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00:00:06.780 Hi everybody, I am Jess Furman. We are going to be blitzing Nas. This is our pilot episode of
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00:00:12.040 The Nerd and the Newbie by Decoded under Culture and Stacks and we're going to be covering Starter
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00:00:17.460 Cities. I am so excited to talk to her about it because she has no idea what this is. Most people
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00:00:22.900 don't. I didn't. I just spent a month in Malaysia with the network school at a pop-up city, also
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00:00:28.680 Starter City, and follow along. We're going to tell you all about it. All right, let's go blitz Nas.
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00:00:37.480 wait so how does that actually work welcome to decoded
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00:00:47.220 are you ready to talk about startup cities and artificial islands across the world i'm ready to
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00:00:54.440 ask you what the heck either of those two things are all right well let's just go right into it
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00:00:59.640 what comes to mind when you hear a startup city have you ever heard of that before the terminology
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00:01:24.300 I mean, Star Trek comes to mind. Like, you know, the Starship Enterprise felt like a startup city. I don't know. Like, or, you know, the Founding Fathers. Like, what is a startup city? And how do you decide you're making one? And how do you find people to live in it with you?
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00:01:40.120 All right. So as you know, I just spent the last month in Malaysia at a place called the Network School, and it is being touted as a startup city, which I would say is pretty accurate.
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00:01:45.460 It's basically a pop-up community that is in Forest City in Malaysia.
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00:01:47.960 It's on an artificial island called Forest City.
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00:01:52.080 And it's right across, like a stone's throw across from Singapore itself.
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00:01:59.120 And the whole premise for the Startup City is basically getting together a community of people, finding an area.
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00:02:01.260 In this case, it's a special economic zone.
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00:02:02.860 You know what a special economic zone is?
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00:02:05.760 America?
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00:02:07.140 I don't know.
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00:02:08.160 All right.
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00:02:19.400 So in we live in L.A., there's certain areas that are designated special economic zones like I think Santa Monica might be one of them and a small level like there's slight different like it's incorporated versus something else.
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00:02:28.820 It's basically just an area where the some legal business legislation might be different than it would be somewhere else.
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00:02:37.160 So in Malaysia, there might be certain business laws, but in a financial economic zone, it might be tax free, for example, like on this artificial island where I was.
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00:02:47.040 Got it. Got it. Okay. So an artificial island is just a phrase used to describe one of these special economic zones?
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00:02:57.200 No. So in this case, what makes this really fun is I'd read about this. I'd read about like basically different areas where you would have what are called pop-up cities, which is a smaller kind of thing.
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00:03:01.380 It's basically like I was in, I don't know if you remember, I was in Istanbul a few years ago.
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00:03:09.520 Vitalik, who co-founded Ethereum, this is blockchain, he has a community called Zuzalu and he did a three-month pop-up in Montecito.
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00:03:12.260 I missed that one, but I made it for the one in Istanbul.
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00:03:13.200 It was a lot smaller.
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00:03:13.960 It was called ZuConnect.
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00:03:20.440 So pop-up cities are different than starter cities, essentially, because with a pop-up city, you can pick any region.
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00:03:22.800 So there's a bunch of them happening at all times.
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00:03:30.580 It's basically a bit of a takeover of an area with a group of people, or in this case, these were hackathons, and people were building in the tech space.
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00:03:38.580 Now, the starter city in a special economic or financial zone, and in this case, on an artificial island, this is more of a permanent structure.
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00:03:46.160 So I hadn't actually gotten a chance yet to spend any time in a permanent structure somewhere, and this was actually on, yes, an artificial island.
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00:03:52.960 so this island was created by man and it was created in an area where they designated this
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00:03:57.640 special financial zone and essentially you get on it and it's like it's gorgeous they're like
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00:04:02.480 so it's abandoned so whoever decided to build this they're all of these like look there's lore
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00:04:07.420 around that it was like maybe like a laundering space for people to like put their money and
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00:04:13.220 so whoever invested in this area you're all these high-rise buildings and there's this beautiful
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00:04:18.400 foliage everywhere and there are these like ponds and it's like an island and it's very industrial
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00:04:22.580 like it's across from a lot of like factories and stuff and you see barges going by between like the
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00:04:28.020 singapore side and the malaysia side but it's abandoned for the most part and what the network
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00:04:33.040 school has done balaji who basically wrote this book called the network state is he selected this
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00:04:38.340 area it's been running for a couple years it's really new and early and he's directed he selected
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00:04:45.640 this area to basically do like a real world test of what a starter city might be. And so they took
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00:04:51.840 over a hotel and you show up, you pay a fee to be there and everything's all inclusive. There's
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00:04:57.380 programming, there's wellness, health, like you name it. Like it's just, I spent the entire month
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00:05:01.720 living there. I didn't have to cook. I didn't have to clean. I had built in social, if I wanted
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00:05:09.740 social things to go check out um training like it was incredible that sounds that sounds like
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00:05:20.920 kind of like Shangri-La is it is it like so is it like it you don't have to build a starter city
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00:05:28.640 on an artificial island but in this case that was the choice that was made but do you then have like
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00:05:53.460 So you have your community inside the starter city, but do you, do you have a relationship to the people who are doing other things on this artificial island? I mean, like, is there another, there's the hotel where you were that was taken over by this, you know, organization that wanted to do this experiment.
