What happened to Satoshi Island, the world's first crypto community

Source: PortaldoBitcoin Original Title: What happened to Satoshi Island, the world's first crypto community Original Link: Satoshi Island, envisioned in 2017 as a “crypto-utopia” fully based on blockchain, never came close to what it promised. The project was born with the ambition to create a completely independent community, free from taxes and organized through NFTs and digital governance.

Today, however, the once inspiring scenario of the creator of Bitcoin, Satoshi Nakamoto, is the opposite: the island is abandoned, without infrastructure and threatened to disappear due to the rising sea levels.

The project began when investors renamed the private island of Lataro, in the Vanuatu archipelago, to Satoshi Island, in honor of Nakamoto. Interested parties even paid 120,000 euros for a supposed “digital citizenship” and a lot on the site.

At the time, more than 50 thousand people supported the idea. But what was essential was missing: the island had no electricity, connectivity, or any minimum basis to sustain life — let alone a digital economy.

Anthony Welch, a British developer and one of the main visionaries, stated that the goal was “to build a community, not a real estate business”.

He leased the territory for 75 years and even tried to sell it for $12 million years before. However, in addition to the NFT required for citizenship of Satoshi Island, candidates also needed to purchase their own citizenship of Vanuatu — a type of “Golden VISA” that costs around 120 thousand euros.

The local government came to support the project, but nothing came of it, making it impossible to convert the NFTs into property titles recognized by the State.

End of Satoshi Island

In July 2025, an official statement announced the definitive end of the initiative. Satoshi Island was left without residents, without investments, and completely lacking infrastructure. To make matters worse, Vanuatu is among the countries most threatened by rising sea levels, which could result in the disappearance of part of the territory in the coming decades.

There is, at least, one curious detail in the outcome: Elephant Island, neighboring Lataro and measuring 160 hectares, is for sale — possibly making room for new enthusiasts to once again try to turn a piece of the Pacific into utopia.