Libraries are becoming meeting places where patrons can study and work
together in appropriately designed physical spaces. This trend results
stimulating environments that support community development, emerging new
ideas and strengthening innovation capacity. Another trend is the
extension of services into the virtual environments. These two seem to
represent new core roles of public spaces in general and libraries in
particular. While in times of financial cutbacks the latter role is much
more emphasized as it is able to lead to savings, the meeting place role
has a bigger significance in keeping the society well integrated enough to
survive.  Extensive research has been conducted in this field in the last
few years.
The aim of this paper is to present the theoretical background of the
significance of spaces designed for wide public access (third places, low
vs. high intensive meeting places for raising social capital). Then based
on recent research results I present the role of such areas in communities
focusing on libraries as examples of low-intensive meeting places. I
consider the possibility of extending such areas into virtual
environments. Finally I present some cutting edge developments from the
fields of libraries and urban planning.