// DATABANK - 'PANDEMONIUM: THE RISE OF PREDATORY LOCALES IN THE POST-WAR WORLD' [B. HOOKWAY, 2000]

Buildings and infrastructure, as shapers of the urban milieu, have been superseded by a state of so-called ‘pandemonia’ - the superimposition of cybernetic principles upon the organisation, regulation and control of urban space. For those who cling to the ordered variations of the city plans of the recent past, today’s metropolis is utterly chaotic. Bandwidth has replaced the boulevard, and commuting has given way to the mouse click. After thousands of years of blocks held by mortar, the contemporary city is now stitched together by new modes of communication and control.

> The Three Ages of the Machine

Following the Industrial Revolution, society has advanced through the First and Second machine ages [mechanical and electrical respectively]. During these phases, machines developed from simple mechanical tools to fully electrified tools, and the human-machine relationship remained primarily recurrent and linear in nature, and was based rigidly upon processes of usage and action. 

+ Pandemonium - the three ages of the machine [CTW 2010]

According to Deleuze and Guattari, society has recently entered a third phase in its industrialisation trajectory, their so-called ‘Third Age of the Machine’, in which human-machine systems have now become non-linear [or cybernetic] in nature, replacing the previous non-reversible relation during the First and Second ages. The connection between the human and the machine is now based upon internal, mutual communication, and is no longer driven by processes of usage and action. The ‘Third Age’ has come to dominate all industrial landscapes, particularly in the continuous-process manufacturing and information technology industries.

> The Human + The Industrial Machine

The liberation of information-processing techniques from the human worker began in industry in the 1970s, via the adoption of ‘flexible specialisation’. Previously, Fordist semi-automated assembly lines operated through the resonance of the rhythms of labour and production processes, in such a manner as to enable production routines to be easily quantified and repeated. The advent of cybernetic machines severed this labour-production / human-machine interface – now, the worker has been entirely assimilated into a cybernetically-directed and controlled matrix of production. The human and the machine have been spliced together, and both now function as reciprocal agents within contemporary production environments. As production has become increasingly automated, a deep divide has been created within the workforce. On the one hand, there are the highly skilled engineers and systems analysts who direct, control and maintain complex industrial machinery. However, on the other hand, there are the masses of unskilled workers, whose sole economic asset is their geographic mobility. As a result, a major issue has arisen from the arrival of cybernetic production:  is the worker now forever destined to be either a controller of flux, or to merely become a controlled element of flux?

> The Human + The Information Machine

The organisational and bureaucratic criteria of information environments were subjected to reconsideration in an abstract form in order to free flows of information, which resulted in corresponding transformation to their spatial manifestation. The resulting environment was then recast as a dynamic processing machine, in which variations in the physical environment were shaped by communication flows, and the hierarchical organisation of control began to evolve. The decentralisation of control is seen as a more sophisticated organisational paradigm to a centralised system. With the information age came a new type of office collective, the Burolandschaft, which accommodated the fresh need for greater fluidity in information processing, and a desire to free production from top-down control. Yet a strict level of control is nevertheless implemented, via the creation of an environment of peer-surveillance, in which the work environment has become all-encompassing and relentless. Burolandschaft attempted to embed workers within the process, to act like the parts of a machine as nodes for communication flow. Hierarchy within the information production environment is no longer linear but can now be defined by non-linear networks – the office has become performative.

+ Pandemonium - cybernetic systems [image courtesy of Tim Marjot 2010]

> A Cybernetic Urbanism?

The city, as a complex entity in a perpetual state of flux, has been transformed as a result of the assimilation of cybernetic principles into all aspects of the urban network. Non-linear control organisation, responsive environments in industry and information technologies, and the mergence of the human and the machine; these relatively new concepts are still evolving, and as such will serve to further transform the city, and the architectural theory and practice that creates it. Perhaps, the main task facing architecture in the ‘cybernetic age’ is to accommodate this doctrine through the adaptation of existing urban infrastructures, whilst simultaneously limiting the negative by-products of societal fragmentation and cultural triviality. The traditional dynamics of the city have been irreversibly altered by the integration of cybernetic principles into the fields of design, production and information, particularly when coupled with the increasingly pervasive new digitised ‘global network culture’ we are witnessing. The future prospect of a widespread new ‘cybernetic urbanism’ is a realistic possibility indeed.

