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A large number of ultra-wealthy people living on a vulnerable platform in the middle of the sea. And because they live in international waters, they aren't prot

A large number of ultra-wealthy people living on a vulnerable platform in the middle of the sea. And because they live in international waters, they aren't protected by any nation. Could there possibly be a better target for pirates?

ivankirigin 18y ago
Don't you think an ultra libertarian island would have at least a few guns? Hell, they'd probably have a robot army and strategic nukes.
- justindz 18y ago
  A bunch of ultra-libertarians with guns could probably defend against well-organized and reasonably armed pirates. The odds would be better if they trained, had defense shifts and/or patrols and did other militaristic things. Being purely reactive and without any kind of regimentation probably wouldn't work well. I wonder if that isn't the seed for a form of organization that isn't as free as people would want it to be. Alternately, I'm sure you could hire mercenaries, but then you'd want some counter-balance to their opportunity to turn against you or go rogue. Are there historical precedents for reactive and non-professional--note, I don't mean non-talented--defenses against outside forces that aren't a fluke (e.g. occur several times with the same defending group)? You probably wouldn't want a big mutually-assured destruction style deterrent without the kinds of controls listed above, either.
  - ivankirigin 18y ago
    It was very common for those on the American frontier to defend themselves. I think that is a reasonable precedent. Some of the only laws I would pass on an island would be outlawing violence and establishing mechanisms to enforce this, especially from outside attacks. There are certainly private forces that could get the job done, and I can even imagine a libertarian society decreeing that the government must contract out to multiple competing parties to enforce the laws. The note about MAD is interesting because it is so easy to destroy a village size seastead.
Hexstream 18y ago
A large number of ultra-wealthy people?... then have a battleship cruising nearby. Or deploy some turret system. Or both.
Retric 18y ago
IMO, the real problem is still the abundance of cheep land.
- jam 18y ago
  There sure is a lot of cheap land out there, but nary an allodial title to be found.
  - patio11 18y ago
    Basically, the value of the land to this type of person is less "I own the land" and more "I am totally free of any regulation other than my own". Which should let you predict who is most likely to want to live there. That said, isolated communities in the US come pretty darn close to this already. There are any number of compounds in the Western states where the government takes a very don't-ask-don't-tell stance towards any number of generally applicable laws. The surprising thing for a lot of people with the raids on the polygamist compound wasn't so much that the government would raid if it suspected you were marrying off children but rather that it would take that much to get them to be interested in a township's internal affairs -- people often expect the government to be rather more omnipotent than it is or cares to be.
- HeyLaughingBoy 18y ago
  This is exactly what puzzles me. I live in Minnesota and there is a TON of cheap land out there. A house on 10-20 acres of land for < $300k is pretty normal out in the country. In the 'burbs, you can buy a condo/townhome and pay for it on a waitress's salary & tips. Hell, you can probably move to the middle of a desert in the Southwest and get more land cheaper. Just build your house underground. There is simply no way you can get seaborne property cheaper than you can on dry land once you factor in building and maintenance costs. [edit] You're right about the allodial title, but mortgages can be paid off quickly and taxes are actually useful for some things. Unless you're going to live by yourself on the ocean, there's going to be some form of "taxation" to handle common expenses...like protection from pirates as mentioned.
  - 18y ago
gravitycop 18y ago
Could there possibly be a better target for pirates? Have you read the literature?: http://www.google.com/search?q=seasteading+pirates http://www.google.com/search?q=seasteading+pirates http://www.seasteading.org/seastead.org/commented/paper/ocean.html#Piracy http://www.seasteading.org/seastead.org/commented/paper/ocea... Piracy is still a problem on the high seas, but does not seem particularly worrisome for a seastead. Much of it is small-scale theft - for example, of the 335 attacks reported in 2001, only 73 involved guns. 16 ships were hijacked, and 21 people killed (all but one in asian waters) [ICC2001]. Being above the waves and strong enough to withstand them, in addition to a small number of firearms, will make a seastead a rather difficult target for this kind of criminal. Also, since seasteads are residential vessels, they have a much higher population density than a pirate's usual target. If the seastead uses a tugboat, the tug will be much more vulnerable, and should be watched. Some piracy is done by large organized groups who capture entire ships and their goods (often tens of millions of dollars worth) to be fenced. They use forged documents to obtain a new load of cargo from legitimate shippers, and then steal it too. A seastead should not be valuable enough for this type of theft, as it is not a cargo ship, and would be rather conspicuous in port. Why attack a platform of people who would be defending their homes when you could attack a cargo boat with lightly armed sailors who would much rather not die to protect some corporation's cargo? The armed and organized groups which seasteads should be the most worried about are the navies of traditional governments. Seastead defense is discussed in the infrastructure section. Besides that, pirates these day tend to operate near the horn of Africa.

