Living and working in the mountains thanks to digitalization (Swiss Press Online 2020, by Sibilla Bondolfi, Carlo Pisani, Daniel Rihs) - Swiss Press Award
SWI swissinfo.ch
Sibilla Bondolfi, Carlo Pisani, Daniel Rihs
Could the digital revolution be the salvation for the Swiss mountain areas that are struggling with rural flight? In exploration of this question, the journalists created videos and written portraits of people who, thanks to the Internet, have found a way to support themselves financially, living in remote villages of Grisons or Valais. They work as a documentary filmmaker, travel journalist, teacher, data analyst, in online marketing; or they do commute to the city after all, and use their train-time to work on their laptops. They treasure the alpine idyll, the setting high above the clouds with a low cost of living. At the same time, they are happy about the short distances to the centres. The journalist and the VJ finally do a self-experiment and spend a day in a co-working space in Scuol GR. Their conclusion: they would love to stay, but have commitments in the lowlands. For that to be possible, a profound change would be needed within the Swiss work-culture, and working from anywhere – telecommuting – would have to go from being the exception, to the rule.
Interview with Sibilla Bondolfi, Carlo Pisani, Daniel Rihs
