Balaji Srinivasan

"The old rules do not apply any more, but the new ones have not been written. And we must brace ourselves for more turbulence ahead." https://t.co/8duOq5QZUz

Popups are the new startups. https://t.co/shz1ICWBmJ https://t.co/gRRCg8ZaN0 The old world is fading, while the new world struggles to be born; now is the time of popups. A joke, yet also true. Because the postwar order is melting down, while the post-Internet order is just booting up. That means translating internet communities into physical realities: https://t.co/49NA70wZcZ

From the regulatory state to the acceleratory state. https://t.co/m0yKXRSf0u

What comes next for AI? Perhaps physically specific intelligence, more than artificial general intelligence. Here’s a draft thesis. (1) First, AI is now entering the trough of the hype cycle. Every tech, no matter how amazing, goes through this. It’s actually one of the best times to invest and build once the space begins to thin. (2) Second, AI is both highly useful for search, summarization, visualization, and prototyping *and* a highly annoying source of spam, scams, and slop. Too many will focus solely on the downsides. (3) Third, the exact plateau of AI is quite unexpected. The fact that current models seem to have topped out at “far…

Gold is the reserve currency of the state. Digital gold is the reserve currency of the network. Fiat currency is the reserve currency of the failed state. https://t.co/leMo8Jy2Uc The Golden Age is here… https://t.co/dGVNGD3IlO https://t.co/yWIwDl7gGm

A few years ago, someone asked me “what’s low status today that you think will become high status in 5-8 years?” My answer was bro science. Because it gets formalized into self-experimentation, which in turn accelerates longevity. We are on track. The transition from intuitive bro science to systematic self-experimentation requires quantitative self-diagnostics. And Max is the founder of @superpower, which is helping to make that a reality. @superpower Original thread from AMA with @dwr on Farcaster. https://t.co/inF6KsxokS https://t.co/DszhCyFvHF

China is remonetizing gold. https://t.co/gwVIBXIXqY See also @biancoresearch and @AndreasSteno.

Democrats underestimated Republicans, and lost the meme war. Republicans underestimated China, and are unfortunately losing the trade war. And some in China may underestimate the free Internet, where choice can triumph over force. This requires some explanation. Let's go. (1) First, as a reality shill, we should stipulate that modern China is perhaps the most physically formidable country to ever exist. Visualize a young Bolo Yeung from Bloodsport. It's #1 in electricity, cars, steel, ships, and countless other industries. No country can realistically win a war against today's China, especially in its own backyard, especially over Taiwan. T…

China is more MAGA than MAGA. The Internet is more America than America. That is: China has the heavily armed, highly industrialized, culturally traditionalist, monoethnic society that MAGA wants. Meanwhile, the Internet is global equality and uniform rule-of-code. It’s free markets and free speech, and the next version of what America once was. At this late stage, I don’t think the ~77M in MAGA can realistically out-manufacture the 1.4B of China. But the 7B+ on the global Internet could eventually balance the 1.4B of China. The Internet was built to resist a nuclear attack. So you can’t easily use physical force against it. Even cutting …

The AI flippening. https://t.co/78a520QeWT Crypto has also decentralized to Asia. https://t.co/vQBkd6dyGd About 55% of unicorns are still in the US, but the trendline there is also towards decentralization. https://t.co/oa58mOZJ5J Seven months later, this is roughly what’s happened. The flood of Chinese open source AI models continues.

Billions of dollars. Millions of followers. Thousands of attendees. Half a dozen governments. And one idea whose time has come. https://t.co/Y2JVubfep2 Popups are the new startups. Because we can now populate the land from the cloud. Here's a full conference recap on that exact point. https://t.co/shz1ICWBmJ https://t.co/MVXjOiSond All Network State 2025 talks are now free online. Here's a link to the YouTube playlist: https://t.co/weNEfGTagu

There's dark talent around the world, from the Midwest to the Middle East. Backing this talent is the right thing to do morally and the smart thing to do economically. To be clear: I'm not talking about sending more tech talent to the US. Instead, I'm talking about backing dark talent around the world. That includes the many white kids from places like the Midwest who've been unfairly quota'd out of Harvard. But it also includes those outside America whose societies were ravaged by war, socialism, or communism...and who are just now starting to become productive again. The goal is global equality of opportunity. The Internet actually now p…

This is the livestream for Network State Conference 2025. https://t.co/DX7lOKx2ky

This year's Network State Conference is on Friday, October 3 in Singapore. Our speakers include Vitalik Buterin, Bryan Johnson, Ben Horowitz, Brian Armstrong, Amjad Masad, Ranveer Allahbadia, Arthur Hayes, Nas Daily, Noah Smith, Andrew Huberman, and the governments of Singapore, Dubai, Abu Dhabi, and El Salvador. That means many of the most successful founders, creators, investors, and policymakers in the world are now interested in the idea of bringing online communities into the physical world. Our conference also features writers, community organizers, and intellectuals from around the world (and across the ideological spectrum!) who ar…

The fully automatic trash can. https://t.co/3oNCp3uWYY

Gold is about to flip treasuries. https://t.co/TV1x313L5C See also @LukeGromen’s commentary.

