That’s a strange map in the article. It makes it looks like he’s bought all of Härjedalen, rather than two orders of magnitude less. It’s still a chunky piece of land, but it’s definitely not that big.
dylanz [3 hidden]5 mins ago
He's a huge cross country skier so he probably wants his own little playground
LucaFromAlpha [3 hidden]5 mins ago
what's that meme about rich people just doing really rich stuff and not worrying about being some BS worldly image? yeah that.
silverFork [3 hidden]5 mins ago
Ai farm to be.. I suspect.
david_shaw [3 hidden]5 mins ago
> Ai farm to be.. I suspect.
I suspect the opposite: a billionaire's escape from a potentially turbulent society.
silverFork [3 hidden]5 mins ago
Could be.. zillionaires usually like mountains; I hear he can't drive; driving the boonies far from civilization is not that easy in the winter. He needs to buy a big shovel for the winter.
bpodgursky [3 hidden]5 mins ago
$600/acre for timber forest???
I had no idea Sweden was this cheap. Why wouldn't he drop $22mm on this...
Ekaros [3 hidden]5 mins ago
It is somewhat north. So I would expect potential income to be in line. Thus price can be relatively low and there still is not much profit.
nazgulsenpai [3 hidden]5 mins ago
Perhaps there's a reason Sweden wants him to have all of this land.
Hikikomori [3 hidden]5 mins ago
No he can fuck off please
mahboi [3 hidden]5 mins ago
Guessing it's more expensive if you're buying less, otherwise I kinda want to buy 4 acres.
Nothing to see here. There's no corruption in the civilized world, even less in Nordic countries which are maximally developed culturally and socially.
theropost [3 hidden]5 mins ago
Why does it quote 37,000 acres, then show a picture with a large swath of Sweden highlighted as if that is the area purchased - though Sweden is approximately 111 million acres of land, so this would be 0.003% of the land, so nowhere near the representation in this picture - seem disingenuous to me.
> Alex Karp, CEO of Palantir Technologies, purchased 15,000 hectares (37,000 acres) of forest in Härjedalen, Sweden, for 235 million kronor ($22 million).
Seems like he could buy all of Sweden's forests if he wanted to.
NewJazz [3 hidden]5 mins ago
But would he still have Palantir? Also a large portion of thr forests are likely in public trust, and they'd be hesitant to sell all of it I'd think. Especially to one person with no track record of land management.
bigbuppo [3 hidden]5 mins ago
I mean, the first thing I did when I came into money was buy a couple thousand acres of land.
mertleee [3 hidden]5 mins ago
Assuming this is for conservation, it's hard to find reasons this is a bad thing.
fnordpiglet [3 hidden]5 mins ago
This is where he will build 50 silos
elias_t [3 hidden]5 mins ago
They probably already have nano technology
xhevahir [3 hidden]5 mins ago
He's probably buying it so that he can ski through miles of virgin forest with his Norwegian bodyguards. I hate this weirdo but he's probably not going to do much to the landscape.
eckelhesten [3 hidden]5 mins ago
Weak reason given that Sweden has something called Allemansrätten.
Hikikomori [3 hidden]5 mins ago
Let's hope people will use it and invade his land whenever he visits.
subscribed [3 hidden]5 mins ago
This is a quite far fetched assumption.
I can't recall anything he said or did in the last few years that would make me assume he's done something good for the general public (or the humanity), and not for himself first and foremost.
mahboi [3 hidden]5 mins ago
Why would Alex Karp randomly buy Swedish forest for conservation?
xhevahir [3 hidden]5 mins ago
Skiing. He arranges his life around Nordic skiing to an incredible degree.
fhdkweig [3 hidden]5 mins ago
I don't really know anything about skiing, but can you do that in a virgin old-growth forest?
raddan [3 hidden]5 mins ago
Yes. All you really need are paths. This is a bit of an overgeneralization since forests in different places have different growth habits, but many old growth forests have less underbrush. During the winter, these forests are pretty easy to navigate on Nordic skis. If he wants to skate instead of doing the classic stride, I’m sure he can afford to groom the paths. Grooming really just requires a fancy snowmobile.
germinalphrase [3 hidden]5 mins ago
Potentially. Depending on the style of skiing, you may only need a 2-3 ft wide pathway. That said, ski paths tend to be cleared of trees/large rocks and span about 10-15 feet wide.
rafram [3 hidden]5 mins ago
Who said it's a virgin old-growth forest?
Ekaros [3 hidden]5 mins ago
I too doubt it is actually old-growth. Probably industrial forest. Which means that there is plenty of space around most of the trees.
daneel_w [3 hidden]5 mins ago
It might not get to remain a virgin old-growth forest. If the Swedish logging companies can get away with it, he probably can, too.
cryptolobster [3 hidden]5 mins ago
It still seems a bit strange
mahboi [3 hidden]5 mins ago
Ok that makes a lot more sense
fhdkweig [3 hidden]5 mins ago
Trying to buy himself back into heaven, like Bill Gates did. We only have the article's quotation for evidence, but it does say:
> Karp made the purchase through his newly registered company Cladonia Skog AB. The chairman of Cladonia told the Swedish newspaper that the land provides valuable habitat for wildlife and space for recreation.
colordrops [3 hidden]5 mins ago
He plans to create a ground for hunting humans, a la "The Most Dangerous Game".
moralestapia [3 hidden]5 mins ago
I wouldn't be surprised.
Karp strikes me as the type of person that would do this "for fun".
What are your reasons for assuming that would be the motive of the Palantir founder?
jacquesm [3 hidden]5 mins ago
Why would you assume that?
popalchemist [3 hidden]5 mins ago
why the hell would you assume altruism of the man who takes pride in killing people with automations
mcarper826 [3 hidden]5 mins ago
agreed
eichin [3 hidden]5 mins ago
Maybe he wants his own version of Nathan's estate in Ex Machina (redditor calculations from in-movie clues put it at 7 million hectares, though, so this isn't even close :-)
HN.zip
The purchased forest (15k hectares, 37k acres) is therefore ~1.3% of the region.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/H%C3%A4rjedalen
I suspect the opposite: a billionaire's escape from a potentially turbulent society.
I had no idea Sweden was this cheap. Why wouldn't he drop $22mm on this...
Seems like he could buy all of Sweden's forests if he wanted to.
I can't recall anything he said or did in the last few years that would make me assume he's done something good for the general public (or the humanity), and not for himself first and foremost.
> Karp made the purchase through his newly registered company Cladonia Skog AB. The chairman of Cladonia told the Swedish newspaper that the land provides valuable habitat for wildlife and space for recreation.
Karp strikes me as the type of person that would do this "for fun".
https://fortune.com/well/2023/02/03/billionaire-palantir-ceo...