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Balaji Profile picture
@balajis
Mar 10, 2022 • 9 tweets • 5 min read • Read on X
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No, gold was defeated by the state. FDR seized the gold of US citizens with Executive Order 6102.
theconversation.com/how-the-us-gov… Image
This was just a particularly explicit version of how centralized states expropriated individuals over the 20th century to fund their operations.

Gold was seized at $20.67, then the dollar was devalued so it was $35 per ounce. The state booked the profit.
federalreservehistory.org/essays/gold-re… Image
Even Krugman admits it: fiat currency is backed by men with guns.
Let's go through some of the conceptual issues here.

"It was too inflexible to allow sufficient policy to be done"

In other words, gold once limited the power of centralized states to seize the assets of citizens for their own purposes, like huge wars.
"This monograph presents a survey of the crucial link between state power and finance from the ancient era through to the present day. Cicero once said that the true sinew of war was endless streams of money."
press.armywarcollege.edu/monographs/455/ Image
"Investment in accordance to productive capacity"

Indeed, you want to invest in projects with real cash flows. But you also don't want your money debased via inflation. So the measure of any investment is whether it can outperform simply holding BTC.
For years, retail and professional investors alike have benchmarked their returns in BTC terms. That's why coinmarketcap.com makes charts like this easy. You can see whether the no-op of simply holding BTC outcompetes an investment. Image
Additionally, you can quantify the daily fees paid, which can be plugged into a DCF model just like cash flows, even though these are chains rather than businesses.

This is a different sense in which BTC and other coins actually are "productive assets".
cryptofees.info Image
Technologies like mass production & mass media enabled the growth of centralized states till ~1950. The transistor, PC, internet, smartphone, and BTC are now *on balance* decentralizing that power...albeit not without an attempted Counter-Decentralization.
sotonye.substack.com/p/if-einstein-…

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More from @balajis

Balaji Profile picture
Dec 20
More broadly: AI + social + crypto leads to retribalization of the Western world.

AI fakes mean you only trust info from your tribe.

Social media fragmentation means you only talk to your tribe.

And crypto tribalism means you only trade with your tribe.
What does retribalization look like in the physical world? This is Germany before Bismarck. Image
Ah, it’s actually not the start.
Congress was highly polarized by 2012.
And Twitter by 2017.
Then Gab and Truth broke away in 2020.
Now Bluesky and Threads in 2024.
Read 4 tweets
Balaji Profile picture
Dec 2
Bangladesh was a stable country.

But it didn’t want to give up a military base or take sides on Ukraine.

So in retaliation, psychopathic Democrats backed a coup.

Then the White House lied about it, just like they lied about Hunter’s pardon.

Now it’s going fundamentalist. Image
Image
Image
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Karine Jean-Pierre lied repeatedly about whether Biden would pardon Hunter. That was a “conspiracy theory” back then and a conspiracy reality today.

Now apply that to claims about other matters. Is it really a coincidence that both Bangladesh and Pakistan suffered coups?Image
Democrats and neocons have been escalating pressure on poor Bangladesh since 2022.

They got their coup earlier this year.
Read 5 tweets
Balaji Profile picture
Nov 22
Gautam Adani is an Indian magnate.
He’s built ports, roads — everything.
One of the most prominent men in India.
Now comes the Democrat DOJ.
Indicting an Indian doing business in India.
For some ostensible violation of US law!
Why? Adani is perceived as center right.
And Democrats are now far left.
So it’s just lawfare across borders.
Like their attacks on Elon.
And on Israel’s right.
And on European conservatives.
But…I doubt the Trump admin continues it.
Adani is to Indian ports what Elon is to American space. That’s why Indian leftists hate him.

But the left is too weak locally to attack him, so they whistled for backup to US Democrats.

