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Welcome to the Free Cities podcast. My name is Timothy Allen and this is the official podcast

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of the Free Cities Foundation.

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Hello and welcome to this episode number 168 of the Free Cities podcast.

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Brought to you as always by the wonderful Veritas Villages, our lead sponsor.

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They are of course building off-grid freedom-oriented communities in Latin America.

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Nicaragua, Panama, Costa Rica

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and as you know

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if you're a Bitcoiner like me

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you can buy your property

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at a Veritas village with Bitcoin

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and you can spend Bitcoin at communities

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and they can even help you mine Bitcoin

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with the excess energy

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that your self-sufficient home

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will inevitably produce

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that's what they're doing already

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VeritasVillages.com forward slash free cities

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for more info please mention us

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bit of news from them actually

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They're currently out in El Salvador for the Plan B Forum Conference.

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That's Alex Voss and Patrick Hibbert from Veritas Villages,

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who've actually appeared on this podcast.

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Check it out, episode 156.

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They'll give you the lowdown on what they've been up to

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and what the plans are for other Veritas Villages, etc.

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Some other news, Playa Pacifica, their Nicaragua beachfront village,

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very popular one right now.

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apparently buyers can tour move-in ready homes and homes near completion which makes this a very

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strong option for buyers who want to purchase without a long construction timeline they will

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also offer you this wonderful deal if you are a buyer and you stay in a Veritas Village home

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and purchase that home i.e you rent it the cost of their accommodation and flights

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out there up to a set limit will be deducted from the home purchase price or you could just go and

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stay there you can go and rent them like airbnbs if you want as well but if you do rent it and then

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buy it your whole holiday will be free anyway that's a lovely thought right today's show and

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i would say that this was one of the most enjoyable conversations i've had recently

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this was the first time that I'd met this week's guest but quickly discovered that we shared

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something relatively unique at least in my experience and that is something that takes

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up a good portion of the first part of the conversation the connection between us is a

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northeast Indian state by the name of Nagaland now all will be revealed in the conversation but

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FYI Nagaland is a remote tropical hilly area of the northeast frontier states of India and it was

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somewhere that I spent a good six months as a photographer more than 20 years ago exploring

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my guest today Vikram Bharati was actually born in Nagaland now that's quite amazing to meet

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someone from that part of the world not many people travel there let alone someone who works

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in the free cities ecosystem it's somewhere nagaland that is that i have a real fondness for

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and somewhere that had a pivotal role in my life which i'll reveal in the conversation now vikram

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currently living in singapore co-founded draper startup house and draper nation now draper nation

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is in their own words quotes building the infrastructure of freedom creating high growth

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companies and governance tools that shape the future of borderless citizenship digital sovereignty

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and parallel societies that's their words in my words it is quite hard to decipher i'd say it was

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part think tank part consultant part business development it's a lot of things what's important

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is it's all relevant to the free cities ecosystem in fact vikram in this discussion positions himself

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quite reasonably i would say at the overlap of free cities and network states in the venn diagram

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of the industry in which we work by the way draper nation yeah that's tim draper the connection there

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vikram will explain all in the conversation right what did the ai make of it a wide-ranging

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conversation covers the host's one-man AI-assisted media workflow. Okay, not a hugely important part

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of the conversation. Then pivots into deep reflections on Nagaland and northeast India,

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touching on tribal governance, missionary history, matrilineal cultures, personal travel experiences,

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and how those encounters shaped a lifelong scepticism of centralised systems.

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The conversation then zooms out to free cities, SEZs, democracy versus sovereignty,

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China's development model, Bitcoin versus crypto tokens,

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and culminates in Draper Nation's experiments with digital governance

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and cloud-based nations, arguing that small radical governance sandboxes,

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physical and digital are the best path to future institutional innovation sounds quite wordy but i

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suppose it's not too bad i'll co-sign that and get straight into the conversation before we go a quick

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thank you to my subs on fountain or any value for value platform and especially our biggest supporters

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this week thank you bullish mike nicholas podiensis ekrem philippe martino many thanks to

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you all for the wonderful satoshis you have sent us i appreciate you all and if you're a subscriber

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i will be putting up a new bonus episode soon i'm just trying to find the right one for you

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anyway let's get into the show grab your backpack this week chuck it on the roof of that yellow

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Tata Sumo over there and grab the front window passenger seat. If you've been to northeast India

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you'll get that reference and then once you're in it just sit back relax and enjoy my conversation

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with Vikram Bharati.

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yeah well i'm impressed to see that you do everything here you're like a one-man show

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i know i a bit of a bone of contention has to be said right i have a limited budget

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but i'm a former and sometimes still filmmaker and director so i i would find it hard not

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to do it quite well, at least on a budget.

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Do you do the cameras?

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I do everything.

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I even use a clapperboard, mate.

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Do you do the editing as well?

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My beautiful AI agent does the editing now,

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but hence the clapperboard.

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Right.

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Clapperboards.

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We've always used clapperboards in...

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Do you know what they're for?

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Is it like the beginning, end of a clip?

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It is, but it does do that.

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It does tell you which scene you're looking at, but it also helps you sync everything up.

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You create a very sharp noise.

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Basically, this podcast setup is two cameras and two mics.

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So when I make that crack twice, it gets recorded on all these devices.

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And then when you import all this data into a bit of software for editing it, as long as you line up those cracking sounds, you're synced together.

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um an ai is surprisingly bad at doing that i don't know why you know it should you should you can

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normally automatically just say sync and but inevitably you still end up having to do it by

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hand often but having a clapperboard makes that very very easy um but but yeah the actual editing

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is done by an ai now so i feed it these two feeds so me and you and the two different um audio feeds

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and I tell it which one's you.

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So I say, when you're speaking, then the AI cuts to you.

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Wow, that's amazing.

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And then you watch the one with Patrick.

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Did you watch it or did you listen to it?

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I watched it on YouTube.

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Right, okay.

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That was all AI cutting.

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Wow, that's, I would have never known.

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Exactly, nor would I.

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It's really good at cutting, actually.

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And the reels that you do, the small, short reels.

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They're all AI as well.

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Wow.

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But once again, they're AI, but they take a lot of human input.

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But what the AI gives me basically, and this is kind of how a lot of people use AI anyway, is they, it gives you a starting point.

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So I ingest, when I, what was that I heard?

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Yeah, that's my, is that my phone?

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Let me just put it on silent.

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When I basically with the I ingest the so when the first day I is edited all this, then I ingest it into another AI which listens to it and pulls out what it thinks are important clips.

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Then it creates I create a template for it and an AI template and it creates reels.

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But they're often the production value is not high enough for me.

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So then I go through them and I pick the ones that I think are relevant.

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It'll give me 30 or 40 and I might pick 20 of them because a lot of the time they just get it wrong.

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And then I correct the spelling mistakes because it puts titles on it.

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I make the edits look nicer because it's really bad at editing.

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It edits by the words.

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But when you listen to it, there might be a bit of a word cut off or whatever.

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and then we then that gets ingested into a bit of software which sends it out to social media

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networks all at the same time timed so wow I know so basically wow that's so you are a one-man I'm

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a one-man show at the moment but I don't want to be a one-man show I've been a filmmaker for years

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and worked in large crews and they're too big for sure for now you know you can make a great film

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which is two of you really, but really it's a function of how much income you're generating.

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I mean, I generate income from this, which is profits, but it's not enough to pay someone else to edit.

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So I do that as a labor of love and I don't really pay myself.

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Really, you know, I kind of subsidize that side of it as well, which is actually changing.

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I've brought on a sponsor recently and I'm now getting some new sponsors as well.

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So the idea is to make it a fully functioning business.

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I think you could.

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I mean, when I was watching that one episode, what came to my head was you could really turn this into a media business with all kinds of stuff, not just a podcast, but a whole media franchise in that sense.

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I intend to.

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I intend to.

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I'm not sure.

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Well, look, I'm 54, right?

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I don't want to run a company.

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Okay.

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How old are you?

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I'm 45.

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All right.

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You look a lot younger than 45.

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But you might have a bit more get up and go.

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I wouldn't say I'm reaching.

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Like I love doing this.

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And I am obsessed with talking about all this stuff.

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Free cities, privacy, cryptocurrency, whatever.

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This is my life.

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but the thought of running a business and having to deal with employees and stuff doesn't excite me

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in the slightest or in fact I mean what I love about the way my life works at the moment is

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when I get home in in a few days I can just take the rest of the week off if I want there's no

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there's no the you know as long as I've I've made I've got on top of all the things I need to do

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which I always do I always think it I've always lived a very very free life and even before I did

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this when I was a filmmaker I probably worked probably I did about three months a year and the

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rest of it was with my kids and and you know things ticking over but the actual nuts and bolts of work

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was probably three months out of the year and that only changed because I gave up my whole life once

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I got involved in this and it I mean I don't know this is I think your first foray into all this is

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a little bit is it yeah i free cities i only heard about it recently when when peter reached out to

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me and and it looked really awesome so so it's my first time coming in contact with this community

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though i would say i've been involved in um i would say i don't know you can call this an industry

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yes it is i think i think it's a new industry in fact i think this is probably one of the more

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exciting industries that's sort of bubbling up yes 100 and it has different shapes and forms

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around the world but i've been sort of building in the space for for a while for i would say for

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the last eight years so yeah so well i was i i came in via the bitcoin route i was a bitcoiner

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and that was what flipped my whole life upside down discovering bitcoin back in the day and then

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realizing that that was more important than my former life.

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And through Bitcoin, I met Peter.

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Peter's a Bitcoiner.

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And we know a guy called Safe Dino Moose, who's a very famous.

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He wrote the best.

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Oh, yeah.

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You know Safe.

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Yeah, yeah.

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I've read all his books.

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Okay, right.

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Well, he put us together.

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And then I was quite skeptical, I'll be honest,

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of the Free Cities movement in the beginning,

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mainly because I didn't really understand what it was.

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and actually also thought it was quite boring compared to, you know,

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like that side of it, cities and all this kind of stuff.

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But what I've realized is because Bitcoin is now so ubiquitous,

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it doesn't mean anything to necessarily be a Bitcoiner, if you see what I mean.

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It's just like, it's like, are you a money person or are you a saver?

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It's gone mainstream.

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Exactly right.

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And then I realized that actually governance and living together

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is the next most important thing to sort of solve,

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if you see what I mean.

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And Bitcoin's definitely a part of it.

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And so are lots of other things,

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privacy and the tech stack and all this kind of stuff.

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And then I was like, I can't make boring.

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I can't make films anymore than the way I used to.

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You know what I mean?

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What's the point?

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I used to make films all around the world,

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like kind of, funnily enough,

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here's something that you're going to be surprised at.

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Because I caught the beginning of your talk.

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I had to leave.

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Oh, at the conference yesterday.

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You're from Nagaland.

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I am.

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Dude, I've spent a long time in Nagaland.

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No way.

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Exactly.

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That's not possible.

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It is possible.

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I went to Nagaland.

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I was trying to think when it was.

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I think it was about 20 years ago.

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I traveled all around the frontier states.

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Oh, I've been to all of them.

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I basically went there originally because I'd heard about this story.

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I was like a journalist and filmmaker.

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and I'd heard about this story in Meghalaya,

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which was that someone told me,

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I was in Bhutan on a job and I met this guy.

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This was before there was,

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it was really before the internet, in fact,

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that had really kicked off.

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I said it was around 2000, early 2000, I think it was.

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And I heard about this story in Meghalaya.

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So I went there and then I learned about, you know,

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all the other states, Mizoram, Tripura, Manipur,

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00:16:05,140 --> 00:16:05,840
all these places.

233
00:16:05,840 --> 00:16:10,680
and I was like fucking hell this place is amazing and it was off limits to foreigners that's right

234
00:16:10,680 --> 00:16:15,800
right 20 years ago you couldn't really you could of course I guess as a journalist you probably no

235
00:16:15,800 --> 00:16:21,960
no not as a journalist it's India right right you just meet well what I did was I spent six months

236
00:16:21,960 --> 00:16:27,500
traveling around the front northeast frontier states and Nagaland was the most amazing because

237
00:16:27,500 --> 00:16:31,880
it was the one that was that everyone said oh you can't go there and there's headhunters there

238
00:16:31,880 --> 00:16:32,480
It's dangerous.

239
00:16:32,820 --> 00:16:33,460
Yeah, it's dangerous.

240
00:16:33,780 --> 00:16:38,240
And it kind of was dangerous, but I'd already been to some war zones as a journalist, right?

241
00:16:38,840 --> 00:16:49,200
So I knew that actually in a place like that, you're safer than a local person, really, because you're nothing to do with what's going on.

242
00:16:49,600 --> 00:16:53,160
So I snuck into a few, a few of the states.

243
00:16:53,400 --> 00:17:00,180
And in other ones, I actually had, I managed to get a fake permit for Nagaland because it was all back in the day where you just stamp things.

244
00:17:00,180 --> 00:17:00,720
Just a piece of paper.

245
00:17:00,720 --> 00:17:01,240
Exactly.

246
00:17:01,460 --> 00:17:01,560
Yeah.

247
00:17:01,880 --> 00:17:06,860
But friends of mine who were coming in on in the back of trucks and stuff to go around.

248
00:17:07,220 --> 00:17:10,440
But once you were in those places, they couldn't really catch up with you.

249
00:17:10,500 --> 00:17:17,300
It was unless you hit a roadblock and Nagaland did have some roadblocks, but only when something happened.

250
00:17:17,680 --> 00:17:20,420
Like, you know, like we were in where we were hanging.

251
00:17:20,560 --> 00:17:26,420
I went all around where all the cognac people are because they were the most they were the famous headhunters.

252
00:17:26,580 --> 00:17:26,980
That's right.

253
00:17:26,980 --> 00:17:32,940
But there was still warring, basically, not with the Indian government, but between each other.

254
00:17:33,140 --> 00:17:41,400
And, you know, like not that long ago before I was there, a head appeared on a stake, you know, in the middle of a village somewhere and all this kind of stuff.

255
00:17:41,400 --> 00:17:43,780
And then the police would go in and shut it down.

256
00:17:43,980 --> 00:17:46,060
And like, it's an amazing place.

257
00:17:46,440 --> 00:17:51,400
I've still own quite a number of Naga shawls that I...

258
00:17:52,480 --> 00:17:53,660
The red and blue ones.

259
00:17:53,740 --> 00:17:53,940
Right.

260
00:17:53,940 --> 00:17:58,620
Well, the ones that I really like, they're like Angami.

261
00:17:58,820 --> 00:17:59,520
Do you know what tribe you are?

262
00:17:59,520 --> 00:18:00,600
So I am Angami.

263
00:18:00,740 --> 00:18:01,180
Oh, right.

264
00:18:01,260 --> 00:18:04,100
So my mother is an Angami tribe.

265
00:18:04,700 --> 00:18:04,920
Right.

266
00:18:04,980 --> 00:18:07,700
Well, I've got an old Angami shawl that someone gave me.

267
00:18:07,840 --> 00:18:08,600
Those are beautiful.

268
00:18:08,940 --> 00:18:09,620
It is.

269
00:18:09,700 --> 00:18:10,620
It's a black one.

270
00:18:10,860 --> 00:18:11,100
That's right.

271
00:18:11,340 --> 00:18:11,560
Right.

272
00:18:12,120 --> 00:18:14,180
And it's a famous design.

273
00:18:14,360 --> 00:18:17,900
I know that because it's popped up a few times in my life and I've still got it.

274
00:18:17,940 --> 00:18:19,320
That's so mad that you're Angami.

275
00:18:19,540 --> 00:18:20,600
It's really, really mad.

276
00:18:20,720 --> 00:18:21,940
Have you spent any time there?

277
00:18:22,080 --> 00:18:22,680
Not really.

278
00:18:22,680 --> 00:18:24,380
I was born there.

279
00:18:24,620 --> 00:18:28,180
So my mother is Angami, and my father is from Rajasthan.

280
00:18:28,960 --> 00:18:31,120
So a completely different part of India.

281
00:18:31,840 --> 00:18:37,860
And I was there until I was six or seven, until I left.

282
00:18:38,000 --> 00:18:39,600
So I've been back there since.

283
00:18:39,960 --> 00:18:41,760
In fact, I was there a few years ago.

284
00:18:42,500 --> 00:18:44,680
And I do want to go back again.

285
00:18:44,680 --> 00:18:48,440
But I didn't spend my adult life there.

286
00:18:49,340 --> 00:18:51,960
But it is a very interesting place.

287
00:18:52,680 --> 00:18:58,280
And it's unfortunate that it has a lot of potential.

288
00:18:59,000 --> 00:19:03,620
Because it's unique, it's different, but it's also a very poor place.

289
00:19:04,500 --> 00:19:08,680
And that makes it hard for the culture to really expand

290
00:19:08,680 --> 00:19:12,440
and catch the imagination of sort of mainstream people.

291
00:19:12,680 --> 00:19:18,240
Well, the thing about all of those states, just so people are listening here,

292
00:19:18,300 --> 00:19:22,100
if you think of India as an inverted triangle,

293
00:19:22,100 --> 00:19:27,160
on the northeast corner, including the Himalayas.

294
00:19:27,340 --> 00:19:28,200
Like, is it Arunachal?

295
00:19:28,520 --> 00:19:29,000
Arunachal?

296
00:19:29,120 --> 00:19:29,260
Right.

297
00:19:29,420 --> 00:19:30,500
That's the Chinese border.

298
00:19:30,820 --> 00:19:31,180
Yes.

299
00:19:31,760 --> 00:19:32,280
What's it called?

300
00:19:32,540 --> 00:19:33,520
Arunachal Pradesh.

301
00:19:33,660 --> 00:19:34,100
Yeah, that's it.

302
00:19:34,180 --> 00:19:34,280
Yeah.

303
00:19:34,800 --> 00:19:43,000
And underneath it, there's Assam, Mizoram, Meghalaya, Tripura, Manipur, and Nagaland.

304
00:19:43,600 --> 00:19:50,740
And these are, they're basically, you, as an ethnic group, you are basically Southeast Asian.

305
00:19:50,740 --> 00:19:56,860
you're not of the indian continent but it became incorporated you're i mean burma is very similar

306
00:19:56,860 --> 00:20:03,820
they're they're burmese so i would say the naga people of all the including all the tribes whether

307
00:20:03,820 --> 00:20:11,880
it's um angami or cognac i would say they're more of the burmese stock but the north north of burma

308
00:20:11,880 --> 00:20:17,740
and in fact if you go to you know you go to myanmar today and you go to the north it's all

309
00:20:17,740 --> 00:20:25,040
it's all tribes in fact the naga tribes are in the north of burma yes and um that group are the

310
00:20:25,040 --> 00:20:32,000
tribes that still there's still conflict in in myanmar internal conflict because the tribes

311
00:20:32,000 --> 00:20:38,900
still see themselves as independent people yeah well and the same goes for the the nagas in india

312
00:20:38,900 --> 00:20:44,940
who are separatists really because it shouldn't really be part of india you have you don't have

313
00:20:44,940 --> 00:20:50,900
a huge amount in common culturally with with India as as as a whole I mean India is a vast

314
00:20:50,900 --> 00:20:59,160
place anyway but um but but also there is warring amongst but on the whole I mean I I I would say

315
00:20:59,160 --> 00:21:05,740
it was one of the pivotal moments in my life and it and it even physically it was but spiritually

316
00:21:05,740 --> 00:21:12,500
I I loved hanging out there like I spent like one and a half months on a refugee camp in

317
00:21:12,500 --> 00:21:18,520
Mizaram have you ever heard of the the brew tribe no they were displaced from Mizaram into sorry

318
00:21:18,520 --> 00:21:24,360
into Tripura and there was like 20,000 or something of them living in this refugee camp which was

319
00:21:24,360 --> 00:21:31,360
you can imagine a refugee camp there ended up just being a a city you know and it was all made with

320
00:21:31,360 --> 00:21:36,240
bamboo and that it was a beautiful looking place actually it sounds terrible but it wasn't they

321
00:21:36,240 --> 00:21:42,620
were just displaced and i i i just ended up living with one family and i just started living there

322
00:21:42,620 --> 00:21:49,940
and just there were no foreigners anywhere even now i would say there's really no foreigners it's

323
00:21:49,940 --> 00:21:53,780
become a little bit more integrated just because of technology everyone kind of knows what's

324
00:21:53,780 --> 00:22:01,480
happening but i would say in terms of foreigners in nagaland there's probably still not i would say

325
00:22:01,480 --> 00:22:03,180
there's probably a handful of foreigners who live there.

