Shameless Plug: The Placeless City

I'm delighted to announce the publication of my new book, Die Ortlose Stadt Oder: Die Virtualisierung Des Urbanen (The Placeless City: The Virtualization of the Urban).

Co-authored with Alain Bourdin (Université Paris VIII) and Frank Eckardt (Bauhaus-Universität Weimar), The Placeless City examines ways in which new information and communication technologies have transformed modern notions of urbanity.

This project emerged from a lunch conversation in 2012 during the “Media of the Metapolis” conference in Weimar, where Alain and I had been invited to speak on our relative approaches toward urban life. And now, thanks to Frank's expert negotiation of the German publishing world, we can share the results of that conversation with a larger community!

Publisher's link: http://www.transcript-verlag.de/978-3-8376-2746-6/die-ortlose-stadt

Guest Post: Grow Heathrow

The following is a guest post from "Eddy," a friend I met while attending my fourth Salzburg Global Seminar. As you’ll shortly see, "Eddy" offers a practical, personal, and thoughtful form of engagement with the sometime overwhelmingly complex realities of global capitalism. When he shared these notes with me, I asked for permission to repost them here. 

Transition Heathrow

I’m currently staying/participating at a squatted site called Grow Heathrow. It is proving to be quite an important time for me. Politically affirming. I came here to learn skills, connect with others who have similar ideas about how we provide for ourselves, and give my support to a cause/project I’m passionate about. The squat originated from a need to confront the proposed plans for a third runway at Heathrow Airport. The government in the UK has been looking at airport expansion for a while now – there’s still talk as to where this expansion will take place. If they opt for Heathrow, they’ll have to remove the squatters from this land and tarmac over the village of Sipson; one of the principal aims of the project is to instill community resistance in Sipson against Heathrow Airport Holdings (formerly British Airports Authority), if they come knocking.

The attitude here is great. People are focused. It's a working squat. People arrive for many reasons. I'm here to work. That’s where my head is at the moment - I want to be productive, to be useful. Other visitors are here to enjoy themselves, relax and talk with others. This is a haven for free thought - a space to breathe for those disillusioned with materialism.

Here there’s no room for the workings of capital - no pressure to work the 9 to 5. It is a kind of political expression that directly challenges labour, the 9 to 5 grind. It is this kind of political expression that interests me at the moment, as opposed to attending the monthly anti-war protest/demonstration. Protest is important, but we must also set the agenda. ‘If all we do is oppose what they are trying to do, then we simply follow in their footsteps’.[1] We need to carry on with our activity that isn’t determined by money. We must dedicate ourselves to what we consider necessary or desirable. We must live the world we want to create.[2] Besides, protesting wipes me out (as I recently experienced at the protest against Fracking at Balcome). Not sure I want to devote my time and energy to protests, where we shout, confront police etc. It's not in my nature to use physical force against other humans. Probably too middle class. It's not in my nature to shout about things, sing chants, etc. Perhaps if it's a cause that really riles me up, then I might reconsider.

At the squat there is a non-hierarchical, anarchistic set up. No one is instructed to work. People work when they feel ready to. There are always tasks to be done. People wake up, a group gets together, starts talking - momentum starts to build and we work on a project. And we work hard. But it doesn't feel like work. Because we’re there at our own will, because it’s a cause we believe in, there’s such camaraderie in our collective work. It’s fun and social. What great conversations emerge during work. Working together on something, where there’s a common goal, an objective, sometimes sparks more interesting conversations than assembling with the intention to socialise. During the summer there seems to be a huge flux of international travellers who have heard about the project. The squat reminds me of travelling in hostels – spaces to socialise, unwind and talk idealistically.

Transition Heathrow

A working mind is a healthy mind. People are happy when they're productive, when they're being useful. Their self-esteem grows, their self-confidence and sense of value to the group benefits. During this first month, I have easily forgiven those who have not managed to work and contribute fully.  There will be a long history of reasons as to why some are able to contribute more than others. Those that don't, we should have sympathy for and try to understand why, rather than resent them. I guess I am just grateful I have this working mind, this motivation. I've only been here for a month, and my feelings on this may change. Without special resolve and grit, I imagine it is easy to lose patience over time.

The experience thus far is fulfilling a personal need to experiment with new forms of social relations outside capitalism. Grow Heathrow is an open project with plenty space for people to join the site. Contrary to other squats, it is the project that brings the inhabitants of the site together, rather than a group of friends. This kind of experiment in communal living has its rewards and challenges. There are those that use this space as some kind of refuge from some torment in their lives outside the squat. Although they are often unable to contribute to the collective in a variety of ways, the space must try to accommodate their distress. The community must do its upmost to prevent looking inwards. One older lady, who was previously in a mental institution, has benefitted immensely from gardening, working outdoors and being with people. She tells me how lonely she gets in the evenings on her own in her flat. Living communally trumps any discomfort from sleeping without a mattress.

The squat relies on solar panels and a wind turbine for its electricity, has no running hot water from the tap (although an impressive warm shower wood burner has been built) and there’s a compost toilet on site, minimising water usage. Almost all the food consumed is either grown on site, taken from bins outside supermarkets, or from food wholesalers giving away waste food. I must say, I do get a sense of gladness as I walk about doing my daily activity without barely any ecological footprint.

After 5 months in Salzburg (or rather a lifetime) of talking about the problems of the world, and what needs to be done, I am finally in a living and working arrangement that satisfies my political need to get to grips with the ‘doing’. When I wake up in the morning I feel as though I’m in the right place. At least for now. We’ll see how it goes this autumn.

The land that the community is occupying is up for eviction. So there is that added insecurity that for some residents makes long term-commitment/planning difficult. Indeed, their innate instability and transitory nature is a key criticism of squatted social centres. I seem to forget that bailiffs could start breaking through the gate any minute. Part of me doesn’t believe it will happen: Who would break-up such a peaceful, well-meaning, environmental project? I come across as naïve to some of the old-time squatters, who tell me I’ll soon understand what we’re fighting against when I see the State use its might to destroy any dissenting activity. Property is king. I wonder where I’ll be, what I’ll do when we’re being evicted. I probably won’t know how I’ll react until it’s happening. Can physical force ever be successful against the State? History shows that violence and aggression is what it often does best. Why play them at their own game? But if someone is evicting you from your home - if I develop some emotional attachment to this place - there’s no knowing how one might react.

Transition Heathrow

[1] Holloway, J. 2010. Crack Capitalism. London: Pluto Press, p.3.

[2] Holloway, J. 2010. Crack Capitalism. London: Pluto Press, pp. 3-4.

Lipstick Traces

Reading Lipstick Traces: A Secret History of the 20th Century (recommended by Kathleen McConnell), I am drawn to Greil Marcus's kaleidoscopic collision of paths and passageways, a détournement that conveys the confidence of that mythical cyberpunk author who powers a jet fighter straight toward the ground. Will he pull out in time?

