Lalas
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This is from a Russian media. Mainstream media, not alternative. (So they don't go any deeper, "into conspiracy theories" and formed everything according to their agenda. And part of their agenda is that they attribute all sorts of possible plans and all evils to "Western billionaires," when in fact the Russian rulers also continue to shape society according to the canons of the "Western billionaires" plan. Etc. ) Nothing new, they've just collected some of the already known things about it.
lenta.ru
January 22, 2024
Billionaires are building shelters and bunkers en masse. What are they afraid of and will they be able to survive after the end of the world?
Wired: Billionaire Mark Zuckerberg Is Building a Bunker in Hawaii in Case of the End of the World
On the Hawaiian island of Kauai, a major construction project is underway. Locals say that it was started by Mark Zuckerberg, the founder of the Meta corporation, which owns the Whatsapp messenger and the social networks Facebook and Instagram (in Russia, Meta is recognized as extremist and banned; Instagram and Facebook are also banned). According to rumors, he is building an underground complex where you can wait out any cataclysms: from wars and revolutions to epidemics and natural disasters. And Zuckerberg isn't alone — other billionaires are also preparing for the end of the world.
Zuckerberg is building a bunker with doors that can withstand a powerful explosion and an autonomous power supply
Zuckerberg has been buying land on Kauai since 2014. Now he owns more than five and a half square kilometers of the island. According to the calculations of the American edition of Wired, together with the construction, the project will cost him $ 270 million.
Considerable efforts are being made to keep it secret. You can't look into the territory from the road - it is surrounded by an impenetrable fence almost two meters high. Everyone involved in the project is forced to sign a non-disclosure agreement. People can be fired — and often are fired — even for the mere mention of a construction site on a social network.
In response to a question from Wired, one former employee joked, "It's a fight club. We're not talking about a fight club."
Despite this, journalists still managed to get hold of the project documentation. As it turned out, under a couple of mansions that are being built for Zuckerberg on the surface, there is a shelter with an area of 460 square meters. Tunnels lead there, which are closed by thick doors that can withstand even a powerful explosion.
The underground has an autonomous power supply system, a food warehouse and a water tank with a diameter of 17 meters and a height of 5.5 meters. Part of the area on the surface is reserved for crops and livestock. It is more than enough for the inhabitants of the shelter to survive even without supplies from the outside.
In the trees in the nearby forest, Zuckerberg is going to build 11 structures connected by rope bridges. It will be possible to move from tree to tree on them without going down to the ground.
The creator of ChatGPT has been stockpiling weapons, gold and antibiotics in case of the end of the world since 2016
Zuckerberg isn't the only moneybag who has become unexpectedly concerned about his safety. Next door to his construction site in Kauai is another American billionaire, the head of Melaleuca, Frank Vandersloot, who made his fortune in multi-level marketing. And the small Hawaiian island of Lanai is now fully owned by Oracle founder Larry Ellison.
Silicon Valley Entrepreneurs
They have been preparing for the end of the world for years. Back in the mid-2010s, they were massively buying up real estate in New Zealand. It was there that Peter Thiel, a major investor, an associate of Elon Musk and the creator of Palantir, a company that processes information for the Pentagon and American intelligence services, was going to hide. He believed that New Zealand's remoteness would save it from wars, epidemics, and refugee flows from hot spots.
According to Reid Hoffman, one of the founders of LinkedIn, in certain circles this was called "apocalypse insurance." "All you had to say was that you were looking for a house in New Zealand, and everything was like this: you get the hint, you don't say anything else," he said.
Sam Altman, the head of OpenAI, the company that developed ChatGPT, admitted that he was also preparing for the worst. "My problem is friends who get drunk and start arguing about where the world is going to end," he explained in a 2016 interview with The New Yorker. Possible scenarios: nuclear war, hostile artificial intelligence, and a dangerous virus that escaped from a microbiology laboratory.
I try to think less about it. But he prepared weapons, gold, potassium iodide, antibiotics, batteries, water, gas masks of the Israeli army and a large plot of land in Big Sur where he could escape in case of anything
Sam Altman, Head of OpenAI
In the midst of the COVID-19 pandemic, demand for private islands skyrocketed. The next surge of interest in this topic occurred in 2022 against the backdrop of rising international tensions. In a matter of months, the number of people willing to book a place in the underground bunker has grown by more than 2,000 percent, according to Dante Vicino, the head of Vivos, which is building a giant shelter for 10,000 people.