326
00:22:03,800 --> 00:22:04,460
That's right.

327
00:22:04,780 --> 00:22:07,740
But, and like I say, it actually did change my life because,

328
00:22:08,260 --> 00:22:10,380
so back then I was a filmmaker and a photographer.

329
00:22:10,600 --> 00:22:12,560
Then really I was a photographer only.

330
00:22:12,780 --> 00:22:14,200
I hadn't started making films.

331
00:22:15,040 --> 00:22:21,400
But, so I went to Megaliah and I made a photo story on this,

332
00:22:21,520 --> 00:22:22,900
on these things called living bridges.

333
00:22:23,060 --> 00:22:23,680
Do you know what they are?

334
00:22:23,680 --> 00:22:24,340
Oh, that's right.

335
00:22:24,440 --> 00:22:27,200
That's the trees sort of create the bridges, right?

336
00:22:27,200 --> 00:22:27,640
Yes, right.

337
00:22:28,520 --> 00:22:30,380
They're rubber trees that grow.

338
00:22:30,380 --> 00:22:38,100
the the the khasi tribe they are the khasi up in the highlands of megaliah and for years they grow

339
00:22:38,100 --> 00:22:41,980
them to get these trees together and they create their most incredible bridges and ladders and

340
00:22:41,980 --> 00:22:47,260
stuff like 80 or 90 year old living bridges and no one heard about it there was no lonely planet

341
00:22:47,260 --> 00:22:54,260
guide back then there was no nothing so i i and the internet was in its real fledged in days like

342
00:22:54,260 --> 00:22:59,900
i had an i had a website in 1998 which i designed and built myself you can still see it on the

343
00:22:59,900 --> 00:23:04,700
internet way back machine it's hilarious it's like little blocks of yeah and it was to showcase

344
00:23:04,700 --> 00:23:10,000
my photography but it was it was terrible and what I was doing so when I was traveling whenever I

345
00:23:10,000 --> 00:23:14,940
could get an internet connection which is hard around there but I could I think in in the majors

346
00:23:14,940 --> 00:23:20,180
in Shillong there was an internet cafe that had like dial up on it or something and I was just

347
00:23:20,180 --> 00:23:26,620
publishing my work to a web page just literally embedding it in a web page and then sending the

348
00:23:26,620 --> 00:23:31,900
link to my my family back home so they could see what I've been up to you know because I was just

349
00:23:31,900 --> 00:23:38,140
on this mad two-year I'm just going to photograph the world on my own sort of like trip I gave up a

350
00:23:38,140 --> 00:23:43,620
job as a I worked at a newspaper in London and unbeknown to me I didn't think this thing through

351
00:23:43,620 --> 00:23:52,400
as well but Google was indexing it and after about a year of me doing this I it was becoming

352
00:23:52,400 --> 00:23:57,820
searchable and it never occurred to me back then that things like that would would transpire and

353
00:23:57,820 --> 00:24:04,060
through that the BBC contacted me because they were making a documentary about tribal people

354
00:24:04,060 --> 00:24:08,180
around the world and they said wow we saw these pictures of these bridges what the hell's going on

355
00:24:08,180 --> 00:24:15,320
I got an email random email started a dialogue and ended up working on that film for almost

356
00:24:15,320 --> 00:24:22,680
three years. It was a human planet it was called. It was like the eight part, eight episodes

357
00:24:22,680 --> 00:24:27,620
about all the most crazy indigenous people living in extreme circumstances all around

358
00:24:27,620 --> 00:24:46,768
the world And it was it completely changed my life It was it projected me to this completely different area of the media where I became a sort of person a media personality kind of thing And it was all because of this random guy I met in Bhutan who told me to go to Meghalaya and then I ended up going around spending six months in the Northeast Frontier State

359
00:24:47,048 --> 00:24:50,388
Wow, that's wild. That's really, really wild.

360
00:24:50,388 --> 00:24:56,508
But I couldn't believe it when you said that. You said, like, I'm from Nagel. I'm like, no. And to be an Angami, that's, that's amazing because.

361
00:24:56,508 --> 00:25:05,188
Yeah, I think the Angami tribe, if I remember, is probably the largest tribe in terms of the numbers of people.

362
00:25:05,768 --> 00:25:13,948
And probably the more influential tribe because people in power, I think, are from the Angami tribe.

363
00:25:14,368 --> 00:25:15,428
But there's a lot of tribes.

364
00:25:15,628 --> 00:25:15,988
Oh, yeah.

365
00:25:17,188 --> 00:25:19,208
Chang, Ringma, Chakasang.

366
00:25:19,448 --> 00:25:19,968
That's right.

367
00:25:20,328 --> 00:25:20,848
Sangtam.

368
00:25:21,228 --> 00:25:21,768
Yeah, Mao.

369
00:25:21,768 --> 00:25:22,528
Tangkal, Mao.

370
00:25:22,908 --> 00:25:23,068
Yeah.

371
00:25:23,768 --> 00:25:25,008
There's a lot.

372
00:25:25,008 --> 00:25:25,548
There's a lot.

373
00:25:25,548 --> 00:25:35,188
And I don't think the circumstances have changed that much since you were there in terms of internal conflicts between the tribes.

374
00:25:35,628 --> 00:25:36,868
That still exists.

375
00:25:37,688 --> 00:25:50,128
And I feel maybe that's maybe the main reason why it hasn't, you know, there's no cohesion between the tribes, which is unfortunate because the tribes came together.

376
00:25:50,128 --> 00:25:55,768
thing is though they've tried that like i say i've covered a lot of indigenous people around

377
00:25:55,768 --> 00:26:01,968
the world and um you can't unify tribes like papa in new guinea is another example of this

378
00:26:01,968 --> 00:26:07,568
they've tried all kinds of things papa is a very extreme version of of the northeast states of

379
00:26:07,568 --> 00:26:12,728
india because they're fully like warring with each other all the time and they so the local

380
00:26:12,728 --> 00:26:17,128
government created a festival the hornbill festival which was tried to try and bring them

381
00:26:17,128 --> 00:26:20,748
altogether which has really become a thing now yeah but that's a nightmare because you end up

382
00:26:20,748 --> 00:26:26,108
everyone fighting at these things it's like put everyone all in one place and it's like the spears

383
00:26:26,108 --> 00:26:31,268
come out and it's like oh god here we go again but i don't know i don't expect people to get on

384
00:26:31,268 --> 00:26:36,668
i don't know why you would expect people to get on like just um i think the answer is probably

385
00:26:36,668 --> 00:26:42,928
i mean funnily enough though when i look at the tribes of northeast india that you're very and you

386
00:26:42,928 --> 00:26:48,808
have the same characteristics they're very chilled out actually maybe not the cognacs the cognacs were

387
00:26:48,808 --> 00:26:55,068
pretty extreme right but most southeast agents have that calmness and super polite i mean i

388
00:26:55,068 --> 00:27:00,188
traveled remember i've traveled six months right there was no tourist infrastructure at all and

389
00:27:00,188 --> 00:27:07,208
so i and i never did i never one night spent a night looking for somewhere to stay never there

390
00:27:07,208 --> 00:27:12,308
was always someone who came up to me in the street and said come and stay at my house you know it it

391
00:27:12,308 --> 00:27:18,228
was that kind of a place and uh you know i that's why i ended up staying there for so long i was so

392
00:27:18,228 --> 00:27:26,648
enamored by the extreme like um politeness and just niceness of people i couldn't believe

393
00:27:26,648 --> 00:27:31,328
i don't think that's changed i don't think that's changed i think that's that that hospitality i

394
00:27:31,328 --> 00:27:40,088
think is it's in it's in the culture what was your take on because i find it ironic that even though

395
00:27:40,088 --> 00:27:46,948
people are you know very tribal in nature historically a lot of them are now baptists

396
00:27:46,948 --> 00:27:54,508
yeah there's a reason for that because and here's some weird things about i've i found out a lot of

397
00:27:54,508 --> 00:27:59,788
weird things about yeah especially megaliah where i went first like for example megaliah is the

398
00:27:59,788 --> 00:28:05,208
rainiest place in the world did you know that i did not know that there's a place in in megaliah

399
00:28:05,208 --> 00:28:06,968
which is near to Nagaland.

400
00:28:07,068 --> 00:28:08,388
They're all part of the same sort of area,

401
00:28:08,728 --> 00:28:15,248
which has something ridiculous like over two and a half metres of rain.

402
00:28:15,648 --> 00:28:17,348
It's in the Guinness Book of Records.

403
00:28:17,508 --> 00:28:18,088
It's the rainiest place.

404
00:28:18,708 --> 00:28:20,788
It also has a matrilineal culture,

405
00:28:21,148 --> 00:28:29,148
which means the women inherit all the surname, the second name, property,

406
00:28:29,668 --> 00:28:31,028
all this kind of stuff, which is really weird.

407
00:28:31,028 --> 00:28:33,448
So weird that I ended up making a BBC documentary

408
00:28:33,448 --> 00:28:35,148
about the men's rights movement,

409
00:28:35,208 --> 00:28:40,048
in Megaliah. There's actually a men's rights movement, which was campaigning for equal rights

410
00:28:40,048 --> 00:28:46,828
with women. It's such a crazy place, right? So, you know, loads of weird and wonderful things like

411
00:28:46,828 --> 00:28:52,668
that happen. Sorry, what did you ask me about? I was asking if, what was your thoughts on the fact

412
00:28:52,668 --> 00:29:01,168
that they're all converted to Christianity? So, when I was spending time in Megaliah, I lived with

413
00:29:01,168 --> 00:29:06,788
the Kassi tribe for like about a month and in this beautiful place called Mool-A-Long which is now an

414
00:29:06,788 --> 00:29:12,208
Indian tourist destination strangely but it's where the living bridges are they were they were

415
00:29:12,208 --> 00:29:20,068
the ones that made these bridges and they had a Baptist church there and it turns out that basically

416
00:29:20,068 --> 00:29:28,108
Welsh missionaries went there like a hundred years prior as a lot of missionaries did in a lot of

417
00:29:28,108 --> 00:29:39,048
places i think they saw tribal societies as an easy option because you're polite and you had a

418
00:29:39,048 --> 00:29:45,148
you know you were easy to convince that uh this religion might be better than your indigenous

419
00:29:45,148 --> 00:29:48,908
religion and you see it all around the world everywhere you go this was a very common thing

420
00:29:48,908 --> 00:29:57,788
to do but it was just pure luck that the kind of the the the geography got divided up between right

421
00:29:57,788 --> 00:30:02,148
So if the Baptists are going there, then whoever, they're not going there.

422
00:30:02,228 --> 00:30:03,788
So we'll have this part of India.

423
00:30:03,888 --> 00:30:04,588
You have that part.

424
00:30:04,648 --> 00:30:05,168
You have that part.

425
00:30:05,428 --> 00:30:10,288
Because they knew, the chassi knew more about Welsh history than I did.

426
00:30:10,308 --> 00:30:11,468
And I was living in Wales.

427
00:30:11,728 --> 00:30:22,308
Because this pastor who had set up the church in Molenong had been like, you know, telling them all about famous Welsh people from history and stuff like this.

428
00:30:23,028 --> 00:30:26,508
But yeah, I don't know why everyone took it up.

429
00:30:26,508 --> 00:30:38,288
I suppose people who have an indigenous religion probably saw Christianity as a new and interesting and innovative thing.

430
00:30:38,728 --> 00:30:42,268
And especially because, like it, wrong or right, doesn't really matter.

431
00:30:42,788 --> 00:30:49,288
People were enamored by outsiders coming in because they brought with them things that local people didn't have.

432
00:30:49,628 --> 00:30:52,588
I think now it obviously doesn't make any difference.

433
00:30:52,588 --> 00:30:58,368
they've got the internet now they can see just how screwed up the outside world is yeah i think

434
00:30:58,368 --> 00:31:06,288
back in the day that there was much more of a rosy kind of sheen put on incomers i mean i had that

435
00:31:06,288 --> 00:31:12,488
experience myself i was treated so well like i was i you know wherever i was a basically a sort of

436
00:31:12,488 --> 00:31:18,248
20 something hippie i had dreadlocks long hair and if i walked into a village i'd be like straight

437
00:31:18,248 --> 00:31:23,828
straight over to the guy in charge, sit down, you know, have a drink with them. And it's like,

438
00:31:23,868 --> 00:31:27,748
you know, you don't, you, you get inserted into society at that level. I had no place.

439
00:31:28,208 --> 00:31:30,568
I had no, no, no reason to be at that level.

440
00:31:30,668 --> 00:31:36,408
I'm, I'm, I'm still, I still can't comprehend that, that you were there 20 years ago. It's,

441
00:31:36,448 --> 00:31:40,328
it blows my mind. I've actually never met someone who, who's, you know.

442
00:31:40,328 --> 00:31:43,708
Well, I've not met many people who've ever been there either, you know.

443
00:31:43,708 --> 00:31:50,708
Well, you probably never met anyone who's from there that kind of lives, you know, my lifestyle.

444
00:31:52,068 --> 00:31:54,668
Since Facebook, Facebook's big over there, right?

445
00:31:54,848 --> 00:31:55,128
That's right.

446
00:31:55,168 --> 00:31:56,308
Facebook's kind of like the internet.

447
00:31:56,328 --> 00:31:56,888
It is the internet.

448
00:31:57,168 --> 00:31:58,648
I still get messages from people.

449
00:31:58,968 --> 00:32:01,008
Mr. Tim, we still remember you.

450
00:32:01,108 --> 00:32:02,048
We still this, we still that.

451
00:32:02,108 --> 00:32:08,908
Because like without realizing it, I had an effect on that place, especially Molinong.

452
00:32:08,908 --> 00:32:16,548
And Molinong was the place in Megaliah where there was this one very famous bridge, which the BBC ended up making a film out of.

453
00:32:16,688 --> 00:32:17,888
That was the rest of my story.

454
00:32:17,988 --> 00:32:23,828
So the BBC contacted me and about the bridges and they ended up sending a massive film crew out there.

455
00:32:24,108 --> 00:32:25,908
And then it put it on the map.

456
00:32:26,808 --> 00:32:35,068
And what the only thing that happened that I was surprised about, because I went back about when I went back to do the story on the men's might, the men's rights movement.

457
00:32:35,628 --> 00:32:38,568
Last time I was there, I was this sleepy little village, Molinong.

458
00:32:38,908 --> 00:32:39,708
You know, it was amazing.

459
00:32:39,788 --> 00:32:41,188
It was like an oasis.

460
00:32:42,148 --> 00:32:45,768
And I went back and I imagined, yeah, there's going to be some tourism here now.

461
00:32:45,768 --> 00:32:48,068
What I didn't realize was it was Indian tourism.

462
00:32:48,508 --> 00:32:51,648
And I was expecting to see foreign tourists.

463
00:32:51,788 --> 00:32:53,868
And then the penny dropped.

464
00:32:53,948 --> 00:32:55,148
And I thought, oh, my God, wait a minute.

465
00:32:55,448 --> 00:32:56,268
India's changing.

466
00:32:56,948 --> 00:32:57,348
India.

467
00:32:57,588 --> 00:33:02,828
And then you realize Indian, the middle class in India had risen in that short amount of time.

468
00:33:02,868 --> 00:33:06,488
It was probably only about seven or eight years had exploded.

469
00:33:06,488 --> 00:33:12,848
it you know well it's really exploded now because i was at the hornbill festival oh is it sorry

470
00:33:12,848 --> 00:33:18,228
hornbill is that that's a nagaland one yes right wait a minute did i say that was in

471
00:33:18,228 --> 00:33:24,828
did i just say that there was a hornbill festival in in um papua new guinea no no no no what was

472
00:33:24,828 --> 00:33:30,248
that one called then uh you're talking about hornbill festival in in either magalaya or

473
00:33:30,248 --> 00:33:35,808
there's one in nagaland no the one i was talking about in um oh in papua okay there's there is the

474
00:33:35,808 --> 00:33:39,828
same thing there I think I got them mixed up anyway right right Hornbill you're right is a

475
00:33:39,828 --> 00:33:44,948
coming together of the tribes in Manigaland it's become it's become so I was there a few years ago

476
00:33:44,948 --> 00:33:53,448
and it was very interesting to see Indian tourists who would go for the festival but you know these

477
00:33:53,448 --> 00:33:59,768
were not like Indian family tourists these were young adventurous bloggers you know young

478
00:33:59,768 --> 00:34:06,028
adventurous backpacker types, all Indians, both men and women. In fact, you see a lot of

479
00:34:06,028 --> 00:34:12,528
adventurous women travelers. And generally, these people are educated, you know, they probably

480
00:34:12,528 --> 00:34:18,648
studied abroad. And they're very interested in the fact that in India, there is such a such a

481
00:34:18,648 --> 00:34:22,548
culture. So I think it's a great thing. Just coming, you know, coming back to what you were saying

482
00:34:22,548 --> 00:34:30,128
earlier in terms of the women having rights and women having a lot more control. That's really,

483
00:34:30,288 --> 00:34:34,848
really fascinating. I'm glad you brought it up because I think this is still the case in

484
00:34:34,848 --> 00:34:44,228
Nederland today. The women, you know, when I see my family structure, so it's like my aunts and

485
00:34:44,228 --> 00:34:52,208
they run the families. Like my aunt or aunts, they run the household. They're the breadwinners.

486
00:34:52,548 --> 00:34:55,228
And they're the ones calling the shots.

487
00:34:55,488 --> 00:34:59,568
And the men are out just kind of like working in the fields.

488
00:35:00,288 --> 00:35:06,468
Yeah, Megaliar, the youngest daughter, I think they call her the Kakuda or something.

489
00:35:06,828 --> 00:35:08,608
She inherits everything.

490
00:35:09,428 --> 00:35:12,848
And when you marry, you take on the woman's name.

491
00:35:13,308 --> 00:35:14,048
It's fascinating.

492
00:35:14,388 --> 00:35:15,608
It's absolutely fascinating.

493
00:35:15,728 --> 00:35:17,368
There's only a few matri...

494
00:35:17,368 --> 00:35:19,448
It's not matriarchal, it's matrilineal.

495
00:35:19,448 --> 00:35:27,668
But I think there's almost no matriarchal, as in patriarchal, matriarchal societies in the world.

496
00:35:27,708 --> 00:35:31,128
And there's only a few matrilineal ones.

497
00:35:31,248 --> 00:35:35,828
I think there's some in South America up in the Andes or somewhere like that.

498
00:35:36,148 --> 00:35:45,148
I mean, I guess some historians do say that for most of human history, it's been very much a matriarchal society.

499
00:35:45,148 --> 00:35:48,328
You know, like mother goddess and animism.

