ABSTRACT
This essay is part of an ongoing participatory action research endeavor into the
Digital City (DDS De Digitale Stad), an Amsterdam-based free community
network and the most famous of the initiatives that became known collectively
as the Amsterdam Public Digital Culture. Launched in January 1994, the DDS
quickly attracted tens of thousands of users, making it the largest “freenet” in
the world. Thanks to the publicity it generated, it was instrumental in the intro-
duction of the Internet to the general public in the Netherlands. The aim of its
founders was to democratize the use of the Net and create a digital public
domain.
