Bitcoin Billionaires Want To Start Their Own Countries...And We Should Be Worried.
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- Опубліковано 17 вер 2024
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Billionaire Islands: Are We in Hell?
Private cities aren’t a new idea, but they are gaining steam around certain corners of America's Silicon Valley elite. So why do billionaires want to run their own cities, and what does that mean for the rest of us? And most importantly: Should you move to a billionaire’s private island?
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Written by Amanda Scherker
Hosted by Helen Floersh
Directed by Elizabeth Yarwood
Edited by Benji Dunaief
Produced by Olivia Redden
Music courtesy of Epidemic Sound
#billionaires #culture #wisecrack
© 2024 Wisecrack / Omnia Media, Inc. / Enthusiast Gaming
Tech bros accidentally reinvented trains, buses, mid-day lunch breaks, public parks, and feudalism.
And monopolies. I’m sorry, “blitzscaling”. It’s LIKE a monopoly, but one that’s developed super duper fast. Super different.
Or how people keep reinventing the apartment. Usually in the form of shipping containers.
Not reinventing, just reinstating... Which is disturbing and sickening
Like anyone "accidentally" institutes feudalism.
nonono, pods, not trains, trains are for poor people
Cyberpunk: Billionaires owning a city is a really bad idea
Billionaires: Owning a city, you say
Elongated Muskrat: Cyberpunk is so cool! We all should get chips in our heads! Not me tho. Gotta watch what my wage slaves think to prevent unionization.
Night City was supposed to be a warning, not a blueprint.
Sometimes i wonder what tech bros experience when engaging with cyberpunk media, the authors basically scream to you thru the texts that "this is a bad future", yet you got Zuckerberg naming meta after Snow Crash and Musk's horrible truck.
Guess they heavily identify with the villains and corporations from those universes
Place you bets on which one makes AM.
😂
@@BojoschannelIt's not bad for them. That's what makes it extra horrifying.
So company towns, but bigger and somehow even dumber.
basically that.
I feel like I'm just listening to a setting description for a new Cyberpunk game.
@@bishop186
Because it is... What does OCP does in RoboCop?
Lesson learned: never let nerds get rich
@@arnemyggen Look, Bill Gates and Steve Jobs are also big nerds. The difference is they didn't think they can bring a mentality of bringing their idea to disturb the markets to the rest of society. Heck, they were seeing what they were doing as making tools that would change the world - then take the money, and let people figure the politics out for a long time.
We got rich nerds who are way more arrogant and not representative of anyone.
"I got gene therapy to make me stronger and faster"
No you didn't, you got scammed.
Defeted with a simple "prove it"
Na, works like a charm as long as he gets his ADAM
😂
Bro really doesn’t like the gym
He definitely seems like the type of rich rube that is so convinced he is a "very smart boy" (TM) that he would believe just about any gene therapy delivered via CRISPR Cas9 is safe and effective. I say this as a biologist that is generally more on the side of advancement in tech and science being good and cool (and probably could describe myself as a transhumanist), but with a big enough dash of 'but there could definitely be some downsides we should worry about' skepticism and hesitancy........ that the attitudes of these bio-hacking tech bros competing with each other to see who can be the earliest adopters of every single thing is eye roll and groan inducing and frustratingly infantile/naive and careless/reckless/irresponsible.
Sci-Fi Author: In my book I invented the Torment Nexus as a cautionary tale
Tech Company: At long last, we have created the Torment Nexus from classic sci-fi novel Don't Create The Torment Nexus
Techbro: Don't worry. When I get rich from a modern ponzi scheme, I won't create the torment nexus. I'll create the shrike tree. It'll be a place where people can hang out, recite poetry, and share emotions while being used as living computers for the hivemind.
Didn't Bioshock already show us a free market city run by a billionaire?
Yup... and so did Cyberpunk, though that was run by corporations as opposed to one wealthy individual
Works of fiction are not a demonstration of anything except authorial intent
@user-vb2uq1fy9x
They can work as parables for conveying a moral as well.
