by John Robb
We are in the midst of radical social and economic change brought on by the emergence of a global system that is completely and utterly uncontrollable -- it is too big, too fast, and too complex to control. Unfortunately, the lack of a global control system means that we face a long series of increasingly severe shocks (due to the system’s tight coupling, each new shock will sweep the world in months), wrecking long standing and established structures with ease. The first shocks, a bubble in energy and a financial crisis, have already done significant damage. More are on the way as the global system moves ever farther from normal patterns of operation.
So, how does this impact the future of architecture and design?
In general, this means that designers will need to focus less on macro or global level needs and much, much more on the needs of the local. Why? The solutions to macro level instability will be found in the development of local community’s that build systems and organizations that enable them to both withstand systemic shocks and prosper based on internal dynamics. This is nearly inevitable since architecture and design flow to sources of growth, and we will only see prolonged growth at the local and not the macro level.
The first change will require architecture and design that transforms previously unproductive spaces – most residences and communities are black holes of productivity – into spaces that can produce value, from food to energy. A home, whether it is an apartment building or suburban residence, in 2025 will gain its value from its ability to efficiently produce necessities, and even income (as measured by the value of the output in local trade), for the owner.
Community design will in turn focus on the creation of platforms that support and catalyze increases in production for the community as a whole.
NOTE: For those that are unfamiliar with the concept of a “platform,” it finds its roots in the technology industry. Essentially, it is a system that simplifies a set of processes required for a given activity and bundles them into an easily accessible package. For example, the Internet is a platform. Platforms radically accelerate development and often foster the creation of diverse ecosystems of participants that rapidly innovate to fill the available opportunity/space.
Within resilient communities, we will see the establishment of platforms that make it easier to grow/sell food, produce/share/sell energy, trade, share ideas/methods (social software), produce products (fab labs), collect/share/sell water and much more. For example, to accelerate the ability to share/sell energy within a community, smart grid technology and microgrids provide an excellent avenue of approach. More specifically, if my domestic wood-fired, combined heat power (CHP) system produces excess electricity, I could either sell it into the community's microgrid or store it locally depending on the pricing information I get from smart grid data flows. Another example would be platforms that support local agriculture. Platforms in this category such as vegitecture support localized agriculture and food production and include; centrally located open space for farmer’s markets, small fenced garden plots that can be rented, local cold storage, groves of nut trees, community composting systems, green roofs/walls and much more.
If this sounds like a return to the 19th Century way of life you would be wrong. IF done correctly, the intensity of production and the productivity of participants will be orders of magnitude higher than during that earlier period. Further, IF done correctly it promises a rapid, broad and sustainable increase in standards of living for all participants.
So, get ready and get innovating, for if we can crack the design of the models necessary to accomplish this, it will propagate virally across the entire world.
Tuesday, December 23. 2008
Miel béton
Certainly one of the most intriguing urban project I’ve encountered lately: miel béton (which means “concrete honey” in french): the production of honey on urban roofs in the northern Parisian suburb of Saint Denis. According to new paris bohemian:
“A graphic designer and visual artist by trade, Olivier Darné began his investigation of bees in 2000, when he first placed a single beehive on his house in Saint Denis. Following that experiment with the installation of a dozen hives on the roof of city hall, Olivier was fascinated by the idea of sending bees out into the city as “prospectors” of the urban environment. What, exactly, could bees tell us about our city, about the relationships between wild and urban, between humans and their surroundings, between space and time? What Olivier found was more than gratifying: bees reproduce, in liquid form, the density, changes, and social organization of our city. If you consider that 3000 hectares (or 5000 acres) of city are concentrated into a single pot of honey, the resulting flavors are a gauge of how we urbanites live.
(…)
By consuming honey produced in and from their own city, urbanites connect themselves intimately to their land, even if it happens to be one that’s filled with concrete, high-rise housing blocks, and if they’re lucky, bees.“
Why do I blog this? definitely not related to technology, I found this project amazingly curious as it shows how cities can be curious places for new forms of design. The intersection between nature and the urban environment is surely a relevant topic for design.
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Via Pasta & Vinegar
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Personal comment:
Dans la suite des articles autour de "l'urban farming" réalisé par l'Architectural Association de Londres (voir ICI) . Il faudra probablement dépolluer les villes avant d'y entamer la production de nourriture...
Monday, December 22. 2008
New York City Now Officially Looks Awesome in Google Earth
Have you checked out New York City in Google Earth lately? You should, because Google added a layer of photorealistic building textures which make the city look like something from a decent flight simulator. Or, in one word: awesome!
Google has been adding new photorealistic textures for many months now, and the users themselves have contributed. As a result, there’s almost no important landmark in NYC without a 3D model. See for yourself in the screenshots below:
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Related Articles at Mashable | All That's New on the Web:
Terrorists Using Google Earth to Target Israel
Google’s Earth Day Mashup: Maps + YouTube
Google Earth and NASA Complete Project
Google Earth Enterprise Version Update Released
Google Earth Shows Real-Time Traffic
Google Earth Updates Images
Google Earth Comes To Your Browser
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Via Mashable
Personal comment:
Pas encore "awesome"... mais c'est vrai qu'il est intéressant de voir GE évoluer de jour en jour vers un "monde miroir" (quoiqu'il s'agisse d'autre chose que d'un miroir) de plus en plus complet et dynamique pour ce qui concerne les données géoréférencées.
Global Systems vs. Local Platforms
Thursday, December 18. 2008
Images read from human brain
OSAKA--In a world first, a research group in Kyoto Prefecture has succeeded in processing and displaying optically received images directly from the human brain.
The group of researchers at Advanced Telecommunications Research Institute International, including Yukiyasu Kamitani and Yoichi Miyawaki, from its NeuroInformatics Department, said about 100 million images can be read, adding that dreams as well as mental images are likely to be visualized in the future in the same manner.
Optically received images are converted to electrical signals in the retina and treated in the brain's visual cortex.
In the recent experiment, the research group asked two people to look at 440 different still images one by one on a 100-pixel screen. Each of the images comprised random gray sections and flashing sections.
The research group measured subtle differences in brain activity patterns in the visual cortexes of the two people with a functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) scanner. They then subdivided the images and recorded the subjects' recognition patterns.
The research group later measured the visual cortexes of the two people who were looking at the word "neuron" and five geometric figures such as a square and a cross. Based on the stored brain patterns, the research group analyzed the brain activities and reconstructed the images of Roman letters and other figures, succeeding in recreating optically received images.
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fabric | rblg
This blog is the survey website of fabric | ch - studio for architecture, interaction and research.
We curate and reblog articles, researches, writings, exhibitions and projects that we notice and find interesting during our everyday practice and readings.
Most articles concern the intertwined fields of architecture, territory, art, interaction design, thinking and science. From time to time, we also publish documentation about our own work and research, immersed among these related resources and inspirations.
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