What Makes Values of Coworking Spaces?: A Comparative Case Study in Tokyo, Bali and Berlin

This research explores the value of coworking spaces and nomad work based on ethnographic fieldwork in Shibuya(Tokyo, Japan), Ubud(Bali, Indonesia) and Berlin (Germany). Business has underscored the principles of connection, collaboration, and innovation in recent years. Furthermore, efforts have been made to design workplaces that foster these values. This has been made possible by an offline world that holds new beliefs due to the overlap between online and offline. The development of mobile and social media has no doubt promoted the trend of working in any location. These three cities have gained attention in recent years as a city that is exploring and implementing the movement of location independence in life and business.

This trend represents a new world: ‘second offline’. ‘Second offline’ indicates a context in which virtual information is superimposed onto real space. It means having information from the Internet in one’s daily life and regularly referencing it (Tomita ed, 2016). We can consider PCs and the (early) Web to be ‘linking media’ that transcend physical zones and connect workplaces, as is the case with telework. In contrast, we can consider mobile and social media to be ‘superimposing media’, which indicates a restructuring and upgrade of workplaces from a new perspective, as with coworking spaces and nomad work.

This paper analyzes how workers and directors in coworking spaces make co-organize their “community" by fieldworks conducted in three city which are in different social context. We also discuss how do work “space" becomes work “place” from theoretical viewpoint of Tuan’s terms; “space” and “place”.