Ladonia: An Illegally Created Nation Where Creativity Rules(slate.com)
slate.com
Ladonia: An Illegally Created Nation Where Creativity Rules
http://www.slate.com/blogs/atlas_obscura/2014/02/18/ladonia_in_sweden_is_a_micronation_built_around_nimis_a_driftwood_sculpture.html
8 comments
Such a moronic title: all nations are created illegally, if you believe otherwise show me the paperwork of the USA territory, signed by all previous residents (native Americans)... and no, their graves do not count as a signature under any legal definition.
A legally created nation came into existence three years ago.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/South_Sudan#Independence_.28201...
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/South_Sudan#Independence_.28201...
Not nearly "all" nations are created illegally. Try the Czech Republic and Slovakia, for example. And what about the Algonquin Nation, were they created illegally?
While you do offer good counterexamples, these are more the exception than the rule
"All" only requires one counter example. People should really say something other than "all" unless they really mean "all".
Your brain should not work as a compiler, when everything must be 100% strictly correct on the language syntax to be considered valid.
People shouldn't use absolutes when they don't mean an absolute. It is not about 100% strictness, its about understanding what someone is saying. The "STOP" sign actually means stop, not maybe (that's "YIELD"). In other words, don't get pissy when you use absolute proclamations and others call you on it.
Sadly, there are pieces of paper with signatures on them. Its amazing how scummy the US government got in trying to "legitimize" the land forfeitures. Even sadder how some folks today want to throw out was actually signed and steal the rest.
To be fair there's some circular reasoning here. A contract itself is only valid and legal according to the law of a particular nation. Those pieces of paper had no equivalence of legal meaning in the Native American culture prior to the founding of the colonies and the forced application of English common law.
Well, a treaty is between nations and the Native American had agreements between tribes (and trade) before the Europeans showed up. The European (and later US) treaties were not a new concept, just a new form and some new, particularly scummy, tactics.
Ireland?
I had considered the possibility of purchasing an island and having actual people living and working with me.
a bunch of my friends on IRC were very keen on the idea, although I don't suspect they know what burden it would entail.
yes, we'd be able to set up our own privacy policies and, yes we can have super fast internet, lay our own fiber and infrastructure of that nature could be created.
however, agriculture, the bureaucratic hoops we'd have to jump through to successfully secede and the general hard work and labour that would have to go in, I believe, is unaccounted for.
this is a cool concept, and micronations are a nice idea, I just wish I could find a plot of land that's not owned, I'd definitely put a lot of hard work into getting out of my country.
a bunch of my friends on IRC were very keen on the idea, although I don't suspect they know what burden it would entail.
yes, we'd be able to set up our own privacy policies and, yes we can have super fast internet, lay our own fiber and infrastructure of that nature could be created.
however, agriculture, the bureaucratic hoops we'd have to jump through to successfully secede and the general hard work and labour that would have to go in, I believe, is unaccounted for.
this is a cool concept, and micronations are a nice idea, I just wish I could find a plot of land that's not owned, I'd definitely put a lot of hard work into getting out of my country.
> however, agriculture, the bureaucratic hoops we'd have to jump through to successfully secede and the general hard work and labour that would have to go in, I believe, is unaccounted for.
That, and the inevitable descent into savagery: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lord_of_the_Flies.
That, and the inevitable descent into savagery: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lord_of_the_Flies.
> "the bureaucratic hoops we'd have to jump through to successfully secede"
My understanding of secession has always been that one does not ask for permission. Requests to pay taxes, for example, would fall on deaf ears. Otherwise you've not seceded, you're just on vacation.
My understanding of secession has always been that one does not ask for permission. Requests to pay taxes, for example, would fall on deaf ears. Otherwise you've not seceded, you're just on vacation.
We don't really need more countries, rather we need different countries. Globalization has made the west one giant colorless cat-video-loving nation. Hence the interest in micronations, seasteading and other "alternative citizenships".
It's my understanding that if you discover an unclaimed island it is then automatically claimed by the country of origin of the discoverer.
Kind of like working for Google, or any other tech giant. Lovely.