Pregnant pauses, ragged references, and joyful noises sprawl through a narrative that starts with the Sex Pistols' "Anarchy in the UK" and leads to multiple pasts and futures, each unified in the celebration/critique of modernity, "a voice of teeth ground down to points." Some big dots receive requisite name-checks -- Guy Debord, Henri Lefebvre, Hugo Ball and the dadaists, right alongside Johnny Rotten, Jonathan Richman, and Michael Jackson (with surprisingly good cause). Other ideas are more fleeting, like early-morning highway ghosts, but no less potent.

Modern spectacle

"A recurrent Situationist theme: the idea of 'the vacation' as a sort of loop of alienation and domination, a symbol of the false promises of modern life" (p. 21).

"In the spectacle, passivity was simultaneously the means and the end of the great hidden project, a project of social control" (p. 99).

"Capitalism left the essence of the old (hierarchy, separation, alienation) altogether in place, and raised instead a screen of continuous change, a show in which everything that was new was old as soon as it was pictured, and thus could be replaced by something even more falsely new" (p. 128).

"An ideology is dominant to the degree that it falsifies, to the degree that it can float free of all real-world referents… The hallmark of any ideology is its invisibility as such" (pp. 136, 139).

In the era of Haussmannization, "The separations between work, family, and leisure forced by the new map of the city were internalized by the newly atomized, autonomous individuals of the new Paris -- after all, the whole notion of "individualism" was a modernism, a function of one's subjective choice of what to do with free income and free time. The Commune was a comma in Haussmann's sentence; he had won" (p. 138).

According to the Situationists, "Modern capitalism dissuades people from criticizing architecture with the simple argument that people need a roof over their heads, just as television is accepted on the grounds that people need information and entertainment. People are made to overlook the obvious fact that this information, this entertainment, and this kind of dwelling place are not made for them, but without them and against them. The whole of urban planning can be understood only as a society's field of publicity-propaganda -- that is as the organization of participation in something in which it is impossible to participate" (p. 139).

Describing Le Corbusier's Radiant City: "a prison without walls" (p. 370).

Modern lament

"What could be more productive of an atomized, hopeless fatalism than the feeling that one is deadened precisely where one ought to be having fun?" (p. 50)

"Boredom was a haze, a confusion, and finally the ultimate mode of control, self-control, alienation perfected: a bad conscience" (p. 51).

"Here a miracle as strange as that claimed by any religion was repeated again and again, every day. What was, once, yourself, was now presented as an unreachable but irresistibly alluring image of what, in this best of all possible worlds, you could be" (p. 101).

"You are nothing unless you have everything: that was modernity" (p. 129).

"Pop culture is a product -- a show, a spectacle, a channeling of suppressed wishes into marketable form - and it is an impulse -- a production of suppressed wishes that once released can call their own tune" (p. 149).

"To believe that the present-day novel will be read in a hundred years is not to praise the novel but to condemn the world" (p. 247).

[Radically] incomplete pleasures 

In the ashes, "anything would be possible, and permitted: the most profound love, the most casual crime" (p. 18).

Real mysteries cannot be solved, but they can be turned into better mysteries" (p. 24).

"The original scene . . . was made of people who were taking chances and operating on obscure fragments of imagination" (p. 36).

"'Nothing is true; everything is permitted.' So said Nietzsche and Mourre, and numerous punks, and Dubord, quoting Rashid al-Din Sinan, Islamic gnostic, leader of the Levantine Assassins, Sinan as he lay on his deathbed… the words make up the first line in the canon of the secret tradition, a nihilist catchphrase, an entry into negation, a utopianism, a shibboleth" (p. 442).

Dadaist satire

Hugo Ball: "All living art will be irrational, primitive, and complex; it will speak a secret language and leave behind documents not of edification but of paradox" (p. 196).

"Dada was the notion that in the constructed setting of a temporally enclosed space -- in this case, a nightclub -- anything could be negated. It was the notion that, there, anything might happen" (p. 241).

On the post-dada world: "The dadaists never got over it: they saw the transformation of the world for a few days in a Zurich bar, and while they glimpsed fragments of that vision for the rest of their lives, they never again saw it whole" (pp. 240-241).

Dadaist truth: "the invulnerable sentence: one that could be understood but never explained" (p. 243).

Situationist remapping

"Now the city would move like a map you were drawing; now you would begin to live your life like a book you were writing. Called forth by a street or a building, an ensemble of gestures might imply that a different street had to be found, that a building could be redesigned by the gestures performed within it, that new gestures had to be made, even that an unknown city had to be built or an old one overthrown" (p. 166).

Ivan Chtcheglov: "Everyone will live in his own cathedral" (p. 172).

"As one turns the pages, the neighborhood becomes a labyrinth, where every chance encounter with a word, a picture, a building, or a person seethes with legend and possibility, opening into a secret utopia accessible to anyone capable of recognizing it" (p. 253).

"What if one created something that would simply go on creating of its own accord, a set of wishes translated by gestures, an ensemble of desires whose force fields would level all museums, habits, routines, all everyday walk and talk, until every moment had to be a new work of art, or nothing?" (p. 339)

"As a use of time it was the shifting of the city back into the primeval forest, then into a haunted house more modern than anything modern architects ever dreamed of, a game of freedom in which the goal was not to score but to remain on the field, to consciously position oneself between past and future" (p. 361).

Ivan Chtcheglov: "Architecture will be, at least in the beginning, a means of experimenting with a thousand ways of modifying life, with a view toward a synthesis today found only in legends" (p. 372).

"They saw that all cities were imaginary, complexes of desires turned into geography or suppressed by it, and they saw that all cities could be explored" (p. 385).

"During May '68, it had seemed as if the game had begun. If you looked you could see it happen: every gesture was extended, every street redrawn, every building demolished and rebuilt, every word part of a new language" (p. 440).

"I found a tale composed of incomplete sentences, voices cut off or falling silent… - a map made altogether of dead ends, where the only movement possible was not progress, not construction, but ricochet and surprise" (p. 446).

Situationist performance

Lefebvre spoke of "laying aside all mistrust, all ambition, all schemes . . . In an atmosphere of passionate oneness we would talk far into the night . . . We drank, sometimes there were other stimulants, and these nights had an earnestness, an affection -- it was more than communication, it was a communion" (p. 146).

"The SI was a group of critics; tipping back in their cafe chairs as others acted, they did not apologize" (p. 176).

"Spreading the bad paper of détournement until it began to turn up everywhere, the SI would devalue the currency of the spectacle, and the result would be a fatal inflation. Then a penny could be a fortune… [Of course] that bad paper is the only currency in this tale: lost children seek their fathers, and fathers seek their lost children, but nobody really looks like anybody else. So all, fixed on the wrong faces, pass each other by: this is the drift of secret history, a history that remains secret even to those who make it, especially to those who make it" (p. 179, 184-184).

