-----Original Message----- Thanks to Ben and other colleagues for the developing citations. I have read Harrison and Dourishs Re-Place-ing Space: The Roles of Place and Space in Collaborative Systems as well as other works. I believe that place is not a better term than space. As Dourish suggests, places largely exist within spaces. There may also be reasons to be concerned about the idea that: Physically, a place is a space which is invested with understandings of behavioural appropriateness, cultural expectations, and so forth. I would be concerned that to theorize the Internet or particular technologically mediated settings as places is to suggest that they are geographically situated and to relate a variety of practices, conflicting desires, and diverse users to a singular culture or experience. -------------------------- Michele, I don't think the conceptualisation of cyber/Internet places necessarily requires this kind of singularity. In fact, I think it's pretty much accepted that there are (infinite?) subjective multiple readings of any place - be they on or offline. Internet/Cyber places *are* situated in terms of human geographies and the physical geographies of infrastructure. In terms of cultural singularity - all places are sites of different forms of power and resistance, on or offline. Just as the Troll, virus writer, cracker etc resists the bounding of their cyberspace so graffiti artists, skate boarders and protestors resist in offline space. I'm not trying to explore (and be limited by) metaphors here - just pointing out paralells. If you haven't already, you might be interested in engaging some of these references for a different reading of space and place: Yi-Fu Tuan, Space and Place: The Perspective of Experience, University of Minnesota Press, 1990 Ed Casey, The Fate of Place: A Philosophical History, University of California, 1996 Tim Cresswell, In Place/Out of Place: Geography, Ideology and Transgression, University of Minnesota Press, 1996 As well as Edward Soja's Thirdspace trilogy (The City, Thirdspace, Postmetropolis) Paul