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For as long as there have been states, there have been people seeking to escape state authority..... such escape has meant migration to freer regions.....[some] founding their own free societies. In the last few decades, libertarians have led an increasing number of such efforts — from the failed Republic of Minerva to the modern Seasteading movement. Yet none has been as successful as Roy Bates, Prince Roy of Sealand, who passed away yesterday.
Bates first took to the seas in the 1960s to set up a radio station outside of the United Kingdom’s territorial waters, where he could broadcast free of the heavy hand of regulation that made British broadcasting a dull affair back then. …… Operating in international waters was a means to an end — free, unregulated broadcasting. Bates, however, went further. As AP reports: In the 1960s, inspired by the ‘‘pirate radio’’ movement of unlicensed stations.
Michael Bates said his father initially intended to set up another radio station, but then ‘‘had the bizarre idea of declaring independence.’’ Rejecting a British order to leave, he proclaimed the fort the Principality of Sealand, declaring himself Prince Roy and his wife Joan as princess…….the world’s smallest sovereign state, though it was not internationally recognized…..Today, Sealand makes money by selling aristocratic titles and hosting Internet servers. ‘‘I might die young or I might die old, but I will never die of boredom,’’ Bates said in a 1980s interview.
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