Guy Debord: "Our situations will be ephemeral, without a future: passageways" (p. 182)

"The idea was that, to the degree aesthetic categories could be proven false, social barriers could be revealed as constructed illusions, and the world could be changed" (p. 188).

Norman Cohn's ignored warning: "It is characteristic of this kind of movement that its aims and premises are boundless . . . a true prototype of a modern totalitarian party" (p. 322).

"To be revolutionary is not a matter of degree" (p. 343).

"The construction of situations will be the continuous realization of a great game, a game the players have chosen to play" (p. 347, emphasis in original - see also James P. Carse's Finite and Infinite Games).

Sometimes the situation need be little more than "the right graffiti on the right wall, at the right time, in the right place" (p. 357).

"Leisure would soon be the axis of civilization: a realm of potential happiness so complete that it would test all the mechanisms of alienation to dominate it. A war would be fought over the meaning of life. If leisure was conquered, civilization would turn into a prison disguised as a pleasure dome. But if leisure was not conquered, it would serve as a base for a practice of freedom so explosive that no known social order could ever satisfy it" (p. 369 - see also Herbert Marcuse's The End of Utopia].

Guy Debord: "We need to work toward flooding the market -- even if for the moment only the intellectual market -- with a mass of desires whose realization is not beyond the capacity of man's present means of action on the material world, but only beyond the capacity of social organization as it stands" (p. 390).

"God would be dead, and everything would be sacred" (p. 397).

Punk style

"Because the Sex Pistols had no other weapons, because they were fans in spite of themselves, they played rock 'n' roll, stripping it down to essentials of speed, noise, fury, and manic glee no one had touched before. They used rock 'n' roll as a weapon against itself" (p. 57).

"'New Wave' was a code word not for punk without shock, but for punk without meaning" (p. 82).

Punk "was not history. It was a chance to create ephemeral events that would serve as judgements on whatever came next" (p. 82).

"It was a turning point in history where history refused to turn; as a beacon of the future it revealed nothing so vividly as the past" (p. 431).

Generative criticism

"The spectral connections between people long [are] separated by place and time, but somehow [they speak] the same language" (p. 4).

"If one can stop looking at the past and start listening to it, one might hear echoes of a new conversation; then the task of the critic would be to lead speakers and listeners unaware of each other's existence to talk to one another. The job of the critic would be to maintain the ability to be surprised at how the conversation goes, and to communicate that sense of surprise to other people, because a life infused with surprise is better than a life that is not" (p. 23).

"Theories cannot be kept on paper" (p. 274).

"Unfulfilled desires transmit themselves across the years in unfathomable ways, and all that remain on the surface are bits of symbolic discourse, deaf to their sources and blind to their objects -- but those fragments of language… are a last link to notions that have gone under the ground, into a cultural unconscious. All that remains are wishes without language: all that remains is unmade history, which is to say the possibility of poetry. [Of course] as the poetry is made, language recovers and finds its target: the history that has been made" (p. 308).

"Metaphors are transformative things, proofs of the arbitrary nature of language, grants of mystery to ordinary things -- they are in other words incipient utopias" (p. 397).

I Forgot My Phone

In his book Outside Lies Magic, John Stilgoe notes that many folks growing up in 19th century-America cultivated greater visual acuity than we do today. They actually developed and practiced the art of looking, discerning hues and shades both for the pleasure of aesthetic refinement and for the practicalities of daily life. Stilgoe offers a largely class-bound analysis, summoning notions of chromatics lectures offered during an afternoon tea. Yet he also calls forth images of farmers and drovers who read the clouds with wary appraisal, searching for storm-sign.

In our more media-saturated age, we seldom attune ourselves to the nuances of nature, choosing instead to distill the world into a stock of abstractions. We might adjust our flatscreen controls to "vivid" and crank the volume to "11," but only because our expectations overwhelm the subtle gradations of things. Presence, the experience of "being there," is harder and harder to recognize, or eventually to miss.

Charlene deGuzman knows something about this. Her video expresses the frustration I have felt in gatherings large and small when friends edit our interactions to check messages, to post comments, or maybe just to find something more interesting than the conversations that bind us. Of course I found myself doing the very same thing last night at home with my family, checking my phone while my daughter was sharing the news of her week. I stopped; I don't know if she noticed.

Public Forums in Turkey

While the Erdoğan regime has largely shut down the protests that rocked Turkey last month, Sebnem Arsu describes a promising turn for those who continue to hope for a deepening of democratic processes in that country. Activists are now meeting in public places, sometimes by the hundreds, to discuss and debate strategies to challenge the current government without meeting authoritarianism with violence:

"The forums, an unprecedented exercise in grass-roots democracy in a country with no tradition of public assembly, are not affiliated with any political party. Organically evolving, and with no leadership, they aim not to form a new political party but to structure a new political system. At the very least, participants say, they are a way to keep up the pressure on Mr. Erdogan’s administration."

To clamp down on the noise that would might attract heavy-handed response, participants are using nonverbal communication convey their reactions to speakers. They wave their hands to demonstrate affirmation, cross their arms to show disagreement, and rotate their arms to speed up speakers who take too long.

Young folks and the elderly, radicals and people who have never attended a protest before: these folks don't agree on everything. But they demonstrate the power to disagree without being disagreeable. Jenny and I were there for the tear gas. I wish we could be there for this more hopeful next step.

Read the article: After Protests, Forums Sprout in Turkey’s Parks

Google Glass: See For Yourself

Image from dvice: Google Glass will make dating super creepy (and awesome)

Thanks to Jenny I checked out Charles Arthur's Guardian review of Google Glass, and I'm reminded of some of the early critiques of the iPod and iPhone (not to mention my own preliminary pan of the iPad). Somewhat predictably Arthur emphasizes the first-generation glitches of this augmented reality device: buggy interface, wifi hassles, low-res pix. The price of being bleeding-edge cool.

He also notes the risk of surreptitious snapshots -- and the even greater risk of looking like a tool while wearing these things. Yes, these things may be a creeper's favorite new toy. And I've yet to see pictures of someone wearing these Google Glasses without flashing back to images of Geordi La Forge. Google Glass may be useful for specialized tasks, but most folks may see little more than a gimmick.

Arthur may be right; he may be wrong, but his review is worth a read if only for its conclusion, which rightly points out a deeper concern arising from our potential willingness to outsource our sight: "Google Glass feels like something that would make you see the world less, and replace it with a world seen through a giant corporation's interests, funnelled through a tiny screen suspended above one eye." The electronic panopticon is getting an upgrade.

