The end of the digital society is the digital nomad

At 12:20 noon, a group of men, women and children of different skin colors walked into the hotel conference room. The sign at the door said "Meeting time: 11 o'clock".

On people's feet, some are canvas shoes and some are flip-flops. Button-down shirts and blazers mixed with cargo shorts and tank tops. The conference room is on the 19th floor of the hotel, looking out from the floor-to-ceiling windows, it is the city skyline full of sunshine in Bangkok, Thailand.

In the end, 44 people packed the conference room, drinking beer or Red Bull, listening to presentations on systems administration, direct selling, outsourcing, and "gray hat hacking."

These disheveled and unpunctual people, with median incomes typically in the six figures, are taking part in "vacation-style" sharing sessions with Internet entrepreneurs from around the world. It was an unforgettable meeting that "digital nomad" Mark Manson experienced first-hand. In addition to Bangkok, Las Vegas, Berlin, Tokyo, Miami... Similar conferences and organizations emerge one after another.

Using the Internet to work remotely is called "digital nomads", and its practitioners are called "digital nomads". "Digital nomadism" is not new, but after the Covid-19 outbreak, it has become the hottest way to live and work in the world.

Think about it, on the beach in Bali, drinking iced soda while working, going for a swim in the sea when tired, the only worry is that the computer is not very good at cooling - is it the one that is particularly "Versailles" and that everyone really admires kind?

"Four-hour work week"

People who choose "digital nomads" have both full-time and part-time jobs. The main feature is that they travel and work at the same time.

Three years into Covid-19, telecommuting has become the "new normal". The trend of "digital nomadism" of "working on vacation while on vacation" is on the rise. To cater to this trend, more than 25 countries around the world have launched "digital nomad visas": as easy to apply as a travel visa, but allowing the holder to stay and work for a long time in the country of destination.

Some countries in Europe and the Caribbean that are highly dependent on tourism and have small economies are the first to give the green light to "digital nomads". Countries such as the United Arab Emirates, Brazil and Italy soon followed suit.

The specific name of the "digital homeless visa" varies from country to country - countries such as Germany and the Czech Republic call it a "freelancer visa", Iceland is a "long-term worker visa", and Portugal is called an "independent worker and entrepreneur visa". Different countries have different application requirements. Generally speaking, applicants must pay travel insurance and provide proof of employment and income. The application fee will fluctuate depending on the country and the length of stay, ranging from $200 to $2,000.

As long as they can "go abroad", the only thing left for "digital nomads" is the implementation of where to work, how long to work, and where to live.

The workplace can be a public library, a co-working space, or a coffee shop, as long as there is free fast WIFI. The work schedule is also very flexible, there is no need to work from 9 to 5, when to get up and when to start work, and arrange the schedule according to your own rhythm and mood.

Many cities have established "digital nomadic communities", where digital nomads can rent for a long time, work, and make friends. A relatively well-known community in China is the "DNA Digital Nomad Commune" in Anji County, Huzhou City, Zhejiang Province. The members are generally freelancers who yearn for a free rural life. The commune will also organize public welfare activities, run newspapers for the village, hold film screenings, etc.

Best-selling author Timothy Ferriss, in his book The Four-Hour Work Week, refers to "digital nomads" as the "new rich." The "new rich" are the beneficiaries of economic globalization and high-speed communication technology. They only need to work four hours a week to achieve a balance between life and work.

The definition of "new rich" is not accurate. Most of the people who practiced the "digital nomadic" life at the beginning were those who made their fortunes in the Internet "gold rush" in the early years, such as currency speculators, hackers and founders of unicorn companies. The return on capital is very high and the workplace has been realized Freedom, so there are the Bangkok participants at the beginning of the article, "whose net worth exceeds six figures".

Today, the group of "digital nomads" has greatly expanded, similar to the "backpackers" of the past. You don't have to be rich, as long as you earn enough money to cover the expenses of travel, food and accommodation, "nomadic" can start immediately.

new noun, old face

Not all online jobs are suitable for "digital nomads."

At present, the occupations of "digital nomads" are nothing more than writing, designing, coding and marketing . The point is, in the era of no "nomads", there are also a large number of freelancers in these four types of work. The fundamental difference between "digital nomads" and freelancers is whether they go out to "see the world".