One place in a personal bunker in South Dakota will cost Vivos customers $55,000 (about five million rubles). Asylum in Indiana is somewhat cheaper: $35,000 (3.2 million rubles) per person, and holders of scarce specialties can count on a discount. The company claims that the shelters are designed to operate autonomously without communication with the surface for at least one year.
Billionaires are preparing for an Incident that will put an end to ordinary life, order and finances
A new book by American author Douglas Rushkoff, Survival of the Richest, is entirely devoted to this phenomenon. He believes that attempts to fence themselves off from the collapsing world are doomed to failure. Private islands are extremely dependent on supplies, which cannot be provided in a disaster. The autonomy of Vivos shelters and others like them is very fragile and requires the flawless operation of many not-so-reliable systems, such as hydroponic farms. And even if a billionaire manages to sit out the worst, he will find himself in a new world where nothing depends on his money. Preparing for this is the hardest part.
According to Rushkoff, many of them are already thinking about it. The book mentions one of his encounters with wealthy people who are obsessed with preparing for the coming cataclysms. It happened like this: a few years ago, a certain company invited him to act as a futurologist. The speech he had prepared was of no use. Instead of the usual audience, only five people were waiting for Rushkoff — "ultra-wealthy people from the upper echelons of the world of IT investments and hedge funds." They started asking questions, and he had to answer.
The beginning was innocent and fairly predictable. Bitcoin or Ether? Virtual Reality or Augmented Reality? Who will be the first to build a quantum computer, China or Google? Little by little, they came to the topic that really concerned them. New Zealand or Alaska? Which region will be least affected by the looming climate crisis? It gets worse from there. Which is more dangerous, global warming or biological weapons? How long should we prepare for autonomous survival without outside help? Does the shelter need its own air source? How likely is groundwater contamination? At the end, the executive director of the brokerage firm said that he had almost completed his own bunker and asked me, "How do you get the guards to obey after the Incident?"
Douglas Rushkoff, Excerpted from Survival of the Richest
It was clear that these people had been thinking about the Incident for a long time, some event that would put an end to normal life, order, finances, and everything else. Perhaps they will be able to survive it, but what to do next? One billionaire told Rushkoff that he had hired a dozen former paratroopers to defend himself after the apocalypse. And only then did he realize that without money and laws, he himself risked becoming their victim.
The billionaire wanted Rushkoff to explain what to do in such a situation. Lock up food storage with combination locks that only he can open? Make the guards wear special collars that will work in the event of a threat to his life? Maybe replace humans with robots (if that's even possible)? Rushkoff's answer disappointed him.
In the vicinity of New York, self-sufficient farms for billionaires are being organized
Rushkoff tried to explain to his interlocutors that survival after the cataclysm requires not so much equipment and weapons, but people who will not leave as soon as they are no longer paid. "Don't just invest in ammunition and electric power fences, invest in people and relationships," he writes. The billionaires who invited him were clearly hoping for a different answer.
Projects that are based on other principles also exist. One of them was started by the former president of the American Chamber of Commerce in Latvia, John Cole. He's trying to set up a couple of self-sufficient farming communities in the New York City area. "They're designed to withstand the Incident in the best possible way and benefit society as semi-organic farms at the same time," he explained to Rushkoff. "Both are about a three-hour drive from New York. Close enough to get there when it starts."
At the end of the day, their target audience is the same billionaires, but they are betting not only on weapons and security systems (which, by the way, also exist). "The only way to protect your family is to be with other people," Cole says. According to his plan, the inhabitants of these farms will not be divided into employees and employers, as in other similar projects. They should be a single team that is able to take care of itself.
If (or when) supply chains are disrupted, people will be left without food. COVID-19 was a wake-up call – everyone saw how stores fought over toilet paper. And when it comes to food shortages, it will be much worse
John Cole
Another feature of Cole's farms is their lack of dependence on external suppliers, which he considers the most vulnerable point of modern agriculture. If the county is threatened with starvation, such communities will be able to feed it. This alone makes them safer.
"To be honest, I'm less scared of the prospect of running into armed gangs than I am of a woman at the gate holding a baby in her arms and asking for food," Cole admits. "I wouldn't want to face such a moral dilemma."
