Cryptocurrency Magnate's Plan to Turn 67,000 Acres into Blockchain-Based 'Smart City' (lasvegassun.com) 81
"A cryptocurrency company that owns 67,000 acres in rural northern Nevada wants state government to grant technology companies power to form local governments on land they own," reports the Associated Press.
Jeffrey Berns, CEO of Nevada-based Blockchains LLC, ultimately envisions "a city where people not only purchase goods and services with digital currency but also log their entire online footprint — financial statements, medical records and personal data — on blockchain."
The Associated Press calls him "a cryptocurrency magnate" who "hopes to turn dreams of a futuristic "smart city" into reality." To do that, he's asking the state to let companies like his form local governments on land they own, which would grant them power over everything from schools to law enforcement...
The company wants to break ground by 2022 in rural Storey County, 12 miles east of Reno. It's proposing to build 15,000 homes and 33 million square feet of commercial and industrial space within 75 years. Berns, whose idea is the basis for draft legislation that some lawmakers saw behind closed doors last week, said traditional government doesn't offer enough flexibility to create a community where people can invent new uses for his technology.
"There's got to be a place somewhere on this planet where people are willing to just start from scratch and say, 'We're not going to do things this way just because it's the way we've done it,'" Berns said. He wants Nevada to change its laws to allow "innovation zones," where companies would have powers like those of a county government, including creating court systems, imposing taxes and building infrastructure while making land and water management decisions...
If lawmakers back the proposal, technology companies with 50,000 acres of land that promise a $1 billion investment could create zones governed by three people like county commissioners. The draft legislation says two of them initially would be from the company itself... The former consumer protection attorney said the idea was born from how he sees government as an unnecessary middleman between people and ideas.
"For us to be able to take risks and be limber, nimble and figure things out like you do when you're designing new products, that's not how government works. So why not let us just create a government that lets us do those things?" Berns said.
The article notes that "innovation zones" and Blockchains LLC were both a key part of the governor's annual "State of the State" address last month. And that both the governor's campaign and an affiliated political action committee "received a combined $60,000 from the company."
Jeffrey Berns, CEO of Nevada-based Blockchains LLC, ultimately envisions "a city where people not only purchase goods and services with digital currency but also log their entire online footprint — financial statements, medical records and personal data — on blockchain."
The Associated Press calls him "a cryptocurrency magnate" who "hopes to turn dreams of a futuristic "smart city" into reality." To do that, he's asking the state to let companies like his form local governments on land they own, which would grant them power over everything from schools to law enforcement...
The company wants to break ground by 2022 in rural Storey County, 12 miles east of Reno. It's proposing to build 15,000 homes and 33 million square feet of commercial and industrial space within 75 years. Berns, whose idea is the basis for draft legislation that some lawmakers saw behind closed doors last week, said traditional government doesn't offer enough flexibility to create a community where people can invent new uses for his technology.
"There's got to be a place somewhere on this planet where people are willing to just start from scratch and say, 'We're not going to do things this way just because it's the way we've done it,'" Berns said. He wants Nevada to change its laws to allow "innovation zones," where companies would have powers like those of a county government, including creating court systems, imposing taxes and building infrastructure while making land and water management decisions...
If lawmakers back the proposal, technology companies with 50,000 acres of land that promise a $1 billion investment could create zones governed by three people like county commissioners. The draft legislation says two of them initially would be from the company itself... The former consumer protection attorney said the idea was born from how he sees government as an unnecessary middleman between people and ideas.
"For us to be able to take risks and be limber, nimble and figure things out like you do when you're designing new products, that's not how government works. So why not let us just create a government that lets us do those things?" Berns said.
The article notes that "innovation zones" and Blockchains LLC were both a key part of the governor's annual "State of the State" address last month. And that both the governor's campaign and an affiliated political action committee "received a combined $60,000 from the company."
How high will the walls be? (Score:3, Interesting)
I'm not usually one to oppose the freedom to "innovate", but what will keep their unbridled creations from spilling out into other areas? And how will this help at all with the FAA, FCC, EPA, etc.?
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Exactly my thought. No doubt this song is how it works:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fjevsnCRQ_A [youtube.com]
Blockchain as a concept is a dead end (Score:2)
The decentralization achieved with Bitcoin is not a software module imported from the Bitcoin repository. The decentralization is a consequence of incentives. If you fail the decentralization, the project is pointless.