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00:06:00.740 but presumably there are other entities on this artificial island as well did was there any
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00:06:06.620 interaction between you guys or or when i was there there were like kids there were parents
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00:06:11.600 or people walking dogs or like people were coming to the beach every night for fireworks like um
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00:06:16.560 and what i've heard is that because there's activities that are happening routinely now
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00:06:22.140 in this building um it's kind of revitalized at least like the little area that that the hotel
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00:06:27.980 as that. But from what I've seen so far, again, like this is, so the reason one of his theories
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00:06:32.060 is, and this is something that was an aha moment for me when he, when Balaji spoke the first week
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00:06:36.600 and kind of gave an intro to what his whole idea for this place was, aside from what I'd read and
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00:06:41.320 what I'd heard from other people, he basically said, you know, there are a lot of places around
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00:06:47.680 the world that have infrastructure already. They have running water, electricity, and you've
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00:06:52.180 probably seen advertisements for like move to japan like get like a for a dollar you could
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00:06:57.360 have this house or like in italy somewhere in france and like you know it already has like in
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00:07:01.400 some cases in most cases they need to be fixed up which is similar to this area like there's a
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00:07:06.220 there's a lot that had to be fixed up about these buildings but at the same time if there's already
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00:07:12.340 a physical infrastructure in place then what's what caused people to leave right a lot of times
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00:07:17.240 it was to go to the cities it was to go move to different areas right but no one was necessarily
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00:07:23.800 migrating out of these areas because they were geographically undesirable necessarily based on
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00:07:29.180 whether maybe it just was economics right but in the present world with technology with digital
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00:07:33.120 money with blockchain with remote work ever since the pandemic a lot of people are not going back
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00:07:38.460 to the office you know you can really like and this is one of his concepts you can really pick
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00:07:42.460 an area and say hey like what if i get a group of people together i mean this was a building in a
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00:07:48.920 community but his whole concept is like find places and start organizations and start based
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00:07:53.560 on community and based on an interest or common interest you guys all have and and find a place
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00:08:03.000 that has some resources already and maybe build there and what would you say is the most common
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00:08:08.760 interest among the people you found at this place like what's the most common denominator that
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00:08:16.360 unifies everyone i would say for the starter city of this this case so basically the network state
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00:08:21.440 is based off of like the idea of like what technology does and what the promise was of
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00:08:28.620 nation states and so like the ethos for this initially was kind of entrenched more in i would
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00:08:35.880 say the blockchain technology sector Balaji was a chief technology officer at um i believe cto at
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00:08:42.260 coinbase um and uh he works very heavily on usdc which is a stable coin which has been in the news
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00:08:47.820 a lot lately um it's a stable coin that's crypto stable coin that's basically pegged to the u.s
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00:08:52.120 dollar um so and he's a tech founder originally like he'd spend a lot of time in san francisco
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00:08:57.940 so the what i found when i went was it wasn't necessarily very blockchain heavy i expected it
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00:09:05.040 to be i went um in like just this past may um and may was ethereum month um so there definitely
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00:09:08.300 were a lot of programs that I felt really comfortable with because I worked a lot in
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00:09:11.980 this space and I've done a lot of hackathons and I love this space but I was surprised a lot of
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00:09:17.560 people were just tech oriented um but it also surprised me it wasn't just tech nerds I mean it
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00:09:22.500 was but it was also families there were over 23 kids there they have programming for kids like
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00:09:27.400 that whole piece of it where you're like wow like what if I'm a single mother and I want to I want
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00:09:32.500 to expose my kids to different types of programming and they had free daycare they had programs for
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00:09:37.440 the kids that were like you know swimming lessons volleyball like but they also had coding for kids
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00:09:43.120 and like entrepreneurship like training and things like that so imagine being a kid and like you know
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00:09:48.380 your parent takes you to malaysia for the summer or for a period of time and like you get to meet
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00:09:52.400 all these other kids and also just get access in a front row seat to this type of education
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00:10:17.860 So it sounds like there's like, it's like in the world of remote work, there's a way to both, this provides an opportunity to like connect, commune, and maintain enough solitude to do your remote work.
