I told you I’d take you directly
…into my cortex while planning the Citadel, so here goes.
The first principle we need to discuss, is that a vision must be established before we start talking about locations, leases, ownership, businesses, whatever.
(It doesn’t have to be an ironclad vision, we just have to choose a North Star to chase after, even if it’s potentially the wrong star. See: This Jordan Peterson Video)
Why start with vision?
If I may digress for a few moments, I’d like to hyper-emphasize the importance of ANY individual in leadership clarifying their vision. While it seems easy to say to yourself, “The Citadel is just a house with Bitcoiners, let’s go make it,“ I would caution you that this the absolute wrong way to proceed.
While you may wind up with a house, a building, a ranch, even some new friends maybe, in the long run, you will wind up unhappy.
Why?
Because at a certain scale of organizational growth, it becomes extremely difficult to manage large groups of people (even 12 counts as large in my mind for a growing organization).
At a certain level of growth I’ve seen countless founders run into the inflection point of losing control or becoming a micro-manager.
Side note: I’ve run my own companies for the last 10 years and consulted through an accelerator for ~4.5 years. I’ve worked with a few hundred early stage companies.
Without a clear vision, you tend to either fully release control and the organization spins off of the rails, or you become overwhelmed as a leader because you won’t allow control to go and tire yourself will perpetual micro-management.
Either way your organization is dead in the water.
Back to business.
So in establishing our Citadel, we need to be sure to determine, if not the end goal of the Citadel itself (the product), at minimum the principles by which our Citadel will operate and the domains within which it will live.
Here’s where we are currently:
Let’s reiterate the core Principles of Bitcoin, just to remind ourselves (Citation).
Core Principles of Bitcoin:
Capped Supply of 21 Million Coins
No Censorship. Anyone may transact.
Open-Source. All may see, modify, interact with the code.
Permissionless. No arbitrary gatekeeping.
Pseudonymous. No required KYC to participate.
Fungible. A coin is a coin and all are created equal (Sorry, MARA!).
Irreversible Transactions. No rollbacks (Sorry, Vitalik).
With our principles reiterated, let’s introduce the domains within which we want to play our Citadel Building game.
(Remember: At the end of the day, we are playing a game, combining ideas and resources to build something. While Bitcoin is serious work, it’s important to not take it or yourself too seriously lest you stop enjoying what you do.)
Domains of the Citadel:
Location. The Citadel must exist somewhere. While I believe the Citadel can exist digitally, and already does in many ways, we are concerned with building a physical Citadel. This implies we will be hunting for land/real estate at some point. Whether urban/rural/suburban, I don’t know.
Energy Access and Consumption. Whether it is on-grid, off-grid I’m entirely agnostic. What I DO want to be sure of, is that we have energy sovereignty in both our production and consumption of energy.
Food. This is an interesting one because it can vary so wildly based on your location, but, like all other domains, it must be figured out while searching.
Defensibility. The Citadel must be a defensible location. Whether you are in a city, or in the country, this looks very different, but at the end of the day, you must be able to protect your Citadel by all appropriate measures.
Community. Man is a social animal. While I do believe that a Citadel can exist in the deep woods run by a bearded hermit, this isn’t my path in particular. Additionally, as we often say, “We are so early,“ and when you’re early, you need as many likeminded allies as possible IMO.
Production. What good is a static location sapping your energies and resources? Personally, I believe any good Citadel should produce something. Whether it is physical (goods, a farm, a factory) or immaterial (a coding camp, an outdoors training center, a co-working space) you must not simply consume.
POSSIBLE DOMAIN: Speculative Attack. This one is more contentious. Is it ethical to acquire a Citadel using government lending programs in a dying currency? Is it appropriate to participate in the old system while building the new one? I’m personally of the mind that as long as you protect your downside risk and avoid over-leveraging in all that you do, speculative attacks on the current system are appropriate. In the same way Saylor is offering lending terms in the hyper-inflating USD, I believe Plebs can attack the current monetary system with low time preference and relatively low risk.
Final thought: Be lightning before striking.
This entire process, the planning, the research, the execution, should be thought of as the lightning before the ground strike.
Let me explain:
Before lightning hits the ground, it meanders and explores multiple ‘options’ for where to deploy its energies.
Once it makes ground contact, you get the visible strike and a huge amount of energy deployed through a single channel.
In the same way, we have not struck ground yet and deployed our full energies.
So in the short term we are spinning of small leaders, channels, and trying to find where our Vision and Principles connect with the real world.
Once we make ground contact. We strike.
Thanks for making it this far and helping to even think about the work being done here. It would mean a lot to me if you can subscribe for future updates, tell your friends, and like and share this post.
P.S. You won’t want to miss next week. I’ll be motorcycling up to Cheyenne, WY to talk about planning the Citadel with a few brilliant Bitcoiners.