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During the Bankless podcast, Ethereum co-founder Vitalik Buterin discussed with economist Noah Smith the “effectiveness” of authoritarian regimes after the advent of the Internet and blockchain technologies.

Smith first argued that liberal democracies have historically excelled at aggregating information through markets, elections, and public discourse. However, the Internet's ability to centralize vast amounts of data potentially reduces this advantage.

Moreover, the World Wide Web promotes anarchy by facilitating the spread of misinformation, he believes.

Buterin develops this theme by comparing the information landscape to Thomas Hobbes's concept of a “war of all against all,” in which social balance is achieved only through monopoly control of the public narrative.