But I take it you mean that they don't prove anything about their topic. Which nope, they don't.
And rapture was fantastic only ruined by communists.
Is my ideal society we will build it.
@@TheEverFreeKing ? I mean a big part of the game is mocking Ayn Rand and implying somone still needs to clean the toilets. Not really sure how communists are a major portion of rapture. Outside of Andrew Ryan being an Ayn Rand expy.
I mean, the largest antagonist in the game is Fontantine with his kindly shit. And he's just a generic US crime boss.
Like you get that BS 1 and 2 are openly mocking Rand and her writing, right? Like it really isn't subtle. Much in the same way that infinite is parodying patriotism, jingonism, and nationalism.
It's a crime against ALL OF US that billionaires exist.
Today's Fact: The oldest continuously inhabited city in the world is Damascus, Syria, which has been inhabited for over 11,000 years.
Jericho?
@@gilsimhon9251 jericho is in palestine
it's a shi hole today tho
@@SamNo27 Palestine is part of the world last I checked my figures
that is a fun fact. thank you
Libertarians will play Bioshock once and think Andrew Ryan is the good guy.
Went searching for the first bioshock reference I could find
Media literacy is their weakest point lol
You always think the working man is the good guy
You say this, but I've actually seen people argue that Rapture would have been fine if Andrew Ryan just stuck to his principles and didn't try to use the power of the state to squash Fontaine's private enterprises
@anthonydelfino6171 Rapture collapsed because Ryan stuck to his principles and refused to regulate the sale of Adam.
Helen is hosting, hooray! 👍 Billionaires are building boroughs, booo! 👎
Thanks for hosting Helen. We miss you
I don't like how she talks like an annoying teacher talking to kids, the other guy is better imo
@@Monkehrawrrrshut up troll.
@@Monkehrawrrr Michael is great, but I really urge you to ask yourself some questions. For example, when was the last time you said something nice about a woman that wasn't about appearance? Genuinely.
Helen is an extremely well spoken, well educated person who communicates complex ideas really clearly, while keeping the tone fun and casual, but I often see people say things like this. I just wonder - if she was bringing a different energy than she did, what would the complaint be? Would it be naggy? Bossy? Motherly? "Trying to hard"?
It's tiring seeing all the same shit over and over again. We really need to collectively examine *why* feel feel the way we do about people before publishing those feelings directly onto the internet.
@@-Gnarlemagne sorry dude we aren't robots
@@MonkehrawrrrNah she's cool. I appreciate a break from the other dude
No thank you. We already live too much at the mercy of the rich and their greed. I feel like life on an island completely controlled by them result in either slavery or being hunted for sport. Letting the rich create their own island nations is no different then completely returning to a feudal system of Kings and Queens.
Now if there was the option to move to an island without rich people on it, that might be something worth considering.
Yes the islands without rich people are havens 😂
@@markciappesoni3165 Given what Rich people have done to our societies we could turn them into heavens without them.
Let them live on thier island, but they are not allowed assistants or servants. They gotta build, produce, grow food, and do everything themselves. See how that turns out
How many rich people in Cuba? I really don't know
I wanna live Is in a society full of smart rich people with no democracy. You crazy and the rich people will make a better society Then you could ever dream. You can keep crying about it though While wise people join private societies.
"The billionaires will build a utopian city, free from the shackles of government regulations and moral codes!"
Yes, because that's always worked out great. Just ask the people of Rapture.
A billionaires utopia is everyone else's dystopia....
Rapture was going beautifully until evil communist rose up.
Is this fuc**ng sarcasm?
And it worked in Galt's Gluch, which Rapture is based on.
Almost like fiction isn't a case study.
I can write any ideology I want succeeding and failing.
Neocolonialism is fun until somebody drops ~$10 million worth of weapons in the village next door.
9:02 "Privately-owned and for profit." So, just capitalist aristocracy.
You load 16 tons, what do you get?
