Living the digital nomad life

0:00Hello and welcome to Tech Life on the BBC World Service. The programme about technology and how it affects the world all around us. I'm Shona McCallum. This week we're looking at how tech and visas have freed some workers from their desktops and allowed them to continue their work from other, sometimes more glamorous, parts of the world. They're called Digital Nomads. You can hear more about that in a moment. Also today I speak to a victim of online bullying in Kenya and find out about a charity trying to help. and the tech event in Finland with icy origins. Slush is the worst form of snow. So that's likely something that you're going to face once you land to Helsinki Airport.

1:01First on Tech Life today, come with me to the beach.

1:09I'm sure I've told you before, this is one of my favourite sounds, the waves crashing and the birds tweeting in the background. Perhaps it also appeals to you. Have you ever thought about swapping your office for a location like this? Well, if so, perhaps you're already what is known as a digital nomad. The term was popularised in a book of the same name in 1997, predicting a future workforce of globe-trotting travellers logging in from abroad. Since then, technology has advanced enough that we can now grab a laptop, a rucksack and a passport and work from almost anywhere in the world where there's a decent internet connection.

1:47The number of digital nomads has risen dramatically in the past few years and they're being welcomed in many countries. Slovenia is the latest. However, there are some concerns that they contribute to problems for local communities. We'll get to those issues in a moment. But first, I'm joined by Tech Life's Liv McMahon. Hi, Liv. Hi, Shona. So, Liv, you've been looking into the topic of digital nomads for us. That's right. So what or who is a digital nomad? They're basically someone who's been granted a visa or permit to work in a different country or a foreign country for a limited amount of time, provided that they earn an income outside the country that they're moving to.

2:27So they're working remotely, probably on a laptop and spending their money in a new place, but they're not actually taking the job from a local person. I want to ask you about digital nomad visas too. Yeah, a lot of countries see value in attracting this type of well-paid international worker. We think around 60 countries also do at the moment. And governments will offer residence permits or visas to stay in their country for a set duration, while the worker works for a company that's based elsewhere. Slovenia, which lies just to the east of Italy, is the latest nation to launch this kind of permit for non-EU nationals and it's expected to be available from the 21st of November.

3:08Thanks for that, Liv. Well, let's hear from one person who, along with his partner, is about to become a digital nomad in Spain. My name is Nick Cohn, I'm 35, and I am about to become a digital nomad. At this stage, we are still in our home city, Glasgow in Scotland, and we're about to embark upon the journey to Barcelona in Spain early next year. So what have you put in place then in order to enable that? So we've decided to work with an immigration lawyer to give us support and guidance. There's a lot of terminology, even once it's been simplified, still isn't always the most straightforward.

3:45So we decided to work with an immigration lawyer who's based in Spain, who understands this particular visa really well, who is guiding us through producing all of the paperwork that we need. There's a big upturn in the Spanish digital nomad visa process at the moment. There's a lot of people going for it, so there's a lot of information out there, which is obviously very helpful. As Nick indicated there, he won't be the only digital nomad working in Spain. I spoke to another who's already working there. My name is Anjali Brown. I'm 30 years old and I'm a wellness coach based out of Barcelona.

4:17Tell me about living in Barcelona then and how you feel about being a digital nomad. Yes, I'm loving living in Barcelona. It's been a really big change for me moving from Canada. It's come with some challenges, of course, but it's been a wonderful change. and I love working online and having the flexibility to make a big change like that and also be able to work with people all over the world. Anjali moved to Barcelona because her partner's job was moving there and she wanted to be with him. But what about Nick and his partner? Why do they want to work from Spain? We both decided, after a few kind of life-changing things over the last couple of years, we both decided that we wanted a change of scenery.

5:03We do love Scotland. It will always be our home, but neither of us have lived anywhere other than where we were born. So we've always kind of thought about, well, what if we go somewhere else? And after being on holiday, which involved a stock in Barcelona, we decided this looks like the place for us. And as to how a digital nomad actually does their work from another country, Anjali told me what she does. I work with women who have digestion issues and I help them overcome those issues by means of natural lifestyle changes such as nutrition, movement, sleep and stress management. And do you think you can do that job really from anywhere?

5:46I believe I can with the help of technology like Zoom, because to do this work, you need to have trust in each other. My clients need to trust me and I need to really dive into their life and discover very personal things about their life to be able to help them. And with Zoom, you can have that connection by seeing each other and seeing facial expressions and starting to build relationships. As more visa schemes are created for digital nomads, more people are encouraged to take their career on the road. That's one of the conclusions from a survey of 2 ,000 nomads across Europe for the Social Hub.