// DATABANK - 'A NEW PHILOSOPHY OF SOCIETY' [M, DE LANDA, 2006]

In ‘A New Philosophy of Society’, De Landa explores Deleuze’s investigations into assemblage theory, and postulates that it could be utilised to model the connections and complex, multi-layered interactivity between social entities, from basic inter-personal networks, to government organisations, cities and nations. This, ultimately, could give rise to a more socially-informed urban design methodology, which could have massive benefits for the functioning of the world’s cities. It is in essence, a further branch into philosophical and scientific studies into non-linearity and complex systems.

> Assemblage Theory: In a Nutshell

The book sees De Landa piecing together the scattered work of Deleuze and his theory of assemblages. Basically, De Landa sets out the form of all physical and virtual entities, that being non-linear assemblages of components, which are the outcome of specific historical evolutionary processes. [These components are often themselves assemblages, existing at a smaller spatio-temporal scale]. De Landa explains the central concept of ‘territorialisation’ as that which relates to the extent of homogeneity or heterogeneity of a given assemblage’s internal components, which result in a more or less stable assemblage. The non-linear aspect is in relation to the fact that all assemblages contain built-in feedback loops once they cross a critical complexity threshold – a cybernetic function which enables assemblages to react back upon its constituent components. The notion of non-linear causality, that of “same cause, same effect, always”, is being increasingly discarded in the face of the increasing complexity within contemporary science and society, due to its inability to adequately model systems accurately. De Landa’s hope is that with this insight into how complex systems operate and interact with one another, perhaps the highly complex, yet often misunderstood entity, modern society, could be more effectively understood, modelled, and where necessary, redesigned.

> The Cybernetic City

Throughout the course of the book De Landa highlights the benefits of, and potential application, of assemblage theory in studying and illuminating the connections between various levels of social networks and entities in urban studies. An understanding of the complex interactions and processes that combine to generate an entity called ‘society’ has obvious benefits for the would-be urban designer seeking to understand the collective he is designing for. The internal functioning of society ultimately impacts upon its external environment, namely the city, hence its relevance to the overall study into the future of the city. De Landa elucidates the non-linear, cybernetic functioning of assemblages upon their component parts, and this is indicative of the nature of assemblages’ part-to-whole relations and interactions. These result in non-linear, emergent properties and/or assemblages, whereas whole-to-part interactions react back to affect future successive emergence. This dual-direction cyberneticism is mirrored in the relationship between society and the city, each reacting back upon each other to produce emergent results, due to the interactivity of their respective assemblages.

+ A New Philosophy of Society - network society diagram [from 'Digital META_CITY' CTW 2010]

> The City Assembled

De Landa eventually applies assemblage theory to the city. In his view, the city is composed of countless internal components, each of varying heterogeneity and material manifestation, physicality and expressivity, and including social actors and agents, buildings, infrastructures, organisations and institutions. De Landa postulates that the city’s spatial form is the result of recurrent social rhythms over time, the connections and interactivity processes of these internal components and assemblages. De Landa also shows the processes of territorialisation and de-territorialisation to be a critical factor in the spatial form of the city, in terms of social, cultural and economic distribution of people, resources and infrastructures. Congregation and segregation are thus two methods of increasing the internal homogeneity of a given physical locale, whereas two examples of increasing the internal heterogeneity [de-territorialisation] of an urban region would be increased geographical mobility and land rent impact upon land usage. Perhaps, given the exponential increase in urban complexity over the past few decades, assemblage theory has role to play in the design of the future society and city. Due to its ability to operate in a non-linear manner without having to make the traditional sacrifice when modelling complex systems, that of multi-layered complex interactivity, assemblage theory has the potential to infiltrate urban design theory and practice, just as it has done with other fields of design - the future of the city is unmistakably complex and ultimately cybernetic.

