The Quantified Community and Neighborhood Labs – Kontokosta
– The QC approach seems to be an initiative that starts from the ground up, with input from citizens (both actively and passively), as opposed to a planner’s creation of a Smart City. How likely is it that residents will be willing to share and divulge details of their lives enough for fruitful data collection on a community scale? While “signals emanating from mobile communication devices and other personal electronics” (p. 6) seem to be the most effective means of collecting passive data, an “opt-in approach” is certainly needed if the motivations behind QC’s are truly for the community.
– Is there already an example of a QC that has successfully evolved and contributed to a greater urban space? It seems as though collection of data over a long period of time, evaluation of data, comparisons with nearby QC’s and finally interconnectivity on a large scale would require a huge amount of sustained interest and long term vision.
Instrumental City: The View from Hudson Yards – Mattern
– “This is Hudson Yards, the largest private real-estate development in United States history and the test ground for the world’s most ambitious experiment in “smart city” urbanism.” (p. 1) It is interesting that after every proposal for this site that fell through, the Hudson Yards project is what succeeded and is moving forward. In New York City, nothing in real estate is done without considerable planning and study. Is this, then, an indicator of what the biggest of cities values?
– Is an “out-of-sight, out-of-mind” (p. 5) approach really the best idea when it comes to environmental/ecological concerns in a “smart” setting? I like the author’s idea of something like a chute for a peek into trash collection systems, because I feel that without it, the idea that the built environment does everything for you is harmful for a sense of responsibility in regards to the natural environment.