Read the entire article: Google Glass – hands-on review

More videos from Turkey

Thought I'd share a couple more videos from our recent travels through Turkey. The first is a snippet from a performance by Uninvited Jazz Band. These dudes were playing on Istiklal Street, near Taksim Square. And as you can see from this June 6th video, they managed to convey some sense of the craziness going on just down the road.

The second is a world away from the protests of Taksim: a video from our Cappadocia hot air balloon ride. Scheduling snafus, gray skies, and a crowded gondola meant nothing once we were aloft over those strangely beautiful rock formations. Among many Turkish highlights, the chance to float with Jenny over Cappadocia was probably the best part of our trip.

Taking Taksim

Entirely by chance Jenny and I were in Istanbul amid national convulsions that portended a possible Turkish revolution. The uprising began on May 28th when police used tear gas, pepper spray, and rubber bullets against protesters who’d gathered to halt government efforts to bulldoze Gezi Park near Taksim Square. The initial spasm of street battles left at least four dead and inspired a broader coalition of interest groups to resist Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdoğan’s increasingly authoritarian rule. By the time we arrived, demonstrations had spread across the country and Taksim had become people’s occupation park. Along with tents and barricades, protesters had set up their own food distribution network, a clinic, and even a children’s library.

During our June 3rd visit, we joined the crowds who rallied underneath helicopter searchlights, and we got our first taste of Turkish tear gas. I remember the strange sight of one guy flipping the bird at a copter that wheeled overhead while kids hopped onto burned out cars to snap pictures for Facebook posterity. The night was tense. Two days later, however, a party atmosphere pervaded the place.

Local authorities had pledged not to use violence against the protesters, dancing and concerts had replaced chants and marches, and news reports indicated that the prime minister himself might be willing to negotiate with the opposition. Then in an early morning raid on June 11th, police smashed occupation barricades and began to pummel protesters anew with water cannons and tear gas grenades. Erdoğan had decided to retake the park by force.

We were eating breakfast in our Sultanahmet district hotel when I noticed the televised images of smoke rising from Taksim. “Unbelievable,” I thought, “He’s actually trying to clear the park.” There were thousands of people filling that square. They were rowdy, boisterous, and defiant, but they weren’t threatening anyone. “Don’t go to Taksim,” a manager warned; she added euphemistically, “It’s too crowded.” Jenny agreed, recommending that we avoid pointlessly exposing ourselves to the violence. But I had to see things for myself. “I totally understand if you want to stay,” I said, “but I’ve got to get in there.” Jenny understands my Roy Neary quality and didn’t hesitate: “If you’re going, I’m going.”

Getting to Taksim wouldn’t be easy. Metros were being rerouted and taxi drivers refused to take us. Our only option was a packed tram across the Golden Horn inlet, followed by a steep hike toward Galata Tower. Clomping up those steps we spotted layers of fresh street art, with fists and gas masks providing the common motif. On one wall someone announced, the “revolution will not be televised [-] it will be tweeted.” The cheerful exuberance of our first two visits had given way to a more dire feeling. There were no street performers on Istiklal Street this time, and no one was hawking any of those silly plastic Guy Fawkes disguises. Sidewalk dealers were only selling goggles and surgical masks. Ambulances and fire trucks screamed past, trucks bearing water cannons too. Dazed-looking protesters were walking toward us, silent and dripping with sweat. We had no idea what to expect.

At last we arrived at the Ataturk memorial where just a few nights ago we’d joined throngs of cheering, gleeful occupiers. This time the square was littered with chunks of broken concrete and rivers of soapy water. Body armor-clad cops were mustering in front of us, facing two axes. One was relatively peaceful, the other more menacing. The main group of protesters occupied the high ground of Gezi Park, shouting and chanting but otherwise offering no threat. About a half-dozen kids on a nearby street to the left were taking more direct action, using slingshots to fire rocks at the police. The reply of gas canisters heaved grey streams of smoke back over the protesters’ makeshift barricades.

The lines seemed stable enough and I began to plot a course that would hug the apartment towers surrounding the square. “What about the police?” Jenny asked. “They won’t allow us to go in.” I figured she was right, but then I saw reporters and photographers planted throughout Taksim. Wherever I’d imagine some borderline for press activities, I’d then spot another civilian standing or crouching further off. The cops looked too busy to care. Jenny and I confirmed a rally point, and she reminded me to stay in sight. Knowing that she was hanging back to maintain a broader sense of the evolving situation, I made my way closer toward the rock-throwers’ barricade.

My first stop was a position near the police formation, shooting pictures of those tear gas canisters being launched. When one shell ejection banged into my leg, I realized I’d neglected to get decent cover, so I pocketed the spent canister and ducked behind some rubble. Even so I found myself facing the same rain of stones meant for the authorities. I picked up a piece of wood as a shield and started taking pictures. Now and again an officer would step forward to launch another grenade with a metallic thoonk, and the Gezi Park crowds would hurl boos in reply. Then came another assault, this time from above us.

But when I looked up I only saw an old woman heaving water bottles from her apartment window, a couple exploding against the concrete. One officer swung his grenade launcher upward, and every one of us holding a camera turned toward him. Some folks were professional journalists; they were the ones wearing military surplus gas masks or football helmets festooned with stickers. Most of the civilians however were quasi-professional at best. A few were tourists like me. Nonetheless we shared an unspoken determination that anyone willing to fire a gas canister at an old woman tossing stuff from her window deserved full documentation for his actions. The officer paused and seemed adjust his aim. We all froze. He then lowered his weapon. A squad leader stepped up and began negotiating with the woman. She spat out an epithet and closed her window.

Right then a misfire sent a tear gas canister scuttling near my feet. My lungs filled with stinging paroxysm and my eyes felt like they were on fire. I wanted to rub out the pain, but I knew that doing so would only make it worse. Ducking my head inside my shirt, I bumbled toward Jenny’s direction and tried to control my breathing, cursing my decision to bypass those masks and goggles. I peeked out from my shirt and saw that Jenny too had taken a dose. We shouted toward each other, confirming that neither was hurt. I then ran past the barricade to get closer to the protesters.

Viewing the scene through my camera, I concentrated on angles and composition. Only gradually I became aware that a small group of protesters had ceased shouting at the police and was now concentrating their anger on me. A small stone whizzed past my ear. A silver-haired fellow then stepped up, waving a gas mask in my direction and shouting at the crowd. He turned toward me and said, “They think you’re Turkish press. They’re angry with them right now. You better leave.” I needed no convincing. I thanked him and ran back toward the barricade.

I joined about a half-dozen other photographers clustered behind strands of rebar. From behind us smoke trails arched overhead and rocks spun from the opposite direction. I leaned over a sheet of steel and poked my camera through the barrier, craning my neck to see the viewfinder. I felt a little silly about this pose until I noticed another guy leaning near me doing the same thing. We grinned at each other and went back to work. Alternating between my video and still camera, I snapped pictures until seeing a “lens unattached” warning on my Nikon. I remembered feeling a small impact and wondered if I’d just trashed my camera. It only took a quick twist of the lens though to snap everything back into place.