Another day older and deeper in debt
St. Peter, don't you call me 'cause I can't go
I owe my soul to the company store
Baa baa black sheep have you any wool
Yes sir, yes sir, three bags full
Two for the master, one for the dame
And none for the little boy who cries in the lane
The sheep's wool is taken, given to the rich, & kept from the needy
Do I want to live in a city run by ego maniacs who made their money off the backs a underpaid or free labor, who see humans as items and not autonomous beings?
No. No I do not. Thanks for asking though!
Unskilled unintelligent people crying.You should take care of them, or your a meanie is basically your comment
We actually already live in cities like that.
@@AndreH-fx1pryes we do
@AndreH-fx1pr we live in a corporatocracy and oligarchy
@@AndreH-fx1pr not wrong, friend. Not wrong
Thrown out of our cities and have all of their assets seized seems infinitely more sane.
never gonna happen no matter how much you don't like the rich.
@@10tailedbijuu I'm sure they said the same thing in France in 1780.
** Billionaire wrecks everything **
"You ain't taxin' me man! I'm outta here!"
Billionaires shouldn't run anything.... Billionaires should not exist at all.
The last thing we need is to live in corporate towns where our jobs don't pay real money instead we get paid in Mickey Bucks which can be exchanged for real money if we have enough. The exchange rate however is brutal.
Are you talking about the US dollar and landownership?
@@blakejwcYes
Billionaires: Let me introduce you to Feudalism 2.0
The worst of humanity always seems to be at the top.
Factually incorrect.
These private cities are a good thing and am moving to one to be part of a superior societies free from the tyranny of democracy.
You can keep crying the rich will keep winning forever and ever😎
As long as there are Is people who seek freedom in this life.
Private cities shall not vanish from the earth~
@@TheEverFreeKing your statement just proved his point, just becouse you are rich you can afford to be the worst with no consequences.
@@TheEverFreeKing, you aren’t rich, so you can cry along with all the other people. What makes you think you’ll be spared as one of “the good ones”? You think if you lick their ass enough they might throw you some money and make YOU a billionaire? 😂 Keep dreaming. You’re as useful as a piece of toilet paper to a billionaire, and disposed of just as easily. The “tyranny of democracy” is the only thing preventing these vultures from throwing you in prison or into a labor camp just for the hell of it.
@@Myrgard that... or more probable HE is just a broke boy typing from his mom's basement and dreaming of a life he will never have...
No, it's just that the bottom doesn't have much power to be bad in interesting ways.
A desire to oppress people isn't really noticable in someone poor with a bad job, because at best they can oppress their family, and that's behind closed doors.
Aside from dumb crappy ideas it the racism these rich people put out
As an Arizonan, let me assure you that we aren’t ALL terrifying. There are dozens of sane Arizonans, at least.
I think the sane ones are in Bisbee
There's a lot of things you'll find in Bisbee. I'm not sure sanity is one of them.
@@justfloorit02 Stanhope 🤷🏻♂️
As a non American that spends time in Flagstaff, I can say that there are some lovely sane people there.
DOZENS!!
People understand that Cyberpunk settings are almost always dystopias...right?
People wanna be the ceos of the megacorps
Wisecrack: would you sign up to live in a floating community out in the ocean where no nation's laws could bring you down?
Me: HELL NO! Did y'all **not** play Bioshock?????
Beta male doesn't want to live free lololol
A real Chad answers Yes and goes to help build it😌
I played all of the BioShock games. I know how this turns out...
I bet the rich taste so savory…
This is just fucking nuts. Fuck it! Let's give the billonares an island in the middle of the pacific, but only billionaires and people like that just to see how long before money ain't worth nothing.
Billionaires shouldn't exist 🤷🏻♂️ amassing that much wealth should be punishable by law
I agree, because there's no way one can get that extremely rich without using any underhanded method.
That law should be a tax law which never lets your earnings get that high, & your country of birth as well as current residence have a say here, oh billionaires who move to tax havens!!!
@@kayrienhart8346Tell me you don't know how corporations and finance work without telling me you don't.