Total self-sufficiency is nearly impossible or at least extremely difficult. If you allow external trade it might be doable, although then you have to actually produce something of value, and trade it without bringing the government down on you.
Although I wonder, what kinds of technologies would you need to achieve complete self-sufficiency? It's a practical question too because that's what we would need them to settle mars and the moon, not to mention other solar systems.
Perhaps you could get a lot done with robots, it depends on the task.
Although I wonder, what kinds of technologies would you need to achieve complete self-sufficiency? It's a practical question too because that's what we would need them to settle mars and the moon, not to mention other solar systems.
Perhaps you could get a lot done with robots, it depends on the task.
How do you lay your own fiber and actually get connectivity? I've always wanted to try and take complete control of my internet, but as I understand it, the most I could do is last mile.
Actually you can, if you choose to, work out with a metropolitan area to put fiber between any two points, working with states to get it between states is more work and really needs a small staff to keep track of all the action items (you'll meet a lot of politicians). There are some dusty workable rules laid over from the AT&T breakup in the US that require some access rights.
The last time I priced it out (I was depressed about my choices) it was about $125K to get a fiber between my house and the nearest peering point (PAIX, which is slightly closer than MAE-West). That was about $10K per mile. Once you get there you need to find an IP transit provider to hook up with. Lots more choices than 'cable' or 'dsl' though :-)
The last time I priced it out (I was depressed about my choices) it was about $125K to get a fiber between my house and the nearest peering point (PAIX, which is slightly closer than MAE-West). That was about $10K per mile. Once you get there you need to find an IP transit provider to hook up with. Lots more choices than 'cable' or 'dsl' though :-)
The businesses that serve up to that last mile will vend to folks. At least, out here in the sticks in texas, there are guys who have businesses laying wire and building towers-- you'd call one of them and have them get service, just like time warner or whoever does when they want service in an area. Not cheap, but if you have a business or a community, that's what you do, as I understand it.
If you want to peer with one of the core ISPs you'd probably need to be serving something compelling your side, or at least be willing to pay massive penalties for an imbalanced flow. Even at that level there's nothing magic about the process: you sign a contract with them that says you'll connect your networks together.
I believe there was a group on reddit that tried to do this.
I might be reading this story incorrectly, but it seems like Ladonia is just a normal piece of property which is owned by artists who issue "citizenship".
Is there some other quality I am missing that separates it from any other piece of property someone owns, creates a website for, and calls a micronation?
Is there some other quality I am missing that separates it from any other piece of property someone owns, creates a website for, and calls a micronation?
I used to live in the municipality where there is going on.
The most interesting part is the legal wrangling.
It's not private property - it was built with driftwood in a public nature preserve. The authorities wanted it gone, but first of all - it's natural driftwood - is that illegal? Well, it turned out to be. So the artist sold the sculpture itself to some uncontactable people outside of the country, and suddenly the municipality couldn't just order him to remove it, and so on and so forth. He then built another sculpture of cement with hundreds of numbered rocks, and sold each rock to a different person, in order to spread the "blame" further.
Eventually it got so popular it became a local tourist attraction. And so it still stands.
edit: Aside from that it's just a kooky artist doing kooky things. Lars Vilks in infamous in Sweden for his stunts. He's also been outspoken in free speech issues which has made him a target of Muslim fundamentalists.
The most interesting part is the legal wrangling.
It's not private property - it was built with driftwood in a public nature preserve. The authorities wanted it gone, but first of all - it's natural driftwood - is that illegal? Well, it turned out to be. So the artist sold the sculpture itself to some uncontactable people outside of the country, and suddenly the municipality couldn't just order him to remove it, and so on and so forth. He then built another sculpture of cement with hundreds of numbered rocks, and sold each rock to a different person, in order to spread the "blame" further.
Eventually it got so popular it became a local tourist attraction. And so it still stands.
edit: Aside from that it's just a kooky artist doing kooky things. Lars Vilks in infamous in Sweden for his stunts. He's also been outspoken in free speech issues which has made him a target of Muslim fundamentalists.
Not really.. It's just as much of a country as my apartment is.
