Wireless: A City's Best Friend?

"With a new generation of wireless devices, GPS (global positioning system) locators and ubiquitous networking, future gazers claim, digital space will simply add another dimension to physical space, especially as technology continues to penetrate what sociologist Ray Oldenberg has famously described as "third places": the communal public spaces where people interact with friends or strangers.

'From an urban design perspective, a lot of technologists are just discovering public space... We're interested in the social cues that people already perform in urban spaces, in the artifacts that already exist, like trash cans, park benches, and how they will be mapped or reappropriated into a playful network of digital life on the streets.'

Toggled together, the pragmatic and playful digital city applications will change both the shape and the experience of public space."