6:27It provides accommodation, workspaces and community events for, among others, travelling workers in locations across the continent. Their survey also found that nomads are mid-to-high earners, with many working in manufacturing, retail, leisure, IT and telecoms. Tasha Young is the Chief Membership Officer at The Social Hub. I thought it was really interesting research, especially seeing the huge cross-section of sectors that have digital nomads represented. I think the things for me that are the most important is loneliness and connection are often the biggest challenges for digital nomads. So you cannot just provide a co-working space and assume that's enough to support them.

7:12That's why we focus so much at the Social Hub on community programming and connecting them to each other and locals so they feel safe. Portugal launched its digital nomad visa a few years ago, but not everyone there was happy about it. Guja Akorniro is a senior lecturer at the Political Science Department at Lisbon University Institute. She says a range of wealthy newcomers, including tourists, retirees and digital nomads, contributed to problems for local people in Lisbon. the the discourse is in general against these wealthy people coming and disrupting the city life if i need to address why is because of the housing prices is the first element uh of course so for the housing affordability but the reason for housing affordability uh and the lack of housing affordability are many not just housing also the services the services of the city so the old groceries closing and opening just fashion and fancy restaurants and bars we're not just talking about gentrification is something still different is really kind of a change of the life of the city of the neighbors but the the price of housing is central is central for sure that's Guja Akorniro from Lisbon University Institute now we want to hear from you.

8:36Are you a digital nomad or have you already given it a go? Where did you stay? How did tech help you work? We'd really like to hear your story. You can write a short message or send a brief voice note. Our contact details will be coming up in a moment.

8:59This is Tech Life on the BBC World Service with me, Shona McCallum It's time to say hi to Tony Mbuki in Kenya He liked last week's item about driverless racing cars in Abu Dhabi Tony Whatsapped us to say it feels like exciting times ahead for the world of autonomous vehicles each day bringing us a step closer to safer, more efficient driving experiences for everyone. Well, maybe not everyone will agree with you there, Tony, but thanks for getting in touch. Meanwhile, Frederick Lasimba from Blantyre in Malawi texted us on WhatsApp to mention AI in the workplace, a subject we've covered a lot recently.

9:37Frederick says, my opinion is that AI should not continue being used at work because employees will become unreliable since all tasks are handled by AI. Well I can tell you Frederick that we're still making tech life the old fashioned way Thanks for your message And if you'd like to contact us about anything you've heard on today's programme You can, especially if you've been or thinking about becoming a digital nomad Our email address is techlife at bbc.co.uk Or you can WhatsApp us, text us or voice note us The number is plus 44 330 1230 320 Please include your name and the country where you live Still to come, the tech hotspot making a name for itself in freezing cold Helsinki.

10:31Online stalking, digital violence and cyberbullying. All serious issues that sadly technology facilitates. According to the United Nations, one in three women experience gender-based violence in their lifetime. It affects people all over the world, but today we're going to hear from a survivor of abuse in Africa. I'm Irene Mwendwa, joining in from Nairobi, Kenya. Can you believe it or not, I had to delete some of my photos online. I had to change mobile numbers for a while before I went back to my old number because I was receiving a lot of messages and calls from people who I did not know because my phone number was shared in different WhatsApp groups.

11:13Irene is a lawyer and activist, and as part of her work, she engages in public discourse. The harassment that she faced has undermined her safety and confidence, so much so that she took herself offline. My own experience really has been based on some of the work I do, especially on big events, especially things like elections here in Kenya. Whenever my information is revealed, I've been called names, of course, I've been bullied, I've been told, you know, you're wasting our time, you're wasting our money, you're wasting our governmental processes, even when we were able to collect evidence. So this really painted a painful experience for me and those who were around me at the time, because some of the information about where I live was also revealed.

11:57Who I am, you know, photos of myself also shared online. And this led me to even deleting my account on the platform Twitter, which I was using very much then. And I'm no longer on that platform. as we speak. And how did that make you feel? Shona, the experiences differ. Sometimes you think you've moved on. Sometimes you feel like it's just work. Therefore, you know, I should not also take it that seriously, but it's still hurtful, even when it's not contact based hurt. I go through experiences or times when I ask myself, do I even really know what I'm doing. There's a lot of self-doubt about the work you're doing.