500
00:35:48,328 --> 00:35:55,248
the women were they they were in charge of their bodies for most of human history i think it's only

501
00:35:55,248 --> 00:36:01,168
been a few thousand years that that's changed maybe that's why going back to what you said about

502
00:36:01,168 --> 00:36:09,328
the of religion coming into the area because like i would say christian and religion is very much

503
00:36:09,328 --> 00:36:15,488
patriarchal and like you say indigenous religion is often you could say matriarchal because it is

504
00:36:15,488 --> 00:36:20,628
about the earth and it's about honoring the earth mind you saying that though you know i i dip my

505
00:36:20,628 --> 00:36:27,788
toes into a few of the religions up there and there it's not as it it's very easy to go wow it

506
00:36:27,788 --> 00:36:32,448
just must be amazing being at one with nature and it's not it's nothing like that so they want to

507
00:36:32,448 --> 00:36:36,648
cut down a load of trees to build a garden they'll just do it and they'll burn it as well and you know

508
00:36:36,648 --> 00:36:42,268
like it's it's not it's not as i think people idolize it things like that oh for sure and

509
00:36:42,268 --> 00:36:51,748
Especially Nagaland, the last time I was there, I did notice that there's now a concerted effort to keep the environment intact.

510
00:36:51,908 --> 00:36:54,408
So there's areas where you can't cut down trees.

511
00:36:54,928 --> 00:36:58,228
But a lot of the nature has actually been destroyed.

512
00:36:58,648 --> 00:37:02,528
And it's been destroyed just, you know, from economic reasons.

513
00:37:02,988 --> 00:37:08,608
Timber, and you see even nature, like all the birds and animals have sort of disappeared

514
00:37:08,608 --> 00:37:12,308
because there's no concerted effort to say,

515
00:37:12,428 --> 00:37:15,288
hey, we're going to maintain the rainforest.

516
00:37:15,608 --> 00:37:17,848
Because, you know, in that part of the world, there's rainforests.

517
00:37:17,868 --> 00:37:18,428
Yeah, it's lovely.

518
00:37:18,588 --> 00:37:20,828
And a lot of the rainforests are no more.

519
00:37:20,908 --> 00:37:21,908
I trekked all over there.

520
00:37:22,868 --> 00:37:24,688
Yeah, it's amazing.

521
00:37:25,048 --> 00:37:29,228
After we finish speaking, I have got probably 20,000 photos from there.

522
00:37:29,728 --> 00:37:30,408
I'd love to see them.

523
00:37:30,408 --> 00:37:31,268
Quite a few of them are online.

524
00:37:31,888 --> 00:37:35,468
And there is almost certainly pictures of Vangami people, I'm sure,

525
00:37:35,908 --> 00:37:38,528
because I just went from place to place.

526
00:37:38,608 --> 00:37:41,828
And in the end, it became, I got into the shawls.

527
00:37:42,408 --> 00:37:44,368
If anyone doesn't know about the shawls.

528
00:37:44,368 --> 00:37:45,228
The shawls are amazing.

529
00:37:45,388 --> 00:37:46,168
They're all handmade.

530
00:37:46,388 --> 00:37:46,668
Yes.

531
00:37:47,368 --> 00:37:49,028
And so it became this thing.

532
00:37:49,168 --> 00:37:53,768
And once I got into the shawls, I actually ended up just going to tribes to see their shawls.

533
00:37:54,068 --> 00:37:55,428
Because they're just incredible.

534
00:37:55,428 --> 00:37:58,708
And I still have a huge collection of them.

535
00:37:59,488 --> 00:38:02,108
Like I say, I was given this one, this Angami one.

536
00:38:02,188 --> 00:38:03,948
And it's what started it all off.

537
00:38:03,948 --> 00:38:12,608
and um i get you know it's yeah it's um it's just weird to meet someone from there anyway

538
00:38:12,608 --> 00:38:18,348
but so how did you get from nagaland to to to california then what was the is that because

539
00:38:18,348 --> 00:38:26,988
i know actually i there are that kind of there are many more opportunities now aren't there for

540
00:38:26,988 --> 00:38:32,848
around you know for youngsters from places like that to end up getting getting to america i've

541
00:38:32,848 --> 00:38:35,828
I've run into like, I used to go to Mongolia quite a lot.

542
00:38:36,188 --> 00:38:40,428
You see Mongolians from random places coming to university,

543
00:38:40,768 --> 00:38:43,328
not from wealthy families necessarily or anything like that.

544
00:38:43,368 --> 00:38:46,768
It's just the government do a scheme, get you here, do that.

545
00:38:47,488 --> 00:38:48,888
How did you end up in California?

546
00:38:49,688 --> 00:38:53,148
So my path was very different from, I would say,

547
00:38:53,148 --> 00:38:57,148
the traditional path of someone born there would take.

548
00:38:58,988 --> 00:39:01,108
So my path was different,

549
00:39:01,108 --> 00:39:08,848
And though I think what I've noticed is that, yes, probably today, there's probably a community of Nagas in the U.S.

550
00:39:09,208 --> 00:39:13,928
And predominantly, they probably have moved there through the church.

551
00:39:14,688 --> 00:39:21,868
There's probably a few churches that, because, you know, it's a Christian Baptist religion.

552
00:39:21,868 --> 00:39:25,508
So I think through the churches has probably been some migration.

553
00:39:26,328 --> 00:39:27,948
And I'm on these emails.

554
00:39:28,808 --> 00:39:30,668
I think I joined them a long time ago.

555
00:39:30,668 --> 00:39:35,388
there's a Naga Foundation and I they do scholarships and stuff like that so so

556
00:39:35,388 --> 00:39:41,788
probably through those channels though I think it's still very rare and so my

557
00:39:41,788 --> 00:39:47,888
path was different because even though I was born in Nagaland my father was not

558
00:39:47,888 --> 00:39:53,668
from Nagaland he's from he's from Rajasthan mainstream India and he worked

559
00:39:53,668 --> 00:39:59,228
for the government he's a journalist no no he was a government official he

560
00:39:59,228 --> 00:40:01,488
I thought he said mainstream media no no he was

561
00:40:02,668 --> 00:40:08,208
Like mainstream India. Oh, okay, right like he was from the mainstream India and he was posted to Nagaland

562
00:40:08,208 --> 00:40:10,208
He was posted he actually chose

563
00:40:10,468 --> 00:40:16,548
to to go there because probably like you he was very adventurous, you know at 20

564
00:40:16,548 --> 00:40:23,228
He became he converted to communism and he wanted to sort of he was one of those like very interesting characters and

565
00:40:23,228 --> 00:40:27,408
and a free thinker wanted to do things by himself.

566
00:40:27,688 --> 00:40:34,708
And so he chose to go to the most dangerous and new places in India.

567
00:40:35,068 --> 00:40:36,428
And so he chose to go there.

568
00:40:36,468 --> 00:40:37,408
Nobody wanted to go there.

569
00:40:37,748 --> 00:40:37,868
Yeah.

570
00:40:38,328 --> 00:40:39,808
I did, sorry to butt in,

571
00:40:39,868 --> 00:40:42,448
I did hang out with a lot of the army out there as well.

572
00:40:42,908 --> 00:40:45,648
Because once or twice there was nowhere to stay

573
00:40:45,648 --> 00:40:48,248
because we were just going, you know, we were going off walking.

574
00:40:48,388 --> 00:40:49,608
We walked into Burma.

575
00:40:49,608 --> 00:40:55,588
we we were there's no there's no like line there's no like borders there and i think we were i've been

576
00:40:55,588 --> 00:41:00,028
into myanmar a few times illegally i don't know whether i should say this but from that side from

577
00:41:00,028 --> 00:41:04,748
the thai side you know like everything was negotiable back there i think it's still the case

578
00:41:04,748 --> 00:41:11,908
now it's it's just it's such a vast piece of forest yes that it's very hard to sort of have

579
00:41:11,908 --> 00:41:20,488
borders and do that. But yeah, so my father was, he was just a very interesting man,

580
00:41:21,148 --> 00:41:29,008
and just very adventurous. So when he got there, he did realize that if he wanted to make any sort

581
00:41:29,008 --> 00:41:35,608
of change, he would have to be accepted into the culture. Because, you know, when he moved there,

582
00:41:35,608 --> 00:41:38,228
I mean, this is like probably in the 60s.

583
00:41:38,468 --> 00:41:38,648
Wow.

584
00:41:38,748 --> 00:41:42,428
So you can imagine, you know, the state of affairs there.

585
00:41:42,608 --> 00:41:46,228
Yeah, I wouldn't have walked around the Cognac territory at that particular time.

586
00:41:46,348 --> 00:41:49,268
I think at that time it was still very much very tribal.

587
00:41:49,648 --> 00:41:49,828
Yeah.

588
00:41:50,108 --> 00:41:51,548
But like very warring.

589
00:41:51,768 --> 00:41:52,088
Yes.

590
00:41:52,548 --> 00:41:52,948
Headhunting.

591
00:41:53,148 --> 00:41:53,528
That's right.

592
00:41:54,228 --> 00:41:55,148
Oh, my God.

593
00:41:55,388 --> 00:41:57,908
I hate to say it, but that is what attracted me there.

594
00:41:58,148 --> 00:41:58,248
Yeah.

595
00:41:58,248 --> 00:42:01,388
I look at some photos of when my dad had moved there.

596
00:42:01,388 --> 00:42:04,628
I mean, he was tribal office.

597
00:42:04,628 --> 00:42:10,948
And so he very soon realized that he needed to get accepted into the culture.

598
00:42:11,268 --> 00:42:14,548
And so he married the daughter of the chief.

599
00:42:15,288 --> 00:42:24,468
And so then he became one of them through the marriage and got accepted into the tribe.

600
00:42:24,948 --> 00:42:30,728
And so hence he was able to then affect change and build trust.

601
00:42:30,728 --> 00:42:33,188
but he was not

602
00:42:33,188 --> 00:42:34,948
he was a vegetarian

603
00:42:34,948 --> 00:42:36,668
and as you know

604
00:42:36,668 --> 00:42:37,788
bad idea

605
00:42:37,788 --> 00:42:39,048
it's very difficult

606
00:42:39,048 --> 00:42:41,488
they take meat eating to the next level

607
00:42:41,488 --> 00:42:42,348
Rajasthan

608
00:42:42,348 --> 00:42:45,928
but Rajasthanis aren't traditionally vegetarians

609
00:42:45,928 --> 00:42:49,508
I think Rajasthanis are generally vegetarians

610
00:42:49,508 --> 00:42:50,848
but he was a Hindu

611
00:42:50,848 --> 00:42:53,788
didn't eat meat

612
00:42:53,788 --> 00:42:57,548
and the culture that he got accepted into

613
00:42:57,548 --> 00:42:58,328
heavy

614
00:42:58,328 --> 00:43:00,028
he must have eaten meat though

615
00:43:00,028 --> 00:43:01,108
Especially at their wedding.

616
00:43:01,228 --> 00:43:01,488
Jesus.

617
00:43:01,988 --> 00:43:02,948
Yeah, maybe.

618
00:43:03,868 --> 00:43:06,328
There's no way he didn't eat a piece of meat at their wedding.

619
00:43:07,148 --> 00:43:07,428
Yeah.

620
00:43:08,748 --> 00:43:16,108
I mean, I can't imagine them having a vegetarian restaurant or something like that.

621
00:43:16,308 --> 00:43:18,008
They probably do in Shillong now.

622
00:43:19,028 --> 00:43:19,848
Because it's...

623
00:43:19,848 --> 00:43:20,428
But anyway, yeah.

624
00:43:20,548 --> 00:43:21,048
Come on, carry on.

625
00:43:21,208 --> 00:43:22,108
I'm going to keep butting in.

626
00:43:22,828 --> 00:43:25,188
Though, you know, the food is actually very interesting there.

627
00:43:25,308 --> 00:43:28,388
When I was there last, I mean, the types of rice that grow there,

628
00:43:28,388 --> 00:43:35,348
all the different black rice brown rice wild rice it just grows there it's it's fascinating and and

629
00:43:35,348 --> 00:43:42,628
i think the quality of the produce is actually very high high quality of produce stuff that grows

630
00:43:42,628 --> 00:43:48,388
there up in the altitude it kind of reminds me of a little bit of like peru um you know when you go

631
00:43:48,388 --> 00:43:53,748
to the sacred valley and the corn that comes from there well the in yeah i mean the the british set

632
00:43:53,748 --> 00:43:55,768
set up a lot of tea plantations around there as well,

633
00:43:55,848 --> 00:43:56,448
like Shillong.

634
00:43:57,008 --> 00:43:58,188
Very nice environment.

635
00:43:58,328 --> 00:44:03,128
I mean, Shillong's, you know, like weather is just perfect.

636
00:44:03,568 --> 00:44:05,948
You know, it's like a lot of like Darjeeling.

637
00:44:06,208 --> 00:44:09,528
It's the same, same kind of, the same altitude.

638
00:44:11,108 --> 00:44:14,648
Honestly, the North East Front Estates are so fascinating.

639
00:44:15,668 --> 00:44:16,588
Geographically, everything.

640
00:44:16,588 --> 00:44:19,868
Like the fact that Meghalaya is the rainiest place in the world.

641
00:44:20,228 --> 00:44:23,188
And that's the reason why Bangladesh is always so flooded

642
00:44:23,188 --> 00:44:29,048
because it all goes down yeah and the weather hits the himalayas up in the north can't get past

643
00:44:29,048 --> 00:44:36,308
rains comes down megalaya into bangladesh you can understand so much about about um about just

644
00:44:36,308 --> 00:44:42,048
everything by looking there i you know i went to river i there's a faint the biggest river island

645
00:44:42,048 --> 00:44:47,948
in the world there as well in in assam along the big river that's right brahma is the brahmaputra

646
00:44:47,948 --> 00:44:52,888
yeah and it goes which and you can follow that all the way up into the himalayas as well it's just

647
00:44:52,888 --> 00:44:59,828
so diverse well it's becoming that region is becoming a lot more geopolitically strategic

648
00:44:59,828 --> 00:45:06,428
in the sense that you know the one belt one road initiative plus india is trying to connect the

649
00:45:06,428 --> 00:45:13,448
roads down to to thailand or down to you know to malaysia well also china claim aranachal predict

650
00:45:13,448 --> 00:45:18,388
that's right that's a contagious and there's i went we would we the only place we never got to

651
00:45:18,388 --> 00:45:22,448
where we tried to get up to the border there you know when you go straight to hit the chinese border

652
00:45:22,448 --> 00:45:27,908
and the the army kept saying you can't come you can't come because there's proper skirmishes there

653
00:45:27,908 --> 00:45:35,568
all the time yeah but there's a tribe that i really wanted to visit up there um that they do

654
00:45:35,568 --> 00:45:41,628
oh that's it they they they put the things in their noses like it's insane they these big plates

655
00:45:41,628 --> 00:45:45,808
well i can't remember what they're called i can't remember what they're called but but that was the

656
00:45:45,808 --> 00:45:49,368
only place that i wanted to go that i couldn't get anyway i keep butting in sorry i love the place

657
00:45:49,368 --> 00:45:53,968
you can you can tell okay I could talk about that area for so long so you you

658
00:45:53,968 --> 00:46:02,608
got to oh yeah so my path my path was not the typical path because because of

659
00:46:02,608 --> 00:46:09,888
my father's I guess networks and connections and and his his ability to

660
00:46:09,888 --> 00:46:17,708
and his him being an outsider he sent us off he didn't want us to like me and my

661
00:46:17,708 --> 00:46:23,168
siblings he didn't want us to grow up in in Nagaland because it was dangerous I

662
00:46:23,168 --> 00:46:29,228
mean for him it was a very dangerous situation because he was one of the

663
00:46:29,228 --> 00:46:35,228
first outsiders coming in and and essentially now dictating how things

664
00:46:35,228 --> 00:46:41,888
should be done and the Indians weren't very well yeah so even though he was he

665
00:46:41,888 --> 00:46:46,928
he was embraced by the culture and he married into the culture that was not

666
00:46:46,928 --> 00:46:52,988
sufficient so so it was a very dangerous place for for the for the

667
00:46:52,988 --> 00:46:57,068
children can I ask a quick question do you look any Indian I can't really make

668
00:46:57,068 --> 00:47:02,228
it out you definitely look more Asian than Indian but did you according to your

669
00:47:02,228 --> 00:47:06,968
friends back in Nagaland would they obviously recognize that you're not that

670
00:47:06,968 --> 00:47:15,868
your dad was from register probably I mean I think they see me as mixed and so

671
00:47:15,868 --> 00:47:24,328
if you look at my siblings my my two brothers and my sister are very much they look naga like if

672
00:47:24,328 --> 00:47:31,048
they just look 100% naga me I look maybe a bit mixed because I actually have a beard which nagas

673
00:47:31,048 --> 00:47:38,868
don't have facial hair that's right and so pretty bad beards it's true isn't it it's true remember

674
00:47:38,868 --> 00:47:45,428
that so the facial hair is is is probably sets me a little bit but but I I think I would probably

675
00:47:45,428 --> 00:47:53,508
be embraced as as a naga just because my mother is a gami and and the tribe is well known um but

676
00:47:53,508 --> 00:48:00,628
yeah so so my dad sent us off to an international boarding school and didn't want us to be

677
00:48:00,628 --> 00:48:09,188
raised in that environment so we we left very very early on wow and you said we'll get on to

678
00:48:09,188 --> 00:48:14,968
some free cities to content in a minute but but so do so you reckon there's a naga community in

679
00:48:14,968 --> 00:48:20,328
california is that right i think uh i don't think it's california i think it's somewhere in either

680
00:48:20,328 --> 00:48:27,788
texas all right or uh and it's a church that'll be a church it's i think it's um some pastors i

681
00:48:27,788 --> 00:48:34,568
think naga pastors sort of immigrated to the u.s and then sort of set up this this community you

682
00:48:34,568 --> 00:48:40,748
asked me about my opinion on christianity what's yours what's yours i i it's probably similar to

683
00:48:40,748 --> 00:48:46,048
yours i mean historically you look at around the world the tribes have always been very easy to

684
00:48:46,048 --> 00:48:53,808
convert to to christianity whether it's in south america or or anywhere else in the world um and

685
00:48:53,808 --> 00:48:57,748
and i think you're right i think they're a lot more accepting it's interesting though

686
00:48:57,748 --> 00:49:01,708
because they, it does depend on the temperament of the tribe

687
00:49:01,708 --> 00:49:17,116
and Asian tribes as in Southeast Asians are so soft and welcoming it too it too easy because a lot of tribes do do do reject you know like and I say the cognacs are a bit more like that

688
00:49:17,116 --> 00:49:21,656
mind you the cognacs they're also religious as well because I went to church there you know like

689
00:49:21,656 --> 00:49:25,256
when you go and live there you have to do all that stuff you have to go to church and stuff

690
00:49:25,256 --> 00:49:32,476
but there are lots of cases around the world of of missionaries being told to f off basically but

691
00:49:32,476 --> 00:49:36,696
It's just in Southeast Asia, you can just see why that doesn't happen.

692
00:49:37,096 --> 00:49:41,056
Because you're such a welcoming group of people.

693
00:49:41,056 --> 00:49:46,296
You're obviously going to welcome this thing in and then it's going to, you know, have its effect.

694
00:49:46,516 --> 00:49:51,876
Well, there's probably much deeper reasons, which I honestly, I don't really know.

695
00:49:52,396 --> 00:49:57,696
But I wonder why is it that there's got to be some other reasons.

696
00:49:57,696 --> 00:50:03,996
And I think there might be simpler reasons such as maybe they do need a bit of structure.

697
00:50:04,816 --> 00:50:16,556
You know, when you're very tribal and there's a lot of infighting, maybe coming under one umbrella creates a bit of structure, which maybe creates a bit of stability.

698
00:50:17,136 --> 00:50:18,456
Maybe there's an element of that.

699
00:50:18,616 --> 00:50:27,536
Maybe there's an element of a community cohesion that maybe the church brings that might be seen as a positive thing.

