{ "episodeId": "SLP161", "speakers": { "stephan": { "name": "Stephan Livera", "role": "host", "tag": "STEPHAN" }, "titus_gebel": { "name": "Titus Gebel", "role": "guest", "tag": "TITUS" } }, "segments": [ { "speaker": "stephan", "time": "00:09", "start": 9.05, "text": "Hi and welcome to the Stefan Livera podcast, a show about Bitcoin and Austrian economics. So we're certainly seeing a lot of crazy things happening with coronavirus and obviously everything that's going on with the markets. It's certainly a very unprecedented time and it's probably a good time to start really thinking about and driving towards this idea of Bitcoin citadels. I know I do joke about it, but- Today's episode is actually very relevant for it, so my guest is Titus Gebel. We talk about some of the problems with democracy, standard political activism, and free private cities as an alternative. This idea of it being fee for service, having lower cost, more certainty, and being much more amenable to the way that we as Bitcoin people might want to actually live. So this podcast is brought to you by Kraken, one of the world's leading Bitcoin exchanges. They're consistently rated the best from a security and from a user standpoint, so check them out, they've got a high quality platform, they offer high trading volume and low fees with no minimum or hidden fees. Kraken offer twenty four seven support, it's easy to sign up and get support if you need it. It's also even easier now for active traders and institutions because Kraken have launched nine new foreign currency pairs, a combined offering that allows clients to be more agile and sophisticated. It's available globally, excluding clients in the US. There's also Kraken Pro. Mobile app delivering all the security and features you love about Kraken in a beautiful mobile-first design. 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Titus, welcome to the show." }, { "speaker": "titus_gebel", "time": "03:13", "start": 192.88, "text": "Hey Stefan, it's a pleasure to be here." }, { "speaker": "stephan", "time": "03:15", "start": 195.08, "text": "Yeah, thank you for joining me. I had the pleasure of reading your book Free Private Cities, and I saw a lot of relevance for my Bitcoin audience. so did you want to just start with a little bit about yourself?" }, { "speaker": "titus_gebel", "time": "03:28", "start": 207.53, "text": "Yeah, I'm, Originally from Germany, but I emigrated to Monaco five years ago. Monaco is a small principality in the south of southern France, but it's a known independent country. And, I-- or originally I'm a lawyer by education, but, many years ago I decided that this is not what I want to do until the rest of my life, and I went into the industry, started first the biotech industry and venture capital, and eventually then landed in the resources industry, right? Because I like that, right? It's- It's, digging out, it was easy for me as a lawyer to understand, right? The resources in the ground, you dig it up, end of business model. That was easy for to understand, and, and now it was really, a, a great time and, we've-- And after a couple of years, I think I started in 2004 in resources industry, and after a couple of years in 2006, six, I was in the po- position to start an own company called Mochaf AG, which I founded together with a partner, and we were doing also in Australia, gold mining, silver mining, later tungsten mining. So we really brought things into production and then, expanded to the US, did, oil and gas production. So we really were a primary producer, right? So we, we, we were starting from, from zero and managed to get ten thousand barrel a day, so with only a handful of people. This was really a success story. Went public in two thousand and ten at Frankfurt Stock Exchange. Exchange. And I could eventually retire at the end of 2014 and, focus myself on really what my-- what I'm passionate about is creating alternatives for our living together. I was always interested in politics and, and, and freedom and, self Determination. And I found out that this isn't, frankly, this isn't sought after by the majority, right? So f-freedom has no majority in, in no country, in no system. And so I thought, okay, you have to basically come up with a new product, and then people, if they like it, they take it, if not, they just stay where they are. And that was my, the-- for my personal conclusion to say, okay, it doesn't make sense to go into a country and try to convince people, \"Hey, this is good the way I It should be, it should be more free, you should take care of yourself. no, I say, no, that doesn't work. I have tried it for thirty years and probably I could try it for another thirty years, excepting, expecting a different result. And that's what brought me to the idea to create a, a totally new product, and that's why we, why we are talking at the moment, I, I suppose." }, { "speaker": "stephan", "time": "06:09", "start": 369.24, "text": "Yeah, that's, that's precisely right, and I, I had the opportunity to read your book, I thought it was fantastic. I think there's probably a lot of, let's say, ideological similarity between yourself and me, and probably for many of my listeners as well. I am strongly influenced by Austrian economics and Austrian thinkers such as Hans Simon Hopper and Mises and Rothbard and the, these individuals, and so I think this idea of trying to make the government smaller by using political activism is just not going to work. And so maybe we are better off trying to find ways of seceding either digitally or physically, if that, if, if possible, into, you know, and so one of the-- It's kind of tongue in cheek, I, in fact, I joke about it on my- My podcast, and my sign off is actually, \"I'll see you in the citadels,\" right? And so it's this joke of how, you know, eventually Bitcoin people will become rich, and they'll need somewhere to go away and all be away and kind of defend themselves in a sort of gated community. And I, I actually, as reading, as I was reading your book, I saw a lot of similarities. So perhaps you could just tell us a little bit about, what is the fundamental problem that you see with the democratic system, and why do you think something like be a solution there." }, { "speaker": "titus_gebel", "time": "07:23", "start": 442.7, "text": "Yeah, I think one of the main problems that we have is, is, is called the minimal principle that is people want to have best they can get for the least they can, they have to give for it. And it's normal and, but this principle makes sense evolutionary because nature created all the machines and all the things that are basically helping us to create more value to be more productive with less input, right? Which is, Prerequisite for progress, then makes sense, right? You, you don't want to spend much, but want to get as much out of it as you can. So the problem with this minimum principle is if it, if it meets politics, right? Because in a political, political system, the leaders can redistribute wealth because they have the, the monopoly of force. And now, if you are in a democracy, you still, you and I included, if somebody would offer us, here, look, you get one hundred dollar for ten Ten hours hard work, right hand. In my left hand, you get one hundred dollars for nothing, just make a cross here. Well, most people would take the one hundred dollars for just make, giving their signature for whatever party. And, and this example, I think illustrates the problem. So over time, the politicians to be reelected have to promise more and more free lunch, more and more goodies, right? And there will always be crisis like now, or there will even be a war or a big crisis, and then the more re- Reasonable people will be elected into power, and we have seen this in the mining industry as well, right? So it's the ma-- for exa-for example, Australia, the mining industry is a pillar of, of, of, of the wealth production, right? And if the ma- Absolutely, it's a big part. Yeah. And if the mining industry is, is going well and everybody's happy, and then people say, \"Hey, let's vote the good guys into power,\" right? And the good guys are redistributing the wealth to others and say, \"Hey, we have to And but then they say, \"Hey, and we have to protect the environment, and let's, let's put in very strict rules.\" And that leads to that the resources industry isn't profitable any longer in some areas, right? So then, then the downturn begins. And then people say, \"Hey, maybe we have to vote the tough guys again in power, right?