All these 'blockchain' projects are dead end because the structure of incentives don't generate any meaningful decentralization.
SCOOP: @IBM has cut its blockchain team down to almost nothing, according to four people familiar with the situation.
https://twitter.com/CoinDesk/s... [twitter.com]
https://twitte [twitter.com]
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Will those walls be to keep people out, or keep people in ? What could go wrong. Blockchain has proved useless for everything except Crypto Currencies so lets go big and see what a boondoggle this will be! BTW I bet these 'private enterprise entrepreneur' start begging for public money in the form of tax credits and grants. Amazing how all these entrepreneurs want to take a 'chance', but they want to do it with your money!
Re:How high will the walls be? (Score:5, Informative)
I'm more wondering where they expect their water to come from. Reno NV already has to focus on water conservation for existing residents, and future warming is only going to increase the pressure.
Re:How high will the walls be? (Score:5, Funny)
That's nothing some BLOCKCHAIN can't solve, amirite sport?!
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Blockchain is a failed buzzword.
SCOOP: @IBM has cut its blockchain team down to almost nothing, according to four people familiar with the situation.
https://twitter.com/CoinDesk/s... [twitter.com]
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Don't worry, they'll get it delivered by Uber Eats ;)
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YouTube: Thorium 2017. There's no reason we can't have nearly infinite cheap fresh water and electricity. However, Nevada would still need to import that probably from California.
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Sounds like an attempt to go back to company towns at worst, and an attempt to be their own county/state/country at best.
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I hope this doesn't go through because it's just a thinly veiled libertarian scenario (see Bioshock) which doesn't end well.
There is a reason why stories about big corporations getting bigger than state governments never end well. How the hell this person managed to amass that much land in the first place is questionable, as that's likely land designated as park or farm land, and most of Nevada had been irradiated with nuclear tests, this sounds like trying to be "Las Vegas II". Most of the east part of Nev
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it's just a thinly veiled libertarian scenario
There's nothing libertarian about private companies attempting to wield government powers; the correct word is fascism.
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Over the years there have been a bunch of libertarian projects that pretty much come down to 'hey, if you give our company all the money and power, WE will protect you from the government and
Excuse (Score:3)
So now Blockchain is now the excuse for companies to replace governments?
Wow
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Just another version of the old fashioned company town monopoly. Given the area, I would not be surprised if the water from the retaining reservoirs that catch the snow in the winter will soon be selling for .5 bitcoin/gallon
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fjevsnCRQ_A [youtube.com]
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Cryptocurrency is the new scrip.
Mind you, the fact that a "cryptocurrency company [...] owns 67,000 acres in rural northern Nevada" just goes to show how good a long-term investment they think crypto is.
Re:Excuse (Score:5, Insightful)
It's a Frankenstein's monster combining gerrymandering with time share resorts: slap some buzzwords on your development and when the gullible flock to it turn the equity in their homes into a millstone that anchors them to your products and services.
the bitcoin economy (Score:3)
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and forget the liquor and guns.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fjevsnCRQ_A [youtube.com]
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I note you failed to show how lower taxes cause global climate change. Most people think it is atmospheric carbon based molecules, not a lack of taxes, that cause global climate change.
So if the problem is atmospheric carbon, higher taxes will only shift the carbon usage from the poor to the rich, making their lives worse, without actually doing anything to solve the problem.
Can you prove all the scientists wrong and prove that lower taxes cause global climate change?
It's Nevada (Score:3)
Nevada runs on liquor, guns, prostitution, and gambling already. That's what you just said, since crypto speculation is a synonym for gambling.
This cannot be allowed to happen (Score:5, Insightful)
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You're correct, but Facebook, Amazon, Google, Apple, et al. have found it more effective to simply buy the existing one.
Every single time these fuckers appear before Congress, there's a published list of who they bribed and how much--and yet, nothing happens. This is infuriating.
Our government sold itself to a new set of owners than the People. You should be afraid, and VERY mad.
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Every single time these fuckers appear before Congress, there's a published list of who they bribed and how much--and yet, nothing happens. This is infuriating.
