NEW: We are piloting a three month virtual residency, for two entrepreneurs with bold ideas for making the internet more human and healthy. This is a paid opportunity to spend time exploring and building, and go from early hunch to conviction and clarity. Apply here by Sept 9: newpublic.org/eir
Enterpreneur in Residence
newpublic.orgAug 19, 2026 at 3:30 PM
Enterpreneur in Residence
A virtual residency for founders with bold ideas for the internet
The Virtual Community: Homesteading on the Electronic Frontier
Howard Rheingold tours the 'virtual community' of online networking.Howard Rheingold has been called the First Citizen of the Internet. In this book he tou
The virtual community: homesteading on the electronic frontier
Howard Rheingold tours the "virtual community" of onlin…
Neighborhood Steward Fellowship | New_ Public
An eight-week program bringing together leaders of local-oriented online spaces to experiment with fun new practices and ideas
Local Digital Spaces Are Essential Civic Infrastructure (SSIR)
With traditional community spaces underfunded and neglected, investing in the health of our online gathering places has become essential. <meta property=
Gathering the Custodians of the Internet: Lessons from the First CivilServant Summit - Citizens and Technology Lab
An agenda for citizen behavioral science to maintain and protect the communities we love online.
On-Together: Virtual Co-Working
Virtual co-working with friends or strangers all over the world! Digital pals hang out at the bottom of the screen while you work, study, and get stuff done. Includes productivity tools, hangout spots, breaktime games, and more!
On-Together: Virtual Co-Working
Virtual co-working with friends or strangers all over the world! Digital pals hang out at the bottom of the screen while you work, study, and get stuff done. Includes productivity tools, hangout spots, breaktime games, and more!
Metagov Short Talks (June 14, 2023) : Metagovernance Seminar
Nick Kaufmann and Matt Crittenden present Spectra: the virtual city that builds real cities, a talk discussing how to combine multi-scale cooperative...
we were online
Turn the internet into a living, shared space with real-time traces of people browsing.
New_ Public Invests in Local Online Spaces as Digital Civic Infrastru…
archived 11 Apr 2025 17:34:52 UTC
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Architecture and the Internet: Designing places in cyberspace
Cyberspace, as the information space is called, has become accessible in the past decade through the World Wide Web. And although it can only be experienced through the mediation of computers, it is quickly becoming an alternative stage for everyday economic, cultural, and other human activities. As such, there is a potential and a need to design it according to place–like principles. Making places for human inhabitation is, of course, what architects, landscape architects, and town planners have been doing in physical space for thousands of years. It is curious, therefore, that Cyberspace designers have not capitalized on the theories, experiences, and practices that have been guiding physical place–making. While most 3D environments closely mimic physical spaces, they are, by and large, devoid of the essential characteristics that differentiate a ‘place’ from mere ‘space.’ And only rarely are they sensitive to, and take advantage of, the peculiarities of Cyberspace. We believe that this state of affairs is temporary, characteristic of early adoption stages of new technologies. As the Web matures, and as it assumes more fully its role as a destination rather than as means of communication, there will be a growing need to design it according to place–making principles. By looking at physical architecture as a case study and metaphor for organizing space into meaningful places, this paper explores the possibility of organizing Cyberspace into spatial settings that not only afford social interaction, but, like physical places, also embody and express cultural values. At the same time, because Cyberspace lacks materiality, is free from physical constraints, and because it can only be ‘inhabited’ by proxy, these ‘places’ may not necessarily resemble their physical counterparts.
NEW: We are piloting a three month virtual residency, for two entrepreneurs with bold ideas for making the internet more human and healthy. This is a paid opportunity to spend time exploring and building, and go from early hunch to conviction and clarity. Apply here by Sept 9: newpublic.org/eir
Enterpreneur in Residence
newpublic.org