\" And then the tough guys repair, fix the thing, and the circus starts anew. And the problem is that, and that is all over democracy, the problem is it's, it's an eternal circle, right? But people don't learn from that. So if you're on top of the circle after a big crisis and reasonable guys are in government, and over time, then people find out, \"Hey, I can vote money into my pockets because I'm just voting for this party that is, that is promising more.\" And that means that over time, the other parties, be it conservative or liberal, liberal or even libertarian parties, have to adapt to that. They have to give out goodies, otherwise they're Just elected out of power, and I can give you many examples. I mean, the whole of Europe, right? When they started with democracy at the end of the, of the nineteenth century, these people were really classic liberals, right? and they started even in Germany, thirty percent in, in Switzerland, I think it was sixty, seventy percent, and over time they all disappeared because you can't compete in a, not in a one man, one vote democracy against parties who, for whatever reason And I promise you that they take care of you, of the risk of your life. They take care, you get additional healthcare, you get additional education, you get additional, you name it, right? So we cannot, we as classical lib- liberals or libertarians, we cannot, we cannot compete against those offers. But that, now this is the one thing. The other thing is that of course, you can't redistribute yourself into being wealthy, right? It's not possible. Somebody has to produce it. And like I said with the mining cycle, if you are making production difficult because you have too high taxes and high social security because of your goodies promises, then production will go down, and then less can be redistributed. And the other thing is many groups in society- They dis-discover that they can basically, they have to cry out and then they get some money from the government. So everybody's doing that, right? And over time, eventually, this system is becoming insolvent. And what we are currently seeing is, is a final phase that we are basically printing money, to, to avoid this problem that we have self-created. and that is a problem that will be fixed only for- Ten, twenty years, and then it will start anew. So this is my finding that's okay, I have to got out of this circle, right? Because if I, in democracy, I have no chance. I have maybe a small chance to be stay in power, for ten years after crisis, but after that, it's gone. It will be redistribution again. That's the problem. That's my, what I call the democratic cycle. And, there's no, no way out in, in traditional systems." }, { "speaker": "stephan", "time": "12:35", "start": 754.92, "text": "Right. And so that- So then, in your book, you present this idea of the free private city. So could you just give us a bit of an overview what is that?" }, { "speaker": "titus_gebel", "time": "12:43", "start": 763.19, "text": "Yeah, in a nutshell, it's imagine, A private company takes care for protection of life, liberty and property. You pay a certain amount for that based on a contract. In the contract, the amount is fixed, maybe with an inflation clause, and they say, \"Hey, these are your rights, these are your obligations, and there are some rules, right? And there's a legal system which is a fallback system or whatever.\" So, and you pay a fixed amount for that, and, and then there's no forum that for people can, to change the laws, right? So you-- everybody has a, has a contractually guaranteed position towards the operator, in this case, I would be the pri-- free private city operator, it's a service provider, right? I say, okay, I provide, protection, some infrastructure, dispute resolution, if you want, and you pay, say, one thousand dollar per year That's not much, but this is the basic minimal state, right? Like the classical liberal philosophers, that is what you need, not, not more. And And the good thing is that everybody's protected by this contract, and if I have a problem with you, then we go to outside arbitration, we don't go to my court or the courts I have established, they are all only for the disputes of people that they have amongst each other. This is basically not super new, it's, it's what we call service, and it's what, what we know from international trade that if you, you can go to international arbitration, right? Which is not part of the country where you're working in, especially in the resources industry for big projects, you have something like that. Now, now I'm, I'm now putting this down to the single, to the, to the small man. they say, \"Okay, you can have the same. You have-- you will be protected by a co-contract, and you can go to, to arbitration if you dislike what I'm doing and if you think the contract isn't fulfilled, you can say, 'I'm not going to pay my fees because you didn't guarantee security or whatever.'\" Right? So you're-- and this is something where I just- Transfer what we already knew from the free market into our living together. All right? I make an, I make an offer. You, you don't like the offer, go somewhere else. And there's a lot of variation possible, right? You can have very- I would say, aren't utopist environments, you can have, like me, more classic liberal, minimal states provided by a private company, and then you can have things where they have all kinds of restriction, like, \"We want to be totally CO2 free, we want to have a big social security, or even there's no, no private property, right?\" Well, as long as it's voluntary, as participation is voluntary, I have absolutely no problem with that, right? It can be a communist system, whatever. But people have to take care of the consequences. So on that is, I think, if we, we really want to, to achieve what is achievable from people who are really can be free and are responsible and reasonable, that is security, a safe space, dispute resolution, some infrastructure, for the rest I leave you alone, because I know you can much, do much better than I. I'm only basically creating a framework in with Framework of spontaneous order can then, can then, flourish. And here's my protection against my cycle problem. Every single resident has a contract with the city operator, and that means that even if ninety percent of the residents say, \"Hey, let's create a swimming, let's build a swimming pool,\" right? And they come to you, Stefan, and say, \"Hey, Stefan,\" Pay, we, we, we voted ninety percent in favor of the swimming pool. Everybody, we decided everybody should pay one hundred dollar for it. Now, a thousand said, \"Wait a minute, I didn't sign up for that, right? And you can come to me and say, \"Titus, protect me for those guys. \" And I said, \"Hey, guys, you, you built your swimming pool with your money, okay? And you can charge me and Stefan a higher entrance fee, that's fine. But you can't force Stefan into your ideas. \" Right? And that is, that is the big difference, right? There's no forum for people who aren't successful in life, who are bored, and then they try to impose their will upon the majority, which is the reality what we have in today's parliaments, from the smallest community to the biggest empire. Right? And, the majority of, a large portion of those people is really either couldn't be as successful as they are in, in, in a free market environment, or they really are, completely filled by the wish to dominate others and think they have-- they know what's best for the world, right? And these people can become very dangerous, and still they think they do good, right?" }, { "speaker": "stephan", "time": "17:37", "start": 1056.58, "text": "Yeah, that's right. A lot of, do-gooders out there who, want to actually control other people. I think one of the-- Well, there's a, there's a range of benefits that I could see when I was reading the book. It's, you know, we would have a much more efficient, you know, environment for operation. It would be lower regulation, and it would be like market-driven regulation. I think, and I think the key, the key one, and, and as you were pointing out, it's clear rules that everybody" }, { "speaker": "stephan", "time": "18:06", "start": 1086.08, "text": "Star Wars, Darth Vader, you know, \"Pray I don't alter the deal any further\" style governance. And so it means that, in order for, for things to, you know, the, the, there is competition, but it might be between different free private cities or Bitcoin, different Bitcoin citadels or whatever you wanna call them. a-and the other thing that I found really striking was the extreme low cost, right? So most of us right now, we're used to paying very, very high tax rates. The amounts that you were discussing