Yeah I'll have to check that out... I have to say Balaji Srinivasan (hey look he's got a ghost profile on Nostr, nostr:nprofile1qqsrvuevcd072cv94ud3z9s28y7kcuapleqamugcfsgrjnpgefwky7c0te9us ) was a pretty inspiring figure in the 2010's, as an outspoken advocate for "digital exit." This got him quite a lot of opprobrium from the NYTimes etc.

But I found The Network State to be sort of .... hollow. I think it's like you said, it still pre-supposes States, but tries to invent some category of decentralized State that I guess.... "somehow".... supplants or replaces existing States? As if any major Nation-state is going to create some kind of special "un-citizen" class that are governed by entirely separate sets of laws?

This seems pretty fanciful to me, especially in the current moment. I imagine someone being tossed on the concrete by masked ICE goons desperately reaching for their QR code, "no wait, I'm a citizen of a Network State!!" 😂