700
00:50:27,696 --> 00:50:28,936
Maybe it could be the songs.

701
00:50:29,096 --> 00:50:30,816
Maybe it could be, you know, it could be the singing.

702
00:50:31,136 --> 00:50:31,776
And who knows?

703
00:50:31,956 --> 00:50:35,196
There could be some very simpler elements.

704
00:50:35,696 --> 00:50:41,056
Thing is, though, my impression of those missionaries 100 years ago,

705
00:50:41,116 --> 00:50:43,176
they were very fire and brimstone, weren't they?

706
00:50:44,036 --> 00:50:48,596
It wouldn't cut it now in a lot of places to go in there.

707
00:50:48,776 --> 00:50:53,656
And, you know, like if you don't do what you'll go to hell and all this kind of stuff, you know.

708
00:50:53,656 --> 00:50:56,836
But that was definitely the modus operandi in a lot of places.

709
00:50:56,836 --> 00:51:02,016
You see in Africa as well that that whole kind of, you know, that you'll be damned if you don't do.

710
00:51:02,636 --> 00:51:03,616
You know, that's true.

711
00:51:03,696 --> 00:51:09,336
And I think that's probably what's happened in a lot of parts of the world through the Inquisitions and all of that.

712
00:51:09,436 --> 00:51:13,176
But I think in Nagaland, I think it was probably the other way around.

713
00:51:13,176 --> 00:51:19,576
I think the missionaries who went there were very loving and giving and caring.

714
00:51:19,576 --> 00:51:22,896
and I think that's probably why they got accepted in,

715
00:51:23,116 --> 00:51:26,836
because they were providing love.

716
00:51:28,036 --> 00:51:29,716
I don't think it was coercion,

717
00:51:30,296 --> 00:51:33,196
at least from what I've seen, at least in Nagaland.

718
00:51:33,896 --> 00:51:36,596
South America, I think, probably a different story.

719
00:51:37,736 --> 00:51:41,376
But I think in Nagaland, say 100 years ago, 150 years ago,

720
00:51:41,396 --> 00:51:43,436
that's sort of when the missionaries started going there.

721
00:51:43,876 --> 00:51:46,036
I think they brought a lot of love and care

722
00:51:46,036 --> 00:51:48,036
and an outsider's perspective.

723
00:51:48,036 --> 00:51:50,456
Imagine going in there 150 years ago.

724
00:51:50,616 --> 00:51:51,016
Jesus.

725
00:51:51,016 --> 00:51:51,816
I would have loved you.

726
00:51:52,356 --> 00:51:53,036
Yeah, you would.

727
00:51:53,256 --> 00:51:54,936
I would have been petrified.

728
00:51:55,096 --> 00:52:01,296
I mean, I mean, it's, you know, like when I was there, you could get trucks around and you could move around.

729
00:52:01,476 --> 00:52:04,216
But imagine walking everywhere.

730
00:52:04,936 --> 00:52:10,376
And I mean, you've got to negotiate boundaries everywhere you go.

731
00:52:11,016 --> 00:52:13,776
You can't just walk anywhere and go on to this place.

732
00:52:13,896 --> 00:52:14,556
You know, there's good.

733
00:52:14,836 --> 00:52:16,256
And where are you going to find your fixes?

734
00:52:16,256 --> 00:52:17,836
where are you going to find the people to help you?

735
00:52:17,876 --> 00:52:20,476
Because you can't take this guy into that place.

736
00:52:20,616 --> 00:52:23,596
You've got to find someone he knows to then, you know,

737
00:52:23,676 --> 00:52:26,456
and, you know, walking everywhere even.

738
00:52:27,676 --> 00:52:30,876
I'm fascinated by places where you have to walk everywhere.

739
00:52:31,156 --> 00:52:32,956
I love places without roads.

740
00:52:33,256 --> 00:52:35,076
There's very few places like that now.

741
00:52:35,156 --> 00:52:37,116
But 20 years ago, there were way more,

742
00:52:37,476 --> 00:52:40,176
especially up in the Himalayas and around those places.

743
00:52:41,076 --> 00:52:41,916
Bhutan, the same.

744
00:52:41,996 --> 00:52:45,396
Sometimes in Bhutan, we walked 10 or 12 days to go to places, you know.

745
00:52:45,396 --> 00:52:52,056
and yeah that is what used to drive me to all those places because as soon as a car as soon

746
00:52:52,056 --> 00:52:59,616
as a road comes um everything changes very very quickly within two or three years structures change

747
00:52:59,616 --> 00:53:04,036
and and that i'm not saying that's a bad thing at all i think it's not at all i think i had a very

748
00:53:04,036 --> 00:53:11,076
privileged eye to be able to come you know come from my extreme luxurious life to then go and

749
00:53:11,076 --> 00:53:17,256
sort of poke my my sort of nose into a different world but you know the roads that that's your i

750
00:53:17,256 --> 00:53:20,876
think you're right it's the roads that's the first thing that comes in well maybe the first thing is

751
00:53:20,876 --> 00:53:27,356
the television and then the roads but you know in nagaland the roads are still there's main roads

752
00:53:27,356 --> 00:53:32,536
that sort of connect the highways but most of nagaland is still there's it's it's a walking

753
00:53:32,536 --> 00:53:39,996
culture there's a lot of villages all around i would say most of nagaland probably doesn't have

754
00:53:39,996 --> 00:53:47,116
highways and it's it's dirt roads or really bat-shaped roads well it's a it's a frontier

755
00:53:47,116 --> 00:53:53,876
isn't it it's the edge of india and the only reason this this is my experience because i

756
00:53:53,876 --> 00:53:59,276
traveled all around india for like a couple of years the only reason that they maintain roads

757
00:53:59,276 --> 00:54:07,996
is for military reasons on the borders and that border the border with nagaland and myanmar i

758
00:54:07,996 --> 00:54:11,536
mean it's the edge of Myanmar as well it's like it's kind of like the same in

759
00:54:11,536 --> 00:54:15,076
Myanmar there's nothing there except forest on that edge and then on the

760
00:54:15,076 --> 00:54:18,316
Nagaland edge there's nothing which is why you can walk to Myanmar very easily

761
00:54:18,316 --> 00:54:21,976
then in fact a lot of the tribes live in both countries that's right yeah that's

762
00:54:21,976 --> 00:54:29,116
right well I think the tribes like let's say the Angami tribes I think they were

763
00:54:29,116 --> 00:54:39,016
really part of the Burmese diaspora or the Burmese geographical I guess

764
00:54:39,016 --> 00:54:43,396
structure for for a very long time and they kind of were left to their own

765
00:54:43,396 --> 00:54:47,236
devices for a very long time they were just it was such a remote part of the

766
00:54:47,236 --> 00:54:54,116
world they were just sort of left to their own setup and it reminds me of you

767
00:54:54,116 --> 00:55:00,076
know the tribal uh governance system it's actually very interesting because the tribes sort of manage

768
00:55:00,076 --> 00:55:07,596
themselves and it's almost sort of like the greek systems back in the day where each sort of group

769
00:55:07,596 --> 00:55:15,516
kind of manages themselves and um in a way it's still kind of like that and in a way it kind of

770
00:55:15,516 --> 00:55:23,456
works yeah i mean i i think it actually does i i think i went to a lot of meetings and a lot of

771
00:55:23,456 --> 00:55:30,296
circles of people discussing stuff and there's obviously a great importance put on resolving

772
00:55:30,296 --> 00:55:36,816
issues you know it's the same you see the same thing in tribal societies all around the world

773
00:55:36,816 --> 00:55:43,536
maintaining the tribe is really important and the smaller it is the more important it is to bring it

774
00:55:43,536 --> 00:55:50,396
bring things out you know to have things out via normally an adjudicator and in tribal structure

775
00:55:50,396 --> 00:55:55,356
it's often you know there's there's a there's a hierarchy of people that you can turn to to sort

776
00:55:55,356 --> 00:56:02,576
of have your thing resolved and stuff but um i i agree i i agree you could look at it easily as a

777
00:56:02,576 --> 00:56:09,596
decentralized system of governance right if you took the whole of that area and um people say yeah

778
00:56:09,596 --> 00:56:15,996
but they're warring and and this and the other and it's like yeah but what's worse to like like

779
00:56:15,996 --> 00:56:21,576
take the state of the world if you if the world devolved into lots of tiny city states and you

780
00:56:21,576 --> 00:56:26,716
know there'd be a lot of fighting because there's more of them but i would say that's better than

781
00:56:26,716 --> 00:56:33,576
russia and america fighting like if you you get small you get small conflicts but in in the

782
00:56:33,576 --> 00:56:38,616
centralized version when you get two massive conflicts you get complete annihilation so

783
00:56:38,616 --> 00:56:45,816
actually probably the decentralized one on paper at least is the better more preferable way of of

784
00:56:45,816 --> 00:56:50,876
working. I don't know. It's a theory. Obviously, it fits in with the theory of like free cities and

785
00:56:50,876 --> 00:56:55,436
city states and this kind of stuff as well. That's right. Yeah, it is. It is. I mean, it is a theory

786
00:56:55,436 --> 00:57:02,036
and there's a lot of truth to it, though on the other side. And this is probably the story of

787
00:57:02,036 --> 00:57:12,676
China, because China was this small kingdoms and what propelled China to become a modern,

788
00:57:12,676 --> 00:57:18,116
wealthier nation was the fact that someone brutally was able to put it under

789
00:57:18,116 --> 00:57:25,516
one centralized leadership. And without that, there's no way China would have risen,

790
00:57:26,296 --> 00:57:31,876
at least from a modern perspective and an economic perspective. So I guess there's

791
00:57:31,876 --> 00:57:38,436
truths to both. But what I see interesting with the free cities concept is,

792
00:57:38,436 --> 00:57:48,156
maybe the direction is you centralize and become wealthy and then you decentralize.

793
00:57:48,156 --> 00:57:52,596
I've just written that down. That came to me as you were speaking. It's a function of the

794
00:57:52,596 --> 00:57:57,056
timeline you're on. That's right. I think you're right. Once your standard of living reaches a

795
00:57:57,056 --> 00:58:03,896
certain point, decentralization makes more sense than, than, you know, like then trying it right

796
00:58:03,896 --> 00:58:11,876
from the word go. Yeah. And you can see the contrast between, say, China and India. Because

797
00:58:11,876 --> 00:58:18,536
in a way, India is still, in a way, a decentralized system, because they're a federalist system. And

798
00:58:18,536 --> 00:58:21,756
so there's all these different states, and they have their own cabinets, and they have their own

799
00:58:21,756 --> 00:58:28,016
governance, and, you know, all the states have to vote on stuff. So it is, in a way, similar to an

800
00:58:28,016 --> 00:58:32,816
American system, a federalist system, which is a decentralized system, even though they're the

801
00:58:32,816 --> 00:58:42,116
central authority and you know it's very hard to get stuff done in in in that sort of system

802
00:58:42,116 --> 00:58:48,656
unless you pay unless you pay them enough right I mean that causes corruption though I mean things

803
00:58:48,656 --> 00:58:54,176
are changing though China was able to propel because they were able to bring it under one

804
00:58:54,176 --> 00:59:00,356
centralized system will that change down the road do they become more authoritarian or do then once

805
00:59:00,356 --> 00:59:04,476
once they reach a certain economic level,

806
00:59:05,016 --> 00:59:09,016
do they then decide to all sort of decentralize?

807
00:59:09,516 --> 00:59:10,196
It's possible.

808
00:59:10,416 --> 00:59:12,816
The other thing to obviously mention about China

809
00:59:12,816 --> 00:59:20,016
is when China began the great change,

810
00:59:20,456 --> 00:59:23,196
they used special economic zones to do that.

811
00:59:24,076 --> 00:59:29,616
They couldn't roll out a free market version of capitalism

812
00:59:29,616 --> 00:59:32,996
or sort of a more free market way of doing things.

813
00:59:33,056 --> 00:59:34,456
They couldn't roll it out nationwide.

814
00:59:34,716 --> 00:59:39,076
So they started for special economic zones, Shenzhen, Zhuhai.

815
00:59:39,236 --> 00:59:40,276
I can't remember what they're all called.

816
00:59:40,496 --> 00:59:42,856
And they are now some of the most powerful cities

817
00:59:42,856 --> 00:59:45,836
where they got to try out the free market ideas

818
00:59:45,836 --> 00:59:49,696
before they rolled them out into the rest of the country.

819
00:59:50,256 --> 00:59:52,236
And that can't be underestimated

820
00:59:52,236 --> 00:59:54,356
because that's the history of special economic zones.

821
00:59:54,496 --> 00:59:57,636
It's one of the pivotal moments in the history of special economic zones,

822
00:59:57,636 --> 01:00:05,256
which we're now at the iteration of sovereign special economic zones,

823
01:00:05,316 --> 01:00:08,036
which are more like sovereign entities.

824
01:00:08,196 --> 01:00:08,756
That's right.

825
01:00:08,816 --> 01:00:09,516
Like countries.

826
01:00:09,676 --> 01:00:11,016
And that's kind of where we're at now.

827
01:00:11,876 --> 01:00:12,676
That's right.

828
01:00:12,916 --> 01:00:18,176
And I think contrary to maybe mainstream view,

829
01:00:18,956 --> 01:00:22,736
China is a very, very competitive place

830
01:00:22,736 --> 01:00:26,316
in terms of the different cities competing with each other

831
01:00:26,316 --> 01:00:30,496
for the next hub of electric vehicles or whatnot.

832
01:00:30,836 --> 01:00:33,316
And if you're a mayor of a certain province,

833
01:00:33,956 --> 01:00:35,556
I mean, the way you rise up the ranks

834
01:00:35,556 --> 01:00:41,956
is to make sure your geography exceeds and flourishes.

835
01:00:42,516 --> 01:00:44,096
And so the competition, in a way,

836
01:00:45,096 --> 01:00:48,256
it is in a way sort of decentralized in that sense

837
01:00:48,256 --> 01:00:50,116
because all the different mayors

838
01:00:50,116 --> 01:00:51,956
have to then compete with each other

839
01:00:51,956 --> 01:00:56,176
to make the provinces much more,

840
01:00:56,296 --> 01:00:57,956
better than the guy next to them.

841
01:00:58,236 --> 01:00:58,976
It's true.

842
01:00:59,316 --> 01:01:02,536
I mean, I don't know enough about China.

843
01:01:02,896 --> 01:01:04,696
Last time I went to China was a long time ago,

844
01:01:04,776 --> 01:01:06,956
even around that same time I was in Nagaland.

845
01:01:08,316 --> 01:01:09,696
Actually, maybe a bit later than that.

846
01:01:10,436 --> 01:01:13,576
But you do hear a lot of negative stuff about China,

847
01:01:14,036 --> 01:01:17,236
and rightly so in a way, because it's very centralized.

848
01:01:18,196 --> 01:01:20,156
And I think they are basically,

849
01:01:20,156 --> 01:01:25,796
what they're trialing in the form of governance there this sort of social credit systems and all

850
01:01:25,796 --> 01:01:32,536
this kind of stuff is super dystopian for for the western eye but yet we see it happening here as

851
01:01:32,536 --> 01:01:38,336
well i don't really know but you know i i that i i agree with you shouldn't it's not all bad

852
01:01:38,336 --> 01:01:44,156
but i really don't know what the solution is because i don't believe at all in the social

853
01:01:44,156 --> 01:01:49,616
credit system i think that is dystopian but i don't know how you stop it happening because it's

854
01:01:49,616 --> 01:01:55,176
a function of technology and it makes total sense if i was running a country it makes total sense

855
01:01:55,176 --> 01:02:00,156
yeah you know well i i think i don't think anyone really knows how it's going to play out because

856
01:02:00,156 --> 01:02:07,176
it's never been done in history to in that size and that big scope of 1.5 billion people it's never

857
01:02:07,176 --> 01:02:11,896
it's never been done so i don't think anyone really knows because there's no precedence

858
01:02:11,896 --> 01:02:16,696
and that size but you know what's what's interesting um uh what you were saying that

859
01:02:16,696 --> 01:02:22,796
the rise of China in a way was propelled because they set up a few special economic zones and they

860
01:02:22,796 --> 01:02:30,516
were like the test beds which sort of created the know-how to sort of expand that across the country.

861
01:02:31,236 --> 01:02:39,216
Another, this is, I think I recently was listening to one, a German economist who lived in Japan

862
01:02:39,216 --> 01:02:45,256
and had written a book that was a bestseller in Japan. I forget the name, but he was saying the

863
01:02:45,256 --> 01:02:51,336
other reason China really sort of took off during that time was because Mao,

864
01:02:51,336 --> 01:02:59,936
oh no, Deng Xiaoping had gone to Japan and he had asked them, what's your secret to like

865
01:02:59,936 --> 01:03:07,716
all of the stuff? And I think in Japan there is the truth and then there's the truth. And in public

866
01:03:07,716 --> 01:03:14,276
you speak the truth, but behind closed doors you speak the real truth. And behind closed doors,

867
01:03:14,276 --> 01:03:19,956
they basically said it's the banks because they asked him how many banks do you have and he said

868
01:03:19,956 --> 01:03:28,356
we have one bank and the japanese were like how are you going to get credit to to all of these

869
01:03:28,356 --> 01:03:35,556
people through one bank and in japan at the time they had all these banks to distribute credit to

870
01:03:35,556 --> 01:03:41,716
you know to to uh all the businesses and that's when he went back and he set up

871
01:03:43,076 --> 01:03:50,276
hundreds and hundreds of cooperative banks and that really unleashed the credit system

872
01:03:51,156 --> 01:03:55,716
and and that was probably at least you know according to this theory it was probably one of

873
01:03:55,716 --> 01:04:04,596
the more important factors um of of sort of the rise of china which i think is fascinating well

874
01:04:04,596 --> 01:04:09,336
Well, I mean, imagine the undertaking of going from a communist system to a free market system.

875
01:04:09,716 --> 01:04:11,536
They don't have, they don't even have ownership.

876
01:04:12,056 --> 01:04:12,276
That's right.

877
01:04:12,276 --> 01:04:12,936
There's no market.

878
01:04:13,536 --> 01:04:16,276
There's no market for ownership, property, anything.

879
01:04:16,716 --> 01:04:18,256
You can't roll that out.

880
01:04:18,336 --> 01:04:29,196
You can't just collapse a country of that many people and say, right, suddenly you can now, you know, you can now buy houses, you know, buy bits of land and stuff.

881
01:04:29,196 --> 01:04:29,976
Who knows?

882
01:04:29,976 --> 01:04:38,156
You know, you have, I think the, the SEZs were, you know, like, I mean, Shenzhen is, is a power, a global powerhouse.

883
01:04:38,276 --> 01:04:44,036
Hong Kong, you know, is, is, it has, it had to happen that way.

884
01:04:44,216 --> 01:04:50,876
And I, because, and what's so great about that is you can see the same thing now happening with people.

885
01:04:50,876 --> 01:04:53,856
So it's like, you can't roll out.

886
01:04:53,856 --> 01:04:59,616
I mean, Dubai might be a good example, though, because Dubai started its zones a while ago.

887
01:04:59,976 --> 01:05:06,316
And now when you go to Dubai, you feel like the whole place is just embodying these ideas.

888
01:05:08,316 --> 01:05:18,936
And Dubai will probably, I don't know whether, I mean, that's debatable whether they will actually innovate further in the zone.

889
01:05:19,236 --> 01:05:24,296
But certainly you can try out new governance systems now.

890
01:05:24,436 --> 01:05:27,176
It's not so much the economics side.

891
01:05:27,176 --> 01:05:33,056
It's more like, well, why don't we govern in a bit more of a freer way and see if that works?