By this point the protesters were gaining confidence, advancing toward the barricade. They hurled their rocks and one even launched some sort of water bottle explosive. Then to the shouts and cheers of the Gezi Park crowd someone began to set off fireworks. Tiny explosions crackled above us, shooting off bright sparks that bounced against the buildings. The smell of gas had died down, but I had to know that Jenny was OK. Running back to the police position, I scanned the square until I found her. She was maybe 20 yards off, standing behind the columns of officers and giving me a bemused look that conveyed, “You are such an idiot.” I smiled and motioned that I’d rejoin her soon.

At that moment a long line of protesters appeared seemingly out of nowhere, encircling us. “Where the hell did they come from,” I wondered. Surely the police felt that way too. A few began fingering their weapons, but no one was itching for close-quarters confrontation. The protesters cinched closer to our group and representatives stepped forward. An officer and an occupation leader appeared to be negotiating. The mood was strangely calm as police lowered their weapons. The protesters opened their circle and the police pulled back. The park erupted with cheers. Even so something felt wrong, especially when reporters started to run toward the edge of the park.

The police had summoned a water truck to disperse the protestors. Jenny had wisely made her way toward the entrance near the Ataturk statue; I began planning my exit too. The hose began to spray with enough intensity to throw people off their feet, and it was making a methodical turn in my direction. I got some distance and then circled back to the police position. That’s when I saw five protesters holding hands and kneeling together in front of the truck. The burst intensified until four broke ranks. One remained, gesturing with his arms wide. I don’t speak Turkish, but I imagine him asking, “How could you do this? You should be standing with us.” Most of the police were young, no older than the kids they faced. Most would have preferred responding to the Taksim protesters in some other way; I’m sure of it.

Once more my lungs convulsed with pain, another round of tear gas and pepper spray. I took short breaths, blew snot out of my nose, and tried not to rub my eyes. Jenny had mostly avoided this dose and frankly didn’t mind that I was getting some righteous rebuke for dragging us into this maelstrom. By now Taksim Square was largely emptied. The Gezi Park occupiers were standing their ground, but they knew the police would come for them soon as well. Plumes of black smoke ascended over the city as we started our long walk back.

That afternoon we found ourselves in the same chairs where we first saw the police action on television. Now the local news showed Prime Minister Erdoğan speaking to parliament, blaming the protests on outside agitators and terrorists. His supporters clapped and cheered; there was no split-screen to tell another story. The hotel manager who had earlier warned us not to enter Taksim studied us for a bit, marveling at Jenny’s efforts to translate Erdoğan’s words from the television screen excerpts. She explaining some phrases and then proposed that she might be able to find some news in English. For a while she flipped through channels, offering an occasional “phfft” when Erdoğan would appear again. Then, without a word, she switched the TV off.

Lighting a sky lantern on a
more peaceful night in Taksim

Note: I've posted more images on a Facebook album.

Small Group Communication Strategies

Preparing a presentation on small group communication strategies for the SJSU Salzburg Club, I found it useful to develop a list of conflict management strategies. This list is telegraphically written and can hardly be considered complete. I might return to this collection sometime down the road.

10. Presume that the "right people are in the room"
9. Balance individual and group needs
8. Clarify objectives and deliverables
7. Rotate devil's advocate position
6. Explore alternative venues
5. Assess first; evaluate later
4. Practice active listening
3. Strive for win-win
2. Take a long view
1. Breathe

The Image of the City

Yesterday I reread Kevin Lynch's The Image of the City. The book, published in 1960, is dated by a number of anachronistic terms, the masculine-gendered pronoun usage, and its obvious focus on white, middle class folks (and, of course, the anxious feeling that one is grooving on Sean Connery's version of James Bond when everyone else is buzzing about the Daniel Craig model). Add the obligation to plod through numbingly detailed analyses of three U.S. cities (Boston, Jersey City, NJ, and L.A.), peering through thick layers of history to imagine then-contemporary images urban life, and you've got much potential for frustration.

Even so, this is a remarkable book, one whose precepts, elementary as they may appear to today's readers, offers useful insights well beyond the realm of urban planning. Indeed, I found myself connecting The Image of the City to a number of ongoing personal and professional projects: improving the flow and "legibility" of my classroom Prezis, exploring "navigation" as an analogy for writing/teaching/learning, and considering a range of broader community-building opportunities. Here are some of my favorite quotations.

The Image as Communication Artifact/Process - Notes on social change and pedagogy 

Definition of the image: "the generalized mental picture of the exterior physical world that is held by an individual" (p. 4).

Among its several benefits (listed on page 4), a good image "can furnish the raw material for the symbols and collective memories of group communication" (p. 4).

Social change: "A frequent problem is the sensitive reshaping of an already existing environment: discovering and preserving its strong images, solving its perceptual difficulties, and, above all, drawing out the structure and identity latent in the confusion… It will probably be more difficult to gain an understanding of the problem and to develop the necessary design skill than it will be to obtain the necessary powers, once the objective is clear" (p. 115, 117).

Pedagogy: "The final objective of such a plan is not the physical shape itself but the quality of an image in the mind. Thus it will be equally useful to improve this image by training the observer, by teaching [him or her] to look at [the] city, to observe its manifold forms and how they mesh with on another… Such education might be used, not only to develop the city image, but to reorient after some disturbing change" (p. 117, emphasis in original).

"In the development of the image, education in seeing will be quite as important as the reshaping of what is seen" (p. 120).

The role of agency and perspective in image production and analysis [more links to pedagogy here]

"The observer ... should play an active role in perceiving the world and have a creative part in developing [the] image. [He or she] should have the power to change that image to fit changing needs. An environment which is ordered in precise and final detail may inhibit new patterns of activity… What we seek is not a final but an open-ended order, capable of continuous further development" (p. 6).

On the frustration of fruitless journeys [unnamed subject reflecting on Los Angeles]: "It's as if you were going somewhere for a long time, and when you got there you discovered there was nothing there, after all" (p. 41).

"The image of a given physical reality may occasionally shift its type with different circumstances of viewing. Thus an expressway may be a path for the driver, [an] edge for the pedestrian" (p. 48, emphasis added).

"The image itself [is] not a precise, miniaturized model of reality, reduced in scale and consistently abstracted. As purposive simplification, it [is] made by reducing, eliminating, or even adding elements to reality, by fusion and distortion, by relating and structuring its parts. It [is] sufficient, perhaps better, for its purpose if rearranged, distorted, 'illogical.' It [resembles] that famous cartoon of the New Yorker's view of the United States" (p. 87).

