2004-05-08 05:34
by Vasil KolevI’ve started to understand why is it so hard for me to sleep.
After not being able to go to sleep until 4, I sat and made a short analysis of the things that prevent me from sleeping – I just can’t stop thinking about the things I’ve seen/read through the day, and because I rarely read less than the equivalent of 100 pages – starting with the mailing lists, slashdot, some other informational sites, orkut, documentations, and some books… My head gets filled with information, and sometimes I’m unable to process it all – all the time I start reading a book, and in parallel I’m thinking about some other way the things can be, because there’s something I don’t like in the current way, and that goes on for hours after I’ve stopped reading the book. This way everything that I start working on, can make me think about a lot of variants for days…
One example – i found an article in lwn about the software patents in Europe, and the last developments (see here), and started thinking about the alternatives, because this world’s laws are getting worse.
The first one that came to my mind, was creating a new country. A minute with the dictionary and 10 more with google gave me some information for such projects and ideas (a lot of which sounded funny to me, like one constitutional monarchy between Cuba, Mexico and whatever, in the ocean). I looked around in UN sit, where I found some more information (that to be a member of UN you have first to be recommended by the Security Council to the General Assembly), and, of course, that a lot of those projects are based on the ideas of Ayn Rand (I have to read his works, but there always isn’t enough time, and is somewhere down in the list) and Robert Heinlein. I wrote a simple idea for a checklist what should I need, to create a country, and here goes:
1. Laws
Those have to be patched from some other ideas. There are a lot floating around the net. One general difference with the other will be detailed and clear rationale about everything, probably with examples.
The documents and the money will be crypto-based (no central database, to check someone’s papers you just check their digital signature).
2. Economics
Preferably gold backing for the currency.
3. Army
Minimal army, with nuclear weapons. That will same me the hassle to argue with stupid people with war intentions.
4. Territory
Buying is the last option, it will probably be a island without territorial claims (or several), or some kind of floating/underwater alternative, because the international waters are practically nobody’s. It would be an interesting engineering project to build a tower from the bottom of the sea to rise for 100 meters, and to have some of it above the water.
5. General orientation
Data&development heaven. I think that a small country could feed itself or just to get a good income from intellectual labor. Free/Open Source country?:)
Etc. ill thoughts. If I get involved in this, I’ll probably be able to create a detailed plan for no more than a few days, with the basic development strategy and some extra for the possible situations.
The same thought led me to look in orkut for similar ideas, and in the end I was digging again in the political communities. The worst thing is, that it’s becoming interesting, and some day I might get more involved in this – it’s not something, that you can do jokingly, despite the widely ‘known’ of my people, that everyone understands politics… Who knows, I might be able at last to vote without doubts (I haven’t voted yet, I just hate doing something without enough information, I’ve had my share of problems).
The moral of the story – stopping the alcohol is bad for you, you might even get interested in politics.