892
01:05:33,196 --> 01:05:35,116
And then that bleeds out into the world.

893
01:05:35,156 --> 01:05:37,756
I mean, that's the theory that we were all behind, you know.

894
01:05:37,936 --> 01:05:39,716
And I think it's a good theory, though.

895
01:05:39,776 --> 01:05:54,636
I would say being in the conference last few days, one thing I did notice is I think a lot of the free cities movements and people experimenting, a lot of it is being done in the West.

896
01:05:54,636 --> 01:05:57,116
and the conversation is being,

897
01:05:57,916 --> 01:06:01,556
the conversation is really coming from a sort of Western perspective.

898
01:06:02,336 --> 01:06:05,596
Though I think a lot of this stuff is also happening in Asia.

899
01:06:06,016 --> 01:06:09,136
And if you look at the special economic zones

900
01:06:09,136 --> 01:06:11,936
that are popping up in Asia, it's incredible.

901
01:06:12,356 --> 01:06:16,956
So one of the reasons why I moved to Singapore and live there now

902
01:06:16,956 --> 01:06:21,196
is I wanted to see what's happening in Asia by living there

903
01:06:21,196 --> 01:06:25,916
and not from the Wall Street Journal in California.

904
01:06:26,776 --> 01:06:30,956
And now that I live in Singapore and I see it from that perspective,

905
01:06:31,896 --> 01:06:35,436
there's like across the bridge in Malaysia,

906
01:06:35,716 --> 01:06:40,436
there's a lot of very interesting special economic zones that are popping up.

907
01:06:41,116 --> 01:06:42,696
And in Malaysia, for instance,

908
01:06:43,636 --> 01:06:46,736
the political system is that there is a central government,

909
01:06:46,736 --> 01:06:49,156
but there's also kings.

910
01:06:49,156 --> 01:06:54,496
You know, there's a sultans sort of all over Malaysia.

911
01:06:54,776 --> 01:06:57,356
So Malacca sort of has its own sovereignty.

912
01:06:58,076 --> 01:06:59,596
Johor has its own sovereignty.

913
01:06:59,876 --> 01:07:05,836
Penang, which is sort of more Chinese leadership, has its own sovereignty.

914
01:07:06,836 --> 01:07:10,336
And I suppose there are in a way states, but there's rulers.

915
01:07:10,716 --> 01:07:11,756
There's a sultan.

916
01:07:11,756 --> 01:07:21,336
and that system is I think very interesting for the free city sort of concept to to look at because

917
01:07:21,336 --> 01:07:27,316
they're in a way doing it and they don't call it that but I think it is it is and so that's just

918
01:07:27,316 --> 01:07:31,196
Malaysia but then Indonesia there there's some very interesting stuff happening Indonesia

919
01:07:31,196 --> 01:07:38,396
Vietnam is trying a lot of special economic zones in fact one of my favorite cities in Vietnam is

920
01:07:38,396 --> 01:07:47,056
Da Nang. And Da Nang is a newer city that's very modern, and it's a planned city. So if you go to

921
01:07:47,056 --> 01:07:53,176
Hanoi or you go to Saigon, it's crazy, right? Because the infrastructure is, they're building

922
01:07:53,176 --> 01:07:59,156
on top of each other. But in Da Nang, it was an empty place, and then they planned the city.

923
01:07:59,656 --> 01:08:06,116
So the roads are great, the sidewalks are amazing. And that city is flourishing,

924
01:08:06,116 --> 01:08:07,616
because it's a sort of a new city.

925
01:08:08,576 --> 01:08:11,196
And so I think Vietnam is trying a lot of these things.

926
01:08:11,196 --> 01:08:15,636
And those places do make a lot of difference

927
01:08:15,636 --> 01:08:16,936
because they change the needle.

928
01:08:17,196 --> 01:08:19,796
They move the needle from a macro perspective.

929
01:08:22,376 --> 01:08:25,476
I think you're absolutely right.

930
01:08:25,576 --> 01:08:29,616
And I would say that the reason that it's skewed towards the Western eye

931
01:08:29,616 --> 01:08:33,216
is because the movement in its current form has come out of Europe.

932
01:08:33,396 --> 01:08:33,616
Right.

933
01:08:33,616 --> 01:08:41,096
But 100%, you know, like hotspots of the world, you know, Central America is definitely a hotspot.

934
01:08:41,336 --> 01:08:50,016
But also Asia, Southeast Asia, you know, there's a big project going through a feasibility study in Brunei at the moment, which is exactly what you're talking about.

935
01:08:50,416 --> 01:08:59,236
Sultan wanting to do something, you know, sovereigns get to think much longer term than your average democratic system.

936
01:08:59,236 --> 01:09:12,216
And I mean, one of the conclusions that Free Cities people come to in the end is how do you work with the host government and which the longer term the government can think, the better.

937
01:09:12,956 --> 01:09:20,596
Now, the democratic governments, often you run into super problems immediately and Prosper is experiencing that now.

938
01:09:20,876 --> 01:09:23,856
One government loves the SEZs, gives them the go ahead.

939
01:09:23,856 --> 01:09:28,476
The next one comes in, it's far left socialist and they're like, stop stealing our land.

940
01:09:28,476 --> 01:09:29,956
and then close it down.

941
01:09:30,176 --> 01:09:30,276
Right.

942
01:09:30,676 --> 01:09:34,496
But the reason Dubai is so successful.

943
01:09:34,876 --> 01:09:39,156
It's sovereigns saying, right, here's a hundred year plan for this place.

944
01:09:39,636 --> 01:09:42,136
And there's no voting people in and out.

945
01:09:42,256 --> 01:09:43,696
And as long as you've got a good king,

946
01:09:43,736 --> 01:09:46,456
obviously the downside is if you get a bad king or a bad queen,

947
01:09:46,976 --> 01:09:48,476
they can screw a whole country up.

948
01:09:49,016 --> 01:09:52,996
But on the whole, you know, a lot of people don't like the sovereign model.

949
01:09:53,596 --> 01:09:55,676
But if you just look at it on paper,

950
01:09:55,676 --> 01:09:59,456
has massive benefits to creating great countries.

951
01:09:59,576 --> 01:10:01,156
I mean, we're all here trying to work out

952
01:10:01,156 --> 01:10:03,756
what the best version is.

953
01:10:04,876 --> 01:10:07,456
What's that libertarian book?

954
01:10:07,856 --> 01:10:09,916
I think it's called The End of Democracy

955
01:10:09,916 --> 01:10:11,456
or The Death of Democracy.

956
01:10:13,016 --> 01:10:14,076
Not Hopper.

957
01:10:14,436 --> 01:10:15,596
I think it's Hopper.

958
01:10:16,236 --> 01:10:17,656
Democracy, the...

959
01:10:17,656 --> 01:10:19,496
The God that died.

960
01:10:19,836 --> 01:10:20,716
Yeah, the God that failed.

961
01:10:20,876 --> 01:10:21,016
Right.

962
01:10:21,176 --> 01:10:23,196
I mean, I think the central premise of that book

963
01:10:23,196 --> 01:10:31,936
is that sure that sovereigns uh are a better way of managing than democracies um because they could

964
01:10:31,936 --> 01:10:38,476
think much much um it's it's a fascinating book dude if you go into that and i if you go into that

965
01:10:38,476 --> 01:10:46,496
whole it's the ultimate um red pill is is is democracy doesn't work because at the moment

966
01:10:46,496 --> 01:10:50,476
the democratic system is just untouchable.

967
01:10:51,036 --> 01:10:53,716
I mean, you've got nations fighting for democracy.

968
01:10:54,076 --> 01:10:56,876
Let's bring democracy to Iraq.

969
01:10:57,136 --> 01:10:58,176
Let's bring, you know, and it's like,

970
01:10:58,516 --> 01:11:01,816
but there is a growing interest in the notion

971
01:11:01,816 --> 01:11:03,616
that this is a terrible system

972
01:11:03,616 --> 01:11:05,656
because it forces short-term thinking

973
01:11:05,656 --> 01:11:11,256
and it incentivizes politicians to think in the wrong way

974
01:11:11,256 --> 01:11:13,256
because it's like a job

975
01:11:13,256 --> 01:11:15,796
and you're looking four years ahead.

976
01:11:15,796 --> 01:11:28,956
And when you leave these days, and I mean, when you take democracy to extremes and places like you look at places like Mexico, where when when there's a regime change in Mexico, people are getting killed.

977
01:11:29,276 --> 01:11:35,136
The old people, the people who are leaving are just slaughtered sometimes, you know, like in the new lot, just change all the rules.

978
01:11:35,136 --> 01:11:37,636
And Honduras, the same thing happened.

979
01:11:37,736 --> 01:11:39,556
It went from right to left.

980
01:11:40,396 --> 01:11:45,896
And during the right regime, they changed the constitution to allow for ZAs.

981
01:11:45,996 --> 01:11:47,016
This was voted on.

982
01:11:47,096 --> 01:11:48,956
ZAs are the free zones in Honduras.

983
01:11:50,056 --> 01:11:56,536
The other side got in and said no and changed it back unconstitutionally.

984
01:11:56,796 --> 01:11:59,256
So now nothing means anything.

985
01:12:00,036 --> 01:12:01,496
So what happens now?

986
01:12:02,136 --> 01:12:04,236
Then that was the democratic system again.

987
01:12:04,236 --> 01:12:07,116
There was nothing to keep it in check.

988
01:12:08,316 --> 01:12:14,076
And whatever you plan can be overturned in four years if things don't go well.

989
01:12:15,116 --> 01:12:16,716
And I don't know.

990
01:12:17,296 --> 01:12:20,296
Me personally, I don't really know what the answer is.

991
01:12:20,376 --> 01:12:26,656
I love the private city model because I think that has the best incentive model.

992
01:12:27,056 --> 01:12:31,396
That's like you run a small city as a business and you have a contract.

993
01:12:31,536 --> 01:12:33,816
So if I'm the city provider, I have a contract with you.

994
01:12:33,816 --> 01:12:35,476
This is what, these are my responsibilities.

995
01:12:35,756 --> 01:12:36,896
These are your responsibilities.

996
01:12:37,356 --> 01:12:38,376
And then we stick to it.

997
01:12:38,496 --> 01:12:42,656
And we have an outside arbitration outside of that.

998
01:12:42,916 --> 01:12:48,316
That seems fair, good, and, you know, nothing's perfect.

999
01:12:49,096 --> 01:12:51,716
But at least we've got a contract.

1000
01:12:52,036 --> 01:12:54,596
And people will say, yeah, but contracts get broken.

1001
01:12:54,736 --> 01:12:58,676
It's like, well, the Honduras are doing pretty well with their contract at the moment.

1002
01:12:58,756 --> 01:12:59,656
They had a contract.

1003
01:12:59,856 --> 01:13:01,436
They had an international agreement.

1004
01:13:01,436 --> 01:13:05,116
They had an agreement with the government not to shut them down.

1005
01:13:05,676 --> 01:13:08,776
And then they're suing the government and the government are backing down now.

1006
01:13:08,856 --> 01:13:10,216
So that's kind of working.

1007
01:13:10,756 --> 01:13:15,336
So in Honduras, is the ZAs, is that incorporated into the constitution?

1008
01:13:15,336 --> 01:13:18,456
Yeah, that's how they got the permission to do it.

1009
01:13:19,296 --> 01:13:30,916
The vote was to change the constitution to allow these places because they were prior to that, they were kind of unconstitutional because they have a degree of regulatory sovereignty.

1010
01:13:31,436 --> 01:13:52,104
They don have legal sovereignty on you know like murder you know this kind of they have they have regulatory autonomy But that a big deal That is a big deal Yeah That is a big deal So do SEZs often That the thing The difference with Prospera is you can live there and you can get all the benefits

1011
01:13:52,464 --> 01:13:53,864
It's normally just businesses, you know.

1012
01:13:54,004 --> 01:13:56,984
Yeah, but I do agree about the private cities.

1013
01:13:57,344 --> 01:14:03,284
Ironically, I think yesterday there was a lady that did a presentation and she was mentioning Irvine.

1014
01:14:03,284 --> 01:14:10,464
Irvine California is the largest private city in the world and uh the most successful private city

1015
01:14:10,464 --> 01:14:16,024
in the world because it's the size I used to live in Irvine I had no idea really and I lived there

1016
01:14:16,024 --> 01:14:21,404
for two years and Irvine was well it's it's not a place for me because it's very suburban you know

1017
01:14:21,404 --> 01:14:29,684
big roads fences and uh and big homes so it wasn't it wasn't a place that that I particularly liked

1018
01:14:29,684 --> 01:14:30,444
because I was young.

1019
01:14:31,244 --> 01:14:35,384
But I think it is the safest city in America

1020
01:14:35,384 --> 01:14:41,804
and privately built by the Irvine family.

1021
01:14:42,844 --> 01:14:45,264
And a huge success, huge success.

1022
01:14:46,164 --> 01:14:52,724
And I think more of those will definitely pop up.

1023
01:14:53,064 --> 01:14:56,724
Are you familiar with the work that John McKinney is doing?

1024
01:14:57,384 --> 01:14:58,504
Yeah, I think so.

1025
01:14:58,504 --> 01:15:05,224
he's in this conference and and um he's working with a tribal oh yeah yeah yeah i i caught a bit

1026
01:15:05,224 --> 01:15:10,864
a bit of that sorry yeah he had indigenous people in the states that's right the the native the native

1027
01:15:10,864 --> 01:15:17,464
indian tribes have you know sovereignty of their own land and and i think every state has you know

1028
01:15:17,464 --> 01:15:24,224
some differences but he's trying to do sezs with them and i think that's that that's a very

1029
01:15:24,224 --> 01:15:29,904
interesting idea well basically when you're if you if you adhere to these kind of ideas that

1030
01:15:29,904 --> 01:15:35,664
we're talking about you have to look for opportunities and opportunities arise where

1031
01:15:35,664 --> 01:15:43,884
there are already semi-sovereign places who want to improve themselves it and also it it that there

1032
01:15:43,884 --> 01:15:49,984
almost certainly needs to be an obvious improvement like it's very difficult to sell this idea to like

1033
01:15:49,984 --> 01:15:55,604
the italian government for example it's like why why would we but if you go to honduras

1034
01:15:55,604 --> 01:16:00,904
and you say to the government look you know this place which is the most dangerous part of honduras

1035
01:16:00,904 --> 01:16:05,864
cheloma one of the most which is near where morazan is which is that one of the free cities

1036
01:16:05,864 --> 01:16:11,284
out there yeah we can build this thing if you let us run it the way we want to run it

1037
01:16:11,284 --> 01:16:17,244
in a bit more of a free market so we don't have so many regulations we can build what we want

1038
01:16:17,244 --> 01:16:22,644
we can probably change things around and lo and behold bang it works people want to live there

1039
01:16:22,644 --> 01:16:29,464
you know inside the free city there's literally no crime outside the the mafia run run the place

1040
01:16:29,464 --> 01:16:35,084
and and that's good for a country not necessarily if you're a socialist government unfortunately

1041
01:16:35,084 --> 01:16:39,924
because that forces them that's a forcing function on them to be a better government

1042
01:16:39,924 --> 01:16:45,444
which they they don't really want to the the more centrist and right-leaning governments tend to

1043
01:16:45,444 --> 01:16:50,504
appreciate that a bit more because they also see money coming in investment coming in and they take

1044
01:16:50,504 --> 01:16:56,024
a cut of the taxes because you can you know you can choose your own tax rate and stuff but yeah i

1045
01:16:56,024 --> 01:17:03,664
would say in the same as you said earlier in the same sense that china used secs as sandboxes for

1046
01:17:03,664 --> 01:17:12,864
economic um evolution i think free cities are sandboxes for governance evolution and because

1047
01:17:12,864 --> 01:17:19,604
you get to try anything and if you if you trade if you follow that out into the far future hopefully

1048
01:17:19,604 --> 01:17:26,264
you would have this myriad of experiments happening and the and the good ones will win and the bad

1049
01:17:26,264 --> 01:17:31,384
ones will fail and then we'll kind of know what the best governance model is that's right that

1050
01:17:31,384 --> 01:17:36,444
that's the idea that's the idea and i think it's very exciting and and i think there needs to be a

1051
01:17:36,444 --> 01:17:44,984
lot more experimentation done in small and small sandboxes and it's great to see that people are

1052
01:17:44,984 --> 01:17:49,224
you know doing this and and that's that's essentially what you know what i've been doing

1053
01:17:49,224 --> 01:17:54,124
i haven't asked you have i yeah draper nation i don't even know what draper nation is you better

1054
01:17:54,124 --> 01:17:59,104
give me the 101 quickly i i deliberately didn't look it up because i wanted to ask you you but

1055
01:17:59,104 --> 01:18:05,924
tell me about draper nation yeah so essentially draper nation is a venture lab and it's probably

1056
01:18:05,924 --> 01:18:08,764
the world's first governance venture lab.

1057
01:18:09,544 --> 01:18:14,904
And the idea is to just do a lot of experiments in governments,

1058
01:18:15,224 --> 01:18:19,104
in different forms of governance, whether it's digital, physical,

1059
01:18:19,884 --> 01:18:21,104
and just try them.

1060
01:18:21,204 --> 01:18:25,344
Try them, do experiments, and it's a laboratory of experiments.

1061
01:18:25,784 --> 01:18:27,064
How does that work, though?

1062
01:18:27,144 --> 01:18:28,604
First of all, why Draper?

1063
01:18:28,644 --> 01:18:29,804
What does that mean, Draper Nation?

1064
01:18:29,804 --> 01:18:36,244
So are you familiar with a guy named Tim Draper?

1065
01:18:36,524 --> 01:18:36,744
Yes.

1066
01:18:36,944 --> 01:18:37,104
Okay.

1067
01:18:37,264 --> 01:18:43,404
So I've been working with Tim for the last six years.

1068
01:18:43,604 --> 01:18:43,884
Okay.

1069
01:18:44,784 --> 01:18:47,664
Actually, just say who Tim Draper is for people listening.

1070
01:18:47,924 --> 01:18:48,084
Yeah.

1071
01:18:48,144 --> 01:18:53,684
So Tim Draper is an iconic Silicon Valley venture capitalist.

1072
01:18:53,684 --> 01:19:04,284
his family it's it's a three four generation business and I would say some attribute the

1073
01:19:04,284 --> 01:19:13,184
venture capital business to his grandfather sort of starting the business through setting up the

1074
01:19:13,184 --> 01:19:22,564
GPLP structure and and bringing money from New York to the orange orchards of California you know

1075
01:19:22,564 --> 01:19:29,604
in the 50s or 60s and setting up this new asset class or this new investment class called the

1076
01:19:29,604 --> 01:19:38,724
venture capital business because prior to that capital was done through credit

1077
01:19:38,724 --> 01:19:46,964
or through your commercial investment banking formats and the idea of professionalizing

1078
01:19:46,964 --> 01:19:55,744
the money of friends, family, and fools, professionalizing that as an asset class was a new thing.

1079
01:19:56,264 --> 01:20:00,764
So the Draper family is attributed to sort of starting that business.

1080
01:20:01,084 --> 01:20:06,484
So Tim Draper is a third-generation venture capitalist, invested in a lot of well-known,

1081
01:20:06,804 --> 01:20:12,184
successful companies that are very much oriented towards freedom and making the world a lot

1082
01:20:12,184 --> 01:20:14,364
more free.

1083
01:20:14,364 --> 01:20:15,364
So for instance...

1084
01:20:15,364 --> 01:20:16,664
I didn't know that.

1085
01:20:16,964 --> 01:20:23,104
I know Tim Draper is a sort of figure, is a well-known sort of industrial, well-known venture capitalist.

1086
01:20:23,104 --> 01:20:24,404
Well, he's a wild guy.