// DATABANK - 'NEUROMANCER' [W. GIBSON, 1984]

When it comes to envisioning the future, those individuals who are free to dream quite often make the most farsighted prophets. It is in the arena of science fiction that the original vocabulary of a new virtual, digitised urbanity is to be found. Moreover, it has quite often provided a much more accurate depiction of possible urban futures, with authors acting as ‘cyber-prophets’, when compared with the scientific and architectural establishment. Science fiction literature, in particular cyberpunk, throughout the twentieth century, has acted as a very real catalyst in the technological pursuits of the real world; new concrete scientific developments which are arriving ever more quickly on the heels of phantasmal science fiction.

> Digital Dystopia

Quite possibly the most frequently cited example of a fictional urban condition becoming increasingly relevant in the studies of contemporary society is that of the science fiction classic ‘Neuromancer’, by William Gibson. This seminal book was the novel that first coined the term ‘cyberspace’ back in 1984, as well as, rather prophetically, the concept of the arrival of a fully digitally-mediated society. The phrase ‘cyberspace’ was used to describe a virtual construct, within which exists a parallel virtual world of limitless potential, unrestricted by the limitations of the physical world. Cyberterrorism, genetic violence, cybernetic engineering and a dystopian world dominated by a singular digital virtual construct, controlled by a malevolent and mechanically ruthless artificial intelligence, potentially a logical evolution of our own contemporary military-industrial complex; the novel foresees a subjugated human future increasingly fused with, and ultimately controlled by, technology – a digital dystopia and one with the machine taking primacy over the human. The entire novel sees Gibson describe this new digital dystopia; a dystopia laced with veiled warnings concerning the current technological trajectories of the information age.

> Cyberspace: An Urban Reality

The concept of a globally connected virtual construct, a network that is totally ubiquitous and pervasive, and one which controls the future trajectories of that society is a frighteningly similar concept to the condition which pervades contemporary society. Visually, Gibson likens ‘the Matrix’ to the city, which is not unusual given that the city itself is a hive of information and communication infrastructures, and the centre of the vast majority of all human activity. Clearly, he perceived the human future as an urban one, within a domain dominated by an oppressive, highly complex, cybernetic network of sentient technological agents. All of these themes have understandably found renewed resonance in the study of today’s current social climate of pervasive digital networks.

> A Warning from Cyberspace?

Undoubtedly Gibson’s ‘Matrix’ construct bears a startling resemblance to our own internet construct, although admittedly with a much more militant and oppressive intensity. Perhaps the ‘Matrix’ is the logical result of the development of the contemporary internet, foremost of our global digital networks? This may seem somewhat fanciful but when one considers the fact that the internet’s humble origins began as a military experiment with strategic communications networks, perhaps society should take note of Gibson’s warnings and take care when steering the future evolution of our global virtual networks. As with all technological development, the results can be helpful or hazardous – an excellent example would be that of the internal combustion engine, which provided mobility, and relatively reliable, cheap mechanical power, but also produced congestion, pollution and of course, the car crash. The question for the urban planner is ultimately; will the increasing virtualisation of urban metabolisms be helpful or hazardous to the evolution of the city?

// THE DIGITAL DERIVE

+ The Digital Derive - Wii-mote

This project, currently getting off the ground, is called 'The Digital Derive' and it is a digitally-mediated evolution of the original derive of the Situationist International movement. It is being developed as a system for measuring and mapping the extent to which the city contains potential obstacles for pedestrians' freedom of movement. The methodology has been developed in collaboration with three other MSA students [Nasar Ishfaq, Tim Marjot and Graeme Mill] and a London-based interactive designer [Pablo de la Pena]. The initial feedback regarding the methodology has been very positive, although the application of the methodology, its translation into an experiment into an aspect of urban control, will require some refining. However, the system shall be developed over the weeks to come, with the experiment being tested in Manchester this week, and officially online in Huddersfield next week.

