In Bringing the Public Back to Public Spaces, Glenn Reynolds explains that both offices and home-offices have their problems — and notes a phenomenon I’ve definitely noticed too:
I’ve noticed a lot of small business people in my area giving up their offices, and having meetings in public places — Starbucks, Borders, the Public Library, and so on. In fact, a real estate agent recently told me that the small-office commercial real estate market is actually suffering as a result of so many people making this kind of move.
More:
If a home is, in Le Corbusier’s words, a “machine for living,” then an office is a “machine for working.” But nowadays, the machinery is looking a bit obsolescent. The traditional office took shape in the 19th Century, and the shape it took was in no small part the result of technology: the need for people to be close to each other, and to services like telegraphs, telephones, messengers and (later) faxes, copy machines, and computers.You can pretty much carry all that stuff with you now. And people are doing it.