As I write these words, sitting across from me is a man worth billions. He’s in a plain white t-shirt, black shorts, and sandals, sipping a three-dollar coffee, no different from mine. Balaji Srinivasan, the author of The Network State and founder of a future country. Network States are a highly-aligned online community that crowdfunds territories around the world to someday gain recognition as a new kind of country.

The main objective in writing this essay is to explain my findings and practical observations to readers whose lives and careers are affected by technology and community. That definition doesn’t rule many people out, but that’s precisely the point. Most people are unaware of a technology that will have a significant impact on their lives. They do not realize that this represents an important gap in their knowledge.

Technology’s primary function is not to make existing workflows marginally faster, but to enable entirely new modes of creation and problem-solving. That’s exactly what Network States are. It wants to build something new without historical constraint. Like any product, you start with some proof of concept to show that your idea has legs. The Network School is a prototype of a Network State. Balaji’s team got an island near Singapore, built a school campus inside a hotel, invited “dark talent” from across the world, and is building a community in the remote island of Forest City.

The dark forest theory is meant to explain why humans have not come into contact with aliens. Fermi’s paradox of “Where is everybody?” becomes “Everybody’s here, they’re just quiet.” The theory assumes that in a universe where intentions are unknowable, signaling invites attack. To survive, one must stay silent. On the other hand, the light forest theory explains that in open networks, visibility is selected, unlike the strategic silence of a dark forest. It is when coordination technology like the internet make signaling net-positive, where the equilibrium is showing your work to solidify your being. In other words, a society should strive to be a light forest, which is what Network School is doing by attracting “dark talent.”

We are already creating through our digital activities, enormously rich records of how we think and what we feel, and during this decade, our technology for recording, storing, and organizing this information will advance rapidly. Like the Hubble telescope, capable of discovering dark matter in the universe, mobile telescopes have made it easier to discover dark talent from the internet.  When talent is made legible and composable online, new institutions form faster and endure longer, which is what Networks School is set to prove.

The advent of the internet means relatively easy access to strangers who are whacky enough to gather on a ghost island in Malaysia to learn skills, earn capital, and burn calories as a community. The internet revolution was accompanied by the availability of blockchains, which was originally designed for currency, but also organizes large groups of people. These two critical ingredients are now in place for a successful inception of decentralized nations.

It’s worth mentioning what society is and how Network School provides society-as-a-service. One of the many mantras of a Network State is  “cloud first, land last.” If one can speak, say, of a settlement called Forest City (man made island) and if that settlement also contained full time craft specialists (founders, engineers, marketers, influencers, musicians, and traders), then the internet apparatus that administered it must ipso facto be a start-up society.

There’s a scene in Thor Ragnarok, where the God of Thunder talks to Odin about the Kingdom of Asgard getting destroyed. To which Odin responds, “Asgard isn’t a place. Never was. This could be Asgard. Asgard is where our people stand.”

Every country comes with inherited assets: Geography (where a country is, what’s around it, and what its terrain is like), Geology (natural resources on and under a country’s surface), and Acts of nature (epidemic diseases, floods, and droughts). While many countries have natural resources they can rely on, human capital and social scalability are the most sustainable resources because of a person’s durability compared to inherited assets.

Human capital is when people can produce more revenue than they expend, making them self-sufficient. This sovereignty is what we should individually strive for to be strong as a collective. Man is no slave to race or religion, but his own programming, and productive societies are made from people who have character, common sense, creativity, and civility. The conditions of social scalability are to form a community of people to do great things together and construct more from reality.

Network States are “cloud first, land last” because the cloud is where the people connect, and the land is where they meet (URL to IRL). If Network School is a prototype of a new country called a Network State, then its attendees are a prototype of a new citizenship. You cannot chart territory without explorers stepping into the abyss. Network School must have early adopters if it wishes for mainstream recognition and diplomatic acknowledgment. In other words, Network School is not a place, it’s a people. With that being said, as people, we share the same human nature, which makes us more alike than different. People behave similarly when faced with similar circumstances.

What is the archetype of a remote worker who travels to a remote island in Malaysia to attend an esoteric school? Is the person leading, exploring, or fleeing? Are their motives for attending because of duty, vocation, or avoidance? As they meet other people, are they genuine or just actors? Are their personalities authentic, or do they perform a persona? Are they engaging with the community by lending a hand, or are they just a witness to it? Do they want to go along with collaboration, go ahead by leading, or go solo?

After spending two months attending the Network School, I’ve grown accustomed to hearing people introduce themselves. The line of questioning typically goes, “Where are you from?” or “What are you working on?” Unlike startup founders, I find it difficult to talk about myself because there's a hint of shame in what I do. Sure, I have a relatively respectful career as a consultant advising clients on data architecture. Although I'm skilled enough, the obstacle in my path is working towards something other than a pay cheque.

