Five Cities Beloved by Digital Nomads | Hacker News Reader

Five Cities Beloved by Digital Nomads

bbc.com

53 pointsytNumbers60 comments

Good luck with Thailand. The military junta is close to instituting MITM on all internet communications.[1] They don't even care that it will break online banking and every other business that relies on secure communication. I guess digital nomads will be fine as long as they don't mind that they won't be able to connect securely to their bank, server, AWS, etc.

[1] http://www.bangkokpost.com/opinion/opinion/993937/internet-l...

Upvoted because it's good to bring attention to this idiocy, but I don't think the Thai government is going to try breaking the internet. Everyone is hooked on foreign services. Even supporters of the powers that be will go nuts if stuff like Google, Facebook or Tinder stopped working. It's not China, Thailand cannot hope to force everyone to use some local service instead.

Plus you can't work on a tourist visa and getting a work permit costs a lot of money.

I've never once heard of someone saying that Miami (or Puerto Viejo or Florianópolis) was a good place as a nomad (not even on my radar), and I've been in the "circuit" for almost 2 years now.

Agreed, putting Miami there is a bit of a joke. I am curious what is and has been on your radar for digital nomads and what you think the list should be.

Pieter does a pretty good job of taking the list with his NomadList website. It's hard to say here are best cities because people have different wants and tastes. Some like beaches, some like cities, etc.

Having been in a Miami-based startup... it's fashionable, but not technological. Just about every single tech show has a runway with DJ, and I don't mean finance. The major downside is the investment community is full of retirees who don't really make good VC's. The mayor of Miami is pushing for generating tech and startups, so at least there's a political will.

Brazil is an odd choice considering that a visa costs Americans $100 (last I checked).

$130

And your air ticket is going to cost a lot more than that. The painful part is that you have to fly to a city with a Brazilian Embassy (LA, DC) inside the USA and stay there for a week while your visa application process happens.

I've read somewhere Brazil visa requirements are based on reciprocity. Can it be the US demands something similar from brazilians?

You are correct

https://travel.state.gov/content/visas/en/visit/visitor.html

However Brazil does not require an interview in person, so you can do it by mail

Yes, though because of the Olympics it has been waived this summer.

Yup. That's the deal. Tried to go back when the relationship was a bit more tense (10 years ago) and got denied AND blacklisted for 5 years sad face

I still think the numbers overwhelmingly benefit the US vs Brazil here, considering the huge numbers of Brazilians that come here to vacation (and buy a dozen iPads).

Also, did they say why you were blacklisted? Was there a time where Brazilians were denied entry to the US on tourist visas?

$160 now actually. There are companies that will expedite the process for you if you don't mind mailing your passport to a third party. Costs about $100 extra which is way less than what you're proposing.

Also if you're from the US you can enter Brazil between June 1 2016 and September 18 2016 and stay for up to 90 days with no visa due to the Olympics - no need for Olympics ticket either.

Airfare is pretty cheap inside South America. If you're already in, say, Medellin (which is on the site's list), the $160 visa is a larger factor. Flying to Argentina is a better option.

BTW there's also a Brazilian embassy in San Francisco.

Until March 24, 2016 there was s $160 fee foe US citizens visiting Argentina. (Just incase not everyone is following Argentine visa policy.)

Why does the past matter to people making trips now (or in the future)?

For one, the abolition of the fee is only temporary (for three months) officially.

Just fly to any country with a border with Brazil and you can get a visa there in a few days, its not cheaper as that's based on your country's reciprocity. My point is that if you are intending to head to SA anyway there is no reason to fly to LA or DC first.

What really makes Brazil a no go for me is how dangerous it seems to be. I wouldn't even dare going there for vacation let alone live there for an extended period.

Only the major cities have rampant crime. Get out to the countryside, and it's a wonderful place. Even Florianopolis has much lower crime rates than places like Sao Paulo. As a tourist, you can skip Sao Paulo and not miss much. My wife is a Paulista and we fly in, see some aunties, and then GTFO for Rio or Bahia.

SP is where most of the fiber landings are, so if you're in the networking business, you're probably stuck there.

Same here; I've never ever once heard any of those 3 cities come up once in a conversation. Without mentioning Gran Canaria (and Tenerife) in the Canary Islands, I am suspect of the writer's actual first-hand experience as a nomad. The Canaries are incredible - great food, excellent bandwidth - although 100ms latency to US/AWS does occur every rare now and then -, surprisingly large startup/digital nomad scene, lots of co-working and housing options, etc.

I've heard Miami is okay for a base of operations. No state income tax, beach, good flight options and relatively good supply of housing (from what I've heard). Also mojitos.

I wouldn't be surprised if Miami moves up the list in the next few years from the tax situation alone.

> relatively good supply of extremely expensive housing

FTFY

By US major city standards it isn't completely off-the-wall expensive (I mean, there are at least a dozen more expensive major cities in the US). But, the nomads I know tend to want to save money so they can work less. While I don't set out to find the cheapest place to park my RV, I also don't end up staying in places like Miami for long (when there are similarly nice cities for less than half the price).

If you're based in Miami, you could easily save $$ on the tax situation - even if you're not there FT.

I'm curious on these other similar nice cities to Miami you speak of.

"If you're based in Miami, you could easily save $$ on the tax situation - even if you're not there FT."

Lots of states offer no income tax. Favorites among full-time RVers in addition to Florida are South Dakota and Texas (I'm legally a Texas resident). But, yes, Florida is a great state to call home, if you travel full-time. But, Miami is an expensive city to do it in.