in the book, you mentioned twelve hundred dollars as the contribution amount for something like a Singapore or a Hong Kong level per capita, for a year. Could you just outline a little bit around that number and how such a big cost saving is able to be generated?" }, { "speaker": "titus_gebel", "time": "18:54", "start": 1134.49, "text": "Okay, if you think that- That the, the, the task of the city provider should be protection of life, liberty, and property, what does this mean? It, it mean you have to have a kind of a, of, of a security force, a police force? For internal and external security. Now external is something we come back later, but let's, let's start with internal security, and then you have to provide some dispute resolution mechanisms, be it courts, be it arbitration or whatever, because there will be disputes, right? And there will be- disputes where people can't agree on certain rules or certain, arbitration tribunals, right? So this is a fallback which is probably needed, or it is needed. and, so you have, and, and there are some administrative things, and, and, and you have to pre-- at the, at least in the beginning, you have to create a kind of an infrastructure, otherwise no, nobody's coming, right? You can la-- later try to privatize all of this, but there will be some element of administration. But this is something which was basically the case in the, the, the nineteenth century, right? Which people say this is the night watch state or the, the minimal state. And if you s- just compare these, I just compared these figures with what are, what are cities, spending on that, right? Compared to, what a state is spending on redistribution, on all kinds of programs and, and, I mean, healthcare and education isn't included, right? So you still would have to pay for that, but on your own. So my idea is that this will be much better, can be provided by private initiatives and, and even- Even you can say, okay, let's, let's say there's a minimum protection included in that, in that amount, so that you aren't dying or starving on the street. Then it would be not much higher, right? That we have, I have, elaborated in my book comparisons to, to Hong, to Hong Kong, small states in the Pacific, then, Sandy Springs example, first world example from the US, they have basically privatized nearly everything in their, in their community, and it's- It's a town of one hundred thousand people, it's not, not a small community. So you can come to, and everybody can have a look at the book and see, okay, this is the what we really need. So that would, will make us discover that, that today states aren't only totally inefficient, they are also super expensive for what they offer, right? I mean, ninety percent, if you say this is a market, right? And every state is a market participant. Ninety percent are highly in debt of the market participant, and eighty percent of the customers are dissatisfied with what the government does, right? You know, all over the place, and, and it's, it's highly concentrated. So, if this was a normal market, you would say, \"Hey, \" There, there definitely we can gain something in that market, right? Because obviously they're totally inefficient, right? They, they, they, and they account for thirty percent of all wealth that is created on the world. So the world GDP would be thirty percent, right, only state, activity is thirty percent. So this is the biggest market of all. It's even bigger than financial, bigger than healthcare, bigger than, you name it, right? And, and that is, and, and, and this is something, where, where I said, \"Hey, let's view on, view this as a market. Here's my offer. I provide a service for the people who want to live free, and they-- people know that they have to take care for themselves. We would offer all kind of mutual help things for social problems and for, if you have an accident and cannot work any longer, this-- all this can be covered, right? And it can be covered better, than, than in, in, in a state, because the problem with the state is, again, you start an insti Institution like the National Health Service in the, in the UK, right? And then over time, what happens is this bureaucracy is getting bigger and bigger, and more and more people aren't really doctors or they are surveying doctors. And they, then a lot of things are spent that aren't really healthcare, they're something else, right? But, that over time, that creeps into such society. So this is always a problem if you have no competition. Right? So the, then, and, and in so far, I, I know this is the main, one of the main concerns people have, say, \"Hey, in a private city, it's only for the strong, and the weak people would then suffer.\" Which isn't true, right? Because, if you take Hong Kong as an example Hong Kong has managed to integrate millions of people in a relatively short period of time and bring them to a status where they can take care for themselves. And most people were, were refugees from communist China, they were just coming there with zero, they had no income, they had no work, they had no, no wealth they brought with them. And, and it, they managed this with a, with a system that wasn't a social welfare state, to integrate millions of people and, and get a- with a very low, state ex-state rate, expense rate, about, I don't know, ten percent or something like that, they managed to get a higher, level of wealth for everybody. But now here, here comes the but, if Hong Kong Would have been a democracy since the fifties, this wouldn't happen, because then the redistribution would have started in the fifties, they would have followed the model of the UK, et cetera, et cetera, right? So here comes the takeaway doesn't work with democracy, right? It doesn't work because people are, like they are, you can't, you can't change people. If they're offered a free lunch, they will vote for it. And, and that's the point. So you have to go away, take yourself away, and say, \"Look, we are much better than a dem-- than a democracy, because you can decide basically everything for yourself, and you can associate with your fellow citizens, and you can, you can create self-help groups for social calamities and...\" There will be a fund and there will all kinds of things where we can, we can help people who really can't help themselves. But over, it has-- I, I, I think I'm, I'm going through this in my book, to, to a certain extent, it has been shown that normally it's more than, not more than five percent in any society that are really incapable of, of helping themselves, because either they-- because they are ill or because they are, have some, some, some- Natural born, I would say, incapacities or whatever, so they, they don't really take-- they can't take care of themselves. So this five percent, and I think every society since humankind, the last five thousand years, has found a way to help those people, right? And this is also here the case. So there will be Nobody starving to death on the road. I'm absolutely sure that this isn't going to happen. And again, we can say, \"Hey, here's a proposal. Instead of twelve hundred a year, you pay fifteen hundred dollar a year, and we have a fund. It's called the, the minimum help for people who really can't help themselves so that they don't die, they, they can survive.\" So it, it isn't the big thing. The big money is spent in the states for redistribution, for bureaucracy, and of course, in some countries for having A big army, despite not needing it, right? And then the army needs to do something, right? And then the war started, or we have to take care of this country, and we, it, because of our responsibility, I always-- I mean, I heard, hear this constantly, from my former, home in Germany. Yeah, we have to, we have to, be involved in Syria and all that. I said, okay, you pay for it, and you send your own children. Then suddenly, yeah, suddenly people are not so interventionist. In, getting involved in foreign, wars, right? If they say, \"You pay for it,\" and I would say the same in a free private city. If you want to support a party in a civil war, you're free to do that, but on your own expense, right? And you can even go around and form a, voluntary corps of people who are fighting, on behalf of that party. That's fine, if you're doing it voluntarily, but we are going, not going to pay for that, right? We only be paying for self-defense. Kinds of, are we going to help this country and we're going to help this region? I said, okay, I can do that, but then make a collection and, and send your own money, right? That is one of the big things people say, hey, these libertarian guys