He declared a new country governed by AI. He’s not sure it will end well

By Elizabeth McBride, CNN

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One year ago, tech founder Dan Thomson claimed to have launched an AI-governed country on a tropical island in the middle of Asia. Twelve months later, although he says thousands of people have already signed up to be citizens of his experiment, he's not entirely convinced it will end well.

Thomson claimed to have acquired an island in the Philippines' picturesque Palawan province in 2025. Naming it for his AI company, Sensay, he declared it a micronation, installed a council of AI-powered bots modelled on historical leaders to run it - among them Winston Churchill, Eleanor Roosevelt, Marcus Aurelius, Nelson Mandela, Sun Tzu, Leonardo da Vinci, Alexander Hamilton, Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi - and opened up applications for residency.

What could go wrong?