The Wild, Wild Freedom City

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Happy Wednesday, Future Party. The CEO T-shirt wars are officially on. After Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg was seen wearing shirts emblazoned with Latin phrases comparing him to Caesar, Bluesky CEO Jay Graber responded at SXSW with a similarly styled shirt reading “mundus sine caesaribus” — Latin for “a world without caesars.” Empires rise and empires fall… but a good diss lasts forever.

Groups representing “startup nations” — “tech hubs exempt from the taxes and regulations that apply to the countries where they’re located,” per Wired — are in talks with officials in the Trump administration about potentially building several similar “freedom cities” in the US.

The Big Experiment: Although Próspera in Honduras has successfully launched (not without plenty of controversy), Big Tech’s big dreams of tech utopias have mostly failed to come true… despite plenty of investment and blue-chip pedigree. If freedom cities get the green light, they could spark innovation but also create enclaves built on the power of a tech oligarchy. Your mileage with that tradeoff may vary.

Behind the Cities: Since President Donald Trump teased the idea of instituting 10 freedom cities while on the campaign trail, groups like the Freedom Cities Coalition and Frontier Foundation have put their lobbying power into high gear.

The Future: Both Freedom Cities Coalition and Frontier Foundation have allegedly garnered plenty of support in Washington and are already working with think tanks on drafting legislation that would support freedom cities. The exact legislators who would introduce these bills is still a mystery, but the political tides definitely seem in favor of the idea — people like Peter Thiel and Marc Andreessen, who are already in Trump’s orbit, are big supporters of startup nations.

And considering that venture capital has now turned its attention to industries like energy and defense, there’s plenty of money to be made by greasing the wheels of Washington.

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Creator-economy company Spotter is hosting the first-ever upfront-style event for YouTube creators later this month, featuring some of the internet’s biggest names.

The Big Bet: YouTube has recently taken the crown for the most-watched streamer on televisions, pitting its big-screen viewership (well, at least compared to smartphones and computers) against premium subscription services. Understandably, when top creators hold their own against Hollywood talent (engagement-wise, at least), they’d like a share of the ad-dollar spoils to create longer-term revenue streams.

Behind the Scenes: Spotter Showcase is set to kick off in New York on March 27th.

Closing Pitch: Despite the push to graduate digital stars into Hollywood stars over the past decade, the pipeline never really materialized. Sure, MrBeast has Beast Games on Prime Video, and creators such as Addison Rae and Curry Barker are transitioning to the actual big screen. But the narrative starting to take shape this decade is the creation of an entertainment economy decidedly outside the mainstream system (as much as anything can really be considered “mainstream” these days).

If advertisers buy into that narrative, dedicating ad spend to creators on YouTube will be viewed as an entirely separate budget from the ad spend on traditional TV or premium streaming services.

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91.9% of you voted Scientific exploration in yesterday’s poll: Do you think lunar travel should be prioritized for scientific exploration or commercial interests?

“Science always comes first; then we figure out a way to monetize it (hopefully for the good of all).”

“We have enough commercial pollution here on Earth. I don’t want to look up in the sky and see the latest ad for Amazon’s moon shuttle service projected on the Moon itself!”

“Not everything needs to be monetized.”

Let’s keep the conversation going. Join our Poll Of The Day newsletter, so your opinions can shine. Discover how your views line up with your peers’, check out cool insights, and have some fun. It’s data with personality.

🎭 The new take on Othello, starring Denzel Washington and Jake Gyllenhaal, has become the top-grossing Broadway play for a single week of performances, nabbing $2,818,297.

🪩 Sphere plans to make several smaller versions of its flagship Vegas Sphere throughout the country.

🎮 Sony is testing AI-generated characters in its PlayStation games, starting with Horizon Forbidden West.

📱 Apple is planning a major overhaul of its operating system across all its flagship devices, which is due later this year.

🤖 OpenAI released a platform that allows businesses to create proprietary AI agents.

🚀 Eric Schmidt, the former CEO of Google, is getting back into the C-suite by becoming the chief executive at Relativity Space.

🫠 The stock market is on such a rollercoaster that Citi is now advising customers to take profits from their US stocks and invest in Chinese firms. Yikes.

🏠 Mortgage firm Rocket is buying home-listing platform Redfin for $2.4 billion — a 50% premium on its stagnant stock.

🏌️ Reebok is getting on the green… and hoping for some green… with a new golf footwear line.