706 - Chinese Co-Living Network

Description

By the Wamotopia organizers:

"706 is a youth space (706青年空间) and the intellectual seed of the crypto-nomad movement. Founded in 2012 in Beijing's Wudaokou district, it started as a youth venue for discussions on philosophy, sociology, and technology. As physical spaces in Beijing became harder to maintain, 706 evolved into a "706 Protocol" – akin to freemasonic lodges. It shifted from a single physical community hub to a decentralized network of lounges and co-living hubs – these are usually open to the public and serve as “third” spaces outside work/home. 706 originally established a significant presence in Dali, providing the "software" (the people and ideas) to Dali’s "hardware" (the location). Today, 706 has physical nodes in Liangzhu, Berlin, the Bay area, London, Beijing, Shanghai, ChongQing, Chiangmai and across the world.

Physical Coworking & Co-living Spaces: The base locations i.e. physical co-working and co-living spaces serve as the physical hardware substrate – where members live together for weeks or months to work on specific open-source or social projects or come just for the vibe and culture, some simple for the affordable rent, others choosing to stay permanently.

The Spirit of Pop-up Cities: As a natural consequence of these mimetically fertile cross-pollinating spaces, temporary socio-digital operating systems merge (communities and DAO’s). These are often fueled by idealistic and techno-utopian hubs for exploration, co-creation, co-learning around various topics such as crypto development, longevity, or artificial intelligence. There are now countless roaming popup cities like ShanhaiWoo, (山海坞) and Zuzualu that moves across locations.

One such physical space is DNA (Digital Nomad ANJI) – who revitalized an abandoned bamboo processing factory into a dedicated campus for digital nomads. With countless others like 4Seas, NCC and CYC who weave together co-living and co-working networks for entrepreneurs, artists, and young people who can freely explore the world and themselves without permission or cost. While most see these as simply places to live or work, an increasing number of participants view themselves as "citizens" of a network or “netizens,” rather than residents of a specific country."