The day before President Clinton swept through Dublin, residents of the area surrounding the Guinness brewery received a brochure through their letter boxes. "The Digital Hub", it announced; "International Digital Enterprise Area". The Liberties and Coombe neighbourhoods, said the brochure, would be at the centre of a zone of world-class research, start-up and emerging companies, international flagship projects, and a technology and learning hub.

For many, it was their introduction to a massive urban regeneration and enterprise project that will turn the area into a multimillion-pound high-technology centre for business, education and the arts. But most importantly - and if they get it right - it will also be for the community.

While the notion of a digital village was always inherent in plans surrounding the new Massachusetts Institute of Technology's Media Lab Europe (MLE) research facility, and was announced with the MLE project over a year ago, it failed to draw much attention - until now.

President Clinton's visit nudged the Taoiseach towards giving the embryonic project a mention in his speech at the new Guinness Storehouse tourist facility, not least because President Clinton expressed interest in both MLE and the development of the digital hub.

The hub's recently appointed board and its executive services team believed local communities should not feel the as yet little publicised project would be foisted upon them. Thus the brochures through the doors, to give shape to an undertaking so new and undefined that formal funds have not been granted to it yet (reports of a £31 million grant for the district are actually funds for MLE).

Extensive consultations with community representatives and interested parties are to follow. A concrete development programme is slated for next Spring.

But visit the project's website, and a stream of exciting development ideas present themselves: the digital hub will be a home to special effects, content creation, digital TV, e-cinema, e-music, film, video, and new digital platforms. Couple this with the stated aims of the facility at the core of the hub, Media Lab Europe, and a broad picture emerges of a centre for digital business of all sorts, with a strong leaning towards the arts.

Housing for the area is a priority, say the project planners. And both MLE and the people associated with the hub project reiterate carefully their commitment to the community - jobs, technology access centres, social housing. At the top of the list is the retention of the flavour and ordinary life of the Liberties and Coombe, districts that have long formed both heart and soul of inner-city Dublin.

"When we were bringing in the media lab we didn't think we should just bring it in alone. We felt it should be a part of something like this," says a Government spokesman. He sees the district as a mix of technology, education and culture - including the culture of the area itself.

"From the river up, you have a great sense of culture," he says. "There's tremendous history up there. You want to integrate all this into the community, but for it to have a life of its own, too."

Ms Eve-Ann Cullinan is head of the hub's executive services team. She worked with Ms Laura Magahy in developing Temple Bar, but is wary of pinning down what will happen in the district, given that initial ideas are only being mooted and no groups have been consulted. The digital hub is still "only an idea", she says, but notes it's "about the heritage in the area. The buildings in the area are hugely exciting but require an appropriate approach."

Comparisons with Temple Bar and the International Financial Services Centre are obvious, but Ms Cullinan demurs. "I don't think [the hub] is about what happened in Temple Bar and it's not the IFSC. Lessons can be learned there, but there's no blueprint."

The composition of the development's board, though, gives some indication of the span of interests that will be integrated into the district. Chaired by the former secretary general to the Taoiseach, Mr Paddy Teahon, board members include Mr Ron Bolger, formerly of Eircom; Mr Peter Cassels of ICTU, Dublin city manager Mr John Fitzgerald, Mr Dan Flinter of Enterprise Ireland, IBEC's Jackie Harrison, Mr Don Thornhill of HEA, U2 manager Mr Paul McGuinness, and entrepreneur Mr Paul Kavanagh.

Media Lab Europe is conscious it is at the heart of the project. Corporate operations officer Mr John Callinan says he wants the digital district to work for both "the community and the economy". And he wants it to be worthy of the initial vision for a hub, with MLE at its centre. "A personal concern of mine is that the agenda of the digital village needs to be fairly ambitious. Often, the more ambitious the project, the better the chance of success," he says. "We want a place that is culturally rich on its own merits, but has economic development, and will spawn content."

Integration with other third-level institutions is vital, he says. That's a tricky but crucial area, since MLE was seen as a glamour investment at a time when indigenous institutions were begging for much-needed funding.

Other Irish research and educational institutions were initially sceptical of MLE's presence in the country, admits UCD computer sciences lecturer Mr Mark Keane. "It was a real sort of body blow. We were working along with crumbs from the table and then the Government just gave [£28 million] to these people," he says.

But, some of those worries have subsided, especially as funding has come in for collaborative work; three projects have been approved which will mix MIT and UCD researchers. "Now it looks quite positive," he says.

However, UCD, probably like many third-level institutions, has no plans to locate physically in the village. The new HEAnet high-speed fibre-optic telecommunications network for research, announced by the Taoiseach on Tuesday, will place such institutions in a close virtual community online with the district and MLE.

In addition, telecommunications company 360 networks will have another transatlantic high-speed cable live by spring, which will link MLE directly to MIT's media lab and provide further connections to companies in the hub, says its general manager for Ireland, Mr Patrick Coughlan.

And Mr Keane believes that if the Government is committed to a vision of the Republic as an e-commerce centre, it will support the growth of numerous digital hubs. "We need digital villages in the Liberties, in UCD, in Cork, in Dundalk, and wherever. We can't really have too many."

But whatever about the many, the Liberties and Coombe digital hub will be first, and holds the promise of becoming an international model of how to integrate business, education and arts with community.

Ms Bride Rosney, head of public relations for the digital district board, has a notion the hub will be identified with Dublin but also known abroad, not unlike another well-known Dublin feature. The hub, she hopes, will be "like Guinness. It's in the community and of the community; it's national and international at the same time."

Weblinks: Official Digital Hub website: www.thedigitalhub.com

MIT Media Lab: www.mit.media.edu

MLE: www.medialabeurope.org