So, having developed these two alternatives, how can we aim for the latter, avoiding the pitfalls of
the former? The key to the more positive outcome is providing the residents in our cities with an
accessible and well-understood information culture, capturing the potential of the advanced
information and communication technologies as they relocate in contemporary culture, rather than
unthinkingly succumbing to their inherent capability for social division.
3.1 Democratic Access
Again, information and communication technologies may enable the last point - effective public
consultation - more effectively than ever before, with elements of electronic democracy enabling
public competitions for architecture and design, and democratising public decision-making. Dick
Hebdige (1989) advocates increased emphasis on public consultation as one of the potential positive
aspects of postmodern theory, particularly postmodern architectural theory. Similarly, Landry and
Bianchini (1995) state in The Creative City that
"participation must be more than just a slogan"[26],
that the effects of participation are more than simply paying dues to a democratic process, but that it creates a sense of ownership and may help instill an element of public belief in the intentions of
policymakers and city governments.
The private sector, such as the retail and marketing trades, have extensive experience in capturing
people's opinions, through digital point-of-sale surveillance as well as other methods of more open
and sophisticated public consultation. If city governments were able to creatively feed off this energy
and expertise in private sector marketing, and reformat those
capabilities into democratising public
decision-making, then the true public consultation recommended by Landry & Bianchini (1995) and
Hebdige (1989) is within reach. If public access terminals become truly ubiquitous within a well-
understood and accepted information culture, citizens views on decisions could be articulated and
polled easily and effectively using information technology, with the perceived benefits suggested
above. Not sensing the dynamics of a marketplace, but sensing the dynamics of sections of society
and culture.
In advocating the use of information technology to enrich public consultation, it should be noted that
there are serious implications here, and that we should not unthinkingly use it as either a token
gesture to 'open government', or at the other end of the scale - to sanction the tyranny of the masses.
There is a brand of libertarian laissez-faire government which can be traced in the popularity of Ross
Perot, Newt Gingrich and in