereignty is or how the international legal system works... a common theme of people who've previously tried to start their own countries. It's important to understand how flags work WRT sovereignty.
paganel 15y ago
> The engineering issues exist, but cruise ships are a pretty good proof-of-concept. Cruise ships show that we can get stable, luxurious accomodations at a per-day cost that is on par with an expensive hotel (2-3X SF Bay Area daily rent). The only question is the extent to which we can improve on that. I Ctrl-F-ed both the article and the comments and I was sad not to see any reference to Jules Verne's "Propeller Island" (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Propeller_Island http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Propeller_Island) """ It was first published in 1895 as part of the Voyages Extraordinaires. It relates the adventures of a French string quartet in Milliard City, a city on a massive ship in the Pacific Ocean, inhabited entirely by millionaires. """

jotm 15y ago

But WHY not build it on land? Find a remote piece of land and build your progressive city or refugee center at a quarter of the cost, with much easier access to food, building materials and other stuff. There are thousands of acres of land around the world that are perfect for establishing a new settlement, far away from any civilization, if that's your thing. It'd be easier to create a sort of enclave state (like Lesotho, but smaller, for example) than a seastead...

ArtemZ 15y ago
because there is no land which is not under some state control
throwaway64 15y ago
all land on earth is claimed by a state in some fashion, its much easier to sea stead than to deal with the politics of claiming political independence.
- jotm 15y ago
  But that's exactly it - if you build a seastead, you will also have to abide by some country's laws. Otherwise you'll most likely find it very difficult to do business and acquire anything from anywhere, and if you do anything illegal in say, the United States or Spain, they'll send a vessel to take you into custody... so what's the point of spending a ton of money on a ship that is always in the same location?
  - sausagefeet 15y ago
    Perhaps I'm ignorant, but the major problem with seasteading I find is when you have your first pirate attack or your first natural disaster. Defense/rescue are expensive and would increase the daily costs significantly. In my biased opinion, seasteading sounds neat until you let reality get in the way.
    - tryitnow 15y ago
      Please refer to the book linked to above, the seasteaders are pretty good at anticipating every possible critique and presenting the counterargument, which is often pretty well thought out. Off the top of my mind, I would say the pirate attacks wouldn't be a big deal. Advanced detection and defense systems could be put in place to warn of uninvited vessels approaching. Remember piracy is a big deal precisely in those places least likely to have seasteads (why would someone build a resort, hospital, or tech incubator off the shores of Somalia?). Natural disaster is of course and issue, but I don't know if the probability of natural disaster would be any higher on a seastead versus on land. Natural disasters frequently aren't natural at all, at least the consequences aren't. Just compare the consequences of the Haiti earthquake versus Fukushima. When there are incentives to protect property, it will be protected. The probability of a disaster is uncontrollable anywhere you live, the extent of devastation is controllable.
      - sausagefeet 15y ago
        I will look into the book linked above. > Natural disaster is of course and issue, but I don't know if the probability of natural disaster would be any higher on a seastead versus on land. It's not the probability of a natural disaster happening that is a problem, it's the impact. One of the main reasons for a seastead from what I've heard of seasteaders is to avoid paying taxes they don't believe in. But it costs money to rebuild these things and/or to have another nation-state evacuate them. My impression, admittedly not based on in-depth research, is that seasteaders are after all the benefits that nation-state can offer without paying the taxes for it. But I'll be happy to be proven wrong because I think the idea is really cool.
    - 15y ago