After the Trump admin takes office, let’s see whether this case is still around in a year. Image
It’s even more than that.
Democrat-run districts are corrupt.
As are the Bidens themselves.
Remember 10% for the big guy?
Or the $100B California train to nowhere?
Whereas Adani has actually built.
Just like PM Modi has built up India.
This is why the far left attacks them. Image
Read 4 tweets
Balaji Profile picture
Nov 12
What comes after wokeness?
Democrats align with Communists.
Newsom shows the way.
He’s lost DC, but has Xi.
So: TikTok becomes the Democrat X.
And California defies Trump tariffs.
It’s unfortunately the obvious move.
And already underway. Image
You might know that Xi visited Newsom in SF last year.

You might not know that Newsom visited Xi before. And promised to be China’s “long-term, stable, and strong partner.”
balajis.com/p/only-newsom-…Image
Blue states like Illinois may follow Newsom in defying any tariffs. They want to keep prices down and stay in China’s good graces.

Frankly, it’s extremely difficult to do business without Chinese parts. So they’ll be making the same argument Raytheon is.

theillinoize.com/articles/pritz…Image
Read 4 tweets
Balaji Profile picture
Aug 25
FRANCE IS FOR CRIME, AGAINST FREEDOM

François asks a good question. My answer is: France doesn't care about crime, they care about control.

1) First, Macron hasn't wiped out crime among 70M Frenchmen with all the power of the French State. So it's completely unreasonable to expect Durov to wipe out crime among 1B+ Telegram users with his minimal power of content moderation.

2) Second, the deeper point is that the French state is deeply uninterested in public safety! They allow violent crime, fundamentalist terrorism, and drug dealing to run rampant in France. Just compare Paris to what it was a few generations ago.

3) Third, is Macron held personally responsible for every beheading, rape, and robbery that occurs on French soil? Is he jailed when traveling for violating the human rights of French citizens by not "moderating" his community hard enough? No, he is not. Even though the tools of the French state are vastly greater than those of Telegram, over a vastly smaller userbase. Again: Macron has ~70M citizens to deal with, while Telegram has almost 1B users.

4) Finally, we already know what a real anti-crime policy looks like. It looks like @nayibbukele. And President Bukele is for encryption, and has invited programmers to build on El Salvadoran soil — an offer they'd be well-advised to take up.

5) So: France is an anarcho-tyrannical regime. It doesn't need sophisticated surveillance to stop drug dealing — because it's all happening in public! They know exactly where the criminals are, and the victims too. They are literally setting up spaces for them to do drugs till they die.

I mean, does France need to imprison the CEO of Telegram to stop this?Image
France has fallen to fascism (again).
Build in a country like El Salvador.
Where crime is low.
And coding isn't a crime.
@EmmanuelMacron wanted founders to build in France.
But why would you build in France?
Why would you even visit France?
Build an app, go to jail.
What a failure for the country of Voltaire.

Image
Read 4 tweets
Balaji Profile picture
Aug 16
THE NETWORK SCHOOL

We got an island.

That’s right. Through the power of Bitcoin, we now have a beautiful island near Singapore where we’re building the Network School. We’re starting with a 90-day popup that runs from Sep 23 to Dec 23, right after the Network State Conference. Rent is only $1000/month with roommates or $2000/month solo. And we have plenty of day passes for visitors.

So, go apply online at ns dot com! Then read more below.

THE DARK TALENT
As motivation, I’ve always wanted to expand equality of opportunity around the world. Because my father was born in a desperately poor country, but with the right opportunity he was able to make something of himself. Like dark matter, he was dark talent. And for more than a decade I’ve been thinking about how to give others who are similarly situated the chance to make something of themselves. That is: I’ve been thinking about how to empower the dark talent of the world.

US universities used to fill this role, even imperfectly, and I loved Stanford when I taught there years ago. But the data shows they’ve declined in recent days. And they’re just not affordable or accessible to most of the world. So, it’s time for a new approach. And thanks to Saraswati and Satoshi, I have the resources to endow a new Internet-first institution: the Network School.

The purpose of the Network School is to articulate a vision of peace, trade, internationalism, and technology…even as the rest of the world talks about war, trade war, nationalism, and statism. To revitalize democracy for the internet era, with digital polities and verifiable votes. To train the next generation to be not just leaders of companies, but inspirations for their communities. And to pursue truth, health, and wealth by leveling up our attendees personally, physically, and professionally.

