Merging the Digital and Physical Environments : Week 6
Reflecting on the work and discussion of the last class, the work on the case study analysis is moving along and helping to give an understanding of a particular type of research. The Function of Ornament is insightful to study solely based on the composition of how the author uses case studies to look at and identify specific types of work and the affect that they have on the urban fabric and culture that they correlate to. In connection to the last class, it is apparent that her work consists of the hard quantitative data along with the more subject qualitative data and how they compare in retrospect. Moving along the ideas of the case study, the tactics that she used are closely related to the work that I have been continuing to research. The research has begun to reveal quantifiable data that then can be correlated with a response from people with an urban environment.
My research this week has had me focused more on the broader context of the theories of Smart Cities and their potential implementation into the molds of the urban fabric that have already been created. A city is a tool that can be used to implement technology into the city. I have been looking a bit broader in order to understand the concepts behind what makes a Smart City compared to a regular city as well as the limits for what a Smart City can entail. This understanding will hopefully allow me to begin to look closer at the ever-growing urban fabric of Las Vegas and in particular Las Vegas Boulevard. My hope for the research and the project going forward is one that starts to physically manifest the ideals and concepts of the Smart City with the future of technology that is on the rise (autonomous vehicles, wearable technology, advancements in geo-locating, etc.) This technology can be well established within the existing urban fabric without having to reconstruct or build more of anything.
One source that really began to open up my mind about the possibilities of technology interacting with the city is from the book “Smart Cities: Big Data, Civic Hackers, and the Quest for a New Utopia” Anthony Townsend. I have just read the preface and introduction to the book but I hope to reference it a bit more over the next upcoming weeks. The book begins to look at the reality of implementing technology into the urban environment and the ways that could go about accomplishing such a task. We build and construct our lives and communities around mass mobile communication. This allows the city and urban fabric to use what it has in order to delegate innovation to the city. One potential drawback of the implementation of the digital world is its diversity. The internet went from the “Internet of People to the Internet of Things”. It is a world where people interact with not just people but objects and programmed AI. The internet and the use of the technology that people have in hand (smartphone) can help to transcend the intangible world of the digital environment and use it within the physical environment. Civic hackers and programmers create digital interfaces that allow people to see, touch and feel the city in completely new ways. This reading brought up thoughts about realizing augmented reality, as personal smart devices, in order to digitally amplify the existing environment and information that is perceived in the world.
What is the impact that the technology will have on the lives of the user (positive/negative? How can the basis of the city be used to merge the physical world with the digital world? These are the questions that I have been thinking about during this week of research, and the questions that I continue to look at and look further into while developing my ideas. I have been continuing the research and controlling my thought through my physical journals by sketching, writing questions and analyzing readings.
Moving forward I want to begin to start to analyze what I mean to live and function with layers of information that keep us going. Looking at my own actions and habits might unveil something about the tendencies and ways to further implement those ideas of the smart city through the use of personal technology and advancement.