In “The Centripetal City: Telecommunications, the Internet, and the Shaping of the Modern Urban Environment,” published in Cabinet Magazine 17, Spring 2004/2005 I explore the symbiotic relationship between telecommunications and cities. The telephone and telegraph both concentrate and disperse the modern metropolis, creating both downtown and suburb. But if Internet gurus subscribe to an ideology of deconcentration and distribution of networks, the reality is that the Internet is built on the foundations of the telephone system. As a result, as I conclude, the Internet is centralized and vulnerable to catastrophic collapse.
Month: September 2005
John McPhee’s The Control of Nature: Atchafalaya
John McPhee’s classic essay, The Control of Nature: Atchafalaya is now available online at The New Yorker’s web archive.
Telecom-Cities
Operating since 1997, the Telecom-Cities mailing list is sponsored by the Taub Urban Research Center. Its mission is to focus “on practical and theoretical aspects of the changes advanced telecommuications and telematics are rendering on our urban centers.” You can browse Telecom-Cities via a web interface.