The Altruist
Laurent Cleenewerck has a dream. His Republic of Lomar issues stamps and passports, is applying for nonprofit status as a foundation in Delaware, and aims to be a passport- and document-issuing authority for stateless refugees and other people who want out of unsatisfactory regimes.
     “People from countries such as China or some African nations with very negative links may want to have something more cutting edge, more modern, more transitional. They can be in Uzbekistan and be part of a cutting-edge, Silicon Valley-endeavor,” says Cleenewerck, a California-based network administrator.
     Lomar’s motto is “Empowering our citizens and partner States through knowledge, technology and development.” Lomar promises to eventually offer its 1,500 citizens legal assistance, immigration assistance into “real” countries, and visa services. Lomar has “consulates” in several European countries, and encourages citizens to call the consuls for help if they get in trouble.
     Cleenewerck says Lomar is not seeking money or power — Lomarian passports cost $5 — only to make the world a more hospitable place. And though Lomar hasn’t been formally recognized by any other countries, it has had some diplomatic success: Its “citizens” have gotten into Cuba and Russia on Lomarian passports, Cleenewerck said.
     Computer software salesman Jim Damiano decided to acquire a Lomarian passport because he often travels in Central America, and Guatemalan guerrillas don’t like people with U.S. papers.
     “Faced with the choice of handing over an American passport or a Republic of Lomar passport, the choice is obvious,” he says.

The Jester
Everyone dreams of declaring independence from the rest of the world when they’re 13. Robert Ben Madison just took it farther than most.
     In 1981, he declared his bedroom to be the “independent kingdom of Talossa.” Nowadays, Talossa, population 60, claims to own half of Milwaukee and to be “inexplicably and inextricably connected somehow to Berbers.” The nation has its own language, which extensively uses the umlaut and the letter X. It has a potential population crisis, because all but four of their citizens are male. But citizens are recruiting over the Internet.
     The Talossans aren’t about to rise up with arms and secede from Wisconsin. “We are not a militia group,” says Madison, or King Robert I as he likes to be called in a Talossan context. “We pay taxes … we are as independent as we can be without breaking any laws, which in the grand scheme of things means not very independent at all. We try to be independent in other ways.”
     Talossan independence is cultural and political. Talossans write books about their connection to Indian mounds, invent lexicons of the entirely synthetic Talossan language, and have elections about every eight months.
     “We like elections,” King Robert says.
     Talossa was the first of dozens of Internet-based micronations that look to outsiders like political role-playing games: the Aeldarian Empire, Reunion, and the Principality of Pontecorvo, among others. They have odd titles of nobility and a slightly skewed sense of humor in common.
     The Talossan polity is fragmented, complicated, and thoroughly tongue-in-cheek. There is a foreign policy, mainly consisting of whether to recognize other micronations. The nation is not looking for money and doesn’t sell passports.
     Its denizens often say in their citizenship applications that they see Talossan politics as a leisure activity. Talossa, King Robert says, is an expression of a desire to be someone in a political context.
     “Talossan politics is real-life politics, just smaller and more accessible. People have different philosophical agendas and they want to see them enacted into law, even if the laws are entirely symbolic.”

The Rogue
The Dominion of Melchizedek is the black sheep of the micronation community. On the surface, it’s one of the most mature of the bunch. Based on an uninhabited Pacific island and claiming a chunk of Antarctica and the city of Jerusalem, Melchizedek has corporations, banks and a university. Its ecclesiastical ruler, David Korem (born Mark Pedley), says it is “something like (the Sovereign Military Order of the Knights of) Malta, or the Vatican.”
     Citizen Stan Lipton, a TV producer in Florida, says he’s looking forward to retiring to Melchizedek — the Pacific island part, not the Antarctic section — when it’s built up.
     Unfortunately, a set of  (former) Melchizedekian officials were arrested in the Philippines (the) year (before last) for (overstaying their visas: http://www.melchizedek.com/press/release17.htm). And (several of the hundreds of) Melchizedekian (licensed) banks have been on the hit lists of several governments, including Britain’s and the United States’.
     “We’ve issued several alerts (see last example at   http://www.occ.treas.gov/ftp/Alert/98-38.txt ) to the banking industry about (some of) their (DOM licensed banks) involvement in unauthorized banking activity,” says Janis Smith, spokeswoman for the U.S. Office of the Comptroller of the Currency, the banking-regulation arm of the Treasury Department.
     Korem is nonplussed about his nation-non-grata status with the U.S. government. (In answer to the question, 'How can one know that the DOM financial institutions are secure', he said,) “Where have we said our institutions are secure? … We like to give everyone a chance...” ("In order to be secure, each institution must have substantial net worth, audits by qualified chartered or certified accounts, management with top expertise and good character.")
     Korem himself was (falsely) convicted of mail and interstate fraud in 1983 for (third parties making representations regarding existing debts on real estate owned by a partnership with his father and without his knowledge in 1977), and was (falsely) sentenced to another eight years in 1986 for a (...). currency (exchange banking business) involving Mexican pesos. He started the most recent incarnation of Melchizedek when (released from political prison) in 1990.