Category Archives: city

Placeworlds

As we consider our theoretical justification for using Second Life to facilitate civic engagement, we’ve come up with the notion of placeworlds. Below is a sketch of the concept: Place is experienced space. It is what happens when geographic space … Continue reading

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Civic Engagement and Second Life

As city governments explore their role in burgeoning virtual environments, they should see the creation of engaged and active civic groups as primary to their mission. We recently spoke to a reporter from the Boston Globe, who, after getting wind … Continue reading

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Hub2

Despite the fact that the Boston Globe has declared that the city has plans for a full virtual conversion in Second Life, the truth of the matter is its goals are much more modest. Together with my colleage Gene Koo, … Continue reading

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City as Social Network

I recently posted this series of prompts to the iDC discussion list. Following Google’s acquisition of Feedburner, I want to consider how the threats to privacy that became apparent in that context extend to physical communities (neighborhood, organization, city) that … Continue reading

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OurVirtualHolland

OurVirtualHolland (OVH) is one model of civic presence in SL. Sponsored by the financial firm ING, the space is designed to bring together entrepreneurs under the guise of business created community. The question is: what kind of community is actually … Continue reading

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The Symbolic Function of Capitals

Just a quick note about capital cities. According to Friedrich Kittler, from his article “The City is a Medium”: “Under highly technologized conditions, capitals scarcely need to be built; they only need to be assigned addresses.” There is so much … Continue reading

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