175 - The Last Free Place | Oswald Horowitz

“I will die at sea for sure. I’m not going back.”

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Timothy Allen sits down with filmmaker Oswald Horowitz, the man behind the upcoming documentary The Legend of Landi, to trace the strange true story of Samuele Landi, an Italian tech entrepreneur who set out to live beyond the reach of the normal system on a rusty barge in international waters between Dubai and Iran.

What begins as Oswald's quixotic quest to track Landi down, involving ignored Telegram messages, a ketchup-themed short film, a Croatian police ban, and a Dubai fisherman willing to sail forty miles offshore, opens out into something far bigger. Landi's life turns out to be nothing like the press had painted it, and the story takes turns that nobody could have scripted.

This is a conversation about myth, obsession, sovereignty, and the kind of rare individuals willing to push past every frontier to find out whether real freedom can actually be built at sea.

Enjoy the conversation.

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New ArkPad Seasteading Resort in Próspera: https://tinyurl.com/ArkPad

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LEAD SPONSOR: Veritas Villages: https://www.veritasvillages.com/freecities

Veritas Villages are building off-grid, energy self-sufficient communities for freedom lovers in Latin America. Bitcoin is accepted at all villages, including for the purchase of property.

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Previous interviews with Patrick Hiebert, Founder of Veritas Villages:

• EP 156: https://fountain.fm/episode/66NqAclTBh7FByIX7lCq
• EP 107: https://fountain.fm/episode/Fh6uGwZvVtPsYsR53pTI

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TIMESTAMPS (Audio Version Only)

0:00:29 – Introduction

0:08:24 – Start of conversation

0:09:56 – Why seasteading matters and how Oswald found the world

0:11:53 – Ephemeris and the search for a real seasteader

0:19:17 – Meeting Samuel Landi through Vít Jedlička

0:22:04 – Oswald’s strange strategy for getting invited on board

0:26:16 – Chasing Vít to Liberland

0:33:25 – Dubai, the failed yacht mission, and finding a way to the barge

0:39:39 – Arriving at Landi’s platform in the middle of nowhere

0:43:16 – The whisky test and first impressions of Landi

0:46:22 – Family, adventure, and why Landi chose the sea

0:51:57 – Media narratives, freedom, and why seasteading gets misread

0:55:13 – Living on the barge and why Landi chose barges over prototypes

1:02:26 – Landi’s death and the mystery after the storm

1:07:05 – The wreck, the survivors, and what really happened at sea

1:17:18 – Filming the wreck and Landi’s underwater afterlife

1:23:57 – Liberia, diplomacy, and the wider Landi backstory

1:31:28 – Berlusconi, exile, and the making of a fugitive pioneer

1:36:52 – Why Landi helped rescue Liberian girls in Oman

1:46:05 – Liberland, micronations, and whether new states can survive

1:55:17 – Landi’s family history and the idea of blood memory

2:03:56 – The sovereign individual, frontiers, and escaping the system

2:11:25 – Why pioneers are always treated like outlaws

2:22:09 – The ending of the film and the bronze head of Landi

2:31:47 – Why the monument matters and who it is really for

2:41:24 – Making art for the few people who will actually act

2:49:56 – Final thoughts on seasteading and Landi’s legacy

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NOSTR:

• Timothy Allen: npub1gcf9ltaeu42f4tr20z3avkas04dezlx3jaudqsuu87gvmh686xasrvqjg0
• Free Cities Foundation: npub1lsj8pmgedqqamt89c27tzjjnlf0wn7q7udjm7j2cl9xxz97eacns2mwpee

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LEGACY SOCIAL MEDIA:

• Oswald Horowitz: https://x.com/Osyfilm
• Timothy Allen: https://twitter.com/MrTimothyAllen
• Free Cities Foundation: https://twitter.com/freecitiesfound

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OTHER LINKS:

• The Legend of Landi Film: https://www.thelegendoflandi.com/
• Veritas Villages: https://www.veritasvillages.com/freecities
• Invest in ArkPad's Próspera Resort: http://tinyurl.com/ArkPad
• Free Cities Foundation: https://free-cities.org/
• Become a resident or business owner in Próspera: https://prospera.co/r/freecities