If I were gonna live in Florida for more than a few weeks out of the year, I'd probably pick St. Pete. It's maybe the best balance of "decent city, decent prices, near the ocean" in Florida. Cheaper options exist inland, but it's still much cheaper than Miami.

But, if we open it up to every state, there are tons of great cities that are cheaper than Miami. They're always smaller, and rarely on the ocean, but still provide excellent quality of life very affordably.

I feel like the RV community is a different faction of the digital nomad community which I've been mostly a part of. Usually, I've seen the DNs shun a car and aim for international travel. Can be done either way & I know specifically there's a van-life community, but haven't tapped into any RV-specific ones personally.

I think we might be talking about different things. Miami is not an international destination. If you're living in Miami, you aren't traveling internationally.

I'm just saying that I don't spend a lot of time in Miami because it is expensive and there are cities that are similarly nice (at least in some dimensions) that much cheaper to live in. I don't know any nomads (digital or otherwise) who spend a lot of time in Miami...possibly for the same reason. Miami is a super cool city, but not an affordable one.

This is a good idea for a post, but I'm suprised at the list.

Suprised they left out:

-Ho Chi Minh City (huge number of nomads here)

-Bangkok (same thing)

-Prague (the thailand of europe)

-Bali (the original eat, pray, love)

-Medellin (every nomad in South America is here)

Why is Prague the Thailand of Europe?

Tongue in cheek.

Seems like a lot of DN head there eventually when they turn to Europe. Cheap COL, good food, cheap beer, good internet.

It's also known for its porn industry and has, or used to have, a big sex exhibition, Erotica Sex. Sadly, I don't speak from experience on this....

Prague is no longer cheap, and the food isn't so good there. Budapest is cheaper, fewer tourists and better food. The only thing Prague still has going for it is super cheap high quality beer.

By any western standard, Prague is cheap.

I did January in HCMC this year and was pretty underwhelmed with the nomad scene. There didn't seem to be much going on at all.

Lisbon/Barcelona, though not cheap, have become very popular in Europe

I'll be in Barcelona this summer for a month. It's great.

https://nomadlist.com/

This is a great link!

That is an awful link! I might expected to see some bad points for Bucharest because of, I don't know, air maybe!? (...considering it's a capital with traffic and all.) But no - it scores badly for fun! This is the city that has furbished its entire central district for fun only! People from all around the Europe and western part of Asia fly in here to party because the local authorities made it easy to party 24/7 all around the year! No fun? ...really!? Those score points are arbitrary as hell!

How do they compute the favoribility of a city?

Yekaterinburg, Russia:

English Speaking: bad

Free WiFi: bad

Friendly to Foreigners: bad

Racial Tolerance: bad

Gay Friendly: bad

New Orleans, USA:

The only bad thing is the absence of free WiFi in the city. Yet, Ekaterinburg is apparently 12% better than New Orleans. How so?

Must be the low living and coworking costs.

SanFrancisco.GayFriendly != Great???

Linky for those of in the UK and not allowed to see this:

http://archive.is/uNaEf

Why would bbc.com be off limits to those in the UK? I've never heard this.

The BBC says:

We're sorry but this site is not accessible from the UK as it is part of our international service and is not funded by the licence fee. It is run commercially by BBC Worldwide, a wholly-owned subsidiary of the BBC, the profits made from it go back to BBC programme-makers to help fund great new BBC programmes. You can find out more about BBC Worldwide and its digital activities at www.bbcworldwide.com.

This link doesn't work, despite not being in the UK, I get:

"We're sorry but this site is not accessible from the UK as it is part of our international service and is not funded by the licence fee. "

Medellin is a really great place for Digital Nomads.

Where do digital nomads sleep? I can't imagine that they're signing year-long leases, or that apartments are happy about transient foreign sub-letters dropping in and out. So you have to be rich enough to sleep in hotels every night? I guess there's AieBnb now, but what did they do before that?

I can't say I know any digital nomad, but as a landlord myself, I wouldn't mind as long as they paid upfront and a bit over market price. Considering the difference in purchasing power, this should be affordable.

I don't think so, I think once your on the ground you can generally find short term leases.

Generally airbnbs and hotels. You can negotiate off airbnb in most cases for a lower rate, closer to what the market rate is. For example in the center of Bangkok I negotiated down from nearly $1k/mo on airbnb to $447 cash (16,000 bhat).

actually most places (costa rica, thailand, bali, etc) are fine with renting short term; the "no short-term" renting is very american

most of these places have a mid-long stay tourism tradition prior to DNs

I've only been to Floripa from this list---took a surfing class on the north part of the island. It is lovely, but was just a bit too sparse for my taste. You'll want a car unless you enjoy 30 minute bus rides among the multiple neighborhoods.

I've been to Puerto Viejo & I can tell you... There is nothing there. Well. there were a lot of mosquitos. And very cheap cocaine (i'm not so into that stuff). I guess $6 cocaine might make you very productive?

"digital nomad" is my dream lifestyle. But one of the major drawbacks longterm is rent vs mortgage. Most societies are structured in a way that wants you to settle down. While monthly rent v. monthly mortgage payments might be similar in cost, and both fix the "where do I sleep" problem, after 30 years one leaves you with equity and the other does not. I wish there was something similar to a co-op where owning part of a company entitled me to a room just not any particular room. E.g owning type A stock lets me use a type A room in any city I happen to be in.

What do these folks do for things that require an address? Do hey just have a PO box they check infrequently?

EarthClassMail.com

Thanks!

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