Introducing The Seasteading Institute

[Patri Friedman]

Hi everyone! I've gotten some funding and started a Seasteading
Institute, and we have a brand new website (http://
www.seasteading.org). I'm including the press release below

This is the first and will be the last use of this email list, since
RSS has taken over as a notification standard. The new website has a
Press Releases blog which will be used for major announcements in the
future:

http://seasteading.org/stay-in-touch/press-releases

Here's the RSS feed:

http://seasteading.org/learn-more/press-releases/rss

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Organization Aims To Create New Societies On The Ocean

Mountain View, CA, April 15th, 2008. The Seasteading Institute today
announced that it has been established in order to establish
permanent, autonomous ocean communities to enable experimentation and
innovation with diverse social, political, and legal systems. It will
continue and expand on the work of Patri Friedman and Wayne Gramlich,
authors of "Seasteading: A Practical Guide to Homesteading the High
Seas".

"The public sector is simultaneously the largest industry in the world
and the least innovative, with a barrier to entry and lock-in on its
customers that dwarfs any private monopoly", says Patri Friedman,
TSI's Executive Director. "The world needs a new model of politics
where a diverse ecosystem of providers offers a variety of
institutions that evolve to serve their citizens. The open oceans,
Earth's last frontier, are the ideal place to nurture this vision of a
better world. By making it safe and affordable to settle this
frontier, we will give people the freedom to choose the government
they want instead of being stuck with the government they get."

To help launch the organization, entrepreneur and philanthropist Peter
Thiel has pledged $500,000 to The Seasteading Institute, saying:
"Accelerating innovation is rapidly transforming the world: the
Seasteading Institute will help bring more of that innovation to the
public sector, where it's vitally needed. Decades from now, those
looking back at the start of the century will understand that
Seasteading was an obvious step towards encouraging the development of
more efficient, practical public sector models around the world. We're
at a fascinating juncture: the nature of government is about to change
at a very fundamental level."

The Institute will initially focus on three major areas:

* Community: Building a network of potential residents who are
inspired by the possibilities of seasteading and have the skills and
resources to establish vibrant new communities.
* Research: Exploring the core requirements for seasteading to be safe
and affordable, such as structure design, political feasibility, and
infrastructure (power, heat, food) and advancing key seasteading
technologies through independent research and partnerships.
* Engineering: Proving that the mission is viable by building a safe,
cost-effective, gorgeous seastead, based in the San Francisco Bay and
able to travel in the open ocean.

For more information, see the Institute's website, www.seasteading.org.

Contact:

The Seasteading Institute
in...@seasteading.org
http://www.seasteading.org/

(The Seasteading Institute is a California nonprofit corporation that
is in the process of applying for recognition of tax exemption under
Section 501(c)3 of the Internal Revenue Code.)