Published at 4:45 PM on May 13, 2009

Microsoft Sells Bonds, Raises Billions of Dollars, Now What?

Microsoft Sells Bonds, Raises Billions of Dollars, Now What?

This week, Microsoft began selling bonds and raked in the tidy sum of 3.75 billion dollars. Although some analysts claim that they'll be using the money to buy up cheap stock, Gizmodo.com, Nick Denton's tech blog, is speculating that they'll use the money to buy something "HUGE." Blogger John Herrman wrote, "Today is a great day for wild speculation about Microsoft, so have at it."

Gizmodo Readers gave their two cents about the monolithic purchase, and though their ingenious hypothesis range from Apple to Nigeria, we have a better idea. It's called "land," it grows in the ocean and it's made of a little thing called kryptonite. 

Well, maybe that's a stretch. But we do think building an island would be a great investment for Apple's rivals, whatever materials they use for construction. Patri Friedman of the Seasteading Institute would probably agree. The man who was featured in a February 2009 Wired article is the executive director of the California non profit. TSI's mission is to  build permanent homesteads out on the high seas because, according to SeaSteading.org, "the world needs a new frontier, a place where those who wish to experiment with building new societies can go to test out their ideas." Friedman believes that by opening the ocean as that next frontier, social experimenters will "revolutionize the quality of government...by enabling experimentation, innovation and competition." Tax evasion is simply a little side perk. 

But Microsoft's island wouldn't just be home to grouchy libertarians and starry-eyed utopians. It could be an awesome investment in the wind-energy market. It's tough to maximize wind energy on land, due to local zoning regulations, particularly height restrictions, which limit most buildings to 30-35 feet. As KUOW.org reported, Seattle company Principal Power has recently anchored a deep water wind farm close to Tillamook Bay off the Oregon coast, where winds are much stronger than on land. Get a Seasteading Institute platform, build a wind farm on it, and bam!, energy crisis averted. 

We're not alone in our Orwellian cry for more land. Rita, Charlize Theron's Arrested Development character, probably said it best in Season 3, Episode 6, "The Ocean Walker." In response to her question, "Are houses terribly hard to make?" Michael answered, "Well, the hardest part is finding the land." She replied, "Instead of building houses, maybe you should be building land. On the ocean. There's no land on the ocean." "You are brilliant," Michael pronounced. And though Ron Howard's sarcastic narrator spit, "Yeah, she wasn't," maybe she was.  

Phew. Then again, maybe they're just buying cheap stock. But until they announce their plans, we're left to conspiracy theorize.

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