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00:10:24.040 like some like did you did you ever find it was too much or or was it like just enough do you know
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00:10:28.960 what i mean community yes the selling point for me was actually it's funny because my friend had gone
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00:10:32.960 she was there the month before and she was the one that called me and was like this place is amazing
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00:10:36.460 and she and i met up all over the world like i initially met her in amsterdam at a hackathon
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00:10:41.840 and ETHGlobal hackathon and then we linked up again at like bogota like i was hosting this like
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00:10:47.180 women's event and um and then we decided to actually room together at istanbul so the
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00:10:51.320 ZuConnect community, like she had known them separately than I had known them. And we got to
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00:10:55.020 like, you know, when I put a post it somewhere that I am getting an Airbnb, she's like, I'll
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00:10:58.680 take one of the rooms. And so she's kind of my friend for the end of the world with a lot of
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00:11:05.140 these things. So I had been traveling a lot, and I was really in need of a regroup. And so I told
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00:11:08.320 her, so what are you doing next month? I was like, I've cleared the whole month, I'm going to be in
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00:11:13.460 LA, and I'm going to build. And she was like, No, come here and do it. You know, like, this is
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00:11:16.640 incredible. I'm already here. She was there the month she was there when I got there, but was
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00:11:21.420 there for a whole month before and um what really sold me was this question that you asked the
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00:11:26.740 answer is yes you can work async do whatever you want the programming is uh some of it's from the
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00:11:33.200 core staff but the whole ethos for this community is community sharing and workshops so like i hosted
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00:11:37.720 an event with elaine my friend from elaine elaine is a company called metropolis global and she was
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00:11:42.720 there with another company called crossbar that's doing um like cold storage wallet technology we
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00:11:47.560 did a whole workshop on wallets and we were showing how like crypto wallets work and you
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00:11:51.480 know for people that didn't know about it at all right a lot of people there were not very into
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00:11:55.320 crypto or blockchain so it was the first time they were downloading a wallet and we showed them best
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00:12:00.600 practices and we were able to show them like use cases for wallets that have to do with voting and
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00:12:05.440 governance like and so like we were able to host that workshop so a lot of the workshops and the
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00:12:09.600 things you're learning are from other people but you don't have to attend anything it's not like a
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00:12:14.800 curriculum where you show up and you have to check all these boxes it's at will so I spent probably
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00:12:18.300 the first week going to a lot of these workshops meeting a lot of people and then I hit a good
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00:12:21.760 stride with it and then I spent a lot of time at the co-working space about two blocks away
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00:12:25.860 um whenever I needed real focused attention because everyone was so friendly if you're in
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00:12:30.000 the cafe a lot of times they'd come and talk to you which is great because they'd be oh here you're
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00:12:35.520 working on this like well you know I'm working on that and then you'd learn but um yeah like if you
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00:12:40.300 want to go and like you're working on a book or you have an idea you want to get off the ground
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00:12:44.060 like you it's as much or as little as you want to participate you can there are people that never
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00:12:48.180 come out of their rooms and they kind of like sneak out grab a plate of food and go back so
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00:12:52.960 that's the other cool part is I think like being someone that does travel around a lot like when I
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00:12:57.720 was in Italy I was alone a lot I could make plans with people but I was trying to find co-working
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00:13:02.420 spaces and it wasn't the same level of community like this was a you know a way where I could
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00:13:07.080 really work, but also have people like to work out with if I wanted to. You know, I did a poetry
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00:13:11.840 slam one night, or you see people at dinner, you see people at the cafe. So like, you really start
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00:13:16.240 to just build a peer group that's a lot more organized as a community than it would be if
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00:13:21.660 you just dropped yourself in a random city and worked from a coffee shop. Oh, God, it sounds
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00:13:29.640 like a, it sounds like the same social structure you get to have as a high schooler, but as an
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00:13:35.900 adult where you're just in because i you said like um the co-working space a couple blocks away and
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00:13:41.500 that was the first time i started to expand my brain out of like the brick of and mortar of a
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00:13:47.600 hotel yeah like it sounds like there was there's more than just one building there's like uh
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00:13:55.220 is it like there's a plaza or around which there are buildings that you that can join to create
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00:14:03.020 the city or is it more like the word city is conceptual and it encompasses the places anywhere
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00:14:08.500 the people that are part of this community go yeah that's a really important distinction and
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00:14:12.640 i think i'm glad you asked that because i think if people are considering and watching this and
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00:14:19.400 considering going to pop-up cities um this is actually something that uh is important to know
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00:14:25.040 the difference so like when I was at Zuzalu or ZuConnect sorry in Istanbul it was it was a main
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00:14:29.340 building that had a lot of the programming but everyone kind of stayed wherever they felt like
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00:14:34.100 it so you were all over the city right and then there was like some places where there'd be like
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00:14:40.960 side events that you'd go um in the case of the network school you're in two main towers so most
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00:14:45.600 people who come are in two main towers there are long-termers that live there um but but you know
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00:14:50.500 in this phase of what he's building he was saying i wanted to basically have a place where you
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00:14:55.360 had a room you could sleep you had food in the same building you had workshops in the same
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00:14:59.700 building there was a gym in the same building there's a pool that like all of the basic
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00:15:04.000 essentials that you would need um you still if you want a haircut or if you want to get your
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00:15:07.660 nails done or go some you have to go somewhere else and he said did say he's figuring out in
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00:15:12.240 phase two or three like then they start to kind of pull in certain things that are needed from
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00:15:18.020 the community um he's like but the idea was that you had everything you needed now the long-termers
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00:15:22.660 who who stay there sign the year lease and a lot of them live in some of the side buildings so
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00:15:27.060 there's actually like high rises within walking distance that are other apartment styles you know
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00:15:31.680 more apartment style living as opposed to the hotel um but the idea is that it's self-contained
00:15:31.680 -->
00:15:35.840 but there are other things and one thing that was really cool about this location is you could walk
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00:15:41.180 next door and see like if you didn't want to just eat you know the the the food which by the way was
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00:15:47.560 brian johnson do you know who brian johnson is no brian johnson um he's that longevity guy that
00:15:47.560 -->
00:15:52.160 like you're like i think there's like a thing recently where like he's infusing his son's blood
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00:15:56.440 like he's gonna live forever kind of has tried everything so he has a whole line of different
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00:16:01.640 products and things but he consulted on the meals and he consulted on the menu so that's the other
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00:16:04.980 part is like you have the buffet breakfast while you're there which is like amazing because it's
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00:16:09.800 from all over the world there's like an india station and like a china station there's a um
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00:16:11.260 And eats all food from around the world for breakfast.