The following is an extract from our first presentation of the system, explaining the concept and methodology of the Digital Derive:

[U]RBAN [M]OVEMENT [A]ND [C]ONTROL_The Digital Derive

METHODOLOGY

'An investigation into how urban control devices impact upon pedestrian movement within 'public' urban spaces.'

+ Historical Context_The Analogue Derive

The Situationist International, formed in 1957, developed criticisms of contemporary urbanism & postulated upon possible urban futures. They viewed the city as the principal location for the creation & maintenance of social interactions of domination, as spaces of alienation & control. For the S.I., the city was a highly contested territory, both politically & socially. They attempted to investigate the city via radical forms of geographical action & research, in an effort to instigate urban transformation. The S.I. viewed the city as a tool for asserting political oppression & control, & it worked towards the revolutionary aim of realigning urban society towards a participatory society.

The maps produced by the S.I. counter rigidly-functional urban plans, by suggesting alternate routes & passages through a fluid city. Derives, the name given to the process through which they wandered the city producing their maps, and often carried out during periods of extensive inebriation, were seen as more significant than the destination, & were seen as an alternative method to immerse oneself in the city & comprehend & synchronise oneself with its flows & rhythms. Debord’s maps embody a subversive attitude towards representations of the city, and they question notions of temporal & spatial orientation in their quest for future urban potentials.

+ Concept_The Digital Derive

The Urban Movement and Control system may be utilised within any urban space.  Using a defined geo-spatial boundary [250m² ], based upon a geographic grid reference system [based upon the Ordnance Survey National Grid Reference already in place], UMAC provides an objective, scientific, digital and non-place-specific means of investigating the influence of urban control devices upon pedestrians, via a mapping of their movement within public urban space. This is in complete contrast to the entirely subjective nature of the derives of the S.I., which were based upon notions of desire and individual decision making. UMAC is based upon a system of cybernetic direction determinants, consisting of a set of strict rules governing human movement – it is the logical digital evolution of the analogue psychogeographic theory.

+ The Digital Derive - process diagram [CTW 2010]

+ Process

Pedestrian movement is recorded and tracked simultaneously via three separate but connected devices. Firstly, the pedestrian’s location is tracked and recorded using a GPS-enabled iPhone, which recorded the geo-spatial location of the pedestrian for the duration of the experiment [the x- and y-axes]. Secondly, the acceleration of the pedestrian is measured using the accelerometer within the Wii-Mote device [the z-axis]. Both the iPhone and Wii-Mote are connected to a MacBook laptop, via Bluetooth, for the duration of the experiment, constantly streaming live data into a database. Thirdly, the entire experiment will be recorded using a video camera. This will enable a detailed cross-referencing between the movement data gathered and the nature of the physical space itself. The database, containing all the data pertaining to the pedestrian’s movement, can then be utilised to generate graphical representations of the information.

+ Cybernetic Rules

In order to ensure that the experiment is carried out in an objective and scientific manner, a set of arbitrary rules is required to eliminate the necessity for human cognition and decision-making. The essence of this experiment is to empower the space, and let it determine how the pedestrian navigates his/her environment. The rules are exclusively aimed at movement direction, and if a decision is required relating to a change of direction, a Random-Direction-Indicator system will provide the decision. The RDI is based upon a random output generator script, within Maya parametric modelling software. By removing human interference it is hoped that the experiment will provide ‘clean’ data, uncorrupted by the whims of human desire or resentment. The rule set is as follows:

01_You must stick to defined pedestrian paths.

02_You must always obey the Random-Direction-Indicator.

03_You cannot re-trace your footsteps.  If you are instructed to do so, re-consult the Random-Direction-Indicator.

04_Upon encountering a control mechanism you must pause for 30 seconds and relocate to the opposite edge of defined path/space and continue in the same direction.

05_Upon encountering a grid-boundary, you must stop, relocate to the opposite edge of defined path/space, turn around and continue.

06_Dead-ends must be treated as grid-boundary edges.

07_If there is no option to turn, move perpendicularly from the obstacle.

