5 Ways The Smart City Will Change How We Live In 2012

‘A city’s infrastructure is comprised of a number of systems, including transportation, sewage, utility, and public and private buildings. Urbanization and proliferation of these systems are key to quality of life, but also create a significant toll on the sustainability, energy efficiency and capacity level of a city. Smarter buildings technologies can help the government make it possible to better “listen” to the abundance of information emitted from buildings. This includes thousands, if not millions, of data points produced each week from a proliferation of embedded technologies in data centers, water delivery systems, heating and air-conditioning, security devices, and office equipment.’

Read more about Co.Exist’s 5 top trends for smarter cities

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Digital Urban Renewal

Retro-fitting existing cities with smart solutions is the urban challenge of the 21st century

New tools created by the ICT industry have the potential to help city governments address the growing range of challenges that they are facing. However, the tools themselves are not a “silver bullet” that will solve urban problems in one stroke. Deploying them will require a new discipline of digital urban renewal and a philosophy that incorporates both political leadership and open collaboration.

via humanscalecities:

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Lansing, Michigan - a rising technology powerhouse

I have lived in Lansing for 30 years and have watched recently change from an aging, auto centric area to one of the most thriving dynamic incubators for new technology!  With its cost of living relatively inexpensive compared to either coast Lansing is rapidly becoming THE place for new enterprises.

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infoneernet: A peek into the future Of all the predictions made during the future-happy 1950s — when it was declared we’d soon have flying cars, robot butlers, rocket-delivered mail and food made from wood pulp — there was one forward-looking statement that was completely validated. It was delivered by Criswell, a self-described soothsayer and TV personality, who said, “We are all interested in the future, for that is where you and I are going to spend the rest of our lives.” Otherwise, predicting the future, certainly in the realm of technology, is a risky endeavor. Seen at The Los Angeles Times

infoneernet:

A peek into the future

Of all the predictions made during the future-happy 1950s — when it was declared we’d soon have flying cars, robot butlers, rocket-delivered mail and food made from wood pulp — there was one forward-looking statement that was completely validated.

It was delivered by Criswell, a self-described soothsayer and TV personality, who said, “We are all interested in the future, for that is where you and I are going to spend the rest of our lives.”

Otherwise, predicting the future, certainly in the realm of technology, is a risky endeavor.

Seen at The Los Angeles Times

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Technology Gap

infoneernet:

Professors think they are doing reasonably well when it comes to using technology in the classroom, according to a survey released here this week by CDW-G at the annual meeting of Educause. Not everyone agrees with the faculty view of things. Consider these statistics from nationally representative samples of students and faculty members (at two- and four-year institutions, public and private). Asked about their use and their institutions’ support for technology, professors said the following:

  • 75 percent said that their institution “understands how they use or want to use technology.”

  • 67 percent are happy with their own technology professional development.

  • 74 percent said that they incorporate technology into every class or almost every class.

  • 64 percent said that they teach in what they consider to be a smart classroom.

Sounds like a technology savvy professoriate. But when students were asked whether their professors understand technology and have integrated it into their courses, only 38 percent said Yes. Further, when students were asked about the top impediment to using technology, the top answer was “lack of faculty technology knowledge,” an answer that drew 45 percent of respondents, up from 25 percent only a year ago.

And only 32 percent of students said that they believed their college was adequately preparing them to use technology in their careers.

Seen at Inside Higher Ed

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