Enduring alignment

What makes communities stick around long term?

Apologies for the late delivery on this one, I’ve just come off the back of a week of conferences including Token2049, the Network State conference and a series of fireside chats at Ârc at the Network School over the weekend – stay tuned for some of the takeaways rolling out in the next few weeks…

“A network state is a highly aligned online community with a capacity for collective action that crowdfunds territory around the world and eventually gains diplomatic recognition from pre-existing states.”

It’s a mantra I’ve heard a lot since arriving at Network School, so much so that some of those that have recited it have joked that it has become their morning meditation.

If you haven’t heard it before (and I’ve been surprised at how many here haven’t) it comes from the beginning of The Network State, a book written by Balaji Srinivasan. Honestly I’ve had trouble describing what a network state actually is beyond this, each society interprets it in very different ways, making it impossible to paint them all with the same brush. As I’m sitting in the darkened hall of the Network State conference, I find myself thinking about it deeply.

The talks, alternating between 2-5 minute presentations and a handful of thirty minute fireside chats offer a crash course in the breadth of theories and approaches in the space. Not all of the speakers are working on building a new society. Some are economists, commentators or purely in tech industries that could be brought into a network state.

But of the ones that are creating some kind of new society I notice a pattern that splits the projects into two very broad buckets. One group focuses on the first part of the mantra, the “online community”, let’s call it “the software”. The other is focused on the ending – the land and diplomatic recognition – let’s call it “the hardware”.

This splitting into software and hardware societies characterises the strengths of the founders involved, their experience and their motivations.

Those that focus on hardware and infrastructure use economic incentives and regulatory differentiation as their call to action to drive residents. While those that I would characterise as software focus on human centric themes like “multi generational living” mixed with artistic collaboration and the personality of the people that the project may attract.

Hardware and Software societies

In Network School, (which I would characterise as “hardware” although for the moment many of the residents live in a hotel) there’s a number of elements I guess you could call “points of alignment”.

There’s a desire to “level up” best characterised as the three word slogan of “learn, earn and burn”. When I first read about NS, it was in an official announcement stating that the place could provide “motivation as a service,” which, in practice, is created by the community of founders it attracts that hellbent on making their ideas become a reality. And then there’s a belief that the west is in an irreversible decline, and that the best way forward is to position oneself in the east - which although is shared by some residents, is not the view of all.

The place oozes with the experience and outward facing persona of Balaji – driven by startup mentality and tech culture KPIs. Everything – food, exercise equipment and classes, inspirational lectures, the possibility to pitch Balaji and investors like him – is provided for, meaning that founders can just lock in and get on with their work (if they can resist the distraction of social events created by the community).

Branding, like the walls of the building residents live in, are clean cut and efficient with little cultural influence or design flair. In a presentation on why residents should stay long term, the focus was on the “earn” - economic incentives and increased access to NS points which “may in the future have monetary value” and were presented as similar to equity in a start up. There was no focus or visualisation on what long term life might look like.

For the majority of people I’ve spoken to, they are initially attracted to the place by the environment of “levelling up”, personal goals often centre on “getting healthier” and “being around other founders”, professional goals centre on specific goals for their business like a product launch or funding. Why they stay is a lot less defined – some even noting that even though they signed up long term, it’s with the foresight that they will probably leave for some time every couple of months.

Edge City, a project firmly in the “software” category approaches the project pitch from a different direction – the goal of “human flourishing”. Fundamentally, this is a synonym of “levelling up” but reflects its cultural focus within its wording. Its co-founder, Timour Kosters, centres the conversation around its values on human collaboration and multi-generational engagement. Pop-ups include the presence of alternative therapy practitioners, artists and musicians alongside tech founders.

“We look for people who are curious, kind in high agency,” Timour says during a fireside chat at an event hosted by Ârc at NS. “Curious -They’re always learning, they’re interested and interesting. Kind meaning no assholes. And that doesn’t mean being nice all the time. You can be critical and be doing it in a kind way. Then “high agency” – doing something interesting or building something doesn’t have to be tech. It could be art, music, academics, etc. But live players who are active out there and they’re doing something cool.”

The project is a pop up city, which, instead of settling in one place, organises month-long events which piggy back on the infrastructure of villages around the world. While many of the community attend multiple pop up cities, they are temporary, fit in around the participants (including its founders) day to day life at home. At breakfast at NS one day, while navigating the mechanics of one of those buffet conveyor belt toasters, I spoke to Timour about his life in Berlin and the need to decompress in the world outside network states between pop ups.

The long term vision of Edge however is to bring the community it creates through these pop-ups to permanent bases in charter cities founded by other teams. The hope is that through these initial years of pop-up city collaboration between tech founders, academics, artists and those that are simply “curious”, enough of a multi-faceted culture will have been established that the permanent community will reflect that of a major city like Berlin.

He says that he has little interest in the end goal of diplomatic recognition for Edge, but cities that he has engaged with to establish long term communities in the future are being built with novel models that align with Edge’s focus on human flourishing.

A few days later I sit down to breakfast with Niklas Anzinger, founder of the “layer two” network state of Infinita (software) that is established in the charter city/network state of Prospera, Honduras (hardware). It seems like some of my best conversations happen at breakfast.