On the other hand, some things that take a lot of space are easier to replace these days. Books? I have a lot but I'm not buying a lot of physical books these days. Video collections? How many DVDs have you bought in the past year? TVs are thin, headphones are common, no need for that big multimedia cabinet that used to hold a TV, stereo and media storage.

This is also going to tend to push some people towards "third spaces" for socializing with friends. There's a very active Starbucks near me that's open until midnight, always packed, and which in addition to a bunch of tables full of laptops has several divided off areas with armchairs that regularly have small groups chatting.

Some cities have hscker or maker spaces, but the result is similar (at least what I've seen) : you can't leave you stuff out (it'll get stolen), make too much noise etc. Nothing like a garage where no one will get on you for cutting bricks with a chainsaw.

More simply we miss paying some bills by living in a small apartment where there's not room enough for a desk to out to do that so they end up on the kitchen table covered with kids' spaghetti etc

But it seems like the larger problem today is that it is hard for people to wrap their heads around that when something becomes available, or even common, whatever enables or let's you explore it becomes more important.

It used to be that to be a musician you had to end up in a studio or a stage (or at least in lessons or rehearsals). People would fly across the world for auditions and recordings. Today everyone can have their studio or even stage at home. But that makes your home so much more important. If you don't have the space, the time, if it is too costly, not connected to a community or unstable then it is a lot harder to become a musician.

And that isn't just true for something like being a musician but everyday things like cooking, reading or exercise were we now have more possibilities than ever. Virtual cycling is for example a thing now.

Within reason, check out what your local library may have. It's not going to be a workshop, but some of the same kind of things have been showing up at local libraries as they shift to meet changing usage patterns.

Coffee shop + armchairs you mention is also a time-honoured tradition: the TV show ‘Friends’ is effectively just a camera pinned to that armchair. It’s probably the most famous TV series in the whole western world. People don’t change all that much!

People with desk jobs often forget this, but that's true of a lot of work, too. If I couldn't climb a ladder, I couldn't do my job. Now, I probably won't be doing this when I'm 80, but I don't want to live every day of my life as if I'm the weakest I'll ever be. Desk jobs and comfy ramblers will still be around when I'm old (or disabled) and can't climb any more.

> This is also going to tend to push some people towards "third spaces" for socializing with friends. There's a very active Starbucks near me

I love "third places" in principle, but I find it funny how many people spend all day sipping coffee in front of a computer ... and then to socialize with friends at night, they go to a place where they pay to sit at a computer sipping coffee. I guess if that's what you love doing, go for it. As Ken Robinson said, "They look upon their body as a form of transport for their heads."

But even if you're completely healthy and in great shape, you can have an accident or illness that makes you temporarily unable to climb a ladder. If you broke your leg one day, or came down with a nasty flu or stomach virus, would you want to be living in a place where you needed to climb a ladder to travel between your bed and your bathroom? Nobody is healthy 100% of the time.

This is observation is unfortunately woefully irrelevant to Tokyo. CDs, DVDs and Blu-Ray are still very much alive and kicking in Japan. Tower Records never closed shop, and Tsutaya (the local equivalent of blockbuster) has stores everywhere. I don't have statistics, but physical books (especially Manga) also seem more popular.

And/or absolute hell for eg people with difficulty sleeping or early schedules.

Also makes you realise how many weirdoes wear hard shoes and heels inside. Though I guess that’s less likely in Japan given the strong cultural separation between inside and outside.

Honestly though they are cheap at 5 times the price for a good nights sleep.

I recently stayed in a hotel that is right next to a very major highway, and they provided ear plugs for free.

I would absolutely lie if I were asked about it. I don't play any instruments in my apartment except a keyboard with headphones, but I do have a lot of instruments.

Hoping to come back to Niseko this coming season if you want to meet up!

They did limit the guitar owner's choices. If you read it carefully it's saying she has to live in a soundproofed apt.

You can’t impose “minimum standards” for housing by fiat any more than you can make a plane fly by regulatory directive. That idea displays a level of ignorance comparable to flat eatherism. All you can do is push on the balloon—and when you do, it’ll bulge out somewhere else. In the context of housing, that means if you make it illegal to build housing for poor people in places wit jobs, you’ll either make them homeless, unemployed, or you’ll saddle them with long commutes from places with affordable housing.

Of course you can. This is precisely how the modern world operates.

>any more than you can make a plane fly by regulatory directive.

This honestly sounds like a childish understanding of governance. How you can compare two entirely different things? Aerospace is perhaps the most regulated mode of transport than I can think of. Planes are, quite literally, kept flying by regulatory directive. I'm embarrassed for myself that I need to stoop to explain such a fundamental working of the world.

>That idea displays a level of ignorance comparable to flat eatherism. All you can do is push on the balloon—and when you do, it’ll bulge out somewhere else.

I think you've either got a lot of reading to do or you're a young person who's been inculcated with a juvenile ideology. In either case you need to rid yourself of this simplistic world view.

>In the context of housing, that means if you make it illegal to build housing for poor people in places wit jobs, you’ll either make them homeless, unemployed, or you’ll saddle them with long commutes from places with affordable housing.

You need to have more imagination here. Most countries manage this just fine.