"If the environment is visibly organized and sharply identified, then the citizen can inform it with [his/her] own meanings and connections. Then it will become a true place, remarkable and unmistakable" (p. 92, emphasis in original).

"The city is not built for one person, but for great numbers of people, of widely varying backgrounds, temperaments, occupations, and class… The designer must therefore create a city which is as richly provided with paths, edges, landmarks, nodes, and districts as possible, a city which makes use of not just one or two form qualities, but of all of them. If so, different observers will all find perceptual material which is congenial to their own particular way of looking at the world" (pp. 110-111).

"It is important to maintain some great common forms: strong nodes, key paths, or widespread regional homogeneities. But within this larger framework, there should be a certain plasticity, a richness of possible structures and clues, so that the individual observer can construct [his/her] own image: communicable, safe, and sufficient, but also supple and integrated with [his/her] own needs" (p. 111).

Potentially important link to Walter Benjamin/Susan Buck-Morss/Carlos Gallego [and Michael Calvin McGee?]: "We need an environment which is not simply well organized, but poetic and symbolic as well… By appearing as a remarkable and well-knit place, the city could provide a ground for the clustering and organization of these [personal] meanings and associations. Such a sense of place in itself enhances every human activity that occurs there, and encourages the deposit of a memory trace" (p. 119, emphasis in original, bolding added).

The method of image analysis

Five types of elements: paths, edges, districts, nodes, and landmarks. (p. 46).

• A note about edges: "An edge may be more than simply a dominant barrier if some visual or motion penetration is allowed through it - if it is, as it were, structured to some depth with the regions on either side. It then becomes a seam rather than a barrier, a line of exchange along which two areas are sown together" (p. 100).

• A note about nodes: "Nodes are points, the strategic spots in a city in which an observer can enter, and which are the intensive foci to and from which he is traveling" (p 47). Example: "The subway stations, strung along their invisible path systems, are strategic junction nodes" (p. 74).

• A note about landmarks: "A landmark is not necessarily a large object; it may be a doorknob as well as a dome" (p. 101).

• A note about the potential for regionalization: "A spatial region would be distinguished from a spatial node (a square) because it could not be scanned quickly. . It could only be experienced, as a patterned play of spatial changes, by a rather protracted journey through it. Perhaps the processional courts of Peking, or the canal spaces of Amsterdam, have this quality. Presumably they evoke an image of great power" (p. 105).

Two types of image construction: hierarchical and continuous organization

Hierarchical: "This organization [has] the quality of a static map. Connection [is] made by moving up to the necessary bridging generality, and back down the desired particular" (p. 89)

Continuous organization: "The image [is] put together in a more dynamic way, parts being interconnected by a sequence over time… and pictured as if seen by a motion picture camera" (p. 89).

Beyond hierarchical and continuous organization: "Intuitively, one could imagine that there might be a way of creating a whole pattern, a pattern that would only gradually be sensed and developed by sequential experiences, reversed and interrupted as they might be. Although felt as a whole, it would not need to be a highly unified pattern with a single center or an isolating boundary. The principal quality might be sequential continuity in which each part flows from the next -- a sense of interconnectedness at any level or in any direction. There would be particular zones that for any one individual might be more intensely felt or organized, but the region would be continuous, mentally traversible in any order. This possibility is a highly speculative one: no satisfactory concrete examples come to mind" (p. 115).

Good places [whether in cities, in teaching, or in other environments]

The value of the panoramic view: "There [is] an emotional delight arising from a broad view… Would it be possible, in our cities, to make this panoramic experience a more common one, for the thousands who pass every day? A broad view will sometimes expose chaos, or express characterless loneliness, but a well-managed panorama seems to be a staple of urban enjoyment" (p. 44)

A good street often "acts ambiguously either as linear node, edge, or path for various people at various times" (p. 65).

"Where the journey contains such a distinct series of distinct events, a reach and passing of one sub-goal after another, the trip itself takes on meaning and becomes an experience in its own right" (p. 97).

Effective nodes: "If a break in transportation or a decision point on a path can be made to coincide with the node, the node will receive even more attention" (p. 102)

Summary clues for urban design: singularity, form simplicity, continuity, dominance, clarity of joint, directional differentiation, visual scope, motion awareness, time series, names and meanings" (pp. 105-108).

A note about time series: "Here what would be imaged would be the developing pattern of elements, rather than the elements themselves - just as we remember melodies, not notes" (p. 107).

"If an environment has a strong visible framework and highly characteristic parts, then exploration of new sectors is both easier and more inviting" (p. 110).

The Party's Over (Thank God)

The 2012 election was an endless dinner party whose guests showed up drunk, puked on the pets, and set the rug on fire. Now it's morning in America, and the house is trashed. There's a big screen TV on the lawn, there's a copy of Atlas Shrugged in the toilet, and there's pudding in the blender [Who the hell put pudding in the blender?]. I'm trying to coax the cats back into the living room. I'm saying, "It's over, kitties. Those awful people are gone." The felines know better though; the guests are still here. Some are sleeping, snoring, drooling. Yet a few are pre-gaming for the next big bash, God love 'em. They are, after all, us.

We voted (some of us, at least) on November 6th, but we also expressed our every thought on this grand debate, extolling our opinions all over Facebook, Twitter, and, for all I know, Instagram. We posted and we tweeted and we exclaimed, loudly, that these two candidates somehow reflect the Manichean cosmos of America, blithely ignoring our quiet doubts that the candidates never really debated, not in a meaningful way. Somehow we know that this election cycle was a war between pundits and handlers and flaks who battle only for their own aggrandizement. Party politics as reality television. Here Comes Honey Boo Boo in '16.

Yes, Barack Obama and Mitt Romney offered distinct agendas. And I preferred one to the other. I still do. Yet I know - and you know it too - that the parties who sustain them represent nothing more than a singular culture industry, a machine that produces little more than sound and fury, bread and circuses. At times it felt like we were watching a Coke-vs.-Pepsi Taste Test and actually caring about which sugar water quenches our thirst. It's a game of dissemination, not dialogue, and we're rotting with every corn syrup swig.

A few folks eschewed the vitriolic attacks and bumper sticker discourse that marked this sad, silly season. Jenny, to great credit, attempted a sane and responsible conversation over the past few months, even as some of her Facebook friends became increasingly unhinged. She explored the issues, read broadly, and struggled to make the right call. She tried to vote for both faith and facts. All too frequently, though, many of us abandoned our better angels. I certainly did.

More than once I said to some pals how much I hated Mitt Romney. Hated him. Not just for his policies (whatever they were that particular week) but for his pandering, his cynicism, and that sanctimonious half-smile that invariably preceded a lie. I hated him for the day, years ago, when he supposedly led a pack of prep school bullies to beat up a kid and cut his hair. I hated him for that dismissal of 47 percent of Americans as too lazy and too weak to be born a millionaire. And I hated his cowardly genuflection to the likes of Rush Limbaugh and Donald Trump. I admit it, I sometimes enjoyed how much I hated Mitt Romney, the clarity of it all.