In terms of the convenience of flexible employment and high-risk, low-security employment conditions, "digital nomads" and "gig economy" are very close.

In the beginning, the gig economy was also a game for the "new rich". The “new rich” need a career in hedging—time freedom, financial dispersion, and disregard for organizational constraints. Hedging is a luxury for "achievers" who already have too many attractive options in their lives.

When the gig economy first took off in the United States, Juliet B. Schor, a sociology professor at Boston College, interviewed 43 respondents, mostly young people, who bought their way from Airbnb, Turo (the equivalent of a car rental). Airbnb) and TaskRabbit (a daily work subcontracting app) to make money. She found that they were overwhelmingly white-collar and highly educated.

The gig economy relies on the "contracting" model of monopolistic Internet platforms. Investors invest a lot, and the platform burns money wildly. The "players" who enter in the early stage have considerable income, attracting more people who make a living instead of "playing tickets". field.

Gradually, the gig economy became the only option for earners. Food delivery workers like India have experienced the "high expectations" of food delivery app Swiggy slipping. The app can provide food delivery riders with a monthly income of up to 50,000 rupees (about 660 US dollars), but with the expansion of the epidemic, the downturn in the economy, and the increase in gasoline prices, today's food delivery riders are basically in a situation of "making no money" or barely To maintain a state of food and clothing, and this job does not have any guarantees such as medical insurance, social insurance, etc.

In contrast, the phenomenon of the downward shift of the "gig economy" practitioners is more obvious: they have changed from a hedging game for the "new rich" to a "life-saving straw" for the unemployed to re-employ.

There has not been a similar problem with "digital nomads". First, because this type of work is mainly based on mental labor, it is also ranked in the middle of the income class of the whole society; second, because of its "seeing the world" nature, Including the construction of identity will attract more "Bohemian" elements to join.

identity anxiety

Professional identity matters.

Jesus' career choice is the basis of the afterlife theory of identity. The carpenter in the Galilee region is a semi-skilled job, not very secure, and it is not easy to make money, but he is the Son of God, the King of kings, and the one who saves people from their sins. Two very different identities are combined in him, and a person can be both a craftsman who walks the streets and the most holy person.

Anyone in the world can have the same experience and have unrelated identities at the same time: the worldly identity comes from occupation, income and the evaluation of others, the soul's identity depends on his moral quality.

No matter how mediocre or low the status of the world is, the status of the soul can still remain noble. For the vast majority of ordinary people, the difference between the two identities is full of redemptive comfort.

The "Bohemians" who were "born" in the 19th century were the manifestation of the times when the soul was higher than the secular. This is a group invented by writers to resist the bourgeois way of life. A large group of people wandering in Cambridge, Massachusetts, Venice, California, hate success in the mundane sense, such as promotion and fortune, and attach great importance to the understanding of nature and their own feelings, such as engaging in art.

"Bohemians" were the forerunners of today's "digital nomads". When Jack Kerouac taunted the social animals who "tightly tie their necks and were forced to catch the 5:48 train in Millbrae or San Carlos every morning to go to work in San Francisco", he praised "Son of the Road, Watch the freight train rumble by, experience the size of the world and feel the weight of ancient America." The Beat Generation insisted on measuring the world by the principle of freedom.

The "Bohemian" tradition is also to engage in community. The community can make sure that the people they touch are real friends, not "knowledge economy" guys. Locations known around the world for their 'bohemian' communities include Montparnasse, Bloomsbury, Chelsea, Greenwich Village and Venice Beach.

The appeal of "digital nomads" largely comes from the challenge of "bohemian" tradition to mainstream society. This is the development of the current era when the soul of the information society is higher than the secular. When homeless people look up at the stars on the beaches around the world and type a line of code, those suffocating "involution", "996", high inflation, energy crisis, plague and war all become with the joy of the soul negligible.

Identity anxiety is pervasive. How to define "success" is not very different between today's standards and thousands of years of history. There is no doubt about people's need for identity, but it is worth thinking about how people meet their needs and choose between meeting their own needs and social standards.

"Digital immigrants" want to try some new levels of status under fixed standards, and try to tell others that there is no one way to prove one's "success".

But don't forget, if a person can become a "digital immigrant", he is already considered a "successful person" in the secular sense.