The metaphor of the modern nomads has been haunting theoretical literature for such a long time that its credibility has begun to appear more than a little strained. Yet in the middle of 2008, the highly ­reputable British economics magazine, the Economist, published a special section bearing the title, “Nomads at last”, in which it was argued that the Age of the Digital Nomads had finally arrived after having been falsely proclaimed so frequently in the past. The concept of the modern urban nomads was presumably coined by Marshall McLuhan, the legendary media theorist, in the 1960s and 1970s. In his books, McLuhan painted a brief picture of the mobile employees of the future, who would be on the go around the globe almost constantly and would no longer need a home. In the 1980s, the French economist Jacques Attali – one of President Francois Mitterrand’s advisors – used the term to describe a future in which society would split into a highly mobile jet-set elite and an uprooted working class. In the 1990s, Tsugio Makimoto and David Manner wrote a book with a title containing the term “digital nomads”, which above all praised the blessings of the latest mobile devices.

 

  

But the Economist believes that all of these visions were illusionary. At the time they were promulgated, technology had not reached today’s advanced stage. True, there were a lot of different devices, but they were not yet connected to one another. The image of the modern nomads at that time displayed them dragging all sorts of portable technology around with them so that they could exist – more in line with the image of an astronaut than that of a Bedouin. The real trend observable today, according to the Economist, has existed for only a few years because the modern nomads, who are actually worthy of the name, are like their ancestors in the desert: they are defined by what they leave behind, not by what they take with them. Modern nomads do not have any paper documents because they access all of their documents electronically. Frequently, they do not even have a laptop – a BlackBerry or iPhone is enough. All of the information they require can be retrieved online.

 

  Moreover, the modern definition of the digital nomads no longer necessarily entails that they do a lot of traveling. “They may be teenagers in Oslo, Tokyo, or small-town America just as well as globetrotting CEOs,” notes the Economist. Manuel Castells, a sociologist at the University of Southern California, says: “Uninterrupted connection is the critical element, not movement.” James Katz, professor at Rutgers University in New Jersey, even believes that this development will lead to a “historical re-integration” of our work and private spheres. People in pre-industrial society worked where they lived. It was not until the factories of industrial society, with their division of labor, and the gigantic modern bureaucracies came along that the work and private spheres got separated because workers and civil servants had to be gathered into one place if they were to work efficiently. Today, says Katz, the two areas are once again becoming mixed. We can work where we live and vice-versa.   So an idea which was prophesied at the beginning of the 1990s by MIT researcher Nicholas Negroponte is now beginning to appear in the reality of our lives. More or less concurrently with his vision of the mobile Internet nomads and knowledge workers of the New Economy, a second idealized picture of a new work culture arose which is now just becoming realistic: the glamorous and yet often job-related international jet set which was praised by the British magazine ‘Wallpaper’, published by Tyler Brûlé. Retro-futuristic hotels in Beirut or Hanoi were presented alongside new cell phone models, anti-jetlag tips for frequent travelers, and shopping ideas for globetrotters with a sure sense of style. At the time, this may have looked like unrealistic technological dreaming or hedonistic high-gloss fantasy, but changes in technological and social parameters have today suddenly turned it into a tangible option: a mixture of Brûlé and Negroponte is not a bad set of guidelines for professional happiness.    If the daily commute to the office becomes obsolete thanks to new technology, we can – carrying the idea to its logical conclusion – do our work at places which were technically and financially inaccessible to our mothers and fathers. For example: I am writing these lines in a thoroughly affordable, yet unbelievably tasteful hotel room in Shanghai. There was never any question that the Internet connection via WLAN is free of charge. Room service has just brought some fresh fruit. The fantastic new tailored shirts which I have ordered for 20 dollars each will be delivered in just a few moments, and later I will be meeting some friends for dinner. Only a few months ago, I was a permanently employed office slave in Germany, sitting at the same desk in the same building day in, day out, and not going home until it was dark outside. Just tell me which variation sounds better ... 
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