00:16:11.360 -->
00:16:13.960 So that's where if you want to blow your diet, you totally can blow your diet.
00:16:14.740 -->
00:16:16.940 But for lunch and for dinner, it's protein.
00:16:17.360 -->
00:16:18.320 Everything's like a protein.
00:16:18.440 -->
00:16:19.260 There are no seed oils.
00:16:19.900 -->
00:16:22.840 It's all like sweet potatoes, vegetables.
00:16:23.160 -->
00:16:24.680 There's always a beef, a chicken.
00:16:24.680 -->
00:16:47.900 And it sounds like it sounds so is the idea is the idea that someday you'll be able to source the skill sets of the people that make up the community in order to build out options larger than the like more options than the ones that are presented and create more a sense of city.
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00:17:03.020 Like maybe there's somebody who, I don't know, is a chef and they're interested in tech and they're there and they're like, I want to come back and, you know, make a restaurant here.
00:17:03.320 -->
00:17:04.220 Can I do that?
00:17:04.500 -->
00:17:07.880 And then they maybe can apply to become part of the city or something like that.
00:17:07.920 -->
00:17:08.800 Here's the cool part.
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00:17:15.960 So there's a website that's up and there's once you're part of the community, there's a whole section of tools and they're tools that are built by people who are there.
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00:17:37.100 But the tools aren't just tech tools. Some of them are services. So like one guy who's a long termer realized that people wanted two monitors to work. So he bought a bunch of monitors. And when you show up, he like puts little cards up everywhere. And he's like, rent a monitor for me if you want. Someone else was like, you know, it's kind of hard to get around. I'm going to rent scooters. You know, so he has these little like scooters.
00:17:37.460 -->
00:17:42.180 and then apparently even the cafe in the main area originally like there wasn't a cafe in the
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00:17:47.420 main area and someone just started selling their own coffee or baked goods and then it got to be
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00:17:52.580 a little bit bigger and now there's a cafe that's like run by one of them you know members so that's
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00:17:58.600 the whole idea is like like build with and for the community you know as part of it and so like
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00:18:04.100 people were like incubating different ideas which was also really nice and cool the the thing that
00:18:04.100 -->
00:18:10.100 i want to like i don't want to gloss over is that there's so many different ways to to start up
00:18:10.100 -->
00:18:14.300 these societies and to run them but what was interesting about Balaji's approach is he
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00:18:20.680 called it uh sass like you know you just see sass software but what what he the acronym for sass
00:18:20.680 -->
00:18:27.820 in his case is society as a software and he said his whole premise is look and this is the thing i
00:18:27.820 -->
00:18:31.960 want to then start asking you questions about now that you have digested at least some of this
00:18:31.960 -->
00:18:35.580 is think about society as a service, right?
00:18:35.680 -->
00:18:36.720 And what he's saying is,
00:18:37.300 -->
00:18:39.120 and this goes back to his book about the network state,
00:18:39.200 -->
00:18:42.340 which I'll drop the link about in the bios and the chat,
00:18:42.420 -->
00:18:44.400 whatever we have below, like the links to his book,
00:18:44.460 -->
00:18:46.100 which is free, by the way, on audio.
00:18:46.440 -->
00:18:47.640 I'm not selling anything.
00:18:47.920 -->
00:18:48.760 Like you can read it.
00:18:48.880 -->
00:18:50.320 It's fantastic and it's so interesting.
00:18:50.920 -->
00:18:52.560 And his is about the network state
00:18:52.560 -->
00:18:54.340 and the network school that I'm talking about
00:18:54.340 -->
00:18:56.180 is like the physical embodiment of this,
00:18:56.260 -->
00:18:58.560 is him trying out and testing out this concept.
