The UK is taking its network of 4.2 million CCTV cameras a step further: disembodied recorded voices haranguing errant citizens via loudspeaker. It sounds awful, I know, but every time I visit my home town (one of the 20 towns where the system will be installed) I’m horrified at the behaviour and disregard for public… Read More »
The measure of a society should the simplest one: how it treats its foot-borne citizens. When I lived in Hong Kong a decade ago I remember the continual battle with security guards — Toytown Police, I’d call them — in the mall where my office was. There were precious few places to sit to have… Read More »
Everyone is twittering about Twitter, but I kind of liked this defintion from Leisa Rechelt; “Ambient intimacy”. I like the term, and the piece is definitely worth a read. clipped from www.disambiguity.com Ambient intimacy is about being able to keep in touch with people with a level of regularity and intimacy that you wouldn’t usually… Read More »
I was reading an exchange on a mailing list for a piece of software the other day, where after years of honing the program the developer suddenly faced a mutiny from some of his greatest supporters when it came down to pricing. So I wondered: Just how much are we prepared to pay for software?… Read More »
Traffic is all about rules. But which rules work, and which don’t? A smart planner will always be observing rules and seeing how they might work better. Lifts, for example, have never been optimized for how people organise themselves inside the lift. Buildings will often arrange lines for getting into a lift, but not for what… Read More »