A New Category of American Dream
The most desirable forms of freedom and agency no longer require your physical presence in Analog America.
Dear Friend, Subscriber, and Category Pirate,
We Pirates (as good, mischief-loving pirates) decided to break our own rules and publish on a holiday.
For good reason.
A few years ago, we wrote about a new category of dream — the Digital American Dream.
Today, we want to share a few ideas with you about the future potential of America and how a country (and its citizens) that began with a different point of view can continue to design a new and different future.
In 1776, the United States of America was a new category of country with a radically different point of view.
It was “the land of the free,” where people could leave old categories of countries (with legacy problems like oppression, the inability to move up economically, social/racial injustices, etc., to name a few) in search of freedom of speech, freedom of religion, freedom of financial independence, and a radical sense of personal agency.
And for two and a half centuries, America’s new category of country attracted millions of immigrants driven by the hope of achieving the American Dream for themselves.
America was, and still is, a land of legendary opportunity.
But over the past 250 years, the most desirable forms of freedom and agency no longer require your physical presence in Analog America.
Let’s repeat that one more time, because it’s an easy nuance to skip over:
THE MOST DESIRABLE FORMS OF FREEDOM AND AGENCY NO LONGER REQUIRE YOUR PHYSICAL PRESENCE IN ANALOG AMERICA. (!!!!!!)
Consider these tailwinds:
Remote Work: Online, you no longer need to physically “be” in America to work for an American company or have access to the same work opportunities as Americans.
Cryptocurrencies: Online, you no longer need to transact in US dollars in order to get paid, earn a living, and provide for yourself and your family. (You can send and receive your money instantaneously from anywhere in the world via an Internet connection.)
Digital Businesses: Online, the barrier to entry has never been lower to start a Digital business selling Digital goods. Analog businesses are very expensive to start, more difficult to manage, and less profitable, whereas Digital businesses cost almost nothing to start or maintain, are meaningfully easier to manage, and exponentially more profitable. The reason is because as revenue scales in a Digital business, costs typically do not scale in any linear way. The cost to create and sell one Digital product is not much different than selling 100 or 100,000 Digital products.
Automation Capabilities: Online, more and more jobs are capable of being automated, unlocking more profitable businesses (less fixed costs = less employees = less costs = more profitability), disproportionately rewarding Digital business owners. More Americans realize, every single day, that it’s easier and more profitable for them to create a 1-person Digital business than it is for them to accumulate $250k in college debt and “climb the ladder” of a large, legacy, likely Analog company.
Access To Capital: Online, you don’t need to be part of “the elite” to get access to capital and advance your position of financial independence in society. Digital crowdfunding platforms, for example, are opening up new avenues to attract investors, and sites like GoFundMe and Product Hunt are new ways to access financial support and early adopter Superconsumers (who are always the best source of capital—ARRRRRR!!!!!). In the Native Digital world, the moment you demonstrate the ability to deliver value, you gain acceptance and traction. You don’t need a college degree, an MBA, or to have even worked a full-time job before. Your Digital-first value trumps any legacy signs of “credibility” (this is a VERY hard thing for Native Analogs to wrap their heads around). Furthermore, your followers, email subscribers, and Digital customers can be your investors. So can your friends on X.
Access To Education: Online, (almost) all of the information you would need to complete many higher education programs successfully can be found online—either at an obscene discount or for free. (Medicine, law, and rocket science being some of the few exceptions, for now…) In addition, the Digital world provides access to highly specialized and ultra-niche education (like the Category Design Academy) decades before legacy institutions even begin to think about adding it to their curriculums. Maybe most importantly, you no longer need to physically move to America in order to get an American education.
The list goes on and on.
The Digital American Dream
According to The National Desk, “Studies show that an empire survives, on average, 250 years.” And in 2026, the United States of America, founded in 1776, will celebrate its 250th anniversary.
Now, is The United States of America going to “crumble” in 2026?
Bill Clinton said it best: “It depends on what the meaning of the word is, is.”
In many ways, the Analog American Dream has already crumbled. Nobody wants to work in a physical warehouse when they know it’s possible to manage a Digital storefront, from home, in their sweatpants. Nobody wants to rack up $120,000 in student loans to get an Analog job that will never allow them to achieve financial independence.
If the legacy American Dream was to come to America, find or create a good job, improve your station and live a life of “freedom,” the Digital American Dream is to come to Digital America and find or create a Digital job that unlocks new, even more desirable levels of both Analog and Digital freedom. (When you make Digital Moolah, your real life changes too.)
Here’s the BIG IDEA: You don’t have to live in America to achieve the Digital American dream.
You can work with American companies, getting paid in digital dollars sent straight to your digital wallet, all while living in Venezuela, or Bolivia, or Kenya. (Balaji Srinivasan, former CTO of Coinbase and GP at Andreessen Horowitz, articulated this idea well in his book, The Network State: How To Start A New Country.) And every single day, fewer Native Digitals wake up and say to themselves, “I want to work a good Analog job, have a good pension, and retire at age 65 in my little house on my plot of land.”
Instead, they desire the (Digital) opposite:
“I don’t want to own a house. I want to Airbnb my way around the world.”
“I don’t want to work a 9-5 job. I want to work for myself or work part-time for a few different companies/clients. I want flexibility.”
“I don’t want to (have to) show up to a physical office. I want to work from my laptop, wherever I choose.”
“I don’t want to work a job that pays me a steady salary and gives me a 2% raise every year. I want to create something that allows me to scale my income exponentially, regardless of how hard I work, that I can automate so I get paid passive income.”
“I don’t want a boss. I want a partner/mentor who provides a great deal of agency and autonomy.
If you listen closely, these statements are inspired by the legacy category of America (freedom & agency) but have (almost) nothing to do with the physical world.
Native Digitals reject the physical world—because it’s not where they primarily spend time, or where their “identity” lives—and instead want to pursue a NEW kind of freedom. A kind of freedom that can only be unlocked in a frictionless, infinitely scalable, digital space.
What do we call someone who leaves the Analog world in search of “a new world,” online?
What do we call someone who experiences the highest forms of freedom and agency, regardless of what country they live in, what race they are, what sexual orientation they identify with, or what family lineage they are from?
What do we call someone who uses the Internet to advance their position in society far beyond what would have been possible based on their physical surroundings?
Intellectual Capitalists.
To see why your ability to elevate to an Intellectual Capitalist is possible (and highly probable), keep reading The Digital American Dream.
If you’re looking for more to read this weekend, a few suggestions:
Why Native Digitals (People Under 35) Are A New Category Of Human
The Mentor Myth: What Native Analogs Can Learn From Native Digitals
Arrrrrrr,
Category Pirates 🏴☠️ 🇺🇸
On the other hand, there does seem to be some blowback - a return to community life. But we don't seem to know how to do it anymore - and it shows, in the way our communities are crumbling to pieces around us (literally - bridges & buildings falling down, water systems failing, gas mains exploding) - and we seem unable to think and work together toward fixing things.
Independence, love this