00:18:59.040 -->
00:19:01.760 But society as a service is basically this idea
00:19:01.760 -->
00:19:08.340 rooted in the premise that when we agreed to participate as humanity in statehoods in different
00:19:08.340 -->
00:19:13.280 states, there was some sort of social contract, right? There was some idea that if I'm going to
00:19:13.280 -->
00:19:18.320 pool my resources, I'm going to pay taxes, if we're going to all agree to be governed by a set
00:19:18.320 -->
00:19:24.280 of rules in each of these areas, as citizens, what's the promise for the state? Why do we agree
00:19:24.280 -->
00:19:29.980 to give over our individual sovereignty and participate in whatever government or structure
00:19:29.980 -->
00:19:33.740 that we're in why do we all say yes i mean some people have more rights less rights depending on
00:19:33.740 -->
00:19:40.320 where you are but there is some promise that the state has right to fulfill for their citizens and
00:19:40.320 -->
00:19:47.400 his whole concept is that this is failing worldwide which i happen to agree with especially in the u.s
00:19:47.400 -->
00:19:53.440 in taking politics out of it like health care education like where's the money going what is
00:19:53.440 -->
00:19:58.380 the quality of life that you have as you age in the u.s you know and and what do people have access
00:19:58.380 -->
00:20:02.500 to you and where is this what is the promise of what a state is supposed to give you right as a
00:20:02.500 -->
00:20:12.080 citizen yeah i mean it makes me think about like the the promise we make as citizens when we pay
00:20:12.080 -->
00:20:19.920 taxes like it's a it's a we we think we're engaging in our end of a social contract
00:20:19.920 -->
00:20:30.420 where you know we're paying into a system that we are trusting because we technically have a vote
00:20:30.420 -->
00:20:41.320 yes to take care of our interests and we we let that system kind of operate on its own
00:20:41.320 -->
00:20:50.140 based on, it's almost like a faith-based system at this point. And the faith is completely
00:20:50.140 -->
00:20:56.500 disintegrating because there isn't enough money to take care of our elderly, and there probably
00:20:56.500 -->
00:21:05.460 won't be to take care of us. And because, you know, the amount of money we have to pay just
00:21:05.460 -->
00:21:12.700 to make sure we can see a doctor is completely unaffordable. Now, when I pay my taxes, I'm a
00:21:12.700 -->
00:21:18.420 little bit like, I know this isn't working. Like, I know this isn't working, but I'm still doing it
00:21:18.420 -->
00:21:26.840 anyway. And I don't know why exactly anymore. And I think what excites me about this and how
00:21:26.840 -->
00:21:35.240 I do think that this affects everybody is that because every ounce of the planet, every inch of
00:21:35.240 -->
00:21:43.180 the planet is owned by some sovereign nation right you can no longer discover land and just
00:21:43.180 -->
00:21:48.000 stake you know put a stake in it and say i'm going to take you know california i'm going to
00:21:48.000 -->
00:21:53.500 put a stake in this this is my ranch my farm like you don't have that option so these starter cities
00:21:53.500 -->
00:22:01.560 to me represent hope right for people globally because it's the it's a chance to look at the
00:22:01.560 -->
00:22:08.320 world and say okay and again this is based off of mobility right because my visa as an american
00:22:08.320 -->
00:22:12.620 citizen or my sorry the visas i'm able to get because of my citizenship and my passport
00:22:12.620 -->
00:22:16.900 there's a lot of privilege in that and there are other people who like especially when i was in
00:22:16.900 -->
00:22:21.000 malaysia like had to leave a few days earlier because they were only granted a 30-day visa
00:22:21.000 -->
00:22:25.980 to malaysia i was granted a 90 days i could stay 31 days like they're all there's all sorts of
00:22:25.980 -->
00:22:31.000 privilege baked into mobility globally but what i will say is what's cool about this concept and
00:22:31.000 -->
00:22:40.760 What I really want people to think about when they go, oh, this sounds futuristic or Star Trek, is I want them to think about, like, what do you think you should be getting from society?
00:22:40.760 -->
00:22:46.680 And, like, what do you think that, like, you know, or your communities need?
00:22:47.040 -->
00:22:54.920 And just start to kind of pick your ears up when you hear pop-up cities and startup cities and start to think, like, is this the only option there is?
00:22:55.520 -->
00:22:58.420 Or can I build my own, right?
00:22:59.260 -->
00:23:25.160 And that is actually a possibility. I know it sounds futuristic. I know it sounds wild. But there is technology. And now we've gone more remote. There are ways to do this. And people are doing this globally. And that to me is really exciting. Because I came back from Malaysia, you know, 10 pounds lighter, focused with like more of a global community than before. And I paid the cost of less than the cost of my rent in Los Angeles, all included for everything.
00:23:25.640 -->
00:23:31.500 And, you know, I come back here and it's like my rent's more, my car payments, my insurance, food, cleaning.
00:23:31.780 -->
00:23:40.520 And so you start to think, like, if I have the same amount of money and we're pooling resources together and we're all sharing knowledge, what does that look like?
00:23:40.560 -->
00:23:41.600 What does life look like?
00:23:41.800 -->
00:23:43.660 You know, what kind of culture does that create?
00:23:43.980 -->
00:23:53.600 I mean, it's interesting because what my next the next thing I was thinking about was like, well, I'm not going to say it's easy to do this in Malaysia.
00:23:53.600 -->
00:24:21.200 But I am going to say it is it makes sense to do something like this in an experiment inside of a single structure that one person can with a lot of wealth could own and who can like conduct this experiment sort of in in the clear because they're on an artificial island and there aren't, you know, municipal municipalities that they have to deal with or whatever.
