ABSTRACT
Libraries, schools, museums and community institutions need to be considered in innovative recombinations of use that add a new dimension to public space, one that interacts with and supports physical space. Digital places challenge the dualism of form and function; a space in between cannot have a single fixed function attached to it, nor can its boundaries be clearly defined in time or space. Technology is blamed for the social isolation particularly the loss of face-to-face contact as people increasingly spend time communicating online or through mobile media. Boundaries in the spatial world are now less defined by territory or ownership but by the ranges of particular technologies or the connective structures of networks. For instance the case study of Wi-Fi found that public Wi-Fi creates different spaces of access than the existing public space. Interestingly one of the most material ways in which networks become materialised is not through human interaction, but through their need for power and energy.
