I've found a new project on the lines of libertarian independence, and you can read more about it on my Seasteading page.

What I like most about the project is that it involves a clear plan and clear goals. As Katy has pointed out, I've spent a lot of time researching and casting around to try to get a handle on a very tough problem (nation founding), the path to which is rather vague and unknown. The result has been a lack of clear places to put my efforts and of clear markers for success. Seasteading reduces a complicated sociopoliticoeconomic problem to (mostly) an engineering problem with some economic, political, and social aspects which can be left to those who use the technology. While it is a somewhat difficult engineering problem (how to economically build platforms which can withstand ocean waves, which can reach heights of 100-150 feet and deliver tremendous amounts of force), and in an area I am unfamiliar with (marine engineering), it least it is well-defined and has some clearly visible avenues for attack.

The author of the original work, Wayne Gramlich, conveniently lives in the same town I do, so we got together a few days ago to toss around some ideas. It turns out that we also share the same goals for the project: making it possible for people to form small, independent political units and experiment with different methods of government. Wayne has a lot of other projects that he works on, but he says he works best in a team environment, so I hope that my participation will encourage him to put in time on this one. We plan to collaborate on the second version of his paper and the design/construction of the prototypes.

I've started playing around with some wave-powered electricity generator designs, and Katy and I are talking about building a prototype and testing it in Santa Cruz during the christmas break. I found the titles of 8 useful books on offshore structures, waves, and marine engineering and sent little blue pieces of paper off into the Inter-Library Loan system in search of them. When I get back from my EMT class, hopefully a few will have shown up. Speaking of which, tonight I am getting certified in Healthcare-Provider level CPR, in preparation for the class.

Its good to have a realistic project.

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