00:24:21.200 -->
00:24:28.340 but like red tape yes yeah there's less red tape but i was like i'm thinking like could a person do
00:24:28.340 -->
00:24:41.640 this in you know toronto or like in in los angeles or in our is there a way to do this inside of an
00:24:41.640 -->
00:24:48.200 already existing of a non-artificial island you know what i mean well so there's two other pop-up
00:24:48.200 -->
00:24:53.940 cities i would say so pop-up cities like they're a bunch that are coming up globally and again if
00:24:53.940 -->
00:24:58.400 you're interested in this kind of thing follow along uh for our podcast but also like culture
00:24:58.400 -->
00:25:03.580 and stacks i'm going to start posting about some of these opportunities um because they need people
00:25:03.580 -->
00:25:07.440 to populate them but they also want like-minded people that are interested but more permanent
00:25:07.440 -->
00:25:11.880 structures there's two others that come to mind one is Próspera and that's in honduras and that's
00:25:11.880 -->
00:25:15.640 been around for quite a few years and there's another one and that's location dependent like
00:25:15.640 -->
00:25:19.380 you would go to Próspera there's an area you can go you visit it um i'm not sure what their
00:25:19.380 -->
00:25:23.640 citizenship looks like citizenship and they are more like blockchain based so there's they have
00:25:23.640 -->
00:25:28.380 their own currency i believe and they help people set up companies like are blockchain based and
00:25:28.380 -->
00:25:34.520 then there's um zanzibar which is in africa so there actually are two other i would call them
00:25:34.520 -->
00:25:41.100 you know startup settlements maybe but it's not actually a revolutionary thing and i know you're
00:25:41.100 -->
00:25:47.020 saying like yeah sure in balaji's case like it helps to be you know a tech millionaire with tech
00:25:47.020 -->
00:25:52.320 millionaire friends that can afford to set it up at this level um but his goal is to have this be
00:25:52.320 -->
00:25:56.280 you know he's like look maybe the most that we do is this is a startup city for other startup cities
00:25:56.280 -->
00:26:00.460 and people come here and they get inspired and he's like we have a network of these things where
00:26:00.460 -->
00:26:05.020 people can kind of move between them um you know you don't have a need to have a lot of money to
00:26:05.020 -->
00:26:10.260 start this like there are people that have communes and you know again i i hesitate to say communes
00:26:10.260 -->
00:26:12.380 because it's the non-digital version of this,
00:26:12.400 -->
00:26:14.900 and I think a lot of people then think communes, cults, hippies,
00:26:14.980 -->
00:26:17.740 but the reality is pooling resources is nothing new.
00:26:18.020 -->
00:26:18.720 It really isn't.
00:26:18.800 -->
00:26:22.180 If you're part of a religious organization or a group or a nonprofit,
00:26:22.660 -->
00:26:25.500 you do bake sales, everyone shows up, they pitch in.
00:26:25.980 -->
00:26:29.480 So I think the cool part about this is, like, think a little bigger.
00:26:29.480 -->
00:26:34.080 Like, you don't have to end up in a nursing home, ideally, hopefully not.
00:26:34.240 -->
00:26:39.140 I mean, you know, again, money is a factor, but also community.
00:26:39.140 -->
00:26:51.000 If you can band together and you can find like minded people around like a mission driven thing and start to pull your resources like we're told like you have to get your apartment alone, you have to buy your house like that's independence.
00:26:51.000 -->
00:26:56.560 And like we've been sold this thing that I'm I'm not buying at this age anymore.
00:26:56.560 -->
00:27:17.920 I mean, I couldn't agree more. I do. I do think there's like this. There's like people, you know, people our age and a little bit older will get their tentacles up when they hear anything mildly socialist because, you know, we did.
00:27:17.920 -->
00:27:23.660 we do live in the post-Cold War era and there is still the like, you know, the show Star City on
00:27:23.660 -->
00:27:30.380 Apple TV right now is very much about like what happens when that runs amok. I do think there is
00:27:30.380 -->
00:27:39.700 a lot to be gained from just conceptually embracing the notion that we might be better
00:27:39.700 -->
00:27:46.660 off together than alone and that like there is something to there is something to
00:27:46.660 -->
00:27:56.360 mine when people get together that doesn't exist when people are single entities trying to survive
00:27:56.360 -->
00:28:04.500 i think that like this conversation requires you to understand that like you can build things with
00:28:04.500 -->
00:28:11.380 people who are like-minded in a way that suits what you want your end goal to be you know and
00:28:11.380 -->
00:28:16.740 and that collective action doesn't have to mean socialism or communism it just means like you know
00:28:16.740 -->
00:28:21.660 if I need someone to drive me to the airport or you know I'm not gonna raise my own animals kill
00:28:21.660 -->
00:28:27.920 them build my own house like it's it's unavoidable to have to rely on people and so like how do you
00:28:27.920 -->
00:28:35.520 completely i mean i i like that i like being able to draw that distinction
00:28:35.520 -->
00:28:40.660 um really overtly so what happens if somebody's like
00:28:40.660 -->
00:28:48.580 not don't sign me up but definitely let me try that do you know what i mean like i'm curious like
00:28:48.580 -->
00:28:57.440 what what does a um a startup city curious do because you know what i mean yes because
00:28:57.440 -->
00:29:03.100 would you consider yourself startup city curious before you started this or were you already on
00:29:03.100 -->
00:29:11.460 board i want a t-shirt that says startup city curious but you're just like startup city you're
00:29:11.460 -->
00:29:12.660 Just like, just curious.
