From: mark@unicorn.com
Date: Thu, 15 Jan 1998 20:24:01 +0800
To: cypherpunks@cyberpass.net
Subject: Sealand (was Re: (eternity) autonomous agents)
Message-ID: <884866825.4040.193.133.230.33@unicorn.com>
MIME-Version: 1.0
Content-Type: text/plain



Lucky Green wrote:

>Sealand, about which I wrote about on this list before, was an example 
>that should be studied by the offshore advocates. Based in an old 
>oilrig housing platform,

Victorian sea-fort, AFAIR.

>some unlucky investors attempted to establish 
>their own country. They began issuing stamps and passports for their 
>"country". As any reasonable person should have expected, nobody would 
>move their mail and nobody recognized their passports.

Which wasn't the point; the majority of those they sold were just
for fun, not serious attempts at being recognized. However, I noticed
a newspaper article over Christmas about a woman who's selling
professional-looking passports in the names of countries which no
longer exist or changed names; the intention, presumably, being
that immigration officials won't realise that the passports aren't
real.

>They went bankrupt.

I'd be interested to know where you got your information from, because
both Strauss ('How to start your own country') and the Micronations
Web page tell different stories; that Sealand was set up mostly for fun
by a couple of guys who made a lot of money from pirate radio and
it lasted at least fifteen years.

Of course this doesn't detract from the main point, which is
that you won't get away with offshore data-havens unless you are
able to defend them against invaders; Strauss claims Sealand was
invaded by some German businessmen at one point, and any such 
data-haven will soon be visited by cops or warships.

    Mark