Миллиардеры массово строят убежища и бункеры. Чего они боятся и смогут ли выжить после конца света?
На гавайском острове Кауаи идет крупная стройка. Местные жители поговаривают, что ее затеял Марк Цукерберг: он сооружает подземный комплекс, где можно переждать любые войны, революции и стихийные бедствия. И Цукерберг не один — другие миллиардеры тоже вовсю готовятся к концу света.
Billionaires are building shelters and bunkers en masse. What are they afraid of and will they be able to survive after the end of the world?
Wired: Billionaire Mark Zuckerberg Is Building a Bunker in Hawaii in Case of the End of the World
On the Hawaiian island of Kauai, a major construction project is underway. Locals say that it was started by Mark Zuckerberg, the founder of the Meta corporation, which owns the Whatsapp messenger and the social networks Facebook and Instagram (in Russia, Meta is recognized as extremist and banned; Instagram and Facebook are also banned). According to rumors, he is building an underground complex where you can wait out any cataclysms: from wars and revolutions to epidemics and natural disasters. And Zuckerberg isn't alone — other billionaires are also preparing for the end of the world.
Zuckerberg is building a bunker with doors that can withstand a powerful explosion and an autonomous power supply
Zuckerberg has been buying land on Kauai since 2014. Now he owns more than five and a half square kilometers of the island. According to the calculations of the American edition of Wired, together with the construction, the project will cost him $ 270 million.
Considerable efforts are being made to keep it secret. You can't look into the territory from the road - it is surrounded by an impenetrable fence almost two meters high. Everyone involved in the project is forced to sign a non-disclosure agreement. People can be fired — and often are fired — even for the mere mention of a construction site on a social network.
In response to a question from Wired, one former employee joked, "It's a fight club. We're not talking about a fight club."
Despite this, journalists still managed to get hold of the project documentation. As it turned out, under a couple of mansions that are being built for Zuckerberg on the surface, there is a shelter with an area of 460 square meters. Tunnels lead there, which are closed by thick doors that can withstand even a powerful explosion.
The underground has an autonomous power supply system, a food warehouse and a water tank with a diameter of 17 meters and a height of 5.5 meters. Part of the area on the surface is reserved for crops and livestock. It is more than enough for the inhabitants of the shelter to survive even without supplies from the outside.
In the trees in the nearby forest, Zuckerberg is going to build 11 structures connected by rope bridges. It will be possible to move from tree to tree on them without going down to the ground.
The creator of ChatGPT has been stockpiling weapons, gold and antibiotics in case of the end of the world since 2016
Zuckerberg isn't the only moneybag who has become unexpectedly concerned about his safety. Next door to his construction site in Kauai is another American billionaire, the head of Melaleuca, Frank Vandersloot, who made his fortune in multi-level marketing. And the small Hawaiian island of Lanai is now fully owned by Oracle founder Larry Ellison.
Silicon Valley Entrepreneurs
They have been preparing for the end of the world for years. Back in the mid-2010s, they were massively buying up real estate in New Zealand. It was there that Peter Thiel, a major investor, an associate of Elon Musk and the creator of Palantir, a company that processes information for the Pentagon and American intelligence services, was going to hide. He believed that New Zealand's remoteness would save it from wars, epidemics, and refugee flows from hot spots.
According to Reid Hoffman, one of the founders of LinkedIn, in certain circles this was called "apocalypse insurance." "All you had to say was that you were looking for a house in New Zealand, and everything was like this: you get the hint, you don't say anything else," he said.
Sam Altman, the head of OpenAI, the company that developed ChatGPT, admitted that he was also preparing for the worst. "My problem is friends who get drunk and start arguing about where the world is going to end," he explained in a 2016 interview with The New Yorker. Possible scenarios: nuclear war, hostile artificial intelligence, and a dangerous virus that escaped from a microbiology laboratory.
I try to think less about it. But he prepared weapons, gold, potassium iodide, antibiotics, batteries, water, gas masks of the Israeli army and a large plot of land in Big Sur where he could escape in case of anything
Sam Altman, Head of OpenAI
In the midst of the COVID-19 pandemic, demand for private islands skyrocketed. The next surge of interest in this topic occurred in 2022 against the backdrop of rising international tensions. In a matter of months, the number of people willing to book a place in the underground bunker has grown by more than 2,000 percent, according to Dante Vicino, the head of Vivos, which is building a giant shelter for 10,000 people.