@@elaineb7065most billionaires don't have "earnings" dummy.
I knew that title was click bait 😂 because boy after listening to what this “CITY” sounds like, I’d rather go live with the Loc Ness Monster before I EVER set foot in this city.
If the loch Ness monster offers universal healthcare, I'm in!
It’s almost like Raccon City’s relationship with Umbrella corporation
Now now, let's not overexaggerate. I don't think corporations have access to nuclear weapons in case the experimental city goes completely kaputt. At least I hope they don't...
Thank you for bringing up this topic. For the record, I don't want to live in a feudal state whether you have it as a king or a billionaire. And more Helen!
It's times like these where I realize that cartoonish evil is all too real.
The one thing no one mentions about Hong Kong is a few people got fabulously wealthy while many live in literal cages. But yes, let's replicate that.
LOADS of people got wealthy, that's why so many people moved there.
There’s just no way that handing over civic control to shareholders whose primary concern is always going to be enriching themselves will EVER result in poorer and more vulnerable folks having any standards of living or hope for being raised out of poverty. Things are bad enough under our current Western Capitalist democracies that still have even a hint of regulation and social programming.
Appreciate the Canadian Indigenous environmental shoutout!
You don’t think people should be allowed to live where they want and under whatever system they want?
@@markciappesoni3165 You're in favour of completely open borders?
There was actually a great TED talk posted like 4 days ago that explains how UBI is literally the answer for all of our problems. A winning presentation
Honestly this stuff just makes me believe that tech bros just aren't very smart to begin with.
Becoming insanely wealthy has always been a matter of luck.
This is what you get when the insanely wealthy want to be cool, rather than powerful.
For 1000s of years, society was divided into lords and peasants. The labels have changed, but we still live in a society of 1st-class and 2nd-class citizens, and the central question of politics is whether we should entrench that division (rightwing) or try to get rid of it (leftwing). These supposedly nonpolitical groups are very rightwing: they don't move to a poor country to build a society of free and equal citizens, they do it to get more freedom and prosperity for themselves at the expense of the local exploited workforce.
It's especially absurd that they call themselves anarcho-capitalists since anarchism is the most leftwing ideology!
Give us the Moldbug episode we desire!!!! (or a stream segment). Maybe there could be a series of episodes/segments on goofy “thinkers” like Moldbug, Nick Land, etc.
Yes. I'd also like a Moldbug episode from you, Wisecrack... at least if it doesn't make you spontaneously combust. Moldbug ain't worth all that.
Isn't this the plot of BioShock?
Well, time for Honduran military to be deployed in that stupid town "prospera", is time to ignore these companies demands and make it known that the people rule in a democracy, so companies either comply in good faith, or we will deploy troops, cuz I would have zero problems deploying and fighting against the interests of multi-nationals to defend my nation, and I assume most of us wouldnt have problem either.
As a honduran, am totally for a patchwork nation, monarcho-capitalist transhumanism for the win.
@@nectarfrost Oh yea I forgot kissing the feet of the rich is so on-brand nowadays.
"Men outnumber women 4 to 1" Well, I'm out.
I just don’t see how any of these problems with billionaires gets resolved peacefully they just keep taking and taking
As the old saying goes, if the Capital controls the state, it is capitalism; if State controls the capital, it is fascism.
A lot of these rich bourgeoisie are actually silently fascist
The amount of work they put in trying to sidestep age of concent is always gross.
G-war once gave a Ted Talk. Also, speaking of Hong Kong, if you want to see how "absolutely de-regulated free market and industry" looks like, look for "Kowloon Walled City".
Yeah, people seriously overestimate where they’re gonna be in the hierarchy.
@@nicolajane7389 The walled city wasn't capitalist it was imposed by the state.
I'm okay being in the lower to middle tier of a private city because it will still be a superior life than disgusting reprehensible evil democracy.
Private cities are the future and you can keep crying about it fascist.
