Non-coercive Collectivism

One of the core values of the cypherpunk movement in the 1990s was non-coercion. Cypherpunks not only wanted to change the world through their own non-coercive methods, but give individuals the ability to resist other coercive forces.

Politically this value is typically associated with libertarianism and can sometimes be interpreted (and manifested) as a fierce individualism where the wellbeing of one’s neighbor is the neighbor’s problem alone.

At ETHDenver, Erik Voorhees and Kevin Owocki had a debate where ostensibly Erik represented this individualist POV and Kevin represented a collectivist one. Starting around the 6:15 mark of that video though, Kevin does a great job of finding the common ground between these two perspectives that are supposed to be at odds.

One of the most powerful aspects of crypto/web3 is that blockchains provide us with credible and non-coercive ways to coordinate “collectivist” outcomes. Collective actions previously only achievable by the State (the enemy of the individualist) are now possible though opt-in only mechanisms.

I believe that the Geo Web is a perfect example of this. We use partial common ownership to define the property rights on the network. This system is also referred to as a Harberger tax, and there’s no faster way to make a libertarian’s skin crawl than to advocate for taxes…

But I would argue that our property rights system is less coercive than a traditional private property system (enforced by the State through a monopoly on violence). 

The Geo Web’s digital land registry will gain legitimacy only by individuals choosing to give it legitimacy. Those that choose to license land on the network will contribute network fees to public good(s) willingly as a net positive tradeoff for access to a thriving network and collective value. The core of our hypothesis is that we will go further, faster, and better together than alone.

On the flip side, those that chose not to participate in our collectivist network can simply ignore our registry. They may disagree because they are anchored to legacy property rights and/or don’t buy our argument for funding public goods. There will always be competing networks with different values. The Geo Web will always be forkable. 

With the Geo Web and other like-minded blockchain projects, the individual’s right to self-determination is maintained. The market will run its course and the door to opt-in to collective action will always exist.

Technical

• Added the features needed for a current licensor to match or decline to match a bid on their parcel with payment streams (https://github.com/Geo-Web-Project/core-contracts/pull/47).
• Began work on the ability for a license bidder to claim a parcel after the matching period has elapsed. This PR also includes the ability for parcels to be claimed out of foreclosure if a licensor’s flow has run dry (https://github.com/Geo-Web-Project/core-contracts/pull/48).
• Continued progress on the Dutch auction logic used for fair launch (https://github.com/Geo-Web-Project/core-contracts/pull/42/commits). 

Community

• Gitcoin GR13 is live today through March 24th. Of course, the Geo Web is participating again. It’s hard to imagine us topping last quarter’s support, but we’re going to try. We’ll never raise VC, so grants are the main source of funding for our work (with an airdrop or two sprinkled in) until we launch our mainnet. Every DAI/fraction of an ETH counts! Thank you for your support!
• The PCOTs (partial common ownership tokens) working group that we’ve been contributing to is picking up steam (website, Gitcoin grant (pending review), & more to come). Our next meeting is this Friday at 1600 UTC. Hit us up on Discord if you want to join!

On Deck

• Streaming payments are getting closer
• Fair launch auction logic completion
• Rethinking our base Ceramic schemas to more elegantly enable more use cases