12:37You end up also asking yourself, will I ever catch a break? For very many women, especially in public life, those who are serving, say, in political positions, journalists here in Africa, have found themselves even self-censoring, you know, and that's the regard with which I even closed my account, my social media account, and therefore the work that I'm doing cannot be as explicit or as shared as much as I've wanted to. We have to be extra vigilant. We have to have schedules that match, you know, our own personal experiences so that we are not abused or followed even in real life. So, Shona, it varies from time to time.

13:17And when you think you're going to do the same work again, you ask yourself, is it really worth it? Yet at the end of the day, it's also work that earns you a good living and it's part of seeking justice. I see other people being able to move on with their lives in a way that, you know, will not be judged. But for me and other people like me who are survivors or victims of violence, we have to always think twice. And that pokes holes, of course, in our own experiences online. In a way, you haven't really got over this and it's still affecting you. Sometimes you cut your losses. I live like I was not on some of those platforms or like I did not engage in some of that work so that I can have a full life like the rest of the people.

14:03But I also decided really I should be bold about sharing my experiences once in a while so that other people who are experiencing the same can be bold enough to make decisions about their lives and how they engage online. And so what do you say to other women that are experiencing something similar? Shona, here in Kenya, in Africa, it has mixed reactions because of the different cultures and backgrounds we are all from. At the moment, I am very much involved in some of the policy and advocacy work with regards to engaging tech companies, building work on our local languages where you address local language abuse in English so that it can be pulled down on some of these platforms.

14:43and the different names that come up in our local languages that don't appear to be abused, especially sometimes in English when they're translated. So doing some of these very simple but practical examples with women here has been very, very, very welcome. I wonder if your own personal experience kind of galvanises you and makes you more determined to help other women. Yes, Shona. I sit on different projects at advisory capacities, working with safety commissions from Australia, here in Kenya, and other parts of the world who are trying to hold big tech companies accountable, and also to contextualize some of these efforts, especially to understand what online violence means.

15:30So we've been building a lot of educational content on how to engage safely, to be aware of some of the hooks that are used to trap us into ongoing online discourses that can be quite harmful, especially to our families and to our friends and people around us. So what is being done to help protect women like Irene? Well, Womankind Worldwide is the UK's largest feminist charity operating out of Kenya. The team are preparing for the UN's 16 days of activism later this month. Their strapline is No Excuse for Online Abuse, which aims to end digital violence against women and girls in Africa. Here's their co-CEO.

16:11Hi Shona, I'm Disha Sikhand. Thanks for inviting me along to BBC Tech Life. Digital violence can not only be used to attack the character and legitimacy of a woman, but also to perpetuate some of those gender stereotypes. So as a result, as you can imagine, some women resort to avoiding digital platforms entirely to protect themselves, and some that we've heard from have even abandoned their careers due to the abuse that they faced online. Do you see a future where there are equal rights for women and girls across the world? I think although at the moment everything looks quite doom and gloom, particularly when you look at the statistics, we are absolutely really, really hopeful because there is a huge opportunity.

16:53Whilst technology can cause harm, it should really be a space where we're creating opportunities for women and that it can empower women as opposed to being a place of fear. And how much work do you think you've got to do between now and then? Yeah, lots of work to do, but it's really about a collective effort around it in terms of thinking about what that solution would be. Ultimately, we want digital spaces to be safe for women and to be about creating opportunity for them. It would need a concerted effort from a number of different people. So really what we'd need in the first case would be for governments to firstly enforce the laws that protect women and girls from digital violence.

17:41And secondly, to hold those tech platforms accountable for that safety online. And alongside that, we obviously need those tech firms to ensure that safety is built into the core of their platforms, not just an optional extra. We need them to remove that harmful content and to enforce the codes of conduct. How worried are you about violence in real life? Because we know that once these stereotypes are fuelled online, quite often women and girls end up being the victims. So it is really worrying because in the online space, it gives people the confidence to say and do things that they might not do in real life to start off with.

18:22But as that confidence grows, as they see that there's a whole community around them doing something similar, we then see that that translates into violence in real life. But as well as that being a threat, I think we also need to see it as actually an opportunity to prevent violence. if we know that it might start online and then come into real life. If we actually had the right types of laws and protections, then we might be able to stop it before it happens in real life. And that was Desha Sukhand, the co-CEO of Womankind Worldwide, a feminist charity in Kenya.

19:05We're off to Finland now, the birthplace of Nokia phones and Angry Birds. The currently rather chilly capital, Helsinki, is hosting a big annual tech event this week called Slush. It brings together people founding their own tech companies and experts and investors, and it's firmly on the country's tech calendar. Aino Bergius is the CEO of Slush. So Slush's mission is to help and create founders to change the world. We gathered the global startup ecosystem to here in Helsinki for one week to actually help those existing founders, whatever they're currently struggling with. And on the other hand, we are also on a mission to create more founders.