A lot of this reminds me of the Neil Stephenson novels Snow Crash and The Diamond Age. Anarcho-libertarianism, "distributed republics", nations made up of "franchises". And yes, they're dystopias with huge underclasses that deal with all the externalities.
Stephenson is a very clever writer.
I was combing through comments hoping that someone else was thinking this
"we believe that western European culture is crucial for humanities survival."
You mean the same system that allows you to exist
I got the “bad” Econ professor in business school who was in his 80s, a Keynesian, and hated Milton Friedman. Loved that dude
I dislike Friedman too, but also because he is not alive to see how his ideas boosted the "tech bro" crazy
Woooooo Helen! Congrats on the Some More News gig, and thanks for stopping by! 🥳
What? When?
@@Clewnkaart a couple weeks ago, she's a Writer for them. iirc her first video was the Brain Chip one, and then they had her on the Even More News podcast when Biden dropped out
"I am Andrew Ryan, and I'm here to ask you a question.
Is a man not entitled to the sweat of his brow?
'No!' says the man in Washington, 'It belongs to the poor.'
'No!' says the man in the Vatican, 'It belongs to God.'
'No!' says the man in Moscow, 'It belongs to everyone.'
I rejected those answers; instead, I chose something different.
I chose the impossible. I chose... Rapture.
A city where the artist would not fear the censor.
Where the scientist would not be bound by petty morality.
Where the great would not be constrained by the small!
And with the sweat of your brow, Rapture can become your city as well."
My personal hero I will be moving to one.
Tech bros are the reason Stalin had purges
The downside is Russia has never recovered
That’s a pretty ignorant statement
Started having purges...
@@railroadforest30You're a petty ignorant statement.
No, it was his paranoia and general insanity
This is straight out of Bioshock 😫
I swear billionaires are creating a modern form of colonialism
"Is there some society that doesn't run on greed?"
Well, there are the Indigenous tribes around the world that still exist that dont run on greed, and before the Europeans did their bloody expansion of capitalism, there were countless others that weren't run on greed. But then the greedy Europeans came and killed them all off.
For a very specific society right now that doesn't run on greed, we can just look at the Zapatistas.
The problem with people like Milton Freedman is they base their entire philosophies on complete myths made up by people like Adam Smith, while completely ignoring all the evidence provided by modern Anthropology.
Yea funny because you and your type wouldn't last a week living like the primitive savages that we now call indigenous people. You want to know why so many people living on the Indian reservation in US are alcohol and have generational poverty? No ownership of land by individuals. No respect for how the concept of individual property rights and autonomy is how a society is able to create the conditions for people to grow their wealth. Even the reservation that have casinos the tribe might be rich but individual and family poverty is still sky high.
News flash you are not poor because I am rich.
OH…WOW….Their Racists….
Who could have seen that COMING!!!!
Not me……..GASP!!!!
So in other words neo Feudalism
This is why billionaires should not exist.
Then how are you gonna get the job then?
@@antoniobabb1938
I'm a freelance artist...
Are we completely forgetting that small businesses exist?
The real threat is the indifference governments seem to have towards these projects. They do not seem threatened by them and that makes it eerie.
"Ancap is exactly like Feudalism" episode 666
If this project reaches a successful outcome, and a new state is formed. What would stop the US/Russia/China/Japan from declaring war, with a nation with no allies and no army?
Would such a state exist for more than 14 days?
Puerto Rico was independent from Spain, in circa 24 hours before the US took the territory.
Shit I don’t even think another state would have to get directly involved; the local population would have motivation to fight, their state can always provide them with support
America is a oligarchy and corporatocracy
This is my text and script sacrifice for the algorithmic, in favor of good fortunes to turn unto the video creator, and inevitably myself 🙏
The centralization around unregulated individuals is what makes me not care about bitcoin
...I'm pretty sure Bioshock pointed out the big, big problems with people trying this shit out.
Sounds like The Capital in The Hunger Games
My algorithmmic sacrifice
So just doing colonialism
Anyone remember Pastor Richards from GTA Vice City?
So similar to the Bioshock game series. Didn't end well.