+ Urban Control Devices

CATEGORY 1_ Pedestrian/Vehicular Interface - [signage, markings]

CATEGORY 2_ Physical Mechanisms - [surface treatments, level changes]

CATEGORY 3_ Boundary Mechanisms - [signage, fencing, surveillance devices]

+ The Digital Derive - Wii-mote data capture

+ Data Capturing Equipment

_Smartphone [with GPS] - To provide locational data and map the route taken through each 250m² area

_Wii-Mote [with inbuilt accelerometer] - To provide data of acceleration and movement

_MacBook [with Bluetooth connectivity, DarwiinRemote software, Processing software and Random-Direction-Indicator scripting] - To record data directly from the accelerometer and host the Random-Direction-Indicator

_Video Camera - To record the physical experience and to allow for the effective comparison of data

+ The Digital Derive - GPS tracking test screenshot

+ Output

Having recorded the data from the GPS tracker and the accelerometer, computer software will then be utilised to collate the masses of numerical data, and effectively re-interpret them as simple graphs. These simplistic graphs will form the basis of more complex methods of representation and visualisation techniques. The analysis and representation of the data generated will provide a platform for the comparison of city spaces, in terms of the impact particular urban control devices have upon pedestrian movement, and will illustrate the extent of urban control within the prescribed zones.

PRACTICE

+ Experiment Zones

Segments within Manchester city centre will be used as a test zones.  Chosen for their geographical proximity and programmatic nature, the segments chosen are within Manchester’s Spinningfields and Northern Quarter districts.  Although these segments are only 1km apart, they are programmatically very different. The defined boundaries for these two zones have been determined by the OS geographical grid reference system, and as such can be easily catalogues and cross-referenced with other forms of geographical data.

[Further updates shall be posted in due course as this project develops into a fully-fledged methodology for studying the impact urban control devices have upon physical mobility in the city.] 

// DIGITAL META_CITY

+ Digital META_CITY - dissertation front cover visual

This is an extract from my dissertation produced during 2009/10, entitled the ‘Digital META_CITY’, in which I explore the rise of the virtual urban metabolism, and its architectural, social and cultural impact about the city. It represents a deeper study into issues surrounding the escalating ubiquity and pervasiveness of digital infrastructures and their increasing assimilation into every facet of urban life.

>> Abstract

Contemporary society is in the midst of a massive upheaval; an upheaval of a comparable scale to that of the industrial revolution. Social injustice, poverty, resource depletion, ecological devastation, congestion, terrorism, coupled with the relatively new concepts of ubiquitous instantaneous telecommunications, globally networked economies and institutions, and pervasive mass media; the city as we knew it is rapidly transforming, and the impact of these issues upon the spatial configuration and architectural expression of the city has been considerable.

Society is currently engaged in an evolutionary progression from the industrial age, and as a result, today’s cities are witnessing the formation of an increasing chasm between physical urban processes, mostly dating from the industrial age, and the newly digitised virtual urban processes of the information age.

This state of events is by no means unusual, however. Throughout the ages, society has always been a dynamic evolving entity, with the city, the principal manifestation of human civilisation, acting as the focal point for progression. Ever since the first cities, there has always existed within their internal workings, the potential for conflict between their physical and virtual urban metabolisms. Virtual in this sense refers to dematerialised processes, including the flow of information, cultural symbols or even political power, as opposed to physical processes such as agriculture, energy generation or transportation.

These ‘Analogue Cities’ have undergone spectacular collapses in the past as a direct result of urban metabolic segregation, and a failure to comprehend the importance of maintaining symbiotic connections between physical and virtual processes. The significance of this issue for the contemporary city is exacerbated by the sheer scale of today’s virtual urban metabolisms, and the global power, ubiquity and pervasiveness of the networks within which they operate.

The city is now being infiltrated and consumed by mass digitisation and the rise of the virtual urban metabolism. Urban designers and architects now have the opportunity to engage with the re-modelling of the city, to cast off its predominantly negative industrial age legacy, and embrace the potential of the information age future.