are cold-hearted, and I'm so good because I'm taking other people's money and do good with it, right? No, you're betraying yourself, right? You, you're betraying yourself. If you help with your own money, I have respect for you. If you help with other people's money, I have totally disrespect for you, because it's the exact opposite. You are egocentric because you feel better if people is helped with other people's money, right? That is, that is, egocentric. And, and that is the, the, the-- and people don't reflect on that. But this is the case here, you, you say, \"Okay, you exactly know what you have to pay, and what we do with the Want to add on that, you are free, right? And you have much more money for that purpose because we only taking away from you twelve hundred or fifteen hundred dollar. And of course, you have to pay something for your, for your health care, you have to pay some insurances, and you have to take care of education of your kids, but still, it's probably much less than you have to spend, than you spend today in any Western country." }, { "speaker": "stephan", "time": "29:00", "start": 1740.36, "text": "Oh, of course, and I think, many Bitcoin people would be interested in this kind of idea as well, because, many-- well, many of us live in a country with capital gains tax, for example, right? So if you wanted to spend your Bitcoin, you're gonna pay capital gains on it, whereas if you were able to set up this kind of Bitcoin citadel area, which is like a low tax, low regulation environment that has kind of opt-in, you know, rules that you opted into from the start, I think that would be, definitely a big improvement The legal system involved as well. So there are obviously different legal possible, there are different possible legal systems. What are some of the ideas around the frameworks that you could put in place, would you say, okay, we're gonna adopt the English common law and that's gonna be our body of law or how, how would that work?" }, { "speaker": "titus_gebel", "time": "29:46", "start": 1786.07, "text": "Yeah, for example, right? I mean, you have to differentiate, yeah, so it's very important. I mean, what we all do is really making contracts with each other. If you go to the baker and, and, and, and buy a bread Right? And, and if something goes wrong, like the bread isn't good, right? You go back, and then you have a set of rights. So there's no need to, to reinvent this because people have found out over five thousand years how this should work, right? And they say, okay, first, for example, most, saying this simple, simple example, most, legal jurisdictions have come to, To two conclusions. One is you can give back the bad bread and get your money back, or you can say, \"I want the better bread.\" Right? So the, the, the baker can say, \"Hey, wait, I want to stick to the deal, but I see this is bad bread, I give you better bread.\" Right? So this is, this is what we have found out. So there's no need to invent this anew, right? And the other thing is you, you won't attract much investors if they say, \"We have a, we have a totally new We have created on our own. Whoo, right? That is a, that is a tough, tough call, right? Because, no lawyer involved would know about that. So the easiest thing to do is for the civil law, for the private law, parties dealing with each other, is just Hey, let's import something that is already working. And for example, the problem with the common law, the common law is very unfavorable, and there's a kind of a trend saying, \"Hey, common law's the reason for success.\" I doubt that. And, but common law is definitely an option. But it is-- the problem with common law, it's not common law any longer because it's kind of diluted by all kind of statutory law, right? So you have the same problems as in civil law. You have all kinds of, of, of laws which every year is coming new Another option would be to take a very systematic, a civil law like the, the German BGB, which means, it's the law book of citizens, and was in-introduced on the first January of nineteen hundred, and it's still there, and a lot of countries have co-copied it, including Japan, and even China has now, after nineteen ninety, taken parts of it, Estonia, Greece, a lot of countries. Why? Because it's very systematic, right? So you have basically a set of rules which covers everything, and then you say It's, it's, it's a general part. Okay, okay. This is all the general rules, and then there are special rules for family law and all that. And if you don't find the rule in the special section, go back to the general section and try to solve it with the general rules. That works for ninety-nine point nine percent of the cases. That should do it, okay? So, and now, and the other thing is between, I mean, they are first projects. What, what did we do? We tried, okay? We want, we want common law that is Common law, but we don't want to spoil common law, right? So what we did is we extracted the common law principles as they were taught, the, the students in the US, the law students. It's called the, Restatement of Law, according to the American, Lawyers Institute. So, and we, and we adapted this with all other best practice common law things and say, \"This is our common law, right? It's basically based on the US common law, but it's frozen here. We don't accept any new rules. It And from here on, we can develop our own common law with our own courts. And basically, this is already existing, that is existing in the Dubai International Financial Center, it's, it's in the Abu Dhabi Global Market. They have introduced own common law based regulation mostly for commercial issues, but now it's growing, right? Because The law is linked to each other, so you can't say it's only commercial law, right? Then now we have to introduce family law and all that. And they have, judges hired from London or other common law countries, including Singapore, and they are now making their own, decisions and thereby creating an own DIFC, law. So this is, already happening. So it's not just a fantasy. This is how it would work, and that, that's how it worked in the past. For example, you may have- I've heard about a Hanzehed League of, of cities in, in, in mostly Germany, but Central Europe, even extending to, to Kiev, to Russia, and, and, and Scandinavia. And they also basically adopted law of cities of Lübeck or cities of Magdeburg, because of, why, why invent a new one, right? And, and the interesting thing was that they had their own courts, but if there was a dispute and they wanted to appeal that, they say, \"Hey, then let's go to this city of, of Lübeck or Magde And appeal there, because this is where the law originates. And I can imagine, frankly, that we will develop the same model. We say, \"Hey, we have our courts, but if there's an appeal, then we go to, to Dubai, because they have so many more judges and they know the system.\" And or we create an own, whatever, free private city, high court, and we say, \"Hey, if you want, you can come. We, we can serve as a service, as a- As an appeal court, because you can't force people to do that, right? So, but you can say this isn't, this isn't a service. And, and then is, you can relative-- Why is it so much better doing this way? Because you are avoiding the problems that every company has, that the rules are constantly changed. Well, if you make an investment and you can't be sure that two or five years from now the basis for investment is just, legislated away, very difficult to make an investment. In our case, hey, this is the legal basis and we aren't going to change it. That is a strong offer, right? Not only to personal, to people, but also through to companies. But again, you should have, you shouldn't, you must, I would say, you must take something that is already known. Right? You don't come up with completely new creation because, look, these systems, and even the, the German BGB was based on, on, I would say, two thousand years of Roman right, experience, right? And, and what they have learned over time of, of the Code Napoleon and all that, and the common law also has hundreds and hundreds of years of trying out and, and finding out. So you can't, you can't do this within a year or two, right? So- It's, it's, and it's no neces- it's not necessary as, as in, in my example with the, with the bad bread that you bought from the baker. I mean, there aren't so much options what you can do, right? If, if you, if you bought something which is, something to eat and which is in a bad, state, then, well, there aren't much, there's not much to do but give it back or get something or exchange it against, a good one. So, and in so far, my call would be," }, { "speaker": "titus_gebel", "time": "36:51", "start": 2211.01, "text": "copy an existing system which is well known, which is working, you, you streamline it, because for example, in Honduras, what we have done, for property transactions, we have- Taken land from New Zealand, but we could slim it down from, I don't, I think, one hundred fifty pages to forty pages, right? So it was possible. Or you can always make it easier. And you shouldn't know, I mean, the more extensive a law is The more it covers single cases, right? You must say if you have a very general law, then there will be cases that aren't covered. There will be gaps. But that's-- I mean, you have to live with that, right? The common law says, \"Okay, then the judges should find a rule. That's fine. That's how you, how you do it.