One interesting aspect about Milton Friedman's neoliberalism: he was for universal basic income in the form of a negative income tax. Interesting how that never manifests in any of the systems that claim to be inspired by his ideas. It's almost like wealthy people just adopt the parts they like and ignore all the parts that make them have any semblance of sustainability.
Greed ironically leads to total financial ruin in the long run.
REading the title: It's like asking, do we want Kings running our nation?
Uhm, colonials with extra steps ? Utopia base on nostalgia ?
These guys are so clueless. Don't they know that corporations are always the villains in every story?
Any person with a personal fortune of 500+ million dollars should pay 90% in tax rate.
Sure, they "earned" their wealth (a mix of talent, luck, connections and inheritance or whatever), but no one needs more than that.
If we have a "minimum acceptable" poverty level, it would only be fair and rational to do the same for the top.
Maybe I should create my own city called Bitcoin Heaven and populate it with cannibals. Then send some invites all free.
Why do we live in Bioshock now?
I mean, dont they already? I'm pretty sure it's not just the state that is responsible for the housing and job situations.
Bit coin billionaires "give us your money for our shiny new e-money, you will get rich like us. Pay no attention to us trying to get far out of reach of you or the law."
It sounds conspiratorial if one reads up on this, but then when Peter Thiel starts openly speaking about this, you know its not just some gossip. Props to Wisecrack for providing a deeper dive on the documentation on this and especially referring it back to the Tech industry. a Lot of digital tech is driven by authoritative thought and it is so important to keep stressing this.
So this is basically a dystopian HOA neighborhood?
Eat the rich?
SO a gringo ethno-state
Yooo Helen's back 🙂
I remember when Walt Disney wanted to do this with Epcot. Luckily lung cancer exists and helped us dodge that bullet.
For everyone who's wandering where the image from the thumbnail comes from, it's a small neighborhood called Vila Andrade inside Morumbi, in São Paulo city (the largest city in America).
Morumbi is one of the most luxurious and expensive places to live in the city and Brazil, but it's also where the largest São Paulo slums are located. The difference between being in luxurious space and the poorest m² is (literally) a corner street.
Yes a video shining light on Curtis Yarvin would be great.
The old line of "socialism or barbarism" comes to mind again.
Yanis calls it technofeudalism where were currently at.
If he's wrong as we're still living under old capitalism, then its not too late. If he is right, then its really only a matter of time before these become major power players. And they already are in so many ways.
It also kinda reminds me of the Chaebols in SK, or fictional companies from Alien, Cyberpunk or any of these other future tech dystopias.
States that remain will either completely disconnect from the global capitalist system, or go entirely authoritarian, taking neoliberalism til its ultimate conclusion, leaving whatever remaining companies to fight it out for whatever remains before getting crushed by other companies. Will be weird.
From the makers of trucks: but worse, cars: but worse, and trains: but worse, we bring to you....feudalism: but techy?
Rich people will try to avoid poor people just like smart people will try to avoid dumb people. 🤷♂
I learned how to calculate the speed of light using chocolate and a microwave in a TedTalk. See? Not all bad. 🧐
Saha by Kim Jiyoung is a great sci-fi book that examines how a similar City might harm the most vulnerable people. Definitely worth a read.
Billionaires are concentrating themselves in a single, lawless, vulnerable location, you say?
I am anything but worried.
You know what is honestly so crazy! Is that for all my life when I heard someone being called a megalomaniac I just assumed it was some silly fictionalized cartoon or comic book villain... Now here we have real life versions! First their own country, then... The WORLD!!! 🤣
Hell is broken. Satan fried the furnace trying to upgrade it for the incoming tech billionaires.
"... 🎶I owe my soul to the company stoooore"
Auroville, near Pondicherry, Tamil Nadu, India is an example of something close to an Utopian City, it started as an experimental township in 1968 with people from all over the world free from greed and is still going strong even after 50+ years of existence. please make a video about it.
Billionaires are drawn to the sea... and Poseidon demands his tribute.