Despite being at odds with the people at Network School seeking technological breakthroughs, I cannot help but feel as their equal. Yes, our tax brackets may vastly differ, and the delta between our intelligence may taper off. Yet, there’s a comforting feeling of knowing that we’re under the same roof, working together at the Marina Hotel in Forest City.

Living with remote workers has enlightened me to see that people have a need for security and a deep desire for status. We want to identify with some group and have control over our own fate. If unmet, these needs can block agreement. If you know the incentives, you’ll know the outcome. Remote workers are offered a (relatively) low cost and potentially high benefit trade to those who choose to live on campus. The team has identified that by hosting startup founders in a hotel, offering coworking and gym spaces, while taking care of breakfast, lunch, and dinner, there could be high throughput of human capital at relatively low cost. The problem the team has yet to solve is how to separate the self-interest of people to incentivize growth in a startup society.

To understand what the incentives of Network School alumni are, we must first understand the types of people who attend. Many are here to use Forest City as a base to travel around Asia, especially with Singapore being just 40 minutes by car. Others are remote workers who want to lock in their earnings potential by minimizing costs. Founders are here to block months at a time and have a routine readily available to focus on building their startup. Others have come to find love and deeper bonds, whether friends or lovers. While the rest want to farm equity by being early to a novel yet potentially profitable idea. All that said, if the Network School succeeds in becoming a Network State, the alumni will find themselves in a position of incredible wealth and status.

As I got to know people during my two-month tenure at Network School, I tried to find out if it’s a chemical imbalance, the media they consume, spiritual psychosis, the people they spend time with, their core beliefs, capitalism, unresolved trauma, or if they’re just being performative to stay on an isolated island attending an esoteric school. Truth is, it takes a special kind of person to visit the once-abandoned project of Forest City, and that sense of wonder is what makes Network School an intriguing light forest. After all, Network School is not a place, it’s a people, darktalent seeking to be seen.

I lived in Forest City for two months at Network School as a remote worker in hopes of understanding the vibes of the crypto industry. Needless to say, I plan to stay in Malaysia for a year to build in the startup society. Follow my story by being a member of my email-list and subscribing to my newsletter.

As I write these words, sitting across from me is a man worth billions. He’s in a plain white t-shirt, black shorts, and sandals, sipping a three-dollar coffee, no different from mine. Balaji Srinivasan, the author of The Network State and founder of a future country. Network States are a highly-aligned online community that crowdfunds territories around the world to someday gain recognition as a new kind of country.

The main objective in writing this essay is to explain my findings and practical observations to readers whose lives and careers are affected by technology and community. That definition doesn’t rule many people out, but that’s precisely the point. Most people are unaware of a technology that will have a significant impact on their lives. They do not realize that this represents an important gap in their knowledge.

Technology’s primary function is not to make existing workflows marginally faster, but to enable entirely new modes of creation and problem-solving. That’s exactly what Network States are. It wants to build something new without historical constraint. Like any product, you start with some proof of concept to show that your idea has legs. The Network School is a prototype of a Network State. Balaji’s team got an island near Singapore, built a school campus inside a hotel, invited “dark talent” from across the world, and is building a community in the remote island of Forest City.

The dark forest theory is meant to explain why humans have not come into contact with aliens. Fermi’s paradox of “Where is everybody?” becomes “Everybody’s here, they’re just quiet.” The theory assumes that in a universe where intentions are unknowable, signaling invites attack. To survive, one must stay silent. On the other hand, the light forest theory explains that in open networks, visibility is selected, unlike the strategic silence of a dark forest. It is when coordination technology like the internet make signaling net-positive, where the equilibrium is showing your work to solidify your being. In other words, a society should strive to be a light forest, which is what Network School is doing by attracting “dark talent.”

We are already creating through our digital activities, enormously rich records of how we think and what we feel, and during this decade, our technology for recording, storing, and organizing this information will advance rapidly. Like the Hubble telescope, capable of discovering dark matter in the universe, mobile telescopes have made it easier to discover dark talent from the internet.  When talent is made legible and composable online, new institutions form faster and endure longer, which is what Networks School is set to prove.

The advent of the internet means relatively easy access to strangers who are whacky enough to gather on a ghost island in Malaysia to learn skills, earn capital, and burn calories as a community. The internet revolution was accompanied by the availability of blockchains, which was originally designed for currency, but also organizes large groups of people. These two critical ingredients are now in place for a successful inception of decentralized nations.

