I have participated in 3 popup villages (Zuzalu, Vitalia, and Edge Esmeralda) and each one has given me increasing conviction in popup villages as an important form-factor for growing network societies. This essay includes some reflections on successful popup villages, why they work, and where they could go next. The

A turning point towards coherent growth and institutional recomposition One of the best macro frameworks for understanding the evolution of technologies is Carlota Perez's "Techno-Economic Paradigm Shifts". It charts the S-curve of new technologies through periods of (1) creation of the new technology, (2) frenzied financial

There's a basic playbook for building startup societies. It goes: supper, place, village, city, state. You start with dinner, and coordinate your way to something bigger. Over time, you can grow large structures of human coordination—maybe even new types of cities or states. Traditional suppers, places, villages,

Cabin is building a network city for our Citizens, who span the globe and gather in person. Citizens have passports that give them access to our City Directory of people and places that will make you feel at home anywhere you go. Over the next few years we'll

Modern politics, and its underlying post-Enlightenment political theory, is stuck in a rut. Since the French Revolution of 1789, when the nobles sat on the right side of parliament and the commoner delegates sat on the left side, we’ve used these terms to describe the political spectrum. Political polarization

For all of our excitement about the ways that DAOs could usher in a revolution of collective action, we should remember: they wouldn’t be the first one, and they won’t be the last. Our current world is designed primarily around large centralized structures like national governments, universities, and

There are two types of DAOs that seem to be gaining traction: financial flash mobs and hyperstructures. Each taps into a unique quality of DAOs that isn’t feasible via traditional corporate structures. They represent different extremes of on-chain coordination: fast and hot, or slow and long. In both cases,

There’s only two ways to advance civilization: bundling and unbundling Jim Barksdale, more-or-less Once in a while, in the long arc of civilization, a new set of coordination technologies come along and change everything. By allowing small groups of humans to better cooperate in the collective management of resources,

If you look at the social DAO landscape, you’ll see communities with different social token models. Some, like FWB, use a fungible social token to gate community access. Many emerging PFP-based communities like BAYC use NFTs as the primary community gating mechanism. Whether fungible or non-fungible, social tokens in

A decentralized city is a network of distinct physical locations tied together by shared governance and culture. It allows people to maintain close social ties and norms while moving around to different places. It also creates resilience against local changes in climate, regulation, and society. Inspired by Balaji's

This week, a group of internet friends tried an experiment: what happens when you meet online and then come together IRL to build something? What ideas emerge when you create the open-ended space to explore them collectively? I've spent the past nine months building remote co-living cabins with

This is the 1st essay in a 5-part series on funding models for the creator economy 1. Funding the creator economy [https://words.jonhillis.com/funding-the-creator-economy/] 2. Avoiding the venture trap [https://words.jonhillis.com/avoiding-the-venture-trap/] 3. Cash rules everything around me [https://words.jonhillis.com/revenue/] 4. Shared income

This is the 2nd essay in a 5-part series on funding models for the creator economy 1. Funding the creator economy [https://words.jonhillis.com/funding-the-creator-economy/] 2. Avoiding the venture trap [https://words.jonhillis.com/avoiding-the-venture-trap/] 3. Cash rules everything around me [https://words.jonhillis.com/revenue/] 4. Shared income

This is the 3rd essay in a 5-part series on funding models for the creator economy 1. Funding the creator economy [https://words.jonhillis.com/funding-the-creator-economy/] 2. Avoiding the venture trap [https://words.jonhillis.com/avoiding-the-venture-trap/] 3. Cash rules everything around me [https://words.jonhillis.com/revenue/] 4. Shared income

This is the 4th essay in a 5-part series on funding models for the creator economy 1. Funding the creator economy [https://words.jonhillis.com/funding-the-creator-economy/] 2. Avoiding the venture trap [https://words.jonhillis.com/avoiding-the-venture-trap/] 3. Cash rules everything around me [https://words.jonhillis.com/revenue/] 4. Shared income

This is the 5th essay in a 5-part series on funding models for the creator economy 1. Funding the creator economy [https://words.jonhillis.com/funding-the-creator-economy/] 2. Avoiding the venture trap [https://words.jonhillis.com/avoiding-the-venture-trap/] 3. Cash rules everything around me [https://words.jonhillis.com/revenue/] 4. Shared income

One of the favorite past times of tech twitter during the pandemic has been predicting the next Silicon Valley. Austin, with its natural beauty, weird-chill vibe, flagship university, killer BBQ, and long history of technology companies is an obvious choice. Francis Suarez, with the hustle of a direct-to-consumer CBD salesman

Last Wednesday at 4:00am, bleary-eyed and freshly caffeinated, I watched in awe as a dozen people, many who had never met before, descended on my property and worked together to build something that may be there for hundreds of years. We are building a new Creator Cabin [https://www.