Our government sold itself to a new set of owners than the People. You should be afraid, and VERY mad.
What pissed me off even more is learning how much these asshats sell out for. It’s often 30k, 15k, hell even 2-3k sometimes for an entire industry. What we need is crowd funded bribery such that we pay more and buy our democracy back. Noting would make nearly every last politician shart their pants harder than voters also being the primary lobby. They don’t wanna play ball? Crowd fund an opponent who will.
Re: This cannot be allowed to happen (Score:2)
We already do have crowd funded payoffs to government officials. It's called "taxation".
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The worst part is how those taxes are given to these companies and increased to cover subsidies to the very companies that don't want to pay taxes and are purchasing our government.
They're literally just milking the people for their tax money, while paying the government thugs to do it for them at gunpoint. After all, that's what taxes on proles are backed by.
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If you want to reveal just how to do this, I'll purchase a copy of your pamphlet. In 20th century Western civilization without a telephone, without a credit card, you'll be living in a homeless shelter. Economically, you don't exist. (One of the national food delivery services has started to require that you give them 2 credit card accounts.) That's why even the 3rd world has rural mobile phone service.
Sure, you can get along fine without social media. You won't locate me on Facebook or Twitter or the like.
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> The bloody history of corporate towns should serve a reminder of what not.
The last 5 years or so I've seen a lot of that, people wanting to try out "a new idea" that's been done plenty of times before, with horrible results every time. Was history removed from the curriculum a few years ago and now we're seeing the effects, people who don't know history?
I did notice about 15 years ago my step-daughters spent a lot of time on *-history. Maybe history was replaced with Mexican history, black history, a
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Who Thomas Jefferson was has been changed.
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The bloody history of corporate towns should serve a reminder of what not.
Don't worry. Communism solves that problem. /sarcasm.
And the sarcasm tag is needed because... you actually find unironic communists, not only on reddit but in real-life settings like universities which is damned scary. Either people don't learn from history, or they're mentally defective in the same way that Trumptards are, thinking that they can work within the framework of a revolution (be it fascist or communist) and achieve a
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you actually find unironic communists, not only on reddit but in real-life settings like universities which is damned scary.
Don't be so shocked, I've met Stalinists who didn't believe in the gulags, a Flat-Earther, and no shortage of young Earth creationists. I knew a guy whose grandmother left him a Manchurian coal mine in her will because Chiang had gifted it to her husband and she was sure the day Mao died the people would rise up and restore the warlords and foreign owners. People believe all sorts of weird shit, even ones who should know better.
Agreed, No To Corporate "Benevolent" Dictatorships (Score:3)
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There will be pie in the sky when you die , but it's a lie
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When blockchain isn't stupid enough (Score:3)
So one corporate entity will be the authority over all services and transactions in its domain. Certainly a use case for the overhead of distributed trust if I've ever heard one!
But I guess when regular blockchain fever dreams aren't retarded enough, why not up the ante with Randian nightmare dystopia?
Pick up that can, citizen! (Score:1)
No, the dangerous part is what happens if these get popular and start to regulatorily capture US laws. Make no mistake, our overlords woul
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And "this note is legal tender", so corporate script cannot be demanded instead of bitcoin.
Sweetie, that just means exactly that: the note is legal tender. It doesn't make the note mandatory tender. If the seller demands payment in quatloos, and you agreed to that, you'd better have quatloos on hand.
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Nope, policy can't trump law.
This note is legal tender for all debts, public and private.
Once a debt is established, they are forced to accept payment in said legal tender.
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being in debt to someone doesn't let them tell you where to live
Why do you think they want to form their own government? So they can play with local laws enough to get around that and other regulations. If all transportation belongs to the company then you're walking through the desert trying to leave. Thousands of illegals have died trying that not far from where they want to build their Utopia.
Run away! (Score:2)
Re:Run away! (Score:5, Informative)
You load sixteen tons, what do you get?
Another day older and deeper in debt.
Saint Peter don't you call me 'cause I can't go.
I owe my soul to the company store.
- Tennessee Ernie Ford
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Actually written by Merle Travis
They are called 'Fiefdoms' (Score:2)
And you can pay your rent to the Company, and shop at the Company store.... And the Company pays the police. What could possibly go wrong?