1087
01:20:25,024 --> 01:20:34,264
If you look into him, he's a very, very wild person in a positive sense, very, very passionate.

1088
01:20:34,804 --> 01:20:43,804
And he thinks outside the box and he invests in things that are very unreasonable today.

1089
01:20:43,804 --> 01:20:51,124
and so for instance you know his i think his first fame to success uh was investing in hotmail

1090
01:20:51,124 --> 01:21:00,704
which uh you know if you remember free email at the time was just it was just an insane concept

1091
01:21:00,704 --> 01:21:05,884
my wife's email address is still hotmail honestly i think a lot of people are like that

1092
01:21:05,884 --> 01:21:13,324
you run into some hotmails here and there you you it ages them for sure you know yeah

1093
01:21:13,324 --> 01:21:15,304
It was the first email account I ever got.

1094
01:21:15,504 --> 01:21:16,424
Yeah, it was the first.

1095
01:21:16,544 --> 01:21:18,704
Well, I think AOL was my first.

1096
01:21:19,044 --> 01:21:20,504
But I had a Hotmail one too.

1097
01:21:20,864 --> 01:21:25,064
But, you know, Hotmail changed the world in the sense it allowed anyone to communicate.

1098
01:21:25,944 --> 01:21:29,024
So that was, I think, his first sort of like big success.

1099
01:21:30,004 --> 01:21:35,544
And then after that, Skype, which was video conferencing.

1100
01:21:35,904 --> 01:21:38,524
Which has just been disbanded.

1101
01:21:38,564 --> 01:21:40,484
We've disbanded with Microsoft.

1102
01:21:40,484 --> 01:21:42,324
I should make a correction on that.

1103
01:21:42,324 --> 01:21:44,684
because the other day, I think it was two episodes ago,

1104
01:21:44,744 --> 01:21:45,804
we talked about this, and I said,

1105
01:21:45,884 --> 01:21:47,024
how could they go out of business?

1106
01:21:47,424 --> 01:21:51,124
But actually, they were consumed by Microsoft in a way.

1107
01:21:51,324 --> 01:21:52,304
It became Teams.

1108
01:21:52,444 --> 01:21:52,804
Right.

1109
01:21:52,944 --> 01:21:55,844
So they didn't really go out of business

1110
01:21:55,844 --> 01:21:58,104
in the sense that they were a terrible business.

1111
01:21:58,104 --> 01:22:00,644
They more got consumed by a bigger entity.

1112
01:22:00,924 --> 01:22:01,284
Oh, yeah.

1113
01:22:01,764 --> 01:22:04,004
I mean, I think it was a positive thing.

1114
01:22:04,144 --> 01:22:06,064
Microsoft took the IP,

1115
01:22:06,504 --> 01:22:11,024
and now a lot more people use Teams because of the size.

1116
01:22:11,024 --> 01:22:18,904
and and uh sort of like to your persuasion uh tim is probably most well known for being one of the

1117
01:22:18,904 --> 01:22:26,304
earlier investors in bitcoin and he did an auction he bought one of the marshall auctions and and

1118
01:22:26,304 --> 01:22:33,044
bought a lot of bitcoins and this is very early on i think in 2011 or 2012 beautiful move and he's

1119
01:22:33,044 --> 01:22:38,144
been he's been a proponent of bitcoin from you know the early days so i think that's in a way

1120
01:22:38,144 --> 01:22:45,744
one of his you know he's known he's very well known for that and uh so i've been you know i i i

1121
01:22:45,744 --> 01:22:52,504
admire him a lot um even though he's a very eccentric wild person i think you need more

1122
01:22:52,504 --> 01:22:58,704
eccentric wild people what do you mean even i like eccentric well that's right yeah you strike

1123
01:22:58,704 --> 01:23:04,444
me as someone who would as well he's a fascinating guy and and i have a lot of respect and trust um

1124
01:23:04,444 --> 01:23:10,604
and so i you know i've been working with him for the last six years and doing all kinds of

1125
01:23:10,604 --> 01:23:17,764
different experiments and um so draper nation is is is a company you know named i guess with his

1126
01:23:17,764 --> 01:23:25,804
his last name uh but yeah it's a company that i have built uh with him but so explain to me how

1127
01:23:25,804 --> 01:23:32,944
you um how you experiment with governance like in a company yeah without actually building a city

1128
01:23:32,944 --> 01:23:34,244
and then governing it or something.

1129
01:23:34,644 --> 01:23:38,064
So where my interest is in exploring

1130
01:23:38,064 --> 01:23:42,804
is not governance models on land,

1131
01:23:43,804 --> 01:23:46,524
not governance models on sea,

1132
01:23:47,364 --> 01:23:50,844
but I'm just very curious to see

1133
01:23:50,844 --> 01:23:55,104
if we can build interesting models in cyberspace.

1134
01:23:56,364 --> 01:24:00,304
And so that's been my sort of interest that I'm exploring.

1135
01:24:00,724 --> 01:24:02,404
And it's a very difficult proposition

1136
01:24:02,404 --> 01:24:05,644
but I feel that's sort of like my calling.

1137
01:24:06,424 --> 01:24:10,704
And so the experiments that I would like to do and am doing

1138
01:24:10,704 --> 01:24:12,984
is very much in cyberspace.

1139
01:24:13,304 --> 01:24:17,444
And just to give you some sort of baseline examples,

1140
01:24:18,564 --> 01:24:21,884
one of the earlier, I think, innovators in digital governance

1141
01:24:21,884 --> 01:24:24,744
was the country of Estonia.

1142
01:24:25,184 --> 01:24:28,444
And Estonia launched this e-residency program,

1143
01:24:28,764 --> 01:24:30,784
which I'm a big proponent of

1144
01:24:30,784 --> 01:24:33,244
and have been involved with them for a very long time.

1145
01:24:34,004 --> 01:24:35,884
And e-residency essentially was,

1146
01:24:36,444 --> 01:24:39,264
okay, we have this physical territory called Estonia.

1147
01:24:40,084 --> 01:24:41,084
Everything's digital.

1148
01:24:41,784 --> 01:24:43,964
How about we open up this infrastructure

1149
01:24:43,964 --> 01:24:46,224
to people who are not from Estonia?

1150
01:24:46,584 --> 01:24:47,984
So anybody from around the world

1151
01:24:47,984 --> 01:24:50,384
could become an e-resident of Estonia,

1152
01:24:50,384 --> 01:24:54,864
have access to government administrative services,

1153
01:24:55,104 --> 01:24:57,224
like setting up companies, paying taxes.

1154
01:24:57,224 --> 01:25:05,744
and it opened up the possibility that you could do a lot of these things digitally.

1155
01:25:06,464 --> 01:25:12,144
So that's sort of like one example of where I think there could be a lot of innovation.

1156
01:25:12,764 --> 01:25:16,044
And just to sort of give you some basic data points,

1157
01:25:17,004 --> 01:25:22,364
like 80% of government services can be done digitally,

1158
01:25:22,364 --> 01:25:24,624
whether it's your pensions, your health care.

1159
01:25:24,624 --> 01:25:28,424
80% can be distributed digitally.

1160
01:25:29,624 --> 01:25:33,724
And so that's a big deal.

1161
01:25:34,484 --> 01:25:38,944
And so then that opens up a country to then provide those services

1162
01:25:38,944 --> 01:25:41,684
to people who are not from that geography.

1163
01:25:42,344 --> 01:25:48,484
So that's sort of like the framework where we're pursuing.

1164
01:25:48,864 --> 01:25:52,624
Did Tim Draper ask you to do this, or did you just say,

1165
01:25:52,624 --> 01:25:59,524
look I'm going to do this and they sort of yeah so prior so prior to Draper Nation I started a

1166
01:25:59,524 --> 01:26:07,324
company and Tim invested and it folded into his ecosystem called the Draper Startup Houses and

1167
01:26:07,324 --> 01:26:14,324
this is where I was building physical free cities around the world at one point we were in 30

1168
01:26:14,324 --> 01:26:21,384
countries where we would go into very adventurous countries and put up buildings and these buildings

1169
01:26:21,384 --> 01:26:29,144
would become small private micro nations and mostly entrepreneurial people startups would come live

1170
01:26:29,704 --> 01:26:34,504
work in these buildings and it was a complete entrepreneurial ecosystem so there would be

1171
01:26:34,504 --> 01:26:40,824
education programs there'd be hackathons that i ran a venture fund we would invest in these companies

1172
01:26:40,824 --> 01:26:47,304
and they would live and work in these buildings and so no degree of sovereignty or anything like

1173
01:26:47,304 --> 01:26:53,424
that no there was it was essentially just a startup house if there was no you

1174
01:26:53,424 --> 01:26:57,744
know it's just place people to live and work together but but in essence in a

1175
01:26:57,744 --> 01:27:05,004
way it was sort of like a college dorm but for startups and so I I did that for

1176
01:27:05,004 --> 01:27:10,764
a very long time and we put up these buildings around the world and so that

1177
01:27:10,764 --> 01:27:16,884
was my first are they still operating there yeah yeah so we went at some point

1178
01:27:16,884 --> 01:27:20,924
We went a bit crazy and put up 30 of these.

1179
01:27:21,024 --> 01:27:21,884
Then we consolidated.

1180
01:27:22,164 --> 01:27:23,004
Did you go to Nagaland?

1181
01:27:23,664 --> 01:27:24,644
No, no.

1182
01:27:25,224 --> 01:27:26,104
But though, you know what?

1183
01:27:26,204 --> 01:27:29,164
Interestingly, that thought has crossed my mind.

1184
01:27:29,264 --> 01:27:29,964
Dude, come on.

1185
01:27:30,024 --> 01:27:30,604
You've got to.

1186
01:27:30,724 --> 01:27:31,284
You've got to.

1187
01:27:31,424 --> 01:27:32,284
Like, why wouldn't you?

1188
01:27:32,604 --> 01:27:36,104
Like, why wouldn't you do it in your homeland?

1189
01:27:36,304 --> 01:27:36,864
This kind of thing.

1190
01:27:36,964 --> 01:27:37,284
You know, like.

1191
01:27:37,644 --> 01:27:38,484
I actually, you know what?

1192
01:27:38,484 --> 01:27:45,184
It's a very interesting thought because one of the, I think, one of the strengths that Nagaland has,

1193
01:27:45,184 --> 01:27:47,924
which is completely under

1194
01:27:47,924 --> 01:27:49,604
capitalized on

1195
01:27:49,604 --> 01:27:51,164
is the fact that

1196
01:27:51,164 --> 01:27:53,504
everyone speaks really good English

1197
01:27:53,504 --> 01:27:54,484
yeah you're right

1198
01:27:54,484 --> 01:27:57,004
the young people they all

1199
01:27:57,004 --> 01:27:59,484
speak amazing English

1200
01:27:59,484 --> 01:28:01,504
and I think that's

1201
01:28:01,504 --> 01:28:03,524
what a great

1202
01:28:03,524 --> 01:28:04,844
skill set that is

1203
01:28:04,844 --> 01:28:07,284
and so you know India

1204
01:28:07,284 --> 01:28:09,204
India forayed into

1205
01:28:09,204 --> 01:28:11,364
commerce through call

1206
01:28:11,364 --> 01:28:13,444
centers right in the 2000s

1207
01:28:13,444 --> 01:28:19,204
and everyone would make fun of Indian call centers just because the language

1208
01:28:19,204 --> 01:28:24,544
and the accent but Nagas actually don't have an Indian accent they they you know

1209
01:28:24,544 --> 01:28:28,444
so they speak very well and they communicate really well I think that's

1210
01:28:28,444 --> 01:28:34,624
that's a skill set that I feel like could be used to build stuff but yeah

1211
01:28:34,624 --> 01:28:41,784
that the thought has crossed my mind talking of digital governance models

1212
01:28:41,784 --> 01:28:48,284
the the most fun and interesting one i've heard of recently which is a guy a guy called ian

1213
01:28:48,284 --> 01:28:56,564
underwood i met in new hampshire a few months ago obviously and interviewed him and he he proposed

1214
01:28:56,564 --> 01:29:05,384
a system and i i'm going to really explain it badly but he was saying like if you look at america

1215
01:29:05,384 --> 01:29:14,564
and you see Democrats voting and, you know, the two sides voting, basically,

1216
01:29:14,784 --> 01:29:16,904
and one of them is always disenfranchised.

1217
01:29:17,224 --> 01:29:23,904
So why don't you create an online system where you can register yourself

1218
01:29:23,904 --> 01:29:29,024
and vote for what you want so that everyone gets what they want?

1219
01:29:29,024 --> 01:29:39,744
So you basically, if you believe in this XYZ, then you incorporate that into your sort of like your kind of online status.

1220
01:29:39,924 --> 01:29:45,464
So you can live amongst each other without disenfranchising each other, if you see what I mean.

1221
01:29:45,584 --> 01:29:47,764
And I've explained it really badly here, but.

1222
01:29:48,204 --> 01:29:49,124
It's interesting.

1223
01:29:49,384 --> 01:29:55,144
I think you may be, are you speaking of like this, I think there's a term for it called liquid democracy.

1224
01:29:56,344 --> 01:29:57,624
That's slightly different.

1225
01:29:57,624 --> 01:29:59,864
No, this is his own little idea.

1226
01:30:00,084 --> 01:30:00,284
Oh, I see.

1227
01:30:00,724 --> 01:30:10,004
But I mean, the point is he was saying, you know, if you look at the voting block of, say, Democrats in America, it's the size of some countries, you know.

1228
01:30:10,204 --> 01:30:10,504
Sure.

1229
01:30:10,704 --> 01:30:10,904
Right.

1230
01:30:10,984 --> 01:30:12,424
So why not treat it as a country?

1231
01:30:12,664 --> 01:30:18,544
So why not say, right, as a Democrat, right, for example, so take two different people.

1232
01:30:18,644 --> 01:30:20,524
One person believes in Social Security.

1233
01:30:20,524 --> 01:30:26,824
So one person believes in, you know, we should give money to pay for people who are less fortunate.

1234
01:30:26,824 --> 01:30:30,264
And the other person's like, no, I'm more of a free market person.

1235
01:30:30,264 --> 01:30:33,084
I think, you know, people should, that shouldn't happen.

1236
01:30:33,464 --> 01:30:36,664
So why shouldn't those two people both get what they want?

1237
01:30:37,144 --> 01:30:40,524
Why should we force, if the Democrats get in,

1238
01:30:40,604 --> 01:30:44,884
why should we force Social Security on the Republicans if they don't believe in it?

1239
01:30:45,124 --> 01:30:47,424
So you could just all live amongst each other.

1240
01:30:47,524 --> 01:30:52,824
And if you're a Democrat, you kind of, you're in the Democrat pool online.

1241
01:30:52,824 --> 01:30:58,724
online so you do pay it but you can't take out if you're if you're then uh if you're on the other

1242
01:30:58,724 --> 01:31:02,804
side and you're not paying you can't take it out if you see what i mean he's trying to solve the

1243
01:31:02,804 --> 01:31:09,444
problem of democracy which basically means that if you lose like you can be disenfranchised as

1244
01:31:09,444 --> 01:31:16,604
49.9 oh no no sorry that's wrong you can be disenfranchised like in the uk at our last election

1245
01:31:16,604 --> 01:31:24,504
I think the government won on 20% of the vote, 20% of the kind of people that live in the country.

1246
01:31:24,944 --> 01:31:27,044
That's a terrible system.

1247
01:31:27,424 --> 01:31:33,624
Well, a representative democracy, which is sort of the democracy that we have in the West.

1248
01:31:34,704 --> 01:31:42,624
I mean, I would say there's certainly question marks whether a representative democracy is the right way to govern.

1249
01:31:42,624 --> 01:31:49,664
because you're essentially now electing a group of people to make all the decisions for you.

1250
01:31:50,464 --> 01:31:55,104
And maybe when you were a small, when you were a small country, maybe that made a lot of sense.

1251
01:31:55,544 --> 01:32:04,304
But now if you have a country of three, four hundred million people and four people now make every single decision for you,

1252
01:32:05,064 --> 01:32:08,604
maybe it's time to change that.

1253
01:32:08,704 --> 01:32:12,344
I mean, I think a lot of people have written about this and this is an interesting topic.

1254
01:32:12,624 --> 01:32:21,464
But I do think that because now we have the ability, because we have technology, everyone has a phone,

1255
01:32:22,344 --> 01:32:28,144
things like voting on individual matters, individual things, it's just a lot easier.

1256
01:32:28,504 --> 01:32:36,024
And so why not have people vote on specific issues that are probably more meaningful for them?

1257
01:32:36,664 --> 01:32:40,564
I guess the UK tried it, I think with Brexit.

1258
01:32:40,564 --> 01:32:43,464
I mean, Brexit was an individual referendum, right?

1259
01:32:43,504 --> 01:32:45,144
It was a one policy referendum.

1260
01:32:45,744 --> 01:32:51,764
Yeah, and I think the pushback on that would be mostly it's none of most people's business.

1261
01:32:52,284 --> 01:32:55,884
Well, like, you know, like, what do you know about?

1262
01:32:55,944 --> 01:32:59,064
What do I know about, like, whether we should leave the EU or not?

1263
01:32:59,124 --> 01:33:02,384
Yeah, I've got a personal opinion on it, but I don't run a country.

1264
01:33:02,504 --> 01:33:03,844
I've got absolutely no idea.

1265
01:33:03,964 --> 01:33:07,304
So I find referendums a little bit stupid.

1266
01:33:07,304 --> 01:33:14,904
it you know like i one of the guys i spoke to uh last on this podcast just yesterday they it's um

1267
01:33:14,904 --> 01:33:21,244
patrick hibbert who's making veritas villages they have a they have a system which is like a

1268
01:33:21,244 --> 01:33:28,524
dow but they have waited they have waited voting so you get so within their community it's not quite

1269
01:33:28,524 --> 01:33:33,244
been implemented yet they're just making it now because they wanted to shift put it onto the

1270
01:33:33,244 --> 01:33:40,084
Bitcoin network. But you say you get 100 votes a year, and you can choose where you put those votes.

1271
01:33:40,084 --> 01:33:45,244
So throughout the year, the kind of homeowners will vote on things like, do we want to build this?

1272
01:33:45,564 --> 01:33:51,884
Are we going to allow chickens? Or roosters? Are we going to? And you can choose how much you vote.

1273
01:33:51,944 --> 01:33:55,384
So you could vote. If you don't care much, you could not even vote. If you care a bit, you could

1274
01:33:55,384 --> 01:34:01,024
vote one of your votes. If it's an issue for you that really matters, you could put 60 votes in,

1275
01:34:01,024 --> 01:34:06,364
you know and that way but then you'd have less votes to vote on other things so you have to

1276
01:34:06,364 --> 01:34:10,684
think about this because at the end of the year you get you reset back to another 100 votes or

1277
01:34:10,684 --> 01:34:16,604
whatever it is you know and i like a system like that a little bit more because the one vote per

1278
01:34:16,604 --> 01:34:23,564
person thing is a i mean i don't i don't even vote i don't think my vote does anything i i'm not

1279
01:34:23,564 --> 01:34:29,644
i'm not under any illusions that me voting matters i think when i when i've ever voted in the past

1280
01:34:29,644 --> 01:34:36,144
it was either cope or just me wanting to make myself feel better right fuck you yeah like you

1281
01:34:36,144 --> 01:34:41,704
know which i did in the referendum right i wanted i i wanted to decentralize everything so i voted

1282
01:34:41,704 --> 01:34:49,244
against you know the eu but what what did you do nothing it's just like i just felt better the next

1283
01:34:49,244 --> 01:34:57,084
day when i saw them squirming in their seats going oh shit we lost you know um but but yeah

1284
01:34:57,084 --> 01:34:59,764
So how do you test them out then?