kstenerud 15y ago

I just read the whole book. Here are my comments: 1. "Pilgrims." The author consistently makes comparative references to pilgrims to the American continent. This is disingenious. For the homesteaders, the cost of expansion was very low. Their technological advantage allowed them to drive out the native inhabitants with relative ease. Their infrastructure requirements were minimal, but most importantly, there was fruitful land to be taken at very low cost. Not so with seafaring. Your "land" must be planned and built up-front at substantial cost. Once you've built your "land", you're stuck with that design. You can't just take more "land", since it would require building an entire new platform, once again at substantial cost. What happens when your platform capable of supporting 1000 people can no longer support its growing population? Do you kick people off? Who decides who stays and who leaves? And who would be willing to live with the sword of Damocles over their heads, knowing that at some point in the future, they could be ousted by the council of elders, forced to leave their home and friends, to fend for themselves? 2. Maintenance. The author is very opposed to taxation, and yet the very nature of seafaring incurs substantial maintenance costs. Who will bear those costs? Who will collect the funds? How will you handle disputes over the taxation rate, or people who refuse to pay? 3. Wealth generation. This one was particularly poorly thought out. Tourism? The amount of space dedicated to tourism would have to be so huge to offset the living costs that I don't see this contributing in any meaningful way to economic surplus. Manufacturing dangerous goods? Space ports? Who would want to live near such places? All of the possibilities offered were of small economic value. Any balance of trade would tilt massively in favor of land based economies. 4. Expulsion. How and when do you expel members of the community? Do you write a set of laws, with the more severe prescribing exile? How about people who fall behind in their financial obligations (i.e. taxation) for one reason or another (for example, someone gets sick and can't pay their bills on their salary)? That works well for those on the top, but for those at the bottom of the totem pole, it would be intolerable. 5. Government. I realize that the author is a libertarian, but this worship of the "corporate" government as some sort of panacea is really naive. A corporation is a despotic form of government. Despotism is very well suited to small communities, but still suffers from the flaws of all governments: tyranny. Anyone who has spent time dealing with corporate politics will know how much it resembles swimming in shark infested waters. Political rot builds up, and is all but impossible to remove. Psychopaths make their way to the top and rule with an iron fist, making the company financially profitable, but a nightmare for those who work there. 6. War. The author glosses over arguments of war by hand waving that it might not be as bad as with historical autonomous governments, or that "war drives away trade". Historically, this has not deterred those who bear a grudge. Furthermore, outright armed conflict is unlikely to be the norm. Far easier to simply sabotage the rival platform, since damage to a sea platform is orders of magnitude more devastating than damage to land. 7. "You can just leave if you don't like it." This always makes me laugh. Leaving is not something simple like changing washing powder brands. Leaving involves uprooting your entire life, leaving friends & family, giving up all agreements, titles and numerous other intangible benefits, and then starting over with only whatever money you have in a new place where you don't know other people. The barrier is actually quite huge, especially when the community is small. It's even worse for people who are born on the platform, but don't agree with its politics. You know, just like libertarians who are born in a country but don't like its politics. You can always just leave, right?

a3camero 15y ago

I'd take this book with a grain of salt. I don't think they've consulted with an IL/maritime lawyer (or a lawyer at all?). Seasteading might sound like a hacker's dream but there are a lot of issues not explored in this book that would be incredibly important for anyone considering investing in this idea. 1. EEZ is not 200nm from the territorial sea. It's 200nm from land, they didn't read the UNCLOS definition properly "The exclusive economic zone shall not extend beyond 200 nautical miles from the baselines from which the breadth of the territorial sea is measured." (Article 57, UNCLOS). 2. The contiguous zone is not "pretty much the same" as the territorial sea. 3. They don't really seem to understand what sovereignty is or how the international legal system works... a common theme of people who've previously tried to start their own countries. It's important to understand how flags work WRT sovereignty.

paganel 15y ago

> The engineering issues exist, but cruise ships are a pretty good proof-of-concept. Cruise ships show that we can get stable, luxurious accomodations at a per-day cost that is on par with an expensive hotel (2-3X SF Bay Area daily rent). The only question is the extent to which we can improve on that. I Ctrl-F-ed both the article and the comments and I was sad not to see any reference to Jules Verne's "Propeller Island" (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Propeller_Island http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Propeller_Island) """ It was first published in 1895 as part of the Voyages Extraordinaires. It relates the adventures of a French string quartet in Milliard City, a city on a massive ship in the Pacific Ocean, inhabited entirely by millionaires. """