Page 51 - WHERE WE WORK - Schlegelmilch

Moving between places chapter in the text and tables.
2.4.1 Places of nomadic work
In nomadic work, workplaces are not fixed and designated but keep changing as the workers move between locations. While there are many different places where the nomadic workers work, three types of places were most common: co-working space, café, and housing. By co-working places, we refer to shared flexible office-like place provided by a third party to freelancers and entrepreneurs (Spinuzzi, 2012). Cafés are restaurant-like settings with a casual atmosphere, and the nomads’ housing ranged from fully equipped apartments or houses, hotel or Airbnb rooms, and occasionally even hostels. However, the latter did not include the surrounding areas (e.g., hotel cafés or lobbies). Other places where work was conducted were only mentioned sparsely: during the commute on a bus, train or plane (4 in 2 interviews), libraries (2 in 2 interviews), and hotel lobbies (2 in 1 interview). In the following, we will characterize and compare the three most common places based on their physical, social, and, where applicable, digital characteristics (Table 2.4).
Co-working spaces, cafés, and housing were not mutually exclusive but rather were part of the nomad's way of working. Co-working spaces (Figure 2.1) offer necessary physical facilities for work, such as tables, chairs, electrical plugs, and a reliable internet connection (fast, stable). While cafés and housing also offered necessary facilities, the quality of the internet connection was less reliable and electrical plugs sparser in cafés, thus hindering the nomads' work:
“Even if you didn't come to [co-working space] here in [city on Bali], and you are trying to go to all of the different coffee-shops; it might either be full, they have no plugs, their Wi-Fi doesn't work; you can't connect on Skype. All those things make you so much less productive because you're frustrated trying to even to get work done, and that's not fun.” (Cate, online educator, #33)
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