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Why We Should Urbanize Technology?
Some intrinsic urban properties could help us make liveable digital spaces and humanist technologies.
https://urbanai.fr/its-time-to-urbanize-technology/ The Weight of Oneself (Elmgreen & Dragset), in Lyon (France). Source: Onlylyon
Cities have unparalleled resilience in the face of the destructive forces of political, social and technological disruption. Cities have not only resisted this perpetual change, they made it possible and liveable. They succeed in what Hannah Arendt called one of the main challenges of humanity: creating a common world for different generations. In a nutshell, cities support and empower our civilizations for centuries. This success, how imperfect it may be, should help us better design the digital world and new technologies.
Very few digital spaces follow social contract. Most of the platforms and social media we're using are following rules that have been decided unilaterally. You can accept them or leave the digital place. But that's not how a social contract or even a cité works.
Some intrinsic urban properties could help us make liveable digital spaces and humanist technologies. We could call this process of exporting urban principles towards the field of digital and new technologies, "urbanization of technologies".
Warning sign to inform of the presence of "smombies". Smombie is formed from smartphone and zombie to refer to city dwellers who are constantly looking at their phones. Source: CHRISTOPH SCHMIDT / DPA / AFP
This urbanization is more than ever necessary as digital is threatening our social fabric while new technologies are making our cities uninhabitable. People and territories are increasingly morphing into data to serve algorithms. It's time to reverse this paradigm. Therefore, Prof. Saskia Sassen, together with more than 100 scholars, professionals, and government officials, co-signed the "CALL TO URBANIZE TECHNOLOGY".CALL TO URBANIZE TECHNOLOGYFor years, the Smart City has been the ultimate form of urban progress. This concept can be defined as the use of information technologies to improve the quality of life of citizens while reducing the operating costs for cities and urban stakeholders. The ongoing digital transformation, the abundance of urban data and the emergence of Artificial Intelligence technologies supported this vision as cities around the world became "smarter".
Despite this hype, a growing opposition began to surface. In both Europe and North America, citizens increasingly distrust urban monitoring and claim more digital rights. In Asia, from the Middle East to South East, several Smart Cities such as Masdar and Songdo struggle to attract residents.We believe that this global failure highlights a conceptual deficiency. In the Smart City paradigm, quality of life is mainly quantified via the consumption of urban services and goods. Therefore, technology is used to optimize the city.This approach has its benefits. Optimization of urban services such as water management, urban logistics and infrastructure maintenance can contribute to safer and more efficient cities. To some extent, smart grids make cheaper and greener energy possible while digital tools can foster civic engagement.However, on its own, this paradigm is incomplete. Cities are more than an optimized platform offering a frictionless user experience. Civic participation cannot be reduced to data transmission and human beings are not machines.In contrast, we believe that:1. Cities are owned by people. Streets and parks are shaped by the desire to share a destiny. Places embody our social instincts and our need to gather. In that way, cities materialize our social contract. They are the common ground for generations.2. Cities are incomplete. They evolve and transform over time. Exactly as if urban materiality was malleable. This plasticity allows us to dwell a city, to extend it and to reconfigure spaces. People do not only own the city, they constantly make it.3. Cities are complex systems. Complexity is order in heterogeneity. Likewise, cities are balanced by a bottom-up dynamic: urban density and social interactions contribute to distribute rationality and spread information. These welcoming collisions of singularities and cultures make cosmopolitanism possible. That is why cities are where diversity can flourish and thrive.4. Cities are lands of liberty and opportunities. They are places of encounters and exploration. Encounter with other singularities and exploration of new cultures. These frictions give rise to freedom. It allows self-accomplishment through the interaction with otherness. It gives us the possibility to become who we are.5. Cities are full of meaning. They host the daily story of people, communities and civilisations. This urban narrative reminds us that, "poetically, humans dwell upon the earth".6. Cities are not artificial bubbles. They are part of the biosphere and must echo this fundamental truth. Urbanity depends on our ability to live in a sustainable way and to fulfil our biophilia.Each time a technology atrophies one of these qualities, it de-urbanizes the city.We believe that in addition to optimize cities, we must urbanize technology. That is, designing and developing technologies that promote urbanity and cityness.Considering our six urban principles, urbanized technologies are:1. Situated. They emanate from a social contract, a culture and a geography.2. Open. They are accessible for all and evolutive.3. Decentralized. They empower communities and are equally distributed.4. Frictional. They encourage exploration through interactions.5. Meaningful. They amplify human speech.6. Ecological. They are frugal and low carbon.None of these features are incompatible with contemporary technologies. Sensors can turn into interfaces. Data and codes can become transparent and understandable to all. Algorithms can ease exploration and wandering. Social Media can be decentralized and frictional. Digital can serve the urban narrative.The only limitation to reinvent urban technologies is our imagination. We are convinced it is time to complete the Smart City paradigm and to urbanize technology. It is high time to dwell again upon the earth.CityReads ∣Notes On Cities"CityReads", a subscription account on WeChat,
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