Indian-origin entrepreneur Balaji Srinivasan has taken a giant leap towards laying the foundation of a new unprecedented beginning. Last year, the former CTO of Coinbase made headlines for acquiring an entire island near Singapore to create what he calls his “Network School,” as also established in his book “The Network State.”

This only marked an initial step in helping consolidate a digital-first nation by providing a physical location to an internet community, ultimately making way for “diplomatic recognition from pre-existing states.”

Srinivasan’s vision, as verbally illustrated in his book, was ultimately lived by Instagram user Nick Peterson in real time just weeks ago. Having enrolled in the three-month “Network School,” he helped others catch a glimpse of what his day looked like at the “oasis for gym rats and startup founders.”

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“I’ve been living in this real-life experiment called the Network School, run by Balaji Srinivasan, where we are kind of testing what creating a new nation would feel like,” he said in yet another post released just days ago.

Who is Balaji Srinivasan?

Born on May 24, 1980, to Tamil-origin physician parents in New York, Balaji S Srinivasan grew up in Long Island. The multi-faceted American entrepreneur got a BS, MS and PhD in Electrical Engineering and an MS in Chemical Engineering from Stanford University.

According to his LinkedIn, he is also an angel investor. In addition to formerly serving as Coinbase’s CTO, he has played major roles across various firms. For over a decade now, he remains the co-founder and board member of Coin Center. Having played his part as the co-founder of Earn.com, Counsyl and Teleport as well, he was even a General Partner at Andreessen Horowitz.

During his time as CTO of Counsyl, Balaji Srinivasan won a Wall Street Journal Innovation Award for Medicine and was also named the MIT TR35.

After occasionally teaching classes at Stanford, in August 2024, the entrepreneur announced on social media that he had secured an island for his new internet-first institution, The Network School. At the time, he explained how the establishment was “for people of all ages, not just the youth. And it’s meant to be lifelong rather than one-off, with both a structured and and an unstructured component.”

He also wrote, “Through the power of Bitcoin, we now have a beautiful island near Singapore where we’re building the Network School. We’re starting with a 90-day popup that runs from Sep 23 to Dec 23, right after the Network State Conference. Rent is only $1000/month with roommates or $2000/month solo. And we have plenty of day passes for visitors.”

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The Network School founder’s plans were decades in the making, as he has for long invoked the concept of the “inverse Amish,” referring to a society that “lives nearby, peacefully, in the future” where “we can experiment with new technologies without causing undue disruption to others.”

Taking another deep dive into his past, one realises that he was once even on President Donald Trump’s shortlist to lead the Food and Drug Administration, as per the Wall Street Journal. However, he ruled himself out as controversy surrounded him after he called for Silicon Valley to “exit” from government control.

On social media, Srinivasan remains active on X (@balajis) and Substack (balajis.com).