And now the party's over and we're stuck with the mess. Mitt Romney will probably find a way to make a few more millions. But he'll still hang around too, if only because those Americans who voted for him aren't going anywhere. His partisans are no less sure of their votes now than before election night, and I can't blame them. We could take a walk of shame, but we'd wind up together, right (and left) where we started. It's our house, after all. Honestly I'm not sure how to start cleaning up the mess we've made. The cats are still freaked out, a stench is beginning to rise, and that gunk in the blender? I'm not sure it's pudding. At least I can take some solace in a few wise words I heard on Tuesday night:

"This is a time of great challenges for America, and I pray that the president will be successful in guiding our nation… The nation, as you know, is at a critical point. At a time like this, we can’t risk partisan bickering and political posturing. Our leaders have to reach across the aisle to do the people’s work… This election is over, but our principles endure."

Those are good words, decent words. They remind us of our obligation to be a little kinder to each other, a bit more tolerant of our different beliefs, and a lot more humble. We Americans are a contentious bunch. Always have been, always had to be. We've faced imperial constraint, civil war, economic collapse, and totalitarian advance - and somehow we've stuck together. Better yet, somehow we've managed to expand the sphere of public life, slowly, to include more and more of us. We've been better than this past four years, and we can be better again.

"This election is over, but our principles endure."

Well spoken, Governor Romney.

Yo, Socrates!

Time for another pseudo-script, this time for an upcoming lecture on Plato's Apology. Our scene begins after Socrates has rebuked his "first accusers." Now he faces Meletus and other Athenian citizens who condemn Socrates for various impieties and - even worse - accuse our hero of corrupting the city's youth. Plato may have called this piece a dialogue, but be prepared: The Apology is mostly a broadside by Socrates against those who would condemn him. 

Socrates: OK, you say I teach the youth not to believe in the gods – at least not the gods recognized by Athens.

Meletus: Worse. You don’t believe in any gods.

Socrates: Man, for someone who claims to “care” so much, you certainly don’t care to get your facts straight. You’re prosecuting the wrong guy. It’s either that phantom “Socrates” you read about in that play by Aristophanes, or it's that atheist Anaxagoras. I mean, sure, I dabbled in cosmology back in my youth. Come on, we all did! It was the early Fifth Century, for gods’ sakes. We were all hanging out with the Oracle of Delphi, getting high on fumes. But that doesn’t make me Anaxagoras! Here’s a hint, Care-Bear: We spell and pronounce our names differently. Get it? I may be many things, but I’m sure as hell no atheist.

Meletus: Like I said, you’re a complete atheist.

Socrates: And you’re nothing but a little pipsqueak. Look, you know I believe in divine things. So how can you say I don’t believe in those things that make them divine? You know, the gods? See? See? You must be joking, Meletus. You’re making a mockery out of this trial, trying to confuse folks with these petty charges. Admit it, dude; admit that you’ve brought me here for one reason and one reason only: You’re a tool of those fools who can’t handle my righteous Truth Bombs. Just admit it. I mean, if I’m gonna die for something, let me at least die for something worthwhile. Hey, remember Achilles? Yeah, that guy was brave. He didn’t fear death, even when he knew that fighting Hector would seal his fate. No, he didn’t fear death; he feared dishonor. And you know what? I’m kind of like that guy. Sure, I’m old now. But back in the day, I kept my courage in battle when other soldiers were soiling their armor. I wasn’t scared then, and I’m not scared now. Not of you. No, what scares me is the idea of running away from my duty. To quote that esteemed philosopher Eminem, “God sent me to piss the world off.” And I’m just getting warmed up. Really. So go ahead, release me. Let me go. Know what’ll happen? I’ll tell you what’ll happen. You may release me, but I won’t release you. I’ll come at you until every last Athenian knows that they do not know. I’ll do it because, again quoting Brother Eminem, “I'm sick of you little girl and boy groups. All you do is annoy me. So I have been sent here to destroy you.” And that’s exactly what I’ll do. But with love, the love of a momma cat whose barbed tongue cleans off the muck from her kitties’ coats, the love of a philosopher who will strip away every last piece of ignorance from each and every one of you. Oh, you think you can hurt me? You can’t do a thing to me. Not a thing. "If you strike me down, I shall become more powerful than you can possibly imagine." Yeah, I'm quoting Star Wars. Deal with it. In fact, if you kill me, you’re just hurting yourselves. Think about it. I’m that alarm clock you want to smash in the morning, the very same clock that wakes you up. Remember The Matrix? Yeah, Dark City was better, but whatever. Wake up suckers! Know what I'm sayin'? Ring-ring-ring. Clue-Phone. It’s for you! That’s what I’m saying. And I’m gonna keep on saying it. And I’ll do it for free too. I’ll do it freely, even if it costs me. Check with my wife, my three kids. Am I around for them? Hell no. I’m always out there, helping you idiots. So now you ask, “But oh, oh, why won’t you become a politician, Socrates, why won’t you serve us that way?” Yeah, right. That’s what you need, another politician. There’s a little voice in my head – call it God, call it divinity; call it an undigested bit of beef, whatever – there’s that little voice that keeps reminding me that political life is a sucker’s bet: Have you ever noticed what happens to politicians who stand up against this mob you call a democracy? Huh? How does that work out? Screw that. I’ll keep my number private. I mean, sure, once I held an office. And when our government decided to use that office to punish folks unfairly, I told the government to bite me. “Bite me,” I said. I wasn’t scared. You think I’m scared of you? Oh, and one more thing. Let me remind you: Anything I ever said, I said for free. Free. That means, I wasn’t acting as a professional – like one of those loony Sophists. I was acting as a person, just asking questions. That’s it. That’s what I do: I ask questions, yo. I seek the truth. And look around you. See all those men here who’ve answered my questions? Are they corrupted? Are they injured? Yeah, maybe. If you consider truth to be an injury. And that’s why we’re here, isn’t it? We’re here because you don’t want the truth. You can’t handle the truth. No truth-handlers, you. So bring it on. Judge me according to the law, if you’ve got the guts.