Let me now describe in more detail how the Network School works, who it’s for, and how to apply.

HOW THE NETWORK SCHOOL WORKS
The Network School is for people of all ages, not just the youth. And it’s meant to be lifelong rather than one-off, with both a structured and and an unstructured component. The structured part is about continuous daily self-improvement: learning skills, burning calories, and earning currency. Meanwhile, the unstructured part is about having fun and hanging out with people of similar values.

For short: learn, burn, earn, and fun.

Learn
The first part of the Network School is about learning technologies and humanities.

As motivation, the existing model of US undergraduate education is broken. You pay $100k+ for a four year degree, and then budget nothing for maintenance over the course of your life. It’s like paying $100k+ for a new car and budgeting nothing for maintenance.

By contrast, the Network School is about continuous education. It’s for remote workers, engineers, creators and digital nomads who want to integrate learning into their lives, rather than stopping everything to be a full-time student.

Here’s how that works. We set up mini-classrooms where you can drop in to see the problem of the day.5 You solve that problem and a proctor awards you a cryptocredential, a free non-transferable NFT sent to your crypto wallet that establishes “proof-of-learn.” Often your solution will involve putting code on GitHub/Replit (to show you understand a concept), or posting content to your social media profile (to show you understand a new AI tool). And over time, these cryptocredentials actually build up a cryptoresume proving what you know.

Our initial material focuses on founding tech communities, as distinct from tech companies. As such it touches on everything from crypto, AI, and social media to history, politics, and filmmaking. It should be useful even if you’re just growing a traditional company or building a following. Over time, of course, every branch of the sciences and humanities becomes relevant when building a community. So if this initial experiment works, we can expand branch-by-branch to build a new kind of university.

But we’re intentionally starting with something simple. Our learning is about continuous education, about solving the problem-of-the-day.

Burn
The second part of the Network School is about burning calories.

Longevity is important, but 20th century communities just aren’t physically set up to maximize physical fitness. Quite the contrary: the default mode of Western society is sedentary and sugary. Those who want to escape this need to roll their own nutrition and workout program, which takes time, money, and energy.

We’re changing that. I’ve teamed up with my friend @bryan_johnson to set up Blueprint-inspired food and fitness for the entire Network School community. Bryan will be on campus to set up the program, and then his designates will maintain it on a daily basis. Like many of you, I’ve been both fit and fat at various times, so this is a product I want to use myself.

Every member of the Network School gets a daily workout slot with a semi-personal trainer, much like a group fitness class. You run and lift in the morning at your chosen time, getting a proof-of-workout from your trainer. Your group holds you accountable for showing up. Then you get a box with your Blueprint-optimized healthy meals and head to work. The whole point is to provide willpower-as-a-service, where the community6 provides the discipline.

We’re starting with the basics of running, lifting, eating, and sleeping properly. The initial goal is to hit the limits of your genetics. But if all goes well, the biotech founders that come to the Network School will eventually help us all surpass our genetic limits, to live much longer than we otherwise would.

But again, we’re starting small! And so the “burning calories” part is about lifelong health and the workout-of-the-day.

Earn
The third part of the Network School is about earning currency.

We’ll have crypto prizes of the day for open source projects, AI content creation, and microtasks. There will be $1000 bounties every day for the duration of the program, similar to the various prizes I’ve posted on Twitter and Farcaster. And community members will post their own prizes.

Next, in keeping with the overall theme of self-improvement, we’ll have office hours to help with your job, your career, your visa status, and your funding. We’re much more invested in you than a typical college career center because our interests are aligned: the more you earn, and the stronger you are financially, the more you’ll eventually have to reinvest in the community.

Finally, we’ll have visitor hours with famous visiting technologists. As my friend Sriram noticed, when investors come through Singapore I typically do a podcast with them. Many will also visit the Network School to meet attendees, invest in them, or hire them. Others will give remote talks. And you can see the quality of visitors from the speakers in our conference and podcast.