It's happening. Kazakhstan recently signed a deal with the Solana network state to create a special economic zone. Here's the signing ceremony in Kazakhstan, with @calilyliu and @akshaybd. https://t.co/2aCV25oAnf @calilyliu @akshaybd Here's a more detailed video by @farhaj on Forma, the Solana Economic Zone in Kazakhstan. https://t.co/woCmYK8Qo9

I was a bit confused by the quote tweeted chart. Were there really that many AI companies making $100M in 3.5 years, that it was only a top quartile thing, given that ChatGPT is only three years old? I spoke to @jmelaskyriazi and he said his quartile graph is not an empirical cohort chart. That is, it’s not taking the revenue trajectories of 1000 AI companies and then showing that the top 250 hit $100M ARR in 3.5 years. It is instead an extrapolation of growth rates based on three buckets (he has a post on his methodology). Without meaning any offense, I think this extrapolation could be misleading. Because a true cohort chart that includes…

This is actually already happening, as there are 250,000+ Brits in the UAE alone. It is also why we will see startup societies and network states. https://t.co/BAObgJ8zD3 Yes. With respect to these two countries, a Solana Economic Zone has already been announced in Kazakhstan and we have Network School in Southeast Asia. This space is further along than you might think. Come to https://t.co/m0bsIF7Asm or watch online on October 3 for an overview. https://t.co/dNTqssjHGz

My explanation is that the legacy economy is being sunset in favor of the Internet economy. https://t.co/DTVsMwInvW Since the 2008 financial crisis, every transaction and every communication has moved online. But we are still at the foot of the mountain. The next step is internet economies, communities, cities, presidencies. The world is becoming Internet First. I should clarify that I am not necessarily a believer in any individual tech stock. And of course the physical economy still exists too (albeit mostly in Asia). I am however a believer in the Internet writ large.

I think so. A good analogy is to ant colonies. Individual ants make up a colony, much like cells make up a human body. And yet the colony has an intelligence that’s beyond that of any individual ant. Similarly, one can usefully model human ideologies as meta-organisms that script human beings, much like ant colonies script ants. Sometimes the ideologies are symbiotic and result in the reproduction of both the ideology and the underlying host…like ant colonies help ants reproduce. At other times, human ideologies can be parasitic, by replicating at the expense of the underlying host…like a mind virus that inhibits reproduction. The selfish…

Prime Minister Modi comprehensively defeated the far left in India. It can be done. Naxalites drew their inspiration from Maoism and terrorized India for decades. Now these communists have formally surrendered. https://t.co/knucK2u1jh https://t.co/iCHMOaMiCO Fifteen years ago the far left still controlled almost one third of India. The Modi government fixed the issue by using force against actual terrorists while addressing the underlying discontent with economic development. It worked. https://t.co/z5RI22rap9 https://t.co/DbRgWMDgc4 A big part of the strategy was building infrastructure, not just dealing with terrorists. You need carr…

From internet companies to internet communities. Base is now doing a physical popup at Basecamp. Tesla is building Tesla Diners. Cursor is now running a cafe. We move from physical popups to startup societies and network states. https://t.co/6meYNHoNyA Popups are the new startups. Here’s the Perplexity cafe in Seoul:

TIEBOUT SORTING → NETWORK STATE The mathematical basis for the network state is Tiebout sorting. In 1956, Charles Tiebout proved that if you had: (a) low-cost mobility (b) frictionless discovery (c) no inter-jurisdictional spillover effects, and (d) many possible jurisdictions ...then individuals could vote with their feet by sorting themselves into communities that efficiently matched their preferences for public goods. Those assumptions were theoretical in 1956, but practical by 2026. Thanks to the Internet, mobility is low-cost (due to remote work), discovery of new jurisdictions is inexpensive, and "spillover" is minimal because only S…

Both America and China were invested in the illusion that China wasn't already the world's strongest economy. Psychologically, it suited the incumbent to appear strong. So America downplayed China's numbers. Strategically, it suited the disruptor to appear weak. So China also sandbagged its own numbers. But the illusion is becoming harder to maintain. In retrospect, all the China cope over the last decade or so was really just the stealth on the Chinese stealth bomber. Hide your strength and bide your time was Deng's strategy. Amazingly, denying China's strength somehow also became America's strategy. For example, all the cope on China'…

Linked below is the original article[1] from Politico. We'll see what the actual National Defense Strategy 2025 PDF says, but the article is consistent with remarks Hegseth[2] has made about China's military, particularly its hypersonics. Here's the piece. Pentagon plan prioritizes homeland over China threat This marks a major departure from the first Trump administration, which emphasized deterring Beijing. Pentagon officials are proposing the department prioritize protecting the homeland and Western Hemisphere, a striking reversal from the military’s yearslong mandate to focus on the threat from China. A draft of the newest National Def…

If you must hold fiat, then AED (the United Arab Emirates dirham) and SGD (the Singapore dollar) are probably your best options. Both run on their own sovereign rails, can handle large capital flows, and are built for a global audience. (Not investment advice, just my personal opinion.) Yes, watch the video. I mention that AED is currently pegged to the dollar and the SGD is soft pegged. But because they run on their own rails, both the United Arab Emirates and Singapore can change that peg if they see fit. https://t.co/MaJX7Q7rSQ The Swiss franc (CHF) is out. After Obama went after Swiss bank accounts, the Swiss froze Russian assets, an…

Central bankers expect to buy more gold. https://t.co/9geR4rchm5 The last five years have seen a significant shift in sentiment among central bankers worldwide, away from the dollar and towards gold. These are the last movers in many ways. But they are also big movers. Source: https://t.co/y9NSpQieGp

"Abolish the trade" is about as crazy as "abolish the police", but I guess we are in the time of crazy now.

When fiat is inflated it slowly goes to zero. When it is frozen it temporarily goes to zero. And when it is seized it instantly goes to zero. But hard money cannot be inflated, frozen, or seized.