[The Jury finds Socrates guilty]

Socrates: Wimps. But really, I’m not surprised. Well, I am a little surprised. I’m surprised it was this close. So now Meletus would have you sentence me to death. And me, I’m supposed to offer some sort of alternative sentence. So, OK, let’s see, what would be an ideal punishment for me? Hmmm, when you think about it, there’s only one proper penalty: free meals at the town hall. Yeah, punish me with free food. After all, I’m always trying to get you to stop thinking from your stomachs, to think from your souls. So fill me with Happy Meals, the least nourishing thing you’ve got. A stuffed belly: that’s a fit punishment for a good philosopher. Oh, but perhaps you think I’m kidding, like silly Meletus here who helped concoct this joke of a trial. So what else should I propose? Throw me in jail? Throw me out of town? No way. I won’t go. What kind of life would that be? Me, unable to do what I’m here to do, unable to help people examine their lives. So, should I pay a fine? Yeah, that’s rich. I have no money, people! Got it? No money. Well, I guess I could pay a small fine, one as small as my means – and as worthless as this trial. I’ve got rich pals who’re rolling in dough. A few tokens are useless to them, like this whole thing has been useless to me. So that’s my proposal, I guess: Take some money, for the good it will do you.

[The jury deliberates and selects Socrates’ punishment]

Socrates: Death, huh? Yeah, I figured. But, seriously, what do you think you’ll accomplish? My death needs no help from the likes of you. I'm like, 70 years old, remember? What’s worse, I’m not the one getting punished here. You are. You think I’m the last gadfly to bother you? Forget it. There’ll be others. And they’ll be younger than you. Kids may be my downfall, but they’ll dance on your graves too. So now I’m off to die. No worries here. But before I go, a brief word to those jurors who voted for acquittal… Remember that inner voice that has guided me all these years? Well that voice guided me to this moment; it led me here to die. And that voice has never steered me wrong. So I can tell you with some confidence that my death is not evil, no matter how unjust it may seem. In fact, death is likely to a good thing. Just imagine: Me, Socrates, wandering among truly great men and women in the afterlife, pestering them with my questions. “So, Mr-Epic-Hero, you think you’re so good? You sure? How do you know?” Yeah, that’ll be cool. And they’ll appreciate it, those who died like me. They'll be like, "Thanks, Socrates!" And I'll be all, "No problem, dudes." See? They’ll understand my value. As to those folks who condemned me, I wouldn’t blame them if they actually believed in the crap that tried to sling. Ah, but there’s no point in being bitter. I’m ready for my reward. Just do me this one favor: Take care of my kids. Don’t worry about their wealth or their stature of course. I never did. What I mean is, if you see ‘em acting a fool, if you see ‘em putting on airs, promise me you’ll give ‘em a swift kick. They may complain. You know how kids can be. But that’s OK. If someone’s being an ass, ya gotta kick ‘em in the rear. In the end, it’s the kindest thing you can do.

More Pseudo Scripts

Friday Fun Post: Traffic Light Pong

Check it out: a clever way to inspire micro-moments of public life: http://on-msn.com/OgVRVw

Las Vegas Growth Video

Check out NASA's amazing time-lapse video illustrating the growth of Las Vegas over nearly 40 years.

Morozov's "Death of the Cyberflaneur"

Evgeny Morozov's article, The Death of the Cyberflâneur (NYT, Feb 4, 2012) conveys a greatest-hits version of some my personal passions: urban design, modern art, retro-futurism, and a critique of the contemporary public sphere. Heck, there's Caillebotte's "Paris Street; Rainy Day" right at the top! Before I finished reading the piece, I'd already shared it on Facebook. And that, the author says, is the problem.

Launching with a brief description of flânerie, Morozov argues that while today's social networking aggregations fill our screens with countless threads of endless content, they squash the pleasure of wandering through the web's funkier outskirts - and of being present where we are. One source of particular concern: frictionless sharing, that seamless transformation of impulse to flow that anesthetizes conscious engagement:

"This is the very stance that is killing cyberflânerie: the whole point of the flâneur’s wanderings is that he does not know what he cares about. As the German writer Franz Hessel, an occasional collaborator with Walter Benjamin, put it, “in order to engage in flânerie, one must not have anything too definite in mind.” Compared with Facebook’s highly deterministic universe, even Microsoft’s unimaginative slogan from the 1990s — “Where do you want to go today?” — sounds excitingly subversive. Who asks that silly question in the age of Facebook?"

I get the idea, but only to a point. While I appreciate the article's clever allusions, I don't share Morozov's nostalgia for 90s-era modem-screech. Yes, those lengthy periods of waiting for a page to download produced a Yoda-like sense of where-I-was-and-what-I-was-doing [Do you remember your first time?], I don't recall enjoying that moment at all. Nor do I agree that we are bounded into vacuum-sealed mediocracy by our increasingly efficient search tools. Indeed, I found this essay through precisely the kind of flânerie that Morozov celebrates, using Zite to wander electronic boulevards of chance and serendipity.

Even so I agree with broader claim of this piece, that we are less inclined to wander these days, less able to enjoy the pleasures of getting lost in the labyrinth. In my own meanderings through various omnitopian portals, I find this phenomenon less a cause than an effect. Our fear of ambiguity leads us to seek the blandly familiar. And this fear is borne, I think, in something more substantial than the transformation of our tools.

Forgoing further contemplation along those lines [this is a blog-post; the blog is the book], I still think that Morozov makes a reasonable point. We do not "surf" the web, and few of us care to become cyberspace pilots. We prefer the simulacrum of the world to the real thing, customizing it into our own cocoons, mirrors of our preferences and our delusions, as we passively receive the flow. And from time to time we click "like" as a wave (or a courtesy), knowing that our ripples do not run too deeply.

What would our lives be like if we expected more?

Origami Urbanism Update

Finally wrapping up my chapter for the Urban Communication Reader! Here's some of the new stuff...

To this post-place we now turn, learning to read the city that unfolds itself to our gaze. This is the modern city too, in a way; it is the perfection of modernity, no longer limited by the plane-truth. In this city, flat power is dispelled with a magic trick, a mediated fantasy of moving parts with no mechanism aside from consumer choice. Such power--strange, illusory, intoxicating--must first be recognized as such; its users must be trained to recognize themselves as its masters, to see themselves as artists, engineers, poets, creators. This is post-industrial power, when reality-television allows even the otherwise disadvantaged among us to become producers of icons, to brand themselves. This power is the child’s plaything, the personal totem, the solitary confidence. Easily crumbled, burst with merely a word, this pleasure transcends vast chasms between ideas and action, between self and other.

Origami urbanism reveals the sensual pleasure of this manipulation, our technological means of ascending to the summit of a God’s-eye view once more. Amid the flat city, origami urbanism recall’s Gatsby’s “constant flicker”: the flick of a finger upon an iPad, swiping the world into digital shape.  Such is the power and pleasure of mobile communication devices, the means to produce frames of reference that alter themselves according to our perpetually shifting positions, thickening homogeneity in an internal performance. With these new personal data, navigation, and entertainment devices, we need not be tied to fixed locations but may create new ones instead, building our own multidimensional worlds atop the flat screen.  We wander the boulevard, texting rather than speaking, posting rather than engaging, editing rather than experiencing, and our fantasy worlds appear to convulse with every stroke. The pleasures of origami urbanism appear, to the uninitiated at least, like an addiction.