The Changing Place of Cultural Production: The Location of Social Networks in a Digital Media Industry

Abstract

This article examines the role of place and placemaking within cultural industries in the digital era. The data for this article are drawn from a data set of attendance at more than nine hundred social networking events over a six-year period in New York City’s Internet, or “new media,” industry. These data confirm that place became more,not less,important to cultural production over this period. Networking, or the processes of the formation of social network ties, is concentrated in activities within narrow geographic clusters. This study suggests that the networking events within the industry—cocktail parties, seminars, ceremonies, and the like—mediate access to crucial resources within the industry.