1285
01:35:00,344 --> 01:35:03,864
Like what's the methodology for testing out something like that?

1286
01:35:03,964 --> 01:35:14,084
Yeah, so our methodology is I kind of see ourselves as an action-oriented think tank in that sense.

1287
01:35:14,164 --> 01:35:18,044
I don't like the word think tank, but we take action.

1288
01:35:18,224 --> 01:35:23,964
So we build things, we put them out in the world, and then we see how it performs, and that's how we learn.

1289
01:35:23,964 --> 01:35:31,864
And so the last experiment we did was we built a digital country.

1290
01:35:32,444 --> 01:35:33,944
And we put it out in the world.

1291
01:35:34,464 --> 01:35:36,164
We did some media campaigns.

1292
01:35:36,724 --> 01:35:41,724
And 100,000 people wanted to be part of this virtual nation.

1293
01:35:43,064 --> 01:35:43,984
No location?

1294
01:35:44,324 --> 01:35:44,984
No location.

1295
01:35:45,464 --> 01:35:46,264
Completely virtual.

1296
01:35:46,864 --> 01:35:47,164
Okay.

1297
01:35:47,324 --> 01:35:52,924
So the idea was, can you build a country with everything in it except the land?

1298
01:35:53,964 --> 01:35:56,504
and so that was the experiment.

1299
01:35:57,384 --> 01:35:59,044
And you got 100,000 sign-ups?

1300
01:35:59,284 --> 01:36:02,044
Yeah, and we issued 50,000 passports.

1301
01:36:03,904 --> 01:36:06,104
People came from every country of the world.

1302
01:36:07,104 --> 01:36:10,864
There were Palestinians in there, there were Israelis in there,

1303
01:36:10,984 --> 01:36:13,344
there were people from every country of the world,

1304
01:36:13,744 --> 01:36:16,524
and we ended up having 2,000 ambassadors

1305
01:36:16,524 --> 01:36:19,864
that set up their own embassies around the world,

1306
01:36:20,104 --> 01:36:21,804
and we did this in a span of six months.

1307
01:36:21,804 --> 01:36:23,464
Did you take it to anywhere?

1308
01:36:24,024 --> 01:36:25,324
Because that's a tour de force.

1309
01:36:25,764 --> 01:36:26,224
It's a tour de force.

1310
01:36:26,224 --> 01:36:28,704
I mean, you know, like digital nomads dream of this.

1311
01:36:28,924 --> 01:36:31,884
Because if they get enough people, they can go to governments and say,

1312
01:36:31,964 --> 01:36:34,984
look, I could potentially bring 5,000 people into your country.

1313
01:36:35,264 --> 01:36:36,064
Give us a good deal.

1314
01:36:36,384 --> 01:36:36,764
That's right.

1315
01:36:37,064 --> 01:36:41,944
And especially the baseline first principles is

1316
01:36:41,944 --> 01:36:46,344
if 80% of government services can be done virtually,

1317
01:36:46,344 --> 01:36:54,964
maybe maybe an entity that's a virtual entity can provide the services so that was the experiment

1318
01:36:54,964 --> 01:37:02,404
and it was a very very interesting experiment 50 000 citizens and um so that draper nation that

1319
01:37:02,404 --> 01:37:07,304
was draper nation okay we called it draper nation but you know we want to do a lot of these experiments

1320
01:37:07,304 --> 01:37:13,384
so there were some some very key takeaways that i had from that experiment the main takeaway

1321
01:37:13,384 --> 01:37:22,044
way for me was, wow, it is actually possible. People are interested in becoming part of these

1322
01:37:22,044 --> 01:37:29,244
types of experiments. And so then hence, I was thinking about, okay, if we were to redo this

1323
01:37:29,244 --> 01:37:38,464
again, how would we do it? And it occurred to me that maybe there are nations that exist today that

1324
01:37:38,464 --> 01:37:44,404
don't have their own land. So for instance, Tibet is a very interesting example, right? Tibet,

1325
01:37:45,004 --> 01:37:51,924
they have history, a language, they used to have land, but they will never have land ever again,

1326
01:37:52,084 --> 01:37:56,564
it's just not possible, but they have a culture. They have a religion, culture, diaspora,

1327
01:37:56,984 --> 01:38:01,824
they have an economy. What if you were to take Tibet and put it on the cloud,

1328
01:38:01,824 --> 01:38:06,024
create a country called Tibet, but there's no land,

1329
01:38:06,024 --> 01:38:09,544
but it's Tibetans, and you have government services

1330
01:38:09,544 --> 01:38:13,524
that you provide to citizens of this e-Tibet.

1331
01:38:13,524 --> 01:38:14,364
And then this-

1332
01:38:14,364 --> 01:38:15,984
Wait a minute, like what?

1333
01:38:16,032 --> 01:38:19,552
Okay, so imagine you go to eattibet.com.

1334
01:38:19,812 --> 01:38:19,912
Yeah.

1335
01:38:20,232 --> 01:38:24,452
And there is healthcare, there's insurance, there's pension,

1336
01:38:24,912 --> 01:38:28,492
there's a central bank that you pay into that pays you.

1337
01:38:29,072 --> 01:38:32,252
There is a voting system, there is licenses,

1338
01:38:32,832 --> 01:38:36,412
home ownership licenses, driving licenses.

1339
01:38:36,432 --> 01:38:39,292
This is similar to what I was talking about, actually.

1340
01:38:40,152 --> 01:38:43,192
So, for example, sorry to butt in, say it was Tibet,

1341
01:38:43,192 --> 01:38:47,392
which is a really good example because Tibetans live all over the place in

1342
01:38:47,392 --> 01:38:52,132
China but also in northern India and stuff so you could vote on something

1343
01:38:52,132 --> 01:38:57,832
like we're all gonna do this and it would span borders that's right and but

1344
01:38:57,832 --> 01:39:02,672
they would all act as a as a whole in a sense that's right so the voting is one

1345
01:39:02,672 --> 01:39:07,332
piece an important piece but I think the more important piece for me is you could

1346
01:39:07,332 --> 01:39:12,532
create an economy for Tibetans that is cross-border you could have digital

1347
01:39:12,532 --> 01:39:18,112
services is my mind is just really because I'm thinking you basically can redefine borders at

1348
01:39:18,112 --> 01:39:23,692
will that's right right so with Draper Nation the people who came in were very like startup people

1349
01:39:23,692 --> 01:39:31,012
because that's the business that we had built before but I feel people like a diaspora like

1350
01:39:31,012 --> 01:39:36,532
the Tibetans would be a very interesting good use case or let's say let's take the Kurds you know

1351
01:39:36,532 --> 01:39:40,952
there's Kurds everywhere they don't have their own land but there's millions of them and so if you

1352
01:39:40,952 --> 01:39:50,312
had a Kurdistan on the cloud, you could potentially build an economy for them. So this is, and the

1353
01:39:50,312 --> 01:39:57,152
other thought that I had was, there are digital nations today, we just don't call them that. So

1354
01:39:57,152 --> 01:40:04,652
for instance, Google could be a country, right? They have employees, they have special perks and

1355
01:40:04,652 --> 01:40:11,952
services that provide to their citizens or their employees. They have embassies around the world.

1356
01:40:12,152 --> 01:40:17,532
They have trade agreements. We just don't call them trade agreements. They have all the components

1357
01:40:17,532 --> 01:40:24,652
of a country, but it's a corporate entity. So a multinational corporation, in a way, is a nation.

1358
01:40:24,812 --> 01:40:26,612
It's probably more powerful as well.

1359
01:40:26,972 --> 01:40:33,532
In some cases, Apple is probably more powerful than most countries in the world,

1360
01:40:33,532 --> 01:40:39,552
in that sense. So I think the idea of a digital country, a digital nation,

1361
01:40:40,432 --> 01:40:47,292
sounds far-fetched, but I have an itch to kind of explore that.

1362
01:40:47,512 --> 01:40:52,672
Is that, I mean, I haven't dived deep into Balaji's stuff, but is that essentially a network

1363
01:40:52,672 --> 01:40:58,332
state or is that different in some way? Is the network state just the kind of community side of

1364
01:40:58,332 --> 01:41:05,492
it? Yeah, so I think there's some parallels, and there's some components of it. Though I think

1365
01:41:05,492 --> 01:41:10,972
Balaji's, by the way, I love what he's doing. And recently, I hosted the whole network state crew

1366
01:41:10,972 --> 01:41:16,252
in our office in Singapore. And I love what they're doing. And but I think Balaji's concept

1367
01:41:16,252 --> 01:41:21,592
is essentially, that it's going to be groups of people who just network together. But I think the

1368
01:41:21,592 --> 01:41:26,132
idea of a digital nations, it takes it to the next level, which where you're saying you can actually

1369
01:41:26,132 --> 01:41:34,892
create a nation that is sits on the cloud but it provides all the basic services that a government

1370
01:41:34,892 --> 01:41:40,372
would do i mean for instance you know that tim tim draper usually says this and i'm still trying

1371
01:41:40,372 --> 01:41:46,772
to understand it but he he says that a government is essentially a form of insurance in some

1372
01:41:46,772 --> 01:41:52,172
capacity it's a form of insurance so as as a british citizen if you're something happens to

1373
01:41:52,172 --> 01:41:59,552
somewhere you can kind of count on your government to well I don't count on my

1374
01:41:59,552 --> 01:42:02,892
government anymore but I know what you're saying right it's a form of

1375
01:42:02,892 --> 01:42:06,912
insurance so one of the experiments that I would like to do and we're sort of

1376
01:42:06,912 --> 01:42:12,892
researching this is you know can we build some sort of an insurance product

1377
01:42:12,892 --> 01:42:19,472
let's call it a universal earned income some sort of insurance product that that

1378
01:42:19,472 --> 01:42:25,232
can be sold and can be bought by by citizens so these are all the

1379
01:42:25,232 --> 01:42:30,212
experiments that we try to do hmm I don't know you probably don't know about

1380
01:42:30,212 --> 01:42:33,932
this but it's an interesting experiment you know what liberal and is yeah yeah

1381
01:42:33,932 --> 01:42:40,712
vit vit oh you met vit right here's my interesting take on the evolution of

1382
01:42:40,712 --> 01:42:44,192
liberal and because liberal and started with the idea of a physical piece of

1383
01:42:44,192 --> 01:42:50,152
of land. Gornushiga it's called. It's that little, you don't need to know why, but it's a bit of

1384
01:42:50,152 --> 01:42:56,812
unclaimed land. And whenever they go to that bit of unclaimed land, they always have hassle

1385
01:42:56,812 --> 01:43:03,212
because it's, it's contentious. So the next thing they did was they bought a bit of land

1386
01:43:03,212 --> 01:43:07,852
in Serbia, which is nearby, which isn't contentious. It's just like buying a property.

1387
01:43:07,852 --> 01:43:13,252
and they used it as a base to be, you know,

1388
01:43:13,292 --> 01:43:14,492
where they could base themselves

1389
01:43:14,492 --> 01:43:17,452
because basing themselves in what they call Liberland

1390
01:43:17,452 --> 01:43:18,532
is just too much hassle

1391
01:43:18,532 --> 01:43:20,132
because the police come on and kick them off

1392
01:43:20,132 --> 01:43:20,752
and all this kind of stuff.

1393
01:43:21,732 --> 01:43:23,452
And then slowly but surely,

1394
01:43:24,292 --> 01:43:26,312
the bit of land that they chose in Serbia,

1395
01:43:26,452 --> 01:43:29,072
this is kind of like lots of Liberlanders are living there.

1396
01:43:29,732 --> 01:43:30,912
You know, like, wait a minute.

1397
01:43:30,912 --> 01:43:35,052
So, and then you get Liberland.

1398
01:43:35,212 --> 01:43:37,112
Liberland is also an online community.

1399
01:43:37,312 --> 01:43:37,532
That's right.

1400
01:43:37,852 --> 01:43:41,532
And you get Liberlanders grouping together in other countries.

1401
01:43:42,392 --> 01:43:45,652
And suddenly you start realising, well, hold a minute.

1402
01:43:46,212 --> 01:43:52,172
The place we have the most hassle is that bit of land that we're trying to sort of like terraform.

1403
01:43:53,292 --> 01:43:55,912
Everywhere else people get left alone, but we're still Liberland.

1404
01:43:56,212 --> 01:43:58,112
We're still Liberlanders, you know.

1405
01:43:59,052 --> 01:44:05,352
And I find that really interesting because, you know, there's some truth in it.

1406
01:44:05,352 --> 01:44:11,372
Sure, they want sovereignty, which is the hardest ask in this business that we're in.

1407
01:44:11,812 --> 01:44:14,352
The hardest ask is complete sovereignty.

1408
01:44:15,672 --> 01:44:17,952
But they've got quite a lot as well.

1409
01:44:18,592 --> 01:44:21,552
And I think I have only just noticed it.

1410
01:44:22,052 --> 01:44:23,432
I've only just started realizing it.

1411
01:44:23,452 --> 01:44:26,132
I think they probably realized it a bit a while ago.

1412
01:44:26,272 --> 01:44:33,472
But I've only just pieced it all together because I went there recently and I was sat in Serbia, surrounded by Liberland, was in this lovely place.

1413
01:44:33,472 --> 01:44:34,952
And I was thinking, this is Liberland.

1414
01:44:34,952 --> 01:44:57,208
Right Right So it very interesting And I not I mean I don know whether you kind of worked out the free cities ecosystem but the network state people aren very well represented here We not really a network state type of thing we more like a kind of bricks and mortar you know governance

1415
01:44:57,208 --> 01:45:04,128
type of we're not we're not massively into the online bit yeah so yesterday i had this reflection

1416
01:45:04,128 --> 01:45:11,508
that because the network state community you know i'm close to them and i live in singapore which is

1417
01:45:11,508 --> 01:45:13,688
the network schools across the street.

1418
01:45:14,368 --> 01:45:17,268
And I recently housed that community in our office.

1419
01:45:17,888 --> 01:45:19,228
And the reflection I had was,

1420
01:45:19,868 --> 01:45:25,728
so the free cities community seems very much more buttoned up

1421
01:45:25,728 --> 01:45:27,088
and more pragmatic, right?

1422
01:45:27,108 --> 01:45:32,028
It's like real estate, free cities, development, SEZs, right?

1423
01:45:32,108 --> 01:45:34,488
Very, you need lawyers, you need bankers,

1424
01:45:34,588 --> 01:45:38,848
like you need some proper buttoned up like endeavors, right?

1425
01:45:39,028 --> 01:45:39,248
Yes.

1426
01:45:39,248 --> 01:45:40,548
That seems like free cities.

1427
01:45:40,548 --> 01:45:58,828
And then network state or network state community, there's a lot more dreamers, you know, young dreamers who want to do pop-up cities and they love the idea of buildings, decentralized nodes and all of that.

1428
01:45:58,828 --> 01:46:07,248
But they're usually a lot more younger, a lot more tech-oriented, software-oriented, and a lot more idealistic.

1429
01:46:08,588 --> 01:46:17,008
But there's a convergence in between where you have a group of people who are a bit of both.

1430
01:46:17,328 --> 01:46:18,928
And I think I fall into that category.

1431
01:46:19,188 --> 01:46:20,028
I would say that as well, yeah.

1432
01:46:20,108 --> 01:46:27,908
And there were some people that I met who were at the Network State Conference, and they were here.

1433
01:46:27,908 --> 01:46:39,148
So I think that middle conversions is actually a very interesting group of people because you have to be a dreamer and do unreasonable things, but you also need to be pragmatic.

1434
01:46:39,868 --> 01:46:47,788
And so I think that that middle group of people are people that I think are going to do some very interesting things.

1435
01:46:48,108 --> 01:46:50,408
Yeah, I think I'd agree with you there.

1436
01:46:50,408 --> 01:46:57,368
I think I've come from the Free Cities end of the pie chart for sure.

1437
01:46:57,368 --> 01:46:58,488
I came in that way.

1438
01:46:59,148 --> 01:47:02,608
Because there's a lot of things that delineate those two groups.

1439
01:47:02,928 --> 01:47:07,068
Even like Bitcoiners are almost exclusively on the FreeCity side.

1440
01:47:07,608 --> 01:47:10,568
And on the other side, you get blockchainers.

1441
01:47:10,888 --> 01:47:11,028
Yeah.

1442
01:47:11,228 --> 01:47:13,828
And they don't mix very well.

1443
01:47:13,968 --> 01:47:15,908
In all honesty, we don't mix very well.

1444
01:47:16,028 --> 01:47:19,808
In fact, I was telling Vit, and he was kind of taken aback.

1445
01:47:19,808 --> 01:47:29,508
One of the learnings I had from launching this digital country was you actually don't want to use the blockchain.

1446
01:47:30,708 --> 01:47:31,768
Great, mate.

1447
01:47:32,188 --> 01:47:33,528
I'm going to clip that.

1448
01:47:33,748 --> 01:47:36,608
Well, because we use the blockchain.

1449
01:47:37,448 --> 01:47:37,988
Which blockchain?

1450
01:47:38,248 --> 01:47:40,808
So we built our passport system.

1451
01:47:41,548 --> 01:47:47,148
We built it on base, on top of base, which is an EVM compatible chain.

1452
01:47:47,148 --> 01:47:54,248
And we use fire blocks for our infrastructure and so we outsource the safety and security to fire blocks

1453
01:47:54,248 --> 01:47:59,528
Which is a great company and we launched this past passport system. It's a nightmare

1454
01:48:00,088 --> 01:48:07,348
So you saying that just a database just use a normal database kind of thing. Yeah, well, I say use Bitcoin for money

1455
01:48:08,068 --> 01:48:11,528
so that is a blockchain but just use Bitcoin for money and for

1456
01:48:12,328 --> 01:48:16,088
transactions like databases for this just use dude

1457
01:48:16,088 --> 01:48:18,008
the Bitcoiners are going to love you.

1458
01:48:18,708 --> 01:48:20,288
We've been saying that for years.

1459
01:48:20,428 --> 01:48:21,288
Yeah, just use Bitcoin.

1460
01:48:21,288 --> 01:48:22,688
You don't need a blockchain for any of this.

1461
01:48:22,688 --> 01:48:23,908
You don't need your own token.

1462
01:48:24,148 --> 01:48:25,488
And I know Vit is launching his own,

1463
01:48:25,568 --> 01:48:27,108
he has his own token, et cetera.

1464
01:48:27,628 --> 01:48:32,228
And I get the desire to do it.

1465
01:48:32,228 --> 01:48:36,908
And it's, so I was surprised to learn

1466
01:48:36,908 --> 01:48:39,388
because I thought, okay, we need our own token.

1467
01:48:39,628 --> 01:48:41,668
We need to have blockchain to power

1468
01:48:41,668 --> 01:48:43,328
like all the transactions.

1469
01:48:43,328 --> 01:48:50,728
but the learnings was very clear you actually don't want to do it and so i was telling i was

1470
01:48:50,728 --> 01:48:55,288
trying to tell that hey like this was my experience you shouldn't use the block you know don't do on

1471
01:48:55,288 --> 01:49:01,608
token just just use a database and use bitcoin for payments but i think he's gone down that road

1472
01:49:01,608 --> 01:49:07,048
i grilled him on it the other day again i always do whenever anyone uses a blockchain i will always

1473
01:49:07,048 --> 01:49:11,848
fight the Bitcoin a corner, which is blockchains are for money.

1474
01:49:12,928 --> 01:49:14,328
You know, that's the use case.

1475
01:49:14,388 --> 01:49:14,708
That's right.

1476
01:49:14,928 --> 01:49:18,868
Don't, because anything else that you do doesn't make sense

1477
01:49:18,868 --> 01:49:21,528
because it exists in the digital world.

