In the future many of us will live in nomadic, tech-savvy communities away from urban areas, according to Montreal-based trend forecasting agency Logomachy.

This will occur because of a dramatic rise in the number of us working as freelancers, coupled with an increase in the cost of living in cities. Urban life will become simply too expensive for many of us to manage, and technology will mean there is no need for us to live in any specific location.

Living in tiny but technologically advanced mobile houses, we’ll form ad-hoc communities with individuals who share similar interests, in a manner similar to subreddits.

“Mass digital nomadism will act a little bit like Reddit: agglomerating geeks together in proto-cities (gamers, psychonauts, artists, vegans, nudist, queers), and create super cool homogenous communities,” said Logomachy’s Guillaume Dumas, adding that this system would make it easier for individuals to find friends and potential partners.

Communal tasks such as cooking and cleaning will be shared among the group, leaving the bulk of the day to work on personal or professional projects.

The communities themselves might be made up of tiny mobile homes, but they will have a very high level of tech to support the needs and expectations of community members.

In a report entitled ‘Mass Digital Nomadism: Unlocking New Options for the Information Age’, Logomachy explains:

“For communities of more than a hundred individuals, possibilities will be truly unlimited: cheap electricity from solar panels or windmills, high speed Internet, collective insurances, hot water for showers, industrial 3D printers, fruit trees, aquaculture, education for children, shared tools, sports equipment; you name it.”

Logomachy has dubbed members of these future communities as nomadic urban professionals, or nuppies.

The agency characterises them as being very similar to many post-recession twentysomethings around today; your average nuppy is entrepreneurial, adventurous, liberal and community-orientated. They also have a high level of digital literacy, a ‘jack of all trades’ skillset and are likely to be some form of artist or musician.

The proposed communities have a lot in common with existing intentional communities and communes popularised in the sixties, but with a lot more technology.

However, like these communities, and online communities such as Reddit, mass digital nomadism will need to develop systems to prevent certain disruptive individuals from ruining it for everyone else.

In an online space this is relatively easy; Reddit’s downvote option and ability to report trolling users prevents it from being spoilt.

However, in a physical intentional community this can be a real challenge. An individual can cause hell for the rest through disruptive and damaging behaviour, and hogging of resources.

In a tech-savvy community this could be an even bigger concern. It’s one thing to have to worry about someone eating more than their fair share, but communities will also need to find a way to stop people hogging bandwidth, using up all the 3D printer filament or spending too long flying the communal drone.

Existing communities usually tackle this with certain rules and agreed-upon punishments, and often will screen members before allowing them to join – some communities do have a ‘no rules’ policy, but this usually results in problems arising from antisocial members.

Come the rise of mass digital nomadism, we’ll be interested to see how this plays out.

Featured image courtesy of Stephen McLeod Blythe, inline image one courtesy of Patrick Ahles, inline image two courtesy of Gerald Davison.