Some thoughts on "How to Start a New Country" from 1729.

 In response to the mind provoking article: https://1729.com/how-to-start-a-new-country/ here are my top 3 questions to consider:

1. Article 1 of the Montevideo Convention on the Rights and Duties of States, has the following guidelines (four qualifications) for what constitutes a country: a permanent population; a defined territory; government; and the capacity to enter relations with other states.  Therefore the first question is, how strictly does our new country want to adhere to these four? We know that it is not all countries are universally accepted, with the examples of Israel jumping to mind. But it would certainly help our cause if our network state did fulfill these criteria for its longer term stability.

2. Should it be started from scratch, or can it be an outgrowth of an existing social network. As the article mentions, there are already many successful sites such as FB, Twitter and others who have millions of users. Unfortunately most of those have too many disparate users/interests to be feasible. Interestingly, influencers with large followings might be a logical place to start as they have a large user base and presumably those that chose to follow said person have similar interests which would help achieve most (all?) of the requirements to successfully transition to a new country. If this is the path, the next question would be, who to choose?

3. Interestingly, the belief in Bitcoin and/or other cryptocurrencies (and to a lesser extent the blockchain in general) does check many of the boxes that would qualify it as a religion. This would inherently aide the cause of a network state. That being said, should other elements of national pride/cohesion be incorporated into this project. One person commented that they are Spanish but don't really feel that patriotic about it aside from instances of moments of sporting success such as Nadal winning a Major tournament or their football team succeeding on the world stage. I am not certain a decentralized network state could necessarily achieve a similar effect, but looking for ways to achieve this would assist in making it a stronger entity.