ivankirigin 18y ago

Don't you think an ultra libertarian island would have at least a few guns? Hell, they'd probably have a robot army and strategic nukes.

justindz 18y ago
A bunch of ultra-libertarians with guns could probably defend against well-organized and reasonably armed pirates. The odds would be better if they trained, had defense shifts and/or patrols and did other militaristic things. Being purely reactive and without any kind of regimentation probably wouldn't work well. I wonder if that isn't the seed for a form of organization that isn't as free as people would want it to be. Alternately, I'm sure you could hire mercenaries, but then you'd want some counter-balance to their opportunity to turn against you or go rogue. Are there historical precedents for reactive and non-professional--note, I don't mean non-talented--defenses against outside forces that aren't a fluke (e.g. occur several times with the same defending group)? You probably wouldn't want a big mutually-assured destruction style deterrent without the kinds of controls listed above, either.
- ivankirigin 18y ago
  It was very common for those on the American frontier to defend themselves. I think that is a reasonable precedent. Some of the only laws I would pass on an island would be outlawing violence and establishing mechanisms to enforce this, especially from outside attacks. There are certainly private forces that could get the job done, and I can even imagine a libertarian society decreeing that the government must contract out to multiple competing parties to enforce the laws. The note about MAD is interesting because it is so easy to destroy a village size seastead.

Hexstream 18y ago

A large number of ultra-wealthy people?... then have a battleship cruising nearby. Or deploy some turret system. Or both.

Retric 18y ago

IMO, the real problem is still the abundance of cheep land.

jam 18y ago
There sure is a lot of cheap land out there, but nary an allodial title to be found.
- patio11 18y ago
  Basically, the value of the land to this type of person is less "I own the land" and more "I am totally free of any regulation other than my own". Which should let you predict who is most likely to want to live there. That said, isolated communities in the US come pretty darn close to this already. There are any number of compounds in the Western states where the government takes a very don't-ask-don't-tell stance towards any number of generally applicable laws. The surprising thing for a lot of people with the raids on the polygamist compound wasn't so much that the government would raid if it suspected you were marrying off children but rather that it would take that much to get them to be interested in a township's internal affairs -- people often expect the government to be rather more omnipotent than it is or cares to be.
HeyLaughingBoy 18y ago
This is exactly what puzzles me. I live in Minnesota and there is a TON of cheap land out there. A house on 10-20 acres of land for < $300k is pretty normal out in the country. In the 'burbs, you can buy a condo/townhome and pay for it on a waitress's salary & tips. Hell, you can probably move to the middle of a desert in the Southwest and get more land cheaper. Just build your house underground. There is simply no way you can get seaborne property cheaper than you can on dry land once you factor in building and maintenance costs. [edit] You're right about the allodial title, but mortgages can be paid off quickly and taxes are actually useful for some things. Unless you're going to live by yourself on the ocean, there's going to be some form of "taxation" to handle common expenses...like protection from pirates as mentioned.
- 18y ago

gravitycop 18y ago

Could there possibly be a better target for pirates? Have you read the literature?: http://www.google.com/search?q=seasteading+pirates http://www.google.com/search?q=seasteading+pirates http://www.seasteading.org/seastead.org/commented/paper/ocean.html#Piracy http://www.seasteading.org/seastead.org/commented/paper/ocea... Piracy is still a problem on the high seas, but does not seem particularly worrisome for a seastead. Much of it is small-scale theft - for example, of the 335 attacks reported in 2001, only 73 involved guns. 16 ships were hijacked, and 21 people killed (all but one in asian waters) [ICC2001]. Being above the waves and strong enough to withstand them, in addition to a small number of firearms, will make a seastead a rather difficult target for this kind of criminal. Also, since seasteads are residential vessels, they have a much higher population density than a pirate's usual target. If the seastead uses a tugboat, the tug will be much more vulnerable, and should be watched. Some piracy is done by large organized groups who capture entire ships and their goods (often tens of millions of dollars worth) to be fenced. They use forged documents to obtain a new load of cargo from legitimate shippers, and then steal it too. A seastead should not be valuable enough for this type of theft, as it is not a cargo ship, and would be rather conspicuous in port. Why attack a platform of people who would be defending their homes when you could attack a cargo boat with lightly armed sailors who would much rather not die to protect some corporation's cargo? The armed and organized groups which seasteads should be the most worried about are the navies of traditional governments. Seastead defense is discussed in the infrastructure section. Besides that, pirates these day tend to operate near the horn of Africa.