One place in a personal bunker in South Dakota will cost Vivos customers $55,000 (about five million rubles). Asylum in Indiana is somewhat cheaper: $35,000 (3.2 million rubles) per person, and holders of scarce specialties can count on a discount. The company claims that the shelters are designed to operate autonomously without communication with the surface for at least one year.
Billionaires are preparing for an Incident that will put an end to ordinary life, order and finances
A new book by American author Douglas Rushkoff, Survival of the Richest, is entirely devoted to this phenomenon. He believes that attempts to fence themselves off from the collapsing world are doomed to failure. Private islands are extremely dependent on supplies, which cannot be provided in a disaster. The autonomy of Vivos shelters and others like them is very fragile and requires the flawless operation of many not-so-reliable systems, such as hydroponic farms. And even if a billionaire manages to sit out the worst, he will find himself in a new world where nothing depends on his money. Preparing for this is the hardest part.
According to Rushkoff, many of them are already thinking about it. The book mentions one of his encounters with wealthy people who are obsessed with preparing for the coming cataclysms. It happened like this: a few years ago, a certain company invited him to act as a futurologist. The speech he had prepared was of no use. Instead of the usual audience, only five people were waiting for Rushkoff — "ultra-wealthy people from the upper echelons of the world of IT investments and hedge funds." They started asking questions, and he had to answer.
The beginning was innocent and fairly predictable. Bitcoin or Ether? Virtual Reality or Augmented Reality? Who will be the first to build a quantum computer, China or Google? Little by little, they came to the topic that really concerned them. New Zealand or Alaska? Which region will be least affected by the looming climate crisis? It gets worse from there. Which is more dangerous, global warming or biological weapons? How long should we prepare for autonomous survival without outside help? Does the shelter need its own air source? How likely is groundwater contamination? At the end, the executive director of the brokerage firm said that he had almost completed his own bunker and asked me, "How do you get the guards to obey after the Incident?"
Douglas Rushkoff, Excerpted from Survival of the Richest
It was clear that these people had been thinking about the Incident for a long time, some event that would put an end to normal life, order, finances, and everything else. Perhaps they will be able to survive it, but what to do next? One billionaire told Rushkoff that he had hired a dozen former paratroopers to defend himself after the apocalypse. And only then did he realize that without money and laws, he himself risked becoming their victim.
The billionaire wanted Rushkoff to explain what to do in such a situation. Lock up food storage with combination locks that only he can open? Make the guards wear special collars that will work in the event of a threat to his life? Maybe replace humans with robots (if that's even possible)? Rushkoff's answer disappointed him.
In the vicinity of New York, self-sufficient farms for billionaires are being organized
Rushkoff tried to explain to his interlocutors that survival after the cataclysm requires not so much equipment and weapons, but people who will not leave as soon as they are no longer paid. "Don't just invest in ammunition and electric power fences, invest in people and relationships," he writes. The billionaires who invited him were clearly hoping for a different answer.
Projects that are based on other principles also exist. One of them was started by the former president of the American Chamber of Commerce in Latvia, John Cole. He's trying to set up a couple of self-sufficient farming communities in the New York City area. "They're designed to withstand the Incident in the best possible way and benefit society as semi-organic farms at the same time," he explained to Rushkoff. "Both are about a three-hour drive from New York. Close enough to get there when it starts."
At the end of the day, their target audience is the same billionaires, but they are betting not only on weapons and security systems (which, by the way, also exist). "The only way to protect your family is to be with other people," Cole says. According to his plan, the inhabitants of these farms will not be divided into employees and employers, as in other similar projects. They should be a single team that is able to take care of itself.
If (or when) supply chains are disrupted, people will be left without food. COVID-19 was a wake-up call – everyone saw how stores fought over toilet paper. And when it comes to food shortages, it will be much worse
John Cole
Another feature of Cole's farms is their lack of dependence on external suppliers, which he considers the most vulnerable point of modern agriculture. If the county is threatened with starvation, such communities will be able to feed it. This alone makes them safer.
"To be honest, I'm less scared of the prospect of running into armed gangs than I am of a woman at the gate holding a baby in her arms and asking for food," Cole admits. "I wouldn't want to face such a moral dilemma."