19:48And that was actually one of the reasons Slosh was founded back in like 2008. So what does it mean concretely? How do we get more young people excited about solving big problems through technology? and we want to give them the tools, the belief to actually start. And why is it called Slush? Well, I think it's all about the expectation management because the event is organized during the dark, cold November here in Helsinki. So once a person is traveling all the way to California, they know what to pack because Slush is the worst form of snow. So that's likely something that you're going to face once you land to Helsinki Airport.

20:27So if I have a tech innovation and I've just started up a company to develop my products, how can Slush help me? So Slush is designed first and foremost for the early stage founders. Those are our core audience. So whenever you're raising your first round, hiring your team, or simply just trying to make sense of what next, like we want Slush to be the place for you. And what does it mean more concretely? If you're now a founder, every single year when we start planning the whole main event, we actually start the planning from asking founders directly, like, what do you need in 2025? And through our startup struggle survey, including over 1 ,000 early stage founders all across Europe, we gather the insights of their biggest struggles whenever it's about, like, okay, access to capital or growth or navigating the complex regulatory environment.

21:21And each and every slush is shaped then around those needs. So whatever is your bottleneck now, like we're there to serve you. And what do you think are the biggest challenges for tech startups at the moment? Yeah, something that is interesting seeing like from our Startup Struggle survey conducted this year, like three things came the top struggle, so to say, first being the access to capital, because we know that one of the biggest bottlenecks on scaling a company is that like where do you find capital, especially venture capital, then also just like growth in general. So where do you find the most relevant customers of you?

22:02Of course, like now we see increasing number of, for example, AI companies. So how do we how do you actually stand out in a world where actually there is so much tech currently developed? And something also that is interesting, like a new finding for the year and somehow like tries to maybe tell us a bit about like year of 2025 is that many of the founders mentioned actually the regulatory environment here in Europe and in EU, especially whenever it's about like data regulation, GDPR, also talking about a bit of like a fragmented markets or financial markets. So that's definitely something that like speaks loudly from the founders perspective.

22:44And as well as the event that you've got annually in Helsinki, you're also trying to inspire young people to pursue careers in tech. How are you doing that? Yeah, so every single year, we actually invite 1 ,700 volunteers to help us to build the event. And actually, one of the main reasons why people come to volunteer at Slush is that they want to take their very first step into the startup ecosystem whenever they want to become a founder, operator or a VC in the future. So it's not only about like they come and help us to build the event, but the whole program that we tailor for them. Anything about like opening doors to the most exciting scale ups and startup offices here in the Nordics to actually providing hands on leadership or project management skill to actually like also like educating like what is actually now happening in tech.

23:38What kind of tools you need to have when you start your own company. And beyond Slush itself, is Helsinki and Finland a hotbed for tech innovation? I would definitely say so, especially like during the past years. And something that is good to mention, like Slush was founded back in 2008 for the reason that like entrepreneurship maybe wasn't seen as the most exciting career path that the young people, young and smart people wanted to pursue towards. But now we start seeing like increasing amount of people like going out there and like solving biggest issues through technology and like founding their own companies.

24:15And something that is good to know is that we are only a nation of like 5.5 million people. So it's also seeing from the founders side that you actually need to like build global from day one. And also like mentioning the ecosystem, there is like a strong culture of collaboration. People are super generous with their time intros, like sharing advice, which also make this place and ecosystem feel like super supportive and fast moving. You mentioned the ecosystem there. What's exciting you at the moment in tech and are you able to spot new trends? Yeah, something that I would maybe like mention is that I think like there is increasing momentum around like deep tech and science based startups, especially like quantum, space, data, energy, climate.

25:04And I think like it's for the reason that there is like a strong research base here in Finland. And more and more also like scientists, researchers are choosing to actually commercialize their work and build companies. And then, of course, like something that is always need to be mentioned is the generative AI is, of course, like the top of mind. So seeing also founders across sectors exploring how to apply it meaningfully and not just for the hype around it. That's Aino Berghius, the CEO of Slush, speaking to me from Helsinki.

25:44Well there's no slush outside Techlife headquarters here in Scotland so far but winter is definitely on the way perhaps it's warmer where you are there's just time to remind you of our email address if you'd like to get in touch it's techlife at bbc.co.uk or you can send us a WhatsApp text or voice message on plus 44 330 1230 320 Please remember to include your name and where in the world you live. Today's edition was produced by Tom Quinn and presented by me, Shona McCallum.