It’s worth mentioning what society is and how Network School provides society-as-a-service. One of the many mantras of a Network State is  “cloud first, land last.” If one can speak, say, of a settlement called Forest City (man made island) and if that settlement also contained full time craft specialists (founders, engineers, marketers, influencers, musicians, and traders), then the internet apparatus that administered it must ipso facto be a start-up society.

There’s a scene in Thor Ragnarok, where the God of Thunder talks to Odin about the Kingdom of Asgard getting destroyed. To which Odin responds, “Asgard isn’t a place. Never was. This could be Asgard. Asgard is where our people stand.”

Every country comes with inherited assets: Geography (where a country is, what’s around it, and what its terrain is like), Geology (natural resources on and under a country’s surface), and Acts of nature (epidemic diseases, floods, and droughts). While many countries have natural resources they can rely on, human capital and social scalability are the most sustainable resources because of a person’s durability compared to inherited assets.

Human capital is when people can produce more revenue than they expend, making them self-sufficient. This sovereignty is what we should individually strive for to be strong as a collective. Man is no slave to race or religion, but his own programming, and productive societies are made from people who have character, common sense, creativity, and civility. The conditions of social scalability are to form a community of people to do great things together and construct more from reality.

Network States are “cloud first, land last” because the cloud is where the people connect, and the land is where they meet (URL to IRL). If Network School is a prototype of a new country called a Network State, then its attendees are a prototype of a new citizenship. You cannot chart territory without explorers stepping into the abyss. Network School must have early adopters if it wishes for mainstream recognition and diplomatic acknowledgment. In other words, Network School is not a place, it’s a people. With that being said, as people, we share the same human nature, which makes us more alike than different. People behave similarly when faced with similar circumstances.

What is the archetype of a remote worker who travels to a remote island in Malaysia to attend an esoteric school? Is the person leading, exploring, or fleeing? Are their motives for attending because of duty, vocation, or avoidance? As they meet other people, are they genuine or just actors? Are their personalities authentic, or do they perform a persona? Are they engaging with the community by lending a hand, or are they just a witness to it? Do they want to go along with collaboration, go ahead by leading, or go solo?

After spending two months attending the Network School, I’ve grown accustomed to hearing people introduce themselves. The line of questioning typically goes, “Where are you from?” or “What are you working on?” Unlike startup founders, I find it difficult to talk about myself because there's a hint of shame in what I do. Sure, I have a relatively respectful career as a consultant advising clients on data architecture. Although I'm skilled enough, the obstacle in my path is working towards something other than a pay cheque.

Despite being at odds with the people at Network School seeking technological breakthroughs, I cannot help but feel as their equal. Yes, our tax brackets may vastly differ, and the delta between our intelligence may taper off. Yet, there’s a comforting feeling of knowing that we’re under the same roof, working together at the Marina Hotel in Forest City.

Living with remote workers has enlightened me to see that people have a need for security and a deep desire for status. We want to identify with some group and have control over our own fate. If unmet, these needs can block agreement. If you know the incentives, you’ll know the outcome. Remote workers are offered a (relatively) low cost and potentially high benefit trade to those who choose to live on campus. The team has identified that by hosting startup founders in a hotel, offering coworking and gym spaces, while taking care of breakfast, lunch, and dinner, there could be high throughput of human capital at relatively low cost. The problem the team has yet to solve is how to separate the self-interest of people to incentivize growth in a startup society.

To understand what the incentives of Network School alumni are, we must first understand the types of people who attend. Many are here to use Forest City as a base to travel around Asia, especially with Singapore being just 40 minutes by car. Others are remote workers who want to lock in their earnings potential by minimizing costs. Founders are here to block months at a time and have a routine readily available to focus on building their startup. Others have come to find love and deeper bonds, whether friends or lovers. While the rest want to farm equity by being early to a novel yet potentially profitable idea. All that said, if the Network School succeeds in becoming a Network State, the alumni will find themselves in a position of incredible wealth and status.

As I got to know people during my two-month tenure at Network School, I tried to find out if it’s a chemical imbalance, the media they consume, spiritual psychosis, the people they spend time with, their core beliefs, capitalism, unresolved trauma, or if they’re just being performative to stay on an isolated island attending an esoteric school. Truth is, it takes a special kind of person to visit the once-abandoned project of Forest City, and that sense of wonder is what makes Network School an intriguing light forest. After all, Network School is not a place, it’s a people, darktalent seeking to be seen.

I lived in Forest City for two months at Network School as a remote worker in hopes of understanding the vibes of the crypto industry. Needless to say, I plan to stay in Malaysia for a year to build in the startup society. Follow my story by being a member of my email-list and subscribing to my newsletter.