"A startup is trying to sell idea X" and "Silicon Valley is trying X" are not equivalent.
And even Blueseed has, as part of its pitch: Silicon Valley is the best place in the world to scale a company, and once you’re large enough there are legal channels available to move into Silicon Valley proper. We will provide you with the resources and contacts you need to make the transition. [1]
Perhaps not, but it does get a point across that I don't imagine anyone had trouble interpreting.
Minutiae aside (it was a short post for a reason), the fact this idea is not considered crazy and has a bit of traction is extremely relevant to the discussion as a whole.
the fact this idea is not considered crazy and has a bit of traction is extremely relevant to the discussion as a whole.
Does it? As I see, the idea is choosing a location to take maximum advantage of the benefits of Silicon Valley including those provided by government while avoiding particular restrictions, particularly related to immigration, related to government.
Insofar as hacking government -- which this is -- being considered a potentially-viable startup proposition is relevant to the discussion, its relevant as evidence that government has utility to Silicon Valley even though it poses constraints, not evidence that Silicon Valley doesn't need government.
(And, while I think that it is a fact that the idea "has some traction", I'm less convinced that it is a fact that it is "not considered crazy". An idea can be considered crazy and have some traction.)
Defending government by pointing out things they provide is fundamentally flawed - of course we all get utility from public goods, it's unavoidable.
The argument is not that the government doesn't provide utility, it's about recognising the possibility that there may be other, better ways to deliver the same or better. Ways that do not, for example, divide societies by political leaning; lead to absurdities like irrevocable entrenchment of power in one guy in a big white house; give rise to further insanity such as giving the power to write anti-corruption laws to those most at risk of being corrupted.
This is the best way to build roads? Really? This is the best way to do anything??
The argument is not that the government doesn't provide utility, it's about recognising the possibility that there may be other, better ways to deliver the same or better.
You are free to make that argument, but asserting the conclusion and asking leading questions isn't an argument.
FWIW, we've already, extensively tried the idea of not having a State with a monopoly on force and instead managing the world through private property rights and contractual relationships without the State imposing limits on such relationships to address power imbalances, etc., it's called feudalism.
At no point in this thread - or anywhere else for that matter - have I advocated anarchy, feudalism, feudal anarchism, or anything of the sort. Centralisation is inevitable to an extent. However to say that our options are binary - the status quo vs feudalism - is absurd. There exists a whole set of improvements and new solutions. Parliamentary democracy is intrinsically flawed for many reasons, and I have given some, but fundamentally it's a machine whose original raison d'etre was to be a solution to an information problem. The views, concerns, and opinions of the uneducated, illiterate population were to be distilled into a smaller, more manageable, representative subset who held the power to affect change as per popular will.
One thing we - especially us on HN - have excelled at these past decades is the manipulation of information. This system was designed when paper was a luxury and literacy a specialist skill; we solved democratic decision-making the day we cracked UIDs and radio buttons.
Governance is like software: it takes information (capital, data, views, problem definitions, etc) in, transforms it, and spits information out (capital allocations, laws, etc) out. Tasked with rewriting the current, proprietary, overly ceremonious, deeply coupled, trillion line leviathan that only runs on a single ancient hardware architecture and has a man page that is not only out of date but is purposely deceptive...would we declare it perfect and go home? Would we dare be so arrogant as to keep it closed source and prescribe our opinions on the world?
Or would we open source it, and see what amazing shit starts to happen?
Comments
They are trying... https://blueseed.co/
"A startup is trying to sell idea X" and "Silicon Valley is trying X" are not equivalent.
And even Blueseed has, as part of its pitch: Silicon Valley is the best place in the world to scale a company, and once you’re large enough there are legal channels available to move into Silicon Valley proper. We will provide you with the resources and contacts you need to make the transition. [1]
https://blueseed.co/quick-facts/
Perhaps not, but it does get a point across that I don't imagine anyone had trouble interpreting.
Minutiae aside (it was a short post for a reason), the fact this idea is not considered crazy and has a bit of traction is extremely relevant to the discussion as a whole.
Does it? As I see, the idea is choosing a location to take maximum advantage of the benefits of Silicon Valley including those provided by government while avoiding particular restrictions, particularly related to immigration, related to government.
Insofar as hacking government -- which this is -- being considered a potentially-viable startup proposition is relevant to the discussion, its relevant as evidence that government has utility to Silicon Valley even though it poses constraints, not evidence that Silicon Valley doesn't need government.
(And, while I think that it is a fact that the idea "has some traction", I'm less convinced that it is a fact that it is "not considered crazy". An idea can be considered crazy and have some traction.)
Defending government by pointing out things they provide is fundamentally flawed - of course we all get utility from public goods, it's unavoidable.
The argument is not that the government doesn't provide utility, it's about recognising the possibility that there may be other, better ways to deliver the same or better. Ways that do not, for example, divide societies by political leaning; lead to absurdities like irrevocable entrenchment of power in one guy in a big white house; give rise to further insanity such as giving the power to write anti-corruption laws to those most at risk of being corrupted.
This is the best way to build roads? Really? This is the best way to do anything??
You are free to make that argument, but asserting the conclusion and asking leading questions isn't an argument.
FWIW, we've already, extensively tried the idea of not having a State with a monopoly on force and instead managing the world through private property rights and contractual relationships without the State imposing limits on such relationships to address power imbalances, etc., it's called feudalism.
At no point in this thread - or anywhere else for that matter - have I advocated anarchy, feudalism, feudal anarchism, or anything of the sort. Centralisation is inevitable to an extent. However to say that our options are binary - the status quo vs feudalism - is absurd. There exists a whole set of improvements and new solutions. Parliamentary democracy is intrinsically flawed for many reasons, and I have given some, but fundamentally it's a machine whose original raison d'etre was to be a solution to an information problem. The views, concerns, and opinions of the uneducated, illiterate population were to be distilled into a smaller, more manageable, representative subset who held the power to affect change as per popular will.
One thing we - especially us on HN - have excelled at these past decades is the manipulation of information. This system was designed when paper was a luxury and literacy a specialist skill; we solved democratic decision-making the day we cracked UIDs and radio buttons.
Governance is like software: it takes information (capital, data, views, problem definitions, etc) in, transforms it, and spits information out (capital allocations, laws, etc) out. Tasked with rewriting the current, proprietary, overly ceremonious, deeply coupled, trillion line leviathan that only runs on a single ancient hardware architecture and has a man page that is not only out of date but is purposely deceptive...would we declare it perfect and go home? Would we dare be so arrogant as to keep it closed source and prescribe our opinions on the world?
Or would we open source it, and see what amazing shit starts to happen?