So, earning is about constant career development and the prize-of-the-day.

Fun
All work and no play makes Jack a dull boy, of course. So the fourth part of the Network School is about fun.

This is the unstructured component. It’s most of what you’re here for. It’s just about assembling great people in one place: positive-sum people who believe in technological progress, internationalism, and capitalism. It’s your internet friends, coming from URL to IRL. Stanford introduced the concept of residential education, but this takes it to the next level.

In fact, our initial location is very similar to Stanford. It’s beautiful and sunny, and less than an hour from a major city (Singapore) with an international airport (Changi). That means you can be heads down during the week, head into the city on the weekends for fun, and get to just about anywhere in Asia within the same day. This is convenient for the >50% of the world that lives within the Valeriepieris circle.

We’ll do some group outings too, but most of the fun will be up to you.

WHO THE NETWORK SCHOOL IS FOR
Who is the Network School for? There are four lenses on this: demographical, ideological, professional, and personal.

Demographically
As mentioned, our focus is the dark talent. The more respect you have for legacy institutions, and the more respect they have for you, the less suitable you’ll be as an applicant.

So: the Network School is for Indian engineers and African founders, for makers from the Midwest and the Middle East, for Chinese liberals and Latin American libertarians, for Southeast Asia’s rising technologists and Europe’s remaining capitalists.

It’s for everyone who doesn’t feel part of the establishment. But it’s definitely not only for tech, because a community does not run on tech alone.

Ideologically
Ideologically, the Network School is for people who admire Western values, but who also recognize that Asia is in ascendance, and that the next world order is more properly centered around the Internet — around neutral code — than around either declining Western institutions or a rising Chinese state.

For example, the Network School is for those who understand that Bitcoin succeeds the Federal Reserve, that encryption is the only true protection against unreasonable search and seizure, that AI can deliver better opinions than any Delaware magistrate, and that democracy can be rejuvenated with cryptography. It is for those who believe in technology, harmony, internationalism, and capitalism. It’s for those who want Silicon Valley without San Francisco. And for those who want to found, fund, and find not just new companies and currencies — but new cities and new communities.

Professionally
Our ideal applicant is capable of remote work, or has enough savings to support themselves while at the Network School. For our initial cohort, we’re seeking three major groups of people in particular:

- Writers, artists, influencers, and filmmakers
- Trainers, athletes, coaches, and clinicians
- Founders, engineers, designers, and investors

These are, roughly, the demographics focused on learning, burning, and earning respectively. Of course, if you fall outside those categories but still think you have something to contribute, you should still apply to the Network School.

Personally
I should mention that the Network School is a “product” that I built for the young version of myself — the aspiring young engineer. This is the community I want to live in: a technocapitalist college town, a Stanford 2.0 that’s globally affordable and genuinely meritocratic.

So, I’ll be on campus full time. Bryan Johnson and I are supervising the setup of everything from bench press to French press. And we’ll eventually be recruiting faculty in the form of content creators, fitness influencers, and angel investors for the learn, burn, and earn portions of our program respectively. But all that in due time.

APPLYING TO THE NETWORK SCHOOL
Ok, so how do you apply to the Network School?

Just go to ns dot com and click "apply." We’ve set up a simple Luma page where you can apply in a few minutes. Then, if you pass review, we’ll send a second application where you pay rent. As mentioned, our monthly rent is $1000 (with roommates) and $2000 (solo). We also have daily and weekly rates too, but short-term visitors still need to apply.

The rent gets you an air-conditioned room on a beautiful island, with internet, gym, and access to all courses and community services. You’ll still need to handle your flights and pay for your food, but we think the overall package is extremely affordable. And so the Network School could be an amazing option for individuals or small teams looking to save money, get fit, and level up while living in paradise.

I’m looking forward to seeing you there! Just fill out the application at ns dot com, also linked in the tweet below.Image
Go apply to the Network School at ! ns.com/apply
Image
Oh, and here's the full announcement with all links and footnotes: balajis.com/p/network-scho…
Image
Read 4 tweets

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