Already been done (Score:5, Insightful)
"There's got to be a place somewhere on this planet where people are willing to just start from scratch and say, 'We're not going to do things this way just because it's the way we've done it,'" Berns said. He wants Nevada to change its laws to allow "innovation zones," where companies would have powers like those of a county government, including creating court systems, imposing taxes and building infrastructure while making land and water management decisions...
We know how it ends.
These "starting over" with a new and better way to make a society always winds up with all the 12 year old girls being "married" to the village leaders.
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Sure has. Remember Sealand not too long ago? Does this joker expect protection from any govt when the Nevada Mob decides to take over? Or does he expect to raise a mercenary army that accepts payment in his local currrency? Good luck with that.
lol. I had forgotten about Sealand and the attack by mercenaries. That was a wtf moment. Or lol, depending on your general outlook on life.
Thanks for the memory.
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Starting over, again (Score:5, Informative)
Government isn't there to protect ideas. It's there to protect people's rights, what few haven't been legislated away, and common assets like land, waterways and air, and of course exclusivity/ownership of other assets. By that metric, a lot of governments around the world are incompetent.
What can a corporation do that the existing courts can't, except create a debtors' prison. I notice that Berns didn't include prisons in that demand for responsibility, implying the state will pay to punish the people Berns dislikes.
In the USA, corporations already have a court system, it's called arbitration.
If you're the government, who's going to give you a bail-out? Also, when you're the government, the people with pitchforks stand outside your door. Good-luck with that.
Ber-be-be-ber-ber-Berns! (Score:1)
His friends can call him Jeffrey, but to you, it's Mr. Berns!
Corpocracy? (Score:2)
Sounds like a pure corpocracy to me, anybody read "Cloud Atlas"?
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Nope, but it's an excellent movie.
"three people like commissioners"? (Score:2)
So they are not people, but appear to have people traits? Are we talking AI government leaders now? Or perhaps total blockchain democracy, everyone votes (on the blockchain record) and >50% wins every decision per commissioner? Who is in which commissioner's voting district is decided by the company who owns the town of course.
Heed the words of Admiral Ackbar (Score:2)
The original "company towns" in the US were towns where a company owned everything, including the stores, medical facilities, and homes. People worked, but the wages were set by the company, as were the rents and the prices for utilities and food and healthcare so that a worker would expend all his money staying alive and providing for his family and have nothing left to either get ahead or escape. Tennessee Ernie Ford had a famous song [www.youtube.comwatch] on this theme. Back then, these towns tended to be very corrupt, but th
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Well, many people are just unbelievably stupid.
Like not having looked at a product a single time, from the time they take it out of the shelf at the store, until they bring it home. To a point where all they were going on to decide if that was what they wanted, was the color of the lid. So they bought washing powder instead of cornflakes "because the box was red". I've literally seen that.
special taxing districts in Colorado (Score:2)
Colorado allows locals to form tiny taxing enclaves. Here's what happens now:
1) A developer wants to build homes. He won't be able to sell them at a competitive price unless he hides the cost in a special tax structure like all his competitors are doing.
2) He buys undeveloped land. Him and his wife and business partner register as the only 3 residents in their new special taxing district.
3) They sell a bond for tens of millions, with balloon payments starting a few years out.
4) He builds the homes, and sell
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contradiction (Score:2)
So... (Score:2)
this is how it ends?
Something something... (Score:2)
Company Town (Score:3)
Hmm... An entire town, and everyone's financial life controlled by a corporation, and where the public officials are employees of the corporation. What a novel idea, no one has done anything like this before, What could possibly go wrong? Wait... Coal Towns, you say? NAH, those were EVIL polluting corporations, not environment-friendly high-tech ones like we have today.
Count me in...
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My great grandparents left a copper mining company town in the upper peninsula of Michigan in the middle of the night on back roads to evade the company enforcers. His brother had left before he was old enough to enter the mines, but he hadn't been so lucky and ended up inheriting his father's debt in addition to his own when his father was injured and could no longer work. My grandmother said the proudest moment in his life was the day several years later when he went back to Red Jacket and paid off his
Company town 2.0 (Score:2)
Because the concept worked so well in the past...
"St. Peter don't you call me, 'cause I can't go
I owe my soul to the company store"
(from the song 16 tons.)