Metapolis and Urban Life

The city has always been a site of cultural, social and physical transformation, on scales from the most personal to the most collective. However, with the rise of the “metapolis” [3, 4] and the issues it brings with it, 24/7 rush hours, the conversion of public space to commercial space, the rise of surveillance, transnational neighborhoods, polyvocal politics and architecture etc. the contemporary city is weighted down. We can no longer technologically or socially be constrained by something planned and canned, like another confectionary spectacle. We dream of something more, something that can respond to our dreams. Something that will transform with us, not just perform change on us, like an operation. The metapolis requires individual, social and technological interaction. As the field of wireless and locative technologies matures, this workshop is interested in exploring a more enduring relationship between the physical and cultural multicity and its digital topographies. This workshop asks the question what might an authentic or native digital/physical relationship be? Authentic to whom? How can these be considered within the hybrid space emerging from the interaction between digital and physical practices? This workshop seek to understand alternative trajectories for digital and wireless technologies while building definitions of place and practice in both physical and digital terms, as well investigating their interaction, influence, disruption, expansion and integration with the social and material practices of our public urban spaces.