1478
01:49:21,528 --> 01:49:26,668
Like if you're using NFTs for your land, it's just an NFT.

1479
01:49:27,248 --> 01:49:29,808
There's no proof that that's connected with the land.

1480
01:49:30,528 --> 01:49:32,308
Those things kind of don't work.

1481
01:49:32,308 --> 01:49:39,348
And also, you know, every blockchain except Bitcoin is attackable quite easily.

1482
01:49:39,488 --> 01:49:43,508
So you're not even getting a kind of foolproof, decentralized way of doing stuff.

1483
01:49:43,728 --> 01:49:46,008
Well, all the tokens, they're sitting on AWS.

1484
01:49:46,528 --> 01:49:46,828
Yes.

1485
01:49:47,248 --> 01:49:48,308
That just is a reality.

1486
01:49:48,468 --> 01:49:50,848
They're sitting in a centralized server, all of them.

1487
01:49:51,888 --> 01:49:57,448
And so it's, you know, after 17 years, I think it's become clear that there's a clear winner

1488
01:49:57,448 --> 01:50:05,668
off the blockchain and there's no second winner it's there's one winner and everything else is

1489
01:50:05,668 --> 01:50:15,408
like so much behind then why not just use that as the money and then the rest is just community

1490
01:50:15,408 --> 01:50:21,568
building i mean that's essentially it you're bringing people together and hopefully you all

1491
01:50:21,568 --> 01:50:28,728
do great fun things together and and have some sort of a some sort of a identity that you can

1492
01:50:28,728 --> 01:50:35,488
all rally towards but essentially that's really it in terms of nation building um so that anyways

1493
01:50:35,488 --> 01:50:41,608
i was trying to explain that to him but well vit vit basically came up with the like he's a he's a

1494
01:50:41,608 --> 01:50:46,088
bitcoin or two i mean they've got a massive bitcoin treasury and they they have every time

1495
01:50:46,088 --> 01:50:52,408
they generate money they put it into the treasury some of it as a bitcoin as well but he he kind of

1496
01:50:52,408 --> 01:50:59,048
had this economic idea to do it this way he you know i mean what what what gives those blockchains

1497
01:50:59,048 --> 01:51:05,328
a bad idea a bad impression is when people just raise using them and and then just sell back into

1498
01:51:05,328 --> 01:51:10,508
the market and they go to zero and that happens thousands and thousands of times it's a game and

1499
01:51:10,508 --> 01:51:15,448
and by the way through our fund we've invested in a lot of you know these projects and and

1500
01:51:15,448 --> 01:51:28,824
Tim Draper has invested in a lot of these projects as well even though Bitcoin is our core principle In the venture business you want to experiment you want to try all the stuff So we have invested

1501
01:51:28,824 --> 01:51:33,384
in all kinds of tokens and all of that. And I think it's fun to sort of see where it goes,

1502
01:51:33,384 --> 01:51:38,664
like give it a chance, like try it out. But I think it's a game. And the game is,

1503
01:51:39,864 --> 01:51:45,464
there's, there's some currents in the world, there's some energies in the world that's pursuing

1504
01:51:45,464 --> 01:51:53,324
tokens and and tokens are a trillion dollar market um outside of bitcoin right so the whole

1505
01:51:53,324 --> 01:52:02,284
token market is 3.5 trillion dollars and a trillion of that is token so there's a lot of money in in

1506
01:52:02,284 --> 01:52:08,964
and so and the game is you put something out people invest in it you sell it back so it's a

1507
01:52:08,964 --> 01:52:14,784
game and i think it's a fun game i actually think it's it's entertainment it's just it's all it is

1508
01:52:14,784 --> 01:52:20,344
entertainment. I don't, I agree with you, but I would say you're quite rare in thinking it's a

1509
01:52:20,344 --> 01:52:27,564
game. I think a lot of people think they're buying. I mean, I remember, you know, the big

1510
01:52:27,564 --> 01:52:34,624
burst of new tokens in 2017, wasn't it? I remember believing a lot of that stuff and thinking,

1511
01:52:34,624 --> 01:52:39,224
you know, yeah, this is, you know, and wanting to know what was new and what was out there.

1512
01:52:39,224 --> 01:52:48,804
But when you watch them all trend to zero in Bitcoin terms after that, and you realize that this is an IPO, this is an IPO process.

1513
01:52:48,964 --> 01:52:53,124
This is how you generate money to start a business.

1514
01:52:53,404 --> 01:52:57,644
So as long as you can convince people the business idea is good, they will buy your token.

1515
01:52:58,204 --> 01:53:00,224
And then you already hold half the supply.

1516
01:53:01,004 --> 01:53:03,084
So then you start selling it back to the market.

1517
01:53:03,924 --> 01:53:06,704
But meanwhile, the whole thing's trending to zero.

1518
01:53:06,704 --> 01:53:10,664
And I think the extreme is meme coins.

1519
01:53:11,824 --> 01:53:14,184
It's like, can I get in and can I get out?

1520
01:53:14,304 --> 01:53:15,024
Right, yeah, maybe.

1521
01:53:15,524 --> 01:53:18,984
But if you're a meme coin trader, you're degenerate, basically, aren't you?

1522
01:53:19,004 --> 01:53:21,264
You're just into gambling and having fun and stuff.

1523
01:53:21,784 --> 01:53:26,564
But the whole way that tokens were marketed was definitely not that.

1524
01:53:27,064 --> 01:53:29,304
It was definitely these things are changing the world.

1525
01:53:29,704 --> 01:53:31,424
Blockchains are going to change the world.

1526
01:53:31,844 --> 01:53:34,104
And a blockchain is changing the world.

1527
01:53:34,164 --> 01:53:35,044
It's the money blockchain.

1528
01:53:35,044 --> 01:53:36,504
It's the Bitcoin blockchain.

1529
01:53:36,704 --> 01:53:37,204
That's right.

1530
01:53:37,484 --> 01:53:42,784
But all the other blockchains are more efficient as just a normal database.

1531
01:53:42,784 --> 01:53:44,744
You don't really need to do it on a blockchain.

1532
01:53:45,144 --> 01:53:49,944
I think maybe in some cases, like a lot of the communities that I visited

1533
01:53:49,944 --> 01:53:53,224
have implemented blockchain voting, for example,

1534
01:53:54,164 --> 01:53:56,644
because you can kind of design it quite easily.

1535
01:53:56,684 --> 01:54:00,684
And it does give you the option to sort of like use a blockchain.

1536
01:54:01,024 --> 01:54:03,244
But you can design the same system.

1537
01:54:04,004 --> 01:54:05,224
No, the voting on the blockchain.

1538
01:54:05,224 --> 01:54:07,804
so we built a system

1539
01:54:07,804 --> 01:54:09,064
that people can vote on the blockchain

1540
01:54:09,064 --> 01:54:11,124
it's just not necessary

1541
01:54:11,124 --> 01:54:13,404
in fact it incurs more complexity

1542
01:54:13,404 --> 01:54:14,664
more costs

1543
01:54:14,664 --> 01:54:16,804
and you don't

1544
01:54:16,804 --> 01:54:18,544
it's just not necessary

1545
01:54:18,544 --> 01:54:21,184
it gets in the way of what you're really trying to do

1546
01:54:21,184 --> 01:54:23,184
and you know

1547
01:54:23,184 --> 01:54:25,244
I think the aha moment for me

1548
01:54:25,244 --> 01:54:27,424
was because I launched

1549
01:54:27,424 --> 01:54:29,444
NFTs, we launched tokens

1550
01:54:29,444 --> 01:54:30,904
we've done all of that

1551
01:54:30,904 --> 01:54:33,164
and because we've done it

1552
01:54:33,164 --> 01:54:34,904
we realized that it is

1553
01:54:34,904 --> 01:54:41,864
it's it's if you look at it as an entertainment value right how is it any more different than

1554
01:54:41,864 --> 01:54:48,324
someone watching netflix or you know binge watching a tv show that they love it's just

1555
01:54:48,324 --> 01:54:55,604
it's entertainment and i i think the newer generation people in this you know who are 17

1556
01:54:55,604 --> 01:55:02,884
16 18 i think they kind of see it as a game and as entertainment and and so the from a perspective

1557
01:55:02,884 --> 01:55:10,724
of entertainment it's kind of it can be fun for the older generation it's not amused yeah what's

1558
01:55:10,724 --> 01:55:17,324
disappointing though is that if you look at the like like take the example of you know meme coins

1559
01:55:17,324 --> 01:55:25,544
yes i see a lot of youngsters like trying their luck on the meme coins but i think that's sad

1560
01:55:25,544 --> 01:55:30,364
because they're being compelled to do that because of the way we live at these days and the systems

1561
01:55:30,364 --> 01:55:35,324
we live under because they could be long-term thinking they could be putting that money into

1562
01:55:35,324 --> 01:55:40,724
bitcoin for the long term and in 20 years they'll they will have achieved something whereas when

1563
01:55:40,724 --> 01:55:46,624
they're meme coining it's like one percent of them that end up up but it's the mindset and the

1564
01:55:46,624 --> 01:55:54,104
mindset is i'm fucked i'm 18 years old i'm fucked i'm gonna try and win a hundred grand on a meme

1565
01:55:54,104 --> 01:56:00,244
coin rather than being able to think long term and going do you know what i'm just gonna bit by

1566
01:56:00,244 --> 01:56:06,484
bit save for the future in a bit of Bitcoin on the side and that's that's a great strategy you know

1567
01:56:06,484 --> 01:56:18,444
well I that that time in history has sailed and you know I always tell my wife and I look at her

1568
01:56:18,444 --> 01:56:26,664
parents and they're the perfect example of what used to work and what doesn't work today with

1569
01:56:26,664 --> 01:56:38,504
what you're saying. So my my wife's parents are Dutch boomers. They had very they worked themselves,

1570
01:56:38,504 --> 01:56:45,384
but nothing fancy they had they owned a campsite in Frigeland and they had their own B&B and very

1571
01:56:45,384 --> 01:56:53,464
basic jobs they did their entire lives. But they were able to buy a house, two houses, they're able

1572
01:56:53,464 --> 01:56:58,504
to save money they're able to sell send their three kids to great universities and they lived

1573
01:56:58,504 --> 01:57:09,784
amazing middle class beautiful lives that is no more and the reality is in today's system

1574
01:57:10,424 --> 01:57:17,304
and it's in china it's in the us it's in europe if you're 18 19 20 coming out of university

1575
01:57:17,304 --> 01:57:26,244
that aspiration is not a reality and that's just the that's just the facts and so when i look at

1576
01:57:26,244 --> 01:57:31,204
the world and i look at the history of the world i don't really see the world as cyclical

1577
01:57:31,204 --> 01:57:40,024
and i don't really see the world as a as a as a linear progression it's ocean currents right

1578
01:57:40,024 --> 01:57:46,544
currents come together they become a tsunami they become a hurricane and there's not much you can do

1579
01:57:46,544 --> 01:58:16,220
when certain currents come together So I think we live in this turbulent currents where the middle class post War Two system is just no more and you can go back So there this is why I think to your point entertainment value of meme coining is it just it a reality of life And it very unfortunate But this is this is a new world I suppose

1580
01:58:16,220 --> 01:58:21,920
yeah I do agree with you Vikram look I'm loving this conversation I could go on for a lot longer

1581
01:58:21,920 --> 01:58:27,160
but as you know I'm on a real tight schedule here we're at one hour 52 minutes and I've got

1582
01:58:27,160 --> 01:58:33,060
eight minutes till the next guy comes in um and I'm sure there's tons of stuff we haven't spoken

1583
01:58:33,060 --> 01:58:38,540
about already because we only just touched on actually what you do after the big Nagaland rant

1584
01:58:38,540 --> 01:58:43,020
but I did enjoy that by the way that's really I've never spoken to anyone about Nagaland I don't

1585
01:58:43,020 --> 01:58:46,420
I think, except in lectures and in presentations and stuff.

1586
01:58:46,520 --> 01:58:48,400
So it's really nice to chat.

1587
01:58:49,240 --> 01:58:51,520
But let's finish on that.

1588
01:58:51,600 --> 01:58:53,620
That was a slightly negative tone.

1589
01:58:53,840 --> 01:58:55,740
I'd like to end on something positive.

1590
01:58:55,880 --> 01:58:59,200
So maybe bring your most positive take to the table.

1591
01:58:59,200 --> 01:59:02,100
And this is why I love what I do,

1592
01:59:02,300 --> 01:59:08,340
because I think we can make a big change in the way the system works.

1593
01:59:09,040 --> 01:59:15,300
And I think the way it's going to, where the needle is going to move is not in trying conventional things.

1594
01:59:15,480 --> 01:59:19,000
I think you're going to have to do experiments that are just far out.

1595
01:59:19,120 --> 01:59:20,540
It's just unreasonable.

1596
01:59:21,120 --> 01:59:26,800
It's the only way to try to build a system where people can have more opportunities.

1597
01:59:26,800 --> 01:59:37,420
And this is why I think the idea of a digital parallel nationhood just creates so much more opportunities for people all around the world

1598
01:59:37,420 --> 01:59:40,880
who can tap into this economy that happens virtually.

1599
01:59:41,180 --> 01:59:46,580
That idea for me is if it works,

1600
01:59:46,920 --> 01:59:49,860
and there's a lot of ifs, it probably won't work.

1601
01:59:49,860 --> 01:59:56,180
But if it does work, it will change the way we organize people in the world.

1602
01:59:56,440 --> 01:59:59,340
I think we change the way economies are built.

1603
02:00:00,100 --> 02:00:06,200
And I think it will change the way people in the future will have opportunities.

1604
02:00:06,200 --> 02:00:12,200
communities so that that's that's why I do you know what I'm doing I mean I would say it already

1605
02:00:12,200 --> 02:00:18,080
has worked I wouldn't say if it works I think online communities are the proof that it works

1606
02:00:18,080 --> 02:00:27,060
every single person I work with currently I met at a in a digital community and sometimes we come

1607
02:00:27,060 --> 02:00:31,580
together sometimes we don't but we're we're we're for all intents and purposes we have a very small

1608
02:00:31,580 --> 02:00:37,340
micronation of people i think that might even be the one of the best applications of the internet

1609
02:00:37,340 --> 02:00:45,000
is connecting people it might be i mean it's worked it's worked on so many levels already even

1610
02:00:45,000 --> 02:00:50,840
dating apps is there you know so many of these applications are about putting human beings

1611
02:00:50,840 --> 02:00:56,820
together that's right um i know we sometimes veer in too much into the digital side but i would say

1612
02:00:56,820 --> 02:01:00,400
that the product's been proven.

1613
02:01:00,940 --> 02:01:01,520
It's happened.

1614
02:01:02,100 --> 02:01:03,540
And I love the idea of,

1615
02:01:04,360 --> 02:01:05,940
I think Tibet's a great idea.

1616
02:01:06,500 --> 02:01:08,080
I don't know how you could ever get everyone

1617
02:01:08,080 --> 02:01:09,340
in Tibet on board with that.

1618
02:01:09,640 --> 02:01:12,560
Well, so we did a hackathon in Bangalore.

1619
02:01:13,100 --> 02:01:14,660
And I wanted to do it in India

1620
02:01:14,660 --> 02:01:16,320
because Dhammashala is in India.

1621
02:01:16,760 --> 02:01:20,720
And you, you know, I put it online to say,

1622
02:01:20,800 --> 02:01:22,760
hey, we're doing a hackathon to build a digital Tibet.

1623
02:01:23,460 --> 02:01:26,760
The amount of engineers that came for the hackathon

1624
02:01:26,760 --> 02:01:28,220
from all over India.

1625
02:01:28,420 --> 02:01:29,180
They just showed up.

1626
02:01:29,580 --> 02:01:32,080
And we did a full weekend hackathon,

1627
02:01:32,360 --> 02:01:35,140
and it's all publicly accessible on GitHub.

1628
02:01:35,460 --> 02:01:37,540
All the code is open source.

1629
02:01:38,340 --> 02:01:40,840
And we have 12 projects.

1630
02:01:41,220 --> 02:01:41,840
And people built.

1631
02:01:41,920 --> 02:01:43,280
People built a central bank.

1632
02:01:43,420 --> 02:01:45,120
People built a jobs portal.

1633
02:01:45,340 --> 02:01:46,760
People built a voting system.

1634
02:01:46,880 --> 02:01:47,800
And it's all there on GitHub.

1635
02:01:47,960 --> 02:01:49,540
So the tools have already been built.

1636
02:01:50,120 --> 02:01:52,000
It's just a matter of not convincing

1637
02:01:52,000 --> 02:01:55,760
some Tibetan authority to say,

1638
02:01:55,760 --> 02:02:02,120
hey let's let's give it your blessing why do you have to why why do you need someone's blessing

1639
02:02:02,120 --> 02:02:07,660
really think about it especially if it's young tibetans i mean there's no there's no there's no

1640
02:02:07,660 --> 02:02:13,680
reason it'd be great to be to get a blessing but in in many ways i feel like the current power

1641
02:02:13,680 --> 02:02:20,980
structures don't understand this stuff what might be better is to present to them 50 000 young

1642
02:02:20,980 --> 02:02:26,760
tibetans already in a network and say hey look what we've done because that's basically how

1643
02:02:26,760 --> 02:02:31,880
how you do things these days and you don't ask people to build products and stuff you know

1644
02:02:31,880 --> 02:02:37,280
but i i don't know i don't know i think it's always good to everything we do is in is in

1645
02:02:37,280 --> 02:02:43,160
corroboration with with with governments but there's nothing wrong but a lot of what we do

1646
02:02:43,160 --> 02:02:48,500
isn't in a way if i'm planning something out i'm not asking i'm not looking for validation before

1647
02:02:48,500 --> 02:02:50,440
I've created the product, you know.

1648
02:02:50,760 --> 02:02:53,260
I mean, I know we have to end here,

1649
02:02:53,480 --> 02:02:55,580
but the next experiment I want to do

1650
02:02:55,580 --> 02:03:01,240
is I want to build a parallel America on the cloud.

1651
02:03:02,620 --> 02:03:04,380
And I'm calling it e-America.

1652
02:03:04,380 --> 02:03:08,100
And I want to build a United States that's on the cloud

1653
02:03:08,100 --> 02:03:11,700
and anyone can join as long as you agree to the constitution.

1654
02:03:12,040 --> 02:03:14,300
And it'll have all the services.

1655
02:03:14,680 --> 02:03:18,280
It'll have registry of company, pay your taxes,

1656
02:03:18,500 --> 02:03:24,200
all the government stuff it will be there everything except land and will it have the

1657
02:03:24,200 --> 02:03:28,440
actual constitution on there you mean it's just going to mimic the whole it'll be a parallel

1658
02:03:28,440 --> 02:03:36,220
united states wow that's that's the next experiment that i want to do wow welcome that's it's great

1659
02:03:36,220 --> 02:03:40,640
good luck with that that that's something i would not be able to wrap my head around that's the

1660
02:03:40,640 --> 02:03:45,020
silicon valley side of you coming out i don't think big like that i think much smaller i think

1661
02:03:45,020 --> 02:03:50,540
in small steps i could never imagine right i'm going to just create america on the cloud you know

1662
02:03:50,540 --> 02:03:55,260
that wouldn't work for me but it obviously works for you so good luck mate and it's been great

1663
02:03:55,260 --> 02:03:59,280
talking to you yeah i'd love to do this again i think i think i feel like there's a lot of places

1664
02:03:59,280 --> 02:04:04,900
we didn't go and and it's just pure time constraints yeah um thanks for having me

1665
02:04:04,900 --> 02:04:08,840
yeah many many many thanks for coming and good luck with absolutely everything

1666
02:04:15,020 --> 02:04:45,000
Thank you.