🙂 All right. Let’s go a few rounds. Our mutual friend @mazmhussain can adjudicate.

(1) First: startup societies are based on 100% consent. No one is there who hasn’t chosen to be there. No one is in a hierarchy if they haven’t opted into that hierarchy. Signing the social contract to join a community is much like signing a contract to join a company: you view the docs, make an informed decision, and opt out if it doesn’t work. That right to exit is the fundamental right.

(2) Second: not all existing laws are good laws, like the PATRIOT Act. Sunsetting *some* laws doesn’t mean you don’t believe in laws in the abstract.

(3) Third: you likely have views on what your ideal community would be. Maybe it’s a vegan village. Maybe it’s modern Amish, where tech is paused at the level of flip phones and people enjoy each other’s company. If you ever decided to build such a peaceful, opt-in community, then we would support you. And that’s what startup societies are about.

I believe the existence of an opt-in community of like minded people with decentralised non hierarchical governance is something really needed. 

Such communities would take away the feeling of people not having "their kinda people" around them at the place they live, and will also allow like-minds to think together and work on ideas that actually matter and can impact the community in a good way.

I am really bullish on this idea of decentralised network communities, ever since I first heard about it in the podcast between lex fridman and @balajis.eth, and I am so glad something like network school is actually happening, couldn't be a part of it this time around, but I'd love to be a part of a network state or a network school in the future. Onwards and upwards.

Author of The Network State.
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