\" And, in, in most countries, people say, \"Hey, we have to make a new law.\" And by doing a new law, you're creating other gaps and you're creating o- other uncertainties" }, { "speaker": "titus_gebel", "time": "37:56", "start": 2275.78, "text": "That's why it's getting worse and worse in our societies, too many laws." }, { "speaker": "stephan", "time": "38:02", "start": 2281.96, "text": "Yeah. And another area that I could see conflict is around cultural conflict, and you touch on this in the book as well, because, looking at our modern day world of, you know, big statism, large states, and they try to make everyone-- They try to sort of mesh everything together, but there may be cases where certain cultural rules or certain religions are just- Just not compatible with each other. So how, what's the, approach and how does a, a free private city approach change that or improve on that approach?" }, { "speaker": "titus_gebel", "time": "38:36", "start": 2316.09, "text": "Yeah, I think this is one of the big takeaways of the book and, of my personal, life. I'm now fifty-two. is Yes, it's fine to have a certain diversity, but if it's too much of a diversity, then it's not going to work, right? And that's why probably Bitcoin people should mostly live amongst themselves because they just have another idea of life. It's like you say, \"Hey, I want to...\" To have the right without capital gains tax, and I want to have the right to transfer wealth without asking for permission, right? And other people say, \"No, no, wait a minute, no, no, this is all owned by the community, and you're basically only entitled to use part of it.\" So what I want to say is, look, if you think that private property is really necessary for freedom and for wealth, then you shouldn't live together with people who think that property is theft, because it, it's incompatible, right? And if you say, \"Hey, we...\" We are humans, we try to find out, what is the best rule, and then we change the rule, they'll come up with a new product. You shouldn't live together with people who say, \"Hey, wait a minute, everything is already here in our book, in our holy book, the Koran, because God told us to.\" It's all in there, we shouldn't change anything that's not compatible. But here's a good thing about the free private city approach, you say, okay, look, hey, why don't you make your own communities, right? And then it's still possible. Well, I think we will see a big segregation in the twenty-first century. Because people discover they are more connected, they discover they are first, they are different, but they are not alone. They discover we are very few, like you and, you and I probably are, I don't know, zero point one percent of world population think similar to us, right? So that's not, that's not a lot, but it's millions of people, right? So, and you say, hey, we can, we can associate together. And then what I think a lot of people will discover, hey, these guys, it's not bad what they are doing, right? Maybe My government and say, \"I want a contract too, right?\" So we can create new products which aren't maybe not for everyone. And the other thing you should keep in mind, I mean, if, if society is- Is going to develop further, then we have to break the cycle, and this will only be a small group that is pioneering that, as always, right? You start, and, and, and a hundred years from now, everybody's like, \"Hey, of course, right? Everybody's going into the system that fits best for him or her.\" And as I wrote in my book, it can change over time, right? You say, \"Hey, I'm young, I'm young, I'm, I'm full of energy, I be-- Go in a free private city, which is a libertarian I can come up with all kinds of, of business models and, and enterprises. And then when you're older, you think, \"Hey, I want to start a family and, and now I go into a system where, whatever, right? There's more children play a bigger role or whatever. There's, there's more, a more offer for, for families. It's, adapt is very, is very quiet, right? And then if you're old, you say, \"Hey, I, I basically, I want to live with the people who are like me,\" right Right, who have the same religion or the, the same ethnicity, I feel better w- like that or where I was when I was young or whatever. And, and that can, again, change over time. So we, and if we had the choice, everybody of us would be happier. and, and if people want to go into a, Islamic state society, well, if it's voluntary, why not? Let them do. And we can even cooperate on the base- basis of, exchange of goods or common defense or whatever with those people, but we don't have to struggle each and every day, right? And that is something which I think is keeping a lot of energy from us doing really productive things, is, is these political struggles. I don't want to have political struggles any longer, and I'm also tar-tired of arguing with people about how society should be, as it- Hey, I can't convince you, I know that, but let me just, let me try it, and I'll show you. And I have people like Stephan and others, they are coming, and we will make the hell of a successful society. Right? And we know that we cannot just grab money out of other people's pockets, b-because I mean, that is our common, common value. I think it's not so my thesis, it's not so much ethnicity or religion, well, religion to a certain degree, of course, because it's an ideology, but it's more the common values, right? If you have common values, it's skin color doesn't matter, right? It's, it's that you say, \"Hey, this is my conviction,\" and I know that the people- People around me share this conviction, and we can, we can make something together which is, which is working, right? And again, different religion to a certain degree, but if the religious become-- religion becomes too politician, then, then it's not working, because then they say, hey, you shouldn't do that, you shouldn't, you shouldn't insult my prophet, you shouldn't insult my god, you shouldn't eat this, you shouldn't eat that. I say, hey, wait a minute, fuck off, right? I, I, yeah? You go into your own society and we do it here as we like it, and that is, that is, I think that will, will happen over time, and I would even make the prediction that is, we will see much more segregation in the twenty-first century. It's the opposite of one world will happen, which doesn't mean that these people are hostile to each other, right? No, no, they're cooperating and exchanging goods and ideas, but they wouldn't say Hey, we have all to live together and there have to be a quota and you have to be a certain, gender, ethnicity to have that, that's a nightmare, right? And because in our society, it's just, hey, you-- if you think you there aren't enough women in business, then start a business where you only have women as employees. I have no problem with that, right? And you're free to do that." }, { "speaker": "stephan", "time": "44:52", "start": 2691.98, "text": "Yeah. So let me throw a couple of, perhaps maybe some of the more difficult ideas around how these things could be resolved, maybe in a more libertarian friendly way. So an example might be something like privacy, right? Now, that's something that's important to a lot of libertarians, maybe not all libertarians, but, and so from a taxation standpoint, I can see there's a benefit here, obviously, because if the typical government needs to know what your income is and what your whatever, then obviously they're gonna start peering into your bank transactions. And, and so on. So that's one aspect where I think straight away the free private city model or the Bitcoin Citadel model of fee for service, you just pay upfront, this is how much you pay, and that's it. Then the government or the private corporation managing it doesn't have to look into that. but another example might be, say, keeping out unwanted people or criminals, but at the same time having surveillance in the society to protect, you know, against, you know, in-like violence internally, or even something like, yeah, yeah, or, yeah, Do you have any ideas around how that could be sort of managed in a way that's kind of respectful of people's rights, but also, you know, k-keeping the place safe too? Yeah." }, { "speaker": "titus_gebel", "time": "46:00", "start": 2760.33, "text": "No, good point. Look, first and foremost, it's, you look which people are coming, right? So there will be no open borders, that's absolutely for sure, and no, no, no society can afford that because it's attracting criminals. The moment you have a certain wealth, it's attracting bad apples, right? So, and here's the thing that, that is, To keep any surveillance and things like that as small as possible, you have to do it upfront. You say, \"Hey, you are applying for, for this, for, for, for being a member, who are you? Can you show us a police report?