00:29:13.680 -->
00:29:19.160 You know, I think for me, I've always been curious.
00:29:19.400 -->
00:29:21.040 I mean, I was in entertainment for a really long time.
00:29:21.040 -->
00:29:23.840 So I've never done like the laid out path.
00:29:23.920 -->
00:29:27.360 Like, you know, I did go to college, but like, you know, then bartending route and then starting
00:29:27.360 -->
00:29:27.940 my own companies.
00:29:27.940 -->
00:29:29.740 And so I've always been a bit renegade.
00:29:29.740 -->
00:29:34.460 So I will say, you know, if there's something that's done a little differently, I probably
00:29:34.460 -->
00:29:35.360 have a propensity.
00:29:35.980 -->
00:29:44.620 And I think for me, the excitement is never in my lifetime, Nas, did I think that I would be getting to have a conversation like this.
00:29:44.700 -->
00:29:51.600 I was like watching maybe Star Trek and all these things thinking like the final frontier might be space and I'll never live to see it.
00:29:51.600 -->
00:29:59.600 And then seeing how like this technology, the technology that has evolved has allowed these pop-up cities to happen.
00:30:00.220 -->
00:30:09.180 Never in my lifetime did I think I'd be sitting in meetings about governance for like creating like, you know, currency for, you know, these organizations.
00:30:09.180 -->
00:30:17.320 And that's a lot of my life now is having these conversations about what does it look like to have a currency around this group or this thing, you know, in this community?
00:30:17.480 -->
00:30:19.020 And what does governance look like, you know?
00:30:19.020 -->
00:30:30.760 so um how do you how do you like i know how Jess Furman gets involved in going to a startup city
00:30:30.760 -->
00:30:38.720 because she has a friend who's there you know how does yeah and i know how i would get to go
00:30:38.720 -->
00:30:45.000 because i know Jess Furman do you know what i mean like but like how do how does the the lay newbie
00:30:45.000 -->
00:30:51.540 yeah figure out how to get involved because this sounds really really fascinating to me at this
00:30:51.540 -->
00:30:57.540 point yeah look i think i mean i'll bring it back to my music roots like you you can't have a music
00:30:57.540 -->
00:31:02.840 career by yourself like you have to you know it's community it's people who are going to play with
00:31:02.840 -->
00:31:07.980 you it's managers agents it's you know it's it's the people that record when you don't know how to
00:31:07.980 -->
00:31:12.700 record you know it's the people that you know have radio play that they can link you up with or
00:31:12.700 -->
00:31:18.720 you know a place to stay while you're touring like so i think community like you if you are
00:31:18.720 -->
00:31:22.900 interested if this is exciting to you and it sounds space age like you're right it's scary
00:31:22.900 -->
00:31:28.120 to just like i mean do what my friend did who just like trusted and like hopped on a plane and
00:31:28.120 -->
00:31:32.240 bought a ticket you know like basically i gotta end up getting off the wait list and going
00:31:32.240 -->
00:31:37.840 like that's a whole other level of bravery i think in his case but i would just say if you're
00:31:37.840 -->
00:31:42.680 hearing this and you're excited and you're interested um join different communities
00:31:42.680 -->
00:31:47.540 definitely check out the network state book free it's a networkstate.com again i get nothing from
00:31:47.540 -->
00:31:53.320 it but you'll be able to download the book if you want it um their links uh you know and um and then
00:31:53.320 -->
00:31:58.540 i have i do have an invite code that gets you a week free um and it's actually only 1500 for the
00:31:58.540 -->
00:32:04.160 month typically this gets it to 1250 i don't post the link publicly because i really want
00:32:04.160 -->
00:32:11.180 to uh contribute to this as a meaningful community but if you um follow me on instagram
00:32:11.180 -->
00:32:17.340 it's @jessfurmanmuse i'll drop the links and you dm me and you give me like a little paragraph
00:32:17.340 -->
00:32:23.740 about who you are and why this might be interesting to you i'd be happy to share that that code um i
00:32:23.740 -->
00:32:27.920 again i don't want to post it because one of the things i respected was that that community is
00:32:27.920 -->
00:32:33.400 really special so you know i think to your point if you're new like yeah listen to a podcast like
00:32:33.400 -->
00:32:39.480 this and one of the reasons why like this is our what pilot is our pilot episode not you know the
00:32:39.480 -->
00:32:44.820 nerd and the newbie but one of the reasons why i wanted to do this is because people don't have
00:32:44.820 -->
00:32:51.160 access to people like me normally um or you know even people like you know the communities that i'm
00:32:51.160 -->
00:32:54.720 mentioning and they don't have access to people like you like there'll be times in this podcast
00:32:54.720 -->
00:32:58.740 where i'm the newbie and you're the nerd right which we've already discussed you know like yeah
00:32:58.740 -->
00:33:04.240 like literally right like we live in hollywood we're in entertainment like you know i think for
00:33:04.240 -->