>> Aim

In the twenty first century, the city is confronted with a wide range of issues concerning its physical and virtual processes. Local and global network connectivity, societal inequality, economic instability and political volatility; all pose questions to the would-be urban designer – to what extent has the rise of the virtual urban metabolism transformed the city, and what impact has the digital transformation had upon architecture? How do we assess the impact upon the city of the digitisation of the built environment, in the hope of facilitating and directing future transformations that are required to ensure the functioning of the modern city during the transition into the information age, and its evolution beyond?

The answer to this predicament is an elusive one indeed. A grasp of the complexities of the city’s relationship between its physical and increasingly pervasive virtual metabolisms, and its ever-more significant digitised local-global functioning, is critical. Only with a solid understanding of these connections and processes within the urban domain, and the impact of the rise of virtual urban metabolism upon the urban fabric and architecture, can the true extent of urban transformation due to digitisation be known.

This dissertation will elucidate the impact of the virtual urban metabolism upon the city, and will demonstrate how the future of the city is reliant upon an urbanism that attempts to integrate its physical and virtual processes, via the re-conceptualisation of the city as a metabolic entity. Such a new approach to urbanism could result in a city that thrives economically, technologically, culturally and socially, through an in-depth understanding of its internal processes, and the symbiosis of its physical and virtual metabolisms – the Digital Meta-CITY.

>> Methodology

The dissertation will begin with The Metabolic City, in which the city, as the materialised form of numerous components and processes [or metabolisms] within human civilisation, will be de-constructed as a metabolic entity to illustrate the internal workings of its physical and virtual urban metabolisms. This section will also include a broad, but brief, sweep of the historical evolution of the city as a metabolic entity. The purpose of this is to provide a level of clarity, [beyond the metaphors and analogies often utilised to conceptualise the city], for viewing the city as an amalgamation and concentration of metabolic processes within complex physical and virtual networks. The digitisation of the flows of wealth, power and information within the city, and the rise of the virtual metabolism, in particular its two most influential networks, [that of the mobile phone and the internet], will also be explored. It is hoped that, having illuminated the metabolic evolution of the city and highlighted the recent prevalence of the virtual over the physical metabolism, that the question of the impact upon the city brought about via digital transformation can now be examined in more detail – has digital transformation ultimately had a positive or negative effect upon our urban evolutionary trajectory? And will the potential future intensification of urban digitisation have similar results?

A study of the urban landscape as a Digital Dystopia will be undertaken in the second section of this dissertation. The negative aspects of the digital transformation of the city are numerous but often veiled, and as such they shall be analysed in detail. Issues concerning the segregation of physical and virtual urban metabolisms, the divergent dual local-global functioning of the city, the new social and economic dilemmas due to increased connectivity, and the spatial consequences of the aforementioned will be examined.

To give a balanced perspective of the digital transformation of the city, in part three, the city as a Digital Utopia will be explored. The positive impacts of the digital transformation of the city are often somewhat more conspicuous than the negative, but they shall also be studied in detail. Issues concerning the symbiosis of physical and virtual urban metabolisms, the convergence of the dual local-global functioning of the city, the new social and economic advantages due to increased connectivity, and the spatial developments as a result of these issues will be examined.

In the final section, The Digital Meta-CITY, all of the fundamental issues discussed throughout the dissertation will be reviewed. Conclusions shall be drawn and speculations made concerning the impact of the rise of the virtual urban metabolism and to what extent it has transformed the city. During the course of this section, a tentative proposal for a new approach to urbanism and architecture shall take shape, the aim of which is to provide a useful structure upon which to model existing urban landscapes, and to guide the future transformation of the Analogue City into the Digital Meta-CITY. An important point worth noting is that the objective of this proposal is to construct a theoretical framework to aid the materialisation of a vast array of urban potentials within existing cities, rather than prescribe a physical spatial form – an open process of urban metabolic symbiosis, as opposed to a closed, spatially deterministic urban plan. An urbanism based upon the symbiosis of physical and virtual urban processes, within a metabolic conceptualisation of the city, may facilitate humanity’s transition into the information age and safely beyond into the unknown urban future.