ABOUT 52ND & WEST
What is 52nd & West? An open lab about urban mobility, social apps, mobile workers and travelers. It is also the place where Twalaba, a new online service destined to make people’s travel more social, was born, and where new ideas and apps are currently being developed. We also use 52nd & West to write and share about what makes our every day’s life better as digital nomads.
Who is 52nd & West? Surprisingly not a place run by two IT engineers with a 100% tech background. Only two old friends and former PR guys passionate about IT and new media, who one day just realized that they could do more working from home than from the office. That was no big guess, but one revolutionary step toward what we are now: happy and more creative than ever before.
Where is 52nd & West? Paris & Vienna are our ports of call, but most of the time we are on the road (or up in the air). Maybe you will spot us in Rome, New York, Berlin, Mexico, or San Francisco (travel & local cultures are the best inspirations to write about being a true digital nomad and to find new ideas for our lab). But you can also just keep an eye on Twitter to see where we are experimenting our crazy ideas for digital nomads.
ABOUT THIS BLOG
If like us you consider your home, hotels, airports and the near by coffee shop, potential working places just as much as your office, then this blog is for you. 52nd & West “the blog” features tips, reviews and opinions on the world of web commuting and travel, to enable mobile workers with better technological solutions and help them improve their mobile experience.
There are today plenty of technological tools, software and hardware, as well as new behavioral trends that make telecommuting possible and so easy to implement for the average worker. This blog is a space where we’re sharing our very own experience of telecommuting and the technologies we daily use to keep in touch with the “outer world” and enjoy from an everything-but-boring life.
I think you have chosen an excellent theme – it’s original, it’s contemporary, it’s fascinating, and a lot of people can identify themselves with it.
I am very much looking forward to hear about the tools of your trade – specifically, the technology (what gadgets and services do you use to maintain a constant presence?) and the logistics of being mobile (how do you travel? What happens when clients want to meet you?).
I really like it!!
@ Christian: thanks for your feedback and ideas! it’s very encouraging to see that the theme of “mobile worker” echoes among other tech lovers! I will of course dedicate some posts to the technologies and tools I daily use to make this “mobile experience” really efficient and enjoyable and share my very own experience of airline companies! Stay tuned via RSS!
Dear Cousin,
Your blog is clever and well design. As an old HR Rep’s, I would love to read comments on your experience working in a virtual office and the relationship you can create with your peers, coworkers and clients.
I am convinced that in the future, we could (or should) work virtually but in the same time I strongly beleive that nothing could replace real contacts in order to stay efficient and speed up his own career. Am I wrong? I don’t know at all, I do not have enough virtual experience.
I wish you “Bon Vent” in your up coming trip around the seas. Leave us some news and pictures.
Cheers,
Tonio.
PS : I love the picture you posted
@ Antoine: Hey cousin! Thanks for your input
I indeed think that it would be great to have you regularly comment my telecommuting experience from your HR point of view. As you probably know, one of the major issue that slows down the development of teleworking in France (and I’d extend this to most “Latin” countries like Italy and Spain) according to analysts, is the lack of faith of employers in their employees, as in France we’re unfortunately still thinking that the latest you stay at the office, the more you work (which you know is not true). The day we’ll move to a more “result oriented” approach where only achievements are evaluated whatever means you used (aka “you worked from home and did your job quicker and better than working from the office”) then I think that telecommuting will spread to the masses (well, I’m referring to the 25% of the population which could actually work from home).
However, it is true that telecommuting 100% of your time when you were early used to working from an open space or regular office, may bring some social drawbacks, like slowly being put away from the group (“you missed the joke of the day”), miss opportunities to win a promotion or get a salary raise, get bored only working from home, or have one single mistake immediately points to the fact that you’re telecommuting…
I think we have a lot to learn from our Scandinavian and US counterparts who successfully implemented this way of improving your quality of life (and not only working!). But I’ll come back in upcoming posts, to this more social aspect for telecommuting.
Fresh! Nicolás, eres un fresco, tío.
Contenido fresco, práctico, usable.
Excelente trabajo. Que no cese.
Gracias por compartir tu visión y experiencia.
@Ramon: Gracias Don Jack! Me alegra que te gusta el blog: la verdad es que le dedico bastante tiempo como el de Skype, y que hay muchisimo que contar y compartir acerca del hecho de ser un “Digital Nomad”. Que bueno entonces que quedó bien! Fui a ver tu blog y me encantó! Tio, tienes una muuuy buena pluma! Bueno, eso ya lo sabia, pero ademas tienes el talento de captiva a tu audiencia. Cuando empiezo a leer uno de tus posts, no me puedo parar antes del final. Me captiva mas que leer gossips! No manches, por favor sigue compartiendo tus aventuras: son buenisimas!!
Tu fidel lector
el pirata