Digital cities 5 : urban informatics, locative media and mobile technology in inner-city developments (Workshop)

Abstract

Many new urban developments are systematically planned and rapidly built and marketed, trying to create instant ‘communities’ in dense concentrations. In Hong Kong for example, new high-rise residential developments create concentrations of up to 10,000 people per apartment precinct (Forrest et al., 2002). Developers and governments around the world struggling to achieve socially sustainable neighbourhood communities in these urban contexts are increasingly considering the role of new media and information and communication technology (ICT). Conventional community technology (such as portals and intranets) do not work by themselves, mainly because they assume a ‘collective’ approach to building community and neglect the social structures that emerge from fluid social networks (Arnold et al., 2003; Foth, 2006a, 2006b; Foth & Hearn, 2007, forthcoming; Hopkins, 2005). Instead of a collective approach, the ecology of social networks and their digital augmentation in the context of inner-city urban developments is the focus of this workshop.