{"id":856,"date":"2015-09-13T16:11:02","date_gmt":"2015-09-13T16:11:02","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.just4letters.com\/pi\/?p=856"},"modified":"2015-09-13T20:20:50","modified_gmt":"2015-09-13T20:20:50","slug":"thoughts-on-ray-oldenburgs-article-our-vanishing-third-places","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.just4letters.com\/pi\/?p=856","title":{"rendered":"Thoughts on Ray Oldenburg\u2019s article “Our Vanishing ‘Third Places\u2019”"},"content":{"rendered":"
In the article \u201cOur Vanishing ‘Third Places\u201d Ray Oldenburg argues that our happiness hinges on our ability to socialize with the people around us, and we need places where we can support this social interaction<\/i><\/b>. Oldenburg coined these places as \u201cthird places,\u201d defining the “first place\u201d as home and the \u201csecond place\u201d as work.<\/div>\n

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Oldenburg outlined the importance of “third places.\u201d They serve has hubs; they benefit communities by providing people with a place for getting information, exchanging ideas, and connecting with each other. Since Oldenburg wrote this article, we have (to some extent) resolved many of these needs with the internet. We have created accessible virtual places within games, social media, and public forums where we can chat and mingle. There are innumerable ways to be informed, entertained and self educated with the internet. While Oldenburg\u2019s vision relied on a local gathering place that people can walk to, we now have an even closer alternative right at our fingertips.<\/div>\n

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Still, it’s worthwhile to consider the nuances of Oldenburg\u2019s physical \u201cthird place\u201d today. Even though the internet has created a version of his \u201cthird place,\u201d it doesn’t quite hit all of his points. While the internet can help facilitate conversations, it does not directly replace\u00a0meeting someone in person. On the internet, we have a high amount of control over who we meet, when we meet, and how we meet. It doesn\u2019t help populate Oldenburg\u2019s barren suburban streets nor does it create the ideal conditions for the casual, spontaneous interactions that he valued. While we have invented technology for us to communicate efficiently, we have not created technology to communicate naturally like we do in real life. We can\u2019t hug a sad friend who is miles away. Unless provoked, most people aren\u2019t proactive to meet their neighbors. Oldenburg\u2019s physical \u201cthird place\u201d forces individuals to step out from behind the screen and actively participate in their surroundings. Unlike your computer or device, you can\u2019t turn off or log out of your physical environment. Oldenburg wants people to contribute to the humanity of a community by being both mentally and physically present.<\/div>\n

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There is certainly value to physical \u201cthird places.\u201d Yet, I don\u2019t think that \u201cthird places” need to be formal structures like Oldenburg’s taverns or corner stores. Even though proximity is obviously convenient, his argument for \u201cwalking cities\u201d might be irrelevant in the next few years. With driverless cars or even improved public transportation, it will be much easier for anyone to make it to their \u201cthird places\u201d no matter what the distance is. Accessibility is no longer a strong enough reason for building local physical “third places.\u201d (Though urban sprawl might be.)\u00a0Kathy Madden’s article \u201cThird Places I Know\u201d describes impromptu “third places” that occur on the sidewalk or in a parking lot – a place forms when and where ever people happen to meet. Services like MeetUp, Lyft, Swarm and even dating apps start to create flexible gathering places that can occur while in route or in situ. I imagine that the future of \u201cplaces” won\u2019t all be contained in neatly framed buildings. They\u2019ll be unconventional, shapeshifting and mobile – maybe they\u2019ll be highly evolved food trucks or mobile gyms?<\/div>\n

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In the article \u201cOur Vanishing ‘Third Places\u201d Ray Oldenburg argues that our happiness hinges on our ability to socialize with the people around us, and we need places where we can support this social interaction. Oldenburg coined these places as … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":24,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[7,1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-856","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-3rd","category-uncategorized"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.just4letters.com\/pi\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/856","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.just4letters.com\/pi\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.just4letters.com\/pi\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.just4letters.com\/pi\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/24"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.just4letters.com\/pi\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=856"}],"version-history":[{"count":5,"href":"https:\/\/www.just4letters.com\/pi\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/856\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":876,"href":"https:\/\/www.just4letters.com\/pi\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/856\/revisions\/876"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.just4letters.com\/pi\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=856"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.just4letters.com\/pi\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=856"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.just4letters.com\/pi\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=856"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}