00:33:09.160 me giving people access is this is the piece right so you know of course i'm going to be biased and
00:33:09.160 -->
00:33:15.480 say follow follow us you know like you know yeah but i look i like what you said about like
00:33:15.480 -->
00:33:22.840 like write something about yourself and why you're interested and dm you and let it be
00:33:22.840 -->
00:33:30.280 and exchange that way so that you can you can you can feel like i mean you don't want to feel
00:33:30.280 -->
00:33:38.780 like you're introducing people um that aren't community-minded to a community that you know
00:33:38.780 -->
00:33:44.160 how to communicate so like communicate that skill set so i think that's the other thing if you're
00:33:44.160 -->
00:33:47.860 listening to this and you're like but what do i have to offer like everyone has something to offer
00:33:47.860 -->
00:33:53.420 like everyone has a unique i really believe this human experience and some looks more glossy and
00:33:53.420 -->
00:33:58.580 shiny than others like Nas's credits my credits but the reality is your unique life perspective
00:33:58.580 -->
00:34:03.640 is not my life perspective and i think the cool part about going to something like this is really
00:34:03.640 -->
00:34:09.300 tapping into what your unique perspective is and realizing that if you are very different that's a
00:34:09.300 -->
00:34:14.700 great thing because it means that you've navigated things that someone like me hasn't and i can learn
00:34:14.700 -->
00:34:19.480 from you because you are you are so different so i i hope if anyone's listening to this they don't
00:34:19.480 -->
00:34:23.800 feel discouraged if they're not flying around the world and doing hackathons or if you look at our
00:34:23.800 -->
00:34:28.940 bios and you're like well of course you do all these crazy things like the the big takeaway for
00:34:28.940 -->
00:34:34.160 this at least for us or at least for me with a goal with us in this podcast you know in decoding
00:34:34.160 -->
00:34:41.240 these things is to have everyone who watches this have see a little bit of themselves in these
00:34:41.240 -->
00:34:47.820 things and start to move towards it instead of feeling intimidated by it sign me up
00:34:47.820 -->
00:34:56.060 all right now it's a final question for you as a newbie now that we've had this whole like
00:34:56.060 -->
00:35:03.340 as a starter city you know startup city newbie um what's your takeaway would you go what do
00:35:03.340 -->
00:35:11.660 you think and you know no no bias but like what's your takeaway i mean i i the idea of
00:35:11.660 -->
00:35:20.240 re like i won't say reinventing the social contract but reinvigorating it with like
00:35:20.240 -->
00:35:28.720 inside a context where the people are actually the people that are affected by it are actually
00:35:30.220 -->
00:35:37.520 getting to like provide the energy and the pulse of the society that it's part of
00:35:37.520 -->
00:35:45.420 is pretty, pretty compelling. Like, I feel like we live in a really disjointed
00:35:45.420 -->
00:35:56.640 society right now. Like culture is, culture is something we invent in order to feel we have
00:35:56.640 -->
00:36:04.480 community like we don't it's almost like we're just looking for ways to connect with each other
00:36:04.480 -->
00:36:11.600 and we're hungry for it I know I am and I look for it in my friends and I look for it in my
00:36:11.600 -->
00:36:19.220 interactions and I but I have to do all of the generating of that myself like to be in a place
00:36:19.220 -->
00:36:22.040 where that engine is just running
00:36:22.040 -->
00:36:25.440 and I get to sort of surf that wave
00:36:25.440 -->
00:36:29.680 and contribute the best aspects of myself
00:36:29.680 -->
00:36:34.740 and then experience other people getting to do the same.
00:36:35.440 -->
00:36:39.380 That sounds pretty thrilling.
00:36:39.880 -->
00:36:42.800 So I would, I mean, I would, I think I would try it.
00:36:43.000 -->
00:36:44.320 I mean, I think I would get there
00:36:44.320 -->
00:36:46.100 and be kind of like your friend and like,
00:36:46.160 -->
00:36:47.720 I don't know what the fuck is going on.
00:36:49.220 -->
00:36:52.700 But I think it would be cool to be there, you know?
00:36:53.180 -->
00:36:53.480 Yeah.
00:36:53.960 -->
00:36:54.180 Yeah.
00:36:54.180 -->
00:36:55.820 All right.
00:36:55.900 -->
00:36:58.080 Well, thank you to everybody for joining us.
00:36:58.180 -->
00:36:59.680 This is our pilot episode.
00:37:00.060 -->
00:37:01.120 I'm Jess.
00:37:01.820 -->
00:37:02.800 I'm Nas.
00:37:03.280 -->
00:37:06.980 And this is Decoded, the nerd and the newbie.
00:37:07.320 -->
00:37:10.740 And like I mentioned, we're going to be switching roles on different topics.
00:37:11.320 -->
00:37:14.740 But if there's anything that you heard that you liked, please look at the captions.
00:37:15.040 -->
00:37:18.900 I'm going to put as many links to resources as I can specifically related to this episode.
00:37:19.220 -->
00:37:25.880 And then please click follow, like, and share so that as we continue to build content, you
00:37:25.880 -->
00:37:28.080 guys can give us feedback and let us know what you want to learn about.
00:37:28.320 -->
00:37:29.360 But thank you for tuning in.
00:37:29.400 -->
00:37:30.200 We appreciate your time.
