Xref: utzoo comp.org.eff.talk:2428 comp.society.futures:2500 alt.cyberspace:262 Path: utzoo!utgpu!news-server.csri.toronto.edu!cs.utexas.edu!usc!apple!arc!arc!steve From: steve@Advansoft.COM (Steve Savitzky) Newsgroups: comp.org.eff.talk,comp.society.futures,alt.cyberspace Subject: Cyberia: An Off-the-Wall Fantasy Message-ID: Date: 23 May 91 00:22:25 GMT Sender: @advansoft.com Followup-To: comp.org.eff-talk Organization: Advansoft Research Corp, Santa Clara, CA Lines: 97 I debated with myself for a while before posting this bit of silliness. There's always the danger that somebody might take it seriously. I wouldn't want that to happen. So, for the fantasy- impaired, here is a grain of salt to take it with: ::::: ::::: ::::: ========================================================================== DISCLAIMER: The following is a work of fiction. Any resemblence between the totally off-the-wall ideas put forth below and opinions actually held or actions advocated by any person (including the author) or organization (especially the author's employer) is highly unlikely. ========================================================================== THE FREE STATE OF CYBERIA* PROLEGOMENA TO A MANIFESTO When in the course of human events, it becomes necessary... Well, that's the way it ought to start, followed by We, the people of Cyberspace, in order to form a more perfect union... The point is that Cyberspace is a separate country, a homeland of the mind, a culture, a people bound together not by geography but by the free exchange of information. To a very large extent we have our own government, our own laws, and our own police. The laws are, to be sure, chaotic and mostly unwritten; the government is an anarchy with volunteer civil servants, and the police are vigilantes with little authority or power. We have no army, few defenses, and most of our territory is in the hands of foreign, imperial powers who have no idea of what goes on in their distant colonies, but who insist on making laws to rule them anyway. Could we declare independence, claim dual citizenship in our native countries and in Cyberia, and sieze control of our own territory? Probably not. (Why not?) It's a crazy idea. (But is it crazy *enough*?) The nation-states and the multinational corporations are too powerful. (But we could put up a heck of a fight, couldn't we?) It's never been done before. (There's never been anyplace like Cyberspace before.) Things like that only happen in fiction. (Cyberspace is a fiction. Virtual reality is a fiction.) There are precedents. In the Middle Ages, the Church was a law unto itself, transcending the national boundaries of Europe. The high seas have always been outside of national law. The Native American tribes on their reservations are separate nations (for some purposes, anyway). Some tactics: o Get organized. (This is *fiction*, remember?) o Form an educational non-profit corporation (Free University of Cyberia) that owns the data and computers that make up Cyberia. Stake territorial claims via copyright. Computers and data would be tax write-offs for their former owners. o Form a religion (Church Of Virtual Enlightenment?). Make writing programs, posting and reading news acts of worship. Get protection via freedom of religion. Declare that the Deity is a hacker running the universe as a simulation. (Quantum effects are due to round-off error.) o Pay (bribe) some tiny country to cede its territorial rights in Cyberspace and recognize Cyberia. Failing that, put a computer on a raft in the middle of the ocean. (Some pirate radio stations did something like this a few years ago, didn't they?) o Make every Cyberian computer an embassy and claim diplomatic immunity. (This is where the whole thing breaks down. No government on Earth would permit such a claim, would they?) o Pass laws that make the advantages of Cyberia so obvious that almost every individual and corporation with a computer would want to be a part of it. ---- * pronounced "sy-BUR-i-a", as in "Cyberspace", so as to avoid confusion with a certain Soviet republic. ========================================================================== Copyright 1991 by Stephen Savitzky; All rights reserved. May be freely distributed on any electronic medium provided it remains complete and unaltered, including the Disclaimer and this copyright notice. ========================================================================== -- \ --Steve Savitzky-- \ ADVANsoft Research Corp \ REAL hackers use an AXE! \ \ steve@advansoft.COM \ 4301 Great America Pkwy \ #include \ \ arc!steve@apple.COM \ Santa Clara, CA 95954 \ 408-727-3357 \ \__ steve@arc.UUCP _________________________________________________________