The artist in question has also had lots of media attention for his work depicting Muhammed (the prophet): https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lars_Vilks#Muhammad_drawings_c... The guy is a racist nutjob.
The artist in question has also had lots of media attention for his work depicting Muhammed (the prophet): https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lars_Vilks#Muhammad_drawings_c... The guy is a racist nutjob.
He's a racist nutjob for drawing "Muhammad as a roundabout dog"? Or is there something else?
If acting like a racist makes you a racist, then yes he is a racist. Some people would just call him a troll though.
I doubt he's racist. He's more of an offline troll.
And hardly a nutjob---if you read his blog (www.vilks.net) he is clearly quite smart.
My impression is that he mainly trolls the art establishment. It's usually quite difficult to tell how serious he is. His book "Hur man blir samtidskonstnär på tre dagar: handbok med teori" ["How to become a contemporary artist in three days"] seems to seriously and carefully argue for George Dickie's institutional theory of art, while at the same time it is clearly taking the piss out of contemporary art projects...
My impression is that he mainly trolls the art establishment. It's usually quite difficult to tell how serious he is. His book "Hur man blir samtidskonstnär på tre dagar: handbok med teori" ["How to become a contemporary artist in three days"] seems to seriously and carefully argue for George Dickie's institutional theory of art, while at the same time it is clearly taking the piss out of contemporary art projects...
I am pretty sure I would like to be friends with this guy.
You are reading it wrong. The property is owned by the Swedish government.
The artists are simply fucking around.
The artists are simply fucking around.
Living close to the so called country I can confirm that your suspicions are mostly correct. The land is owned by the government (afaik) and is not a private property by the artist. From time to time the government threatens to destroy his buildings, but since they have survived this long they can mostly be seen as empty threats.
Does anyone else hate how the horizontal scrollbars make you want to scroll left (with your arrow keys) and then it turns out that this is the command to go to another article?
Probably, yes.
At first, I thought it was a nation created by those that speak Ladin, which would not be surprising considering the autonomous stature of the region.
[1] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ladin_language
[1] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ladin_language
They actually don't have much of an incentive to form their own country - they get piles of money from Italy and Austria as well.
Indeed, Sud Tirol is often cited as a good example of how to handle a linguistic/cultural minority, which mostly involves the aforementioned piles of money, and a lot of freedom to use their own language. In the Ladin speaking area, almost all the signs, for instance, are in Ladin/Italian/German. In the German speaking area, they're in German and Italian.
Indeed, Sud Tirol is often cited as a good example of how to handle a linguistic/cultural minority, which mostly involves the aforementioned piles of money, and a lot of freedom to use their own language. In the Ladin speaking area, almost all the signs, for instance, are in Ladin/Italian/German. In the German speaking area, they're in German and Italian.
"Goaded, Vilks ignored the announcement and decided to take control of the area and secede from Sweden"
The whole secession would be somewhat more believable if the police protection of Vilks didn't costs the Swedish tax payers about a million USD per year.
The whole secession would be somewhat more believable if the police protection of Vilks didn't costs the Swedish tax payers about a million USD per year.
We need more mirconations.
Given that apparently all it takes is for someone to "declare" an unrecognized micronation, I hereby declare one particular square micron in international waters, known only to me, as the world's new smallest unrecognized micronation: Nanotopia. Our motto will be "never found, never conquered." We allow dual-citizenship so long as you don't tell anybody.
Picostan would like to formally declare war against Nanotopia.
Femtopia has always been at war with the larger, overbearing neighbors of Picostan. The largess and crudness drowns out our finer points.
Good luck finding us! :) Even if you comb through the entire great Pacific garbage patch, we'll still elude you!
Attodonica: "Splitters!"
Get a giant boat and park it out in international waters.
I consider it an enormously antiquated idea to bind nations to a piece of land. We should try to arrive at a more abstract definition. And yes, of such nations we need many more.
you might enjoy doctorow's "eastern standard tribe", which, while not one of his better books, had some nice ideas. the premise was that the kind of people who spent large amounts of their time hanging out online would coalesce into tribes based around timezones, and that the timezone you were physically living in would not necessarily correspond to the tribe you belonged to and arranged your waking hours to match.