The evolution of digital nomadism: From high-tech hacker spaces to crypto co-working

ONE of the first modern co-working spaces, C-Base in Berlin, was launched 30 years ago by a group of computer engineers as a “hacker space” in which to share their tech and techniques.

Indeed, many of the people we first encountered in our anthropological research into the emerging world of digital nomadism in the mid-2010s were hackers and computer coders.

Nearly a decade later, we returned to Chiang Mai to see what had happened to these pioneers of the borderless, desk-free life. We wondered if they had been put off by the throngs of travellers who have followed in their sandal-clad footsteps, attracted by glamorous – if often inaccurate – images of the digital nomad lifestyle.

One of the city’s nomad hotspots is Yellow Coworking, which launched in 2020 as a blockchain-oriented, collaborative escape zone from the Covid-19 pandemic.

The later stages of the pandemic were an interesting time to be in Chiang Mai: Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine in February 2022 was followed by mass layoffs in Silicon Valley when Twitter, Meta, Coinbase and Microsoft all made significant cuts.

As a result, Yellow Coworking saw an influx of former Silicon Valley workers, Russian and Ukrainian coders, and crypto enthusiasts.

“Some ex-Silicon Valley employees are here playing around with startups,” one Yellow staff member explained. “It makes sense for them to come here if they are trying to create an MVP.” (That’s “minimum viable product” – startup jargon for a basic prototype that, with luck, will become the next technological success story.)

“With its lower costs, Chiang Mai gives them a longer runway,” the Yellow staff member added, referring to the amount of time the startup can remain solvent without raising additional funds.

People walking into Yellow Coworking’s modernist, European-style building simply raise their hands to sign themselves in via biometric fingerprint scanners.

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Many are computer coders or IT specialists in their 20s, taking advantage of fast broadband and (mostly Western) passports to disconnect their lives from any particular location. They view technology and code as a global language, with no need to stay rooted to a single country or location.

The borderless revolution

In Chiang Mai, cryptocurrency usage has spread to the local population. During one meet-up held in a local bar, the owner took payment for shots of Thai rum in Bitcoin. She, too, talked about the borderless revolution that was coming, and crypto being part of her financial future.

One of the Western “crypto nomads” present was trying to launch his own cryptocoin and get others to invest in it. A few tables away, another who had invested – and lost – a fortune in cryptocurrency explained he was now living in Chiang Mai because of the city’s relatively low cost of living.

For every success story, there were tales of loss and potential scams. Some told outlandish stories of crypto startups and other projects that were hard to validate. One person who wrote e-books on how to invest successfully in crypto was selling courses on how to get involved. Another was writing code to improve the security of the Ethereum blockchain system, to ensure it would be safe from hackers.

Digital nomad hot spots, which also include European cities such as Lisbon in Portugal, show how the worlds of cryptocurrency, blockchain and digital nomadism are colliding – and evolving beyond mere workspace provision.

A collaborative, incubator-like atmosphere is at the core of The Block Lisboa, where you can pay in cryptocurrency and which hosts weekly Crypto Fridays for networking, collaboration and ideas-sharing.

In 2023, it held the first Ethereum Block Summit, which promised to “delve into the future of finance” by exploring “ground-breaking advancements in the Ethereum ecosystem”.

Meanwhile, CV Labs is building a blockchain ecosystem of its own, comprising co-working spaces, events and summits in Lisbon and four other cities including Vaduz in Liechtenstein and Zug – part of Switzerland’s “Crypto Valley”. These spaces are open to cryptocurrency professionals and enthusiasts with professional exchange in mind.

Digital nomads are becoming a valuable asset for states to compete for – as Tsugio Makimoto and David Manners predicted they would in their 1997 book, Digital Nomad.

“Just as we are already seeing governments competing with each other to attract industrial investment,” they wrote, “we may see governments competing with each other for citizens.”

Malaysia’s digital nomad visa initially targeted only nomads from IT and digital professions such as cybersecurity and software development. Estonia launched a digital nomad visa along with its e-residency programme to target high-skilled digital workers.

While these visas typically restrict local employment, many allow nomads to bring family members and offer a path to residency, such as in Spain and Portugal.

Co-working spaces started off as techno-utopian, hacker spaces. Thirty years later, they are an increasingly important aspect of some cities’ tourism calculations – having been given further allure by the rise of the niche group of crypto nomads. THE CONVERSATION

Dave Cook is an anthropologist, published writer and business leader whose research has been featured by Time, Wired, BBC, The Guardian, Le Monde, O Globo, The Independent, World Economic Forum and The Conversation. Olga Hannonen, PhD, is one of the key names in research on digital nomadism. Her expert opinions on various aspects of the digital nomadic lifestyle and associated policy changes have been featured by the Wall Street Journal, BBC, Bloomberg, TRT World and other international media.