Link: http://www.economist.com/specialreports/displaystory.cfm?story_id=10950394

A small frisson of pleasure this morning to discover I'd anticipated the Economist on the topic of digital nomads in March this year.

The current edition has a special report on digital nomadism and its effects--anticipated and unanticipated. Among these, the impact of digital nomadism on families, on cities and public places, and on the traditional workplace.

The Economist also provides an excellent selection of external links for more information about the phenomenon.

Humans have always migrated and travelled, without necessarily living nomadic lives. The nomadism now emerging is different from, and involves much more than, merely making journeys. A modern nomad is as likely to be a teenager in Oslo, Tokyo or suburban America as a jet-setting chief executive. He or she may never have left his or her city, stepped into an aeroplane or changed address. Indeed, how far he moves is completely irrelevant. Even if an urban nomad confines himself to a small perimeter, he nonetheless has a new and surprisingly different relationship to time, to place and to other people. “Permanent connectivity, not motion, is the critical thing,” says Manuel Castells, a sociologist at the Annenberg School for Communication, a part of the University of Southern California, Los Angeles.

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