\" And if it says, \"Hey,\" You have been arrested because of tax evasion or something like that, I say, okay, we can talk about that, right? Right? So, but it's-- I want to know if you are a child molester or, or a drug lord or something, right? Or a political ex-extremist or religious extremist, I want to know that, and I will make, I will investigate that, and I say, \"Look, Stephan, we found out that, you are...\" Somebody who is, putting bombs in churches or in mosques, maybe, that doesn't fit into our society. But you say, okay, normal ninety percent of the people or ninety-five percent would say, \"Hey, there's no problem,\" right? Your average guy, you have-- we aren't, aren't a special criminal, and you don't have crazy ideas like overthrowing free private city. Like, l-let's assume you are a leader of an overthrow the free private city model because these are, creating- Capitalists, exploiters, and you say, \"Hey, Stefan, do you really think I'll take you as a citizen?\" I, I, I would be mad if I do that, because you would, you would agitate from day one, right? So that's-- there will be some controls, but then if we have checked the people, and that is here in Monaco I've been screened. They, we are even asking for a CV, and they were calling me and said, \"What, what was this kind of company you were working for?\" And I said, \"Basically this is good, because I know everybody else here has done the same screening, and now that I'm in, they completely leave me alone.\" And that's exactly good. So what is happening in Monaco? It's cameras all over the place. Okay, that's not, not at what you like, but it's not really a problem, right? It's not really a problem because, they, and have visited police, so they're really serving twenty-four hours, and you can send your children on the street at midnight. I mean, in which city can you do that, right? And, and that is, that is also something, there's a trade-off always. But I would say, here's one thing, we are not going to, to interfere into your, internet on line line into your phone calls, that is not our business, right? We guarantee privacy, that is a product, right? That's a-- because I can guarantee that easy because I've screened the people. And there may also, there will always be people who, who making false claims in, in disguise, but this will eventually be found out. And for example, I would have a clause in the residence that if you are not telling me that you have been a sentenced criminal, then I can cancel the contract if I later find out, right? Something like that. And, and- And another thing interesting here in Monaco is if you commit a crime, and maybe even a petty crime, like, in, in, in, in, in a shop, a shoplifter, small things, they kick you out, right? They kick you out. They say goodbye, yeah, if you're not Monégasque. And eighty percent of the people have no Monégasque citizenship, so that-- these are the rules. So this would be the rules here. Maybe not as strict, but something in between. And there will be other free private city being more, well, we don't care type of things, and you can then decide what, what fits better. But I guarantee you, people want security, right? This is the, the, the really the basis of everything. If you can't, you want to go out of the house and be sure that nobody's robbing you. You come, you want to come back to your flat and be sure that nobody has broken into that, right? And if they, if this happened, which is, will happen from time to time And you come to me and say, \"Hey, wait a minute, Titus, I paid twelve hundred bucks a year for security, now they broke into my apartment, I want damages from you.\" And you were right, because that wasn't my service, and I did, did not good, not good enough. So you, I will have insurance for that, but you will be reimbursed. That is, that is the core, right? That's the difference to what, what we have now, right?" }, { "speaker": "stephan", "time": "50:25", "start": 3024.92, "text": "Yeah, and I think it comes down to ultimately what is the power of the structure, right? So it's a private city corporation that's different to a state, which kind of has these incentives to kind of keep ratcheting up the power, you know, in line with, say, Robert Higgs' thesis from Crisis and Leviathan or things like that. but one other hard, hard case that I think might be interesting and very topical is how would a free private city corporation deal with something like, pandemic or coronavirus, right? So, and I can, you know- And it's, it's a, this is a difficult question for libertarians to answer because, it's kind of like we haven't had the time to build the private versions of the solutions that would work. So things like, okay, quarantining, testing, healthcare, insurance requirements, i-- these are all things that, I guess some combination of those, a private libertarian society would use those. Do you have any thoughts on the kind of framework that a free private city could use against a hypothetical pandemic? Doesn't have to be corona, but- Yeah, no, no, no," }, { "speaker": "titus_gebel", "time": "51:24", "start": 3084.32, "text": "It's, it's, it's, it's an epidemic or war, right? Cities attacked, like in the Middle Ages, you, you hide behind city walls. there will be special rules for that cases, and there will be a kind of, more rules or stricter rules in, in, in that scenarios, and that will be in the contract, right? They'll say, in case of calamities, catastrophes, there will be a special law, and this will be like this and this, so you know in advance, and, then you can always This isn't there any longer, right? For example, especially now in coronavirus crisis, like let's say, okay, we are all afraid and it seems to be a real problem because you've seen what's happened in, in China and in Italy, people are dying in much larger numbers than in normal flu seasons. And so there's obviously a real problem, but people say then, for example, in Germany, hey, you know, we don't have so many death, people. And after several weeks of lockdown, people would say I disagree, and then they can go to court and say, \"I want, right, to, to move freely because there, it's not really a problem.\" So then it would be negotiated, in front of the court, that says Stephan has, made a claim that he wants to move freely again because what is said in the contract that there's a calamity justifying this, exception isn't there any longer. There's no, no," }, { "speaker": "titus_gebel", "time": "52:51", "start": 3171.28, "text": "basically emergency any longer, right? And that would be a, a, a case which couldn't be dealt with by court. But I think relying only on voluntary private things doesn't work in that scenario. And the same- The same is true if there's a kind of a, a hostile, take over by the, by the host nation or so. I mean, the problem of the free private cities, they're-- it's not possible to make them sovereign entities from day one. That will maybe evolve over the decades. But at the moment, we are a kind of a special economic zone plus, right? And that means there's always the host nation with a big military, and then you have, I mean, there are some ways to deal with that, but if there's a really, let's say there's a coup d'état in that particular country, and some parties are trying to attack you, it's not the government, it's some civil, civil war parties, then you have to defend yourself, and in that scenario, you need also leadership. it's, it's like- Like in the military, you can't say, \"Hey, this, this, there's an army or consist-comprising of volunteers, and they can leave any time.\" That doesn't work. And, and, and that is what libertarians have to learn that it, this, not everything can be solved. I mean, in the future, it can be solved partly in private, right? You say, \"There's a private, defense corporation, and we hire them in such cases, right?\" Like the, Carthaginians hired Hannibal, a Greek Soldier of Fortune, who as a, as their, field marshal, right? He was a hired guy basically, hired gun, and that, that will probably happen in the future. But still, you have to have a kind of a monopoly of power saying, \"Hey, this is-- I declare this is war, and war time, and or, emergency time, and I declare that now this mechanism comes into place.\" the- If you, I mean, I'm open to any additional ideas, but I also don't believe that, not having, a police or security that has the al-ultimate monopoly, monopoly of force is working, because it would lead to different securities, and the guy with the biggest securities would say, \"Hey, what do you want? Right? I'm the biggest, I have the biggest guns, you can't tell me nothing.\" So this is how, how many- Well, Lime can offer the people and the libertarians is, look, you know the rules in advance, you can leave any time. I will be, my incentive is to make money, if I provide bad services and, and misusing my power, you will leave, like we would here in Monaco. If the prince is getting crazy, we just leave, right? So the-- and, and that is, that is exactly the competition, the competitive element. And the, the, the profit incentive, because I want to create more free private cities, so I have to have a good reputation. I have to have the reputation that I treat my customers well, that I'm not declaring emergency all the time when there is no emergency, that I'm sticking to my own rules. And then people say, \"Hey, this is a good service provider. I want to go into this free private city, not in that free private city, because this free private city operator has a bad reputation, right?\" That's the best I can offer, right? So that's not a complete anarcho-capitalist world, but I think it's a much, much better world than we have today, and we can find out, right? Because if a free private city is working, then other people will come into that business and they'll say, \"Hey, you have to only pay five hundred here in our, in our place, and we offer other services, and there is...\" Here it's much more libertarian, right? It's open borders, it's there's no police, right? I'm okay, but I don't think it will work, but that is my My business call, right? It's to say, \"Hey, I have a business idea, and you have an- another business idea. That's not a problem. We-- it's no need to fight, Stefan. You, you, you try your thing, I do try my thing, and then we find out what, what the market says, right?\" And I think frankly there will be a lot of- Different, cities possible, because people are different, right? And some people they need leadership, they want to have security, they don't want to-- they don't want freedom, right? And for them, there will al-al-also be offers. but for the people like you and me, a free private city in-- is probably the best we can get in our lifetime." }, { "speaker": "stephan", "time": "57:26", "start": 3446.35, "text": "Right. And so I think this brings me more now, which may be the hardest question. we've heard a lot about these different ideas around making, you know, special economic zones, special administrative regions. what is the best way to actually get that from one of the modern-day nation states, which generally don't want to give up power, they don't want to give up, this, they don't wanna relinquish that control because they view us basically as the tax cattle. So what's the, what's the way to actually have a certain area of land? Free and clear to actually try out these kind of Bitcoin citadel, free private city experiments." }, { "speaker": "titus_gebel", "time": "58:07", "start": 3487.33, "text": "Well, as always, it's a trade-off, right, for the host nation, and it's if they can get something out of it. And that's my offer. I say, \"Hey, here's the deal. We bring good qualified, high performing people. We bring Bitcoin technology, or just mention the name, the word blockchain. They say, 'Oh, blockchain!'\" They don't know what it is, but they have heard that it's something new, and we can, we can bring something new technology in your, in your backward country. So, and here's the deal, you give us some internal autonomy, and we bring investors and, and high, high potential people and new technologies. That's the deal. Do you like it? Because there's a belt of wealth around other city-states. Around Monaco, there's a very wealthy three French communities. Around Hong Kong, there's Shenzhen. Around Singapore, there's-- even in both countries in Malaysia and Indonesia, on the other side of the water, there's a big agglomeration that is profiting from Singapore, from the state, and this effect you will have. And all these belts are in absolutely one hundred percent percent taxable by your country, right? So this is one thing. The other thing is we already have a door. It's called Special Economic Zones, and there are already three thousand working and, on paper there are four to five thousand already existing, but I think about three thousand are really there. And now it's an ev-evolutionary process, and I can only encourage you people to, to support me with that. We say it's, it's, it's nothing special. We don't call it a free private city. It's a special economic zone plus or a prosperity zone or a Bitcoin zone, right? You will get young people who are good entrepreneurs, you, you will get, and interesting new technologies in crypto, and at the moment, I think Bitcoin is also on a good path because it has some advantages so that it's not completely banned as illegal by countries, but it's- It's tolerated, right? So, and that is something which we can make use of because some countries, what I think what the last hype was, what was it? A crypto zone. Okay, a crypto zone. That was Malta was chasing this, Cyprus, even Monaco wanted to have their own crypto. Then, Gibraltar, they all wanted to make crypto stop and change, right? So this is always- And, and then blockchain before it was blockchain, and I don't know what the next thing will be. We will, we will be pragmatic and say, okay, whatever you call it, right? You name it, and we, we fill it with content. So that is what we can do, and it's a good thing. what we can see, I made this example with the, independent court in some areas. So that started in Dubai, now we have seven in the whole world, right? Mostly in the region is, Dubai, Abu Dhabi, Qatar, then, Kazakhstan, and spreading out, Kazakhstan started, and even Georgia now, as first Western country, is coming up with such an idea to establish a common law system with own judges within their legal system. And then what happens next is that in Dubai they found out, hey, commercial law is not enough because family law according to Sharia law, nobody wants that, so we're not getting managers here. Okay, we have to have come up with an own family law. And so it will continue, and people like me will continue to go to governments, and I'm working together, for example, with, with one of the world organizations of special economic zones, I say, \"Hey, special economic zone, every, every country has that, you have to provide something else which is attracting capital now. this is a prosperity zone, and there you have a lot of...\" Much more autonomy, they can make own rules. And the first country that is basically trying this out is Honduras in Central America. They have even changed the constitution to make it possible. And I, there are two projects, which are already permitted, and I was involved in one for several years creating the legal framework. And It is now a little bit delayed because of the Corona crisis, but the idea is to go public by mid this year, right? And then I'm happy to talk about this one or give you more information about that one. And our hope is that this is then the first ignition, and then others will copy that if it's working, and then you start something because it's so decentralized, you have so many of them. It's very difficult, for example, to send an army to, to, to, to kill this zone, right? I mean, that is probably not happening. So we, we creep slowly into that. And special economic zones for a moment are only for companies, but my idea is the next level is, hey, no, they're for residents, and they're for both, and then New entities are created, so it's not seen as so controversial. Secession is always difficult and comes with violence, and maybe sometimes it's necessary, but I think the evolutionary way which we can go now is Creeping into that special economic zones or making a special administrative zone, and then the next level, and then there's more competition, and then maybe a country Falls apart and suddenly you have your serenity. So that, that is, that is my, my plan, if you want." }, { "speaker": "stephan", "time": "01:03:43", "start": 3823.49, "text": "Right, I see, yeah. And, when you-- I guess the, the other thing is when you start something new, it's like you've got no network effect, so you're starting from zero and you've got to try and kind of get that, you've got a zero start problem, right? And I suppose the main incentive that you can offer people is, let's say, okay, if you're a corporation, you can come here and it Very low tax, and that's the big incentive for you, and you can have some workers here, and you can pay way, way less, and so, you know, it's cheap labor, and maybe you can incorporate here or do things like that. Are those the kinds of reasons why, say, a corporation would go to a special economic zone, or what are the typical reasons that draw them there?" }, { "speaker": "titus_gebel", "time": "01:04:25", "start": 3865.84, "text": "Yeah, no, it's not the low tax alone, because you have that in many places of the world, that's not enough. I think for, being myself, a company- Any, founder can say what is even more important than low taxes is, is a legal security that you really can rely on the basis laws, of the basic of the laws for the next ten or twenty years. And if that is, I think our main advantage, we can say, hey, we aren't going to change the rule, or only within the small framework that is already foreseen, but you notice an advance, but we guarantee you For your business and what you pay as a fee, and there will be no initial taxes, right? That is, that is, I think the, the most important, the second most important then is that you have a working administration that is not corrupt, that you have really independent courts, and that is why we are in Honduras are bringing people who are pension judges from the US, who are pension judges from Australia, and they are really, creating the trust that I need in the beginning for people to- To come. And the third thing are low taxes, right? So it's, it's really, companies can deal with, with high taxes or with, with medium taxes, but they can't deal with constantly changing the rules and, and, and, and changing the playing field. That's a nightmare. And, and that is the problem. And that is, I think, what we can offer, as a, as a benefit. But you're right. I mean, the first one is the most difficult one, but, I think we have really, I mean, fi Fifty years ago, there was a han-handful of special economic zones, and now you have several thousand. And I guarantee you, this is, this is the, the, the path that we are, where we are coming into that play. It's not just, crazy libertarian has an idea and now running around and say, \"Australia, give me an island or something,\" right? No, that's, that's not working. Y-you cannot buy serenity. Even billionaires have tried it, it's not going to work, because every politician who would do that would be He will, will vote it out of power, will be even coup d'état if he wants to do that. So you have to go say, \"Hey, you're still the sovereign, it's just a special economic zone with a new level, we call it a special economic zone plus. It's actually a special administrative zone, you leave us alone, the constitution doesn't apply or parts of the constitution, but everything else we do on our own.\" And then the country will say, \"Hey, wait a minute, wait a minute, we want to have this and this and this guaranteed,\"" }, { "speaker": "titus_gebel", "time": "01:06:56", "start": 4016.25, "text": "Your social security systems established here, it's not going to work, right? And then when you have normally in special economic zones, you have Lower taxes, you have less restrictions and you have better labor laws f-for companies. That is already there, so it's not completely new. We are just asking for a little bit more. I have, frankly, I have a list. It's called a wish list, the Pro-Prosperity Zone wish list, because, a Swiss consul told me, \"Titus, the idea is great, but I, I see a problem, free private cities, has- Three words and two of, two of them politicians doesn't like, don't like. It's the word free and the word private. I said, okay, you're right, then let's call it prosperity zone for them. It's exactly the same model, but it, it-- and some people want to technology zone or whatever, right? But I have a wish list saying, okay, these are ten points, and what do you think, which of those points are political feasible in your country, right? And then they say, hey, maybe seven of them, say seven is good. If you say Say three is probably not working, but seven is a start to negotiate. Look, we have to make compromises and concessions in the beginning, but as I said, it's an evolutionary process." }, { "speaker": "stephan", "time": "01:08:11", "start": 4091.74, "text": "Yeah, and I think, it's, it's, it's probably a more feasible pathway than the traditional libertarian political activism pathway. so Titus, if listeners want to find out more about you or find out more about this project and this concept, where should they go and what can they do about it?" }, { "speaker": "titus_gebel", "time": "01:08:31", "start": 4111.15, "text": "Yeah. The first thing you do is go to the website, it's freeprivatecity dot com, freeprivatecities dot com, one word, and there you have, videos and, explanation. There's a newsletter which is coming about every quarter where I talk about the new projects that are coming, which are projects that are nearing, those things. They're not perfect free private cities, but, more autonomous special economic zones, et cetera. And we're also looking for ambassadors, if you already have kind of a- Senior p-person have some network, we're always looking for people who want to invest in potential projects. then just you can, you can have a look at the website and say, hey, maybe I, I want to become an ambassador. We have already, I think, thirty ambassadors all over the world, and each continent we have one, except Antarctica of course, and the, at least one and, Yeah, this is, and of course, you can, can have a look at the book. I mean, if you really want to start something" }, { "speaker": "titus_gebel", "time": "01:09:32", "start": 4172.01, "text": "something on their own, or support a project on their own and say, \"Hey, maybe some of the ideas I would do it differently.\" I said, \"Perfect, right?\" I mean, we need competition, we need, var- diversity in, in, in, in products. But, I think if you have gone through the book, you, you better understand what will be the problems of the, of these kinds of, of undertaking." }, { "speaker": "stephan", "time": "01:09:54", "start": 4194.42, "text": "Yeah, I think, yeah, that's a great way to think of it. I really enjoyed reading the book, and my hope is that over time, so, people out there will go out there and start their own Bitcoin citadels, and they're using some of these ideas around how to make their own free private city, and we'll have com-competition between different states, and we might, we'll see" }, { "speaker": "stephan", "time": "01:10:16", "start": 4216.31, "text": "City states around the world, and, it might not be the ideal anarcho capitalism that I want, but it's at least, once, it's, it's, it's at least much closer. So, I've, I've really enjoyed chatting with you, Titus. thanks for joining me today." }, { "speaker": "titus_gebel", "time": "01:10:29", "start": 4229.26, "text": "My pleasure, thank you Stefan." }, { "speaker": "stephan", "time": "01:10:31", "start": 4231.08, "text": "So I hope you enjoyed that. I think it's a pretty cool idea that we could set up all these different Bitcoin citadels around the world. Imagine it this way, they could have areas for Bitcoin mining, and these cit The rules could be much more clear and outlined at the start. It could be set up in a way that's more amenable to a Bitcoin libertarian viewpoint, and this kind of idea could actually be very profitable also. So I definitely recommend checking out the book to get more details and ideas on how this sort of thing could be structured, but it's well worth a look. If you wanna get the show notes and the transcript for this episode, go to stephanelivera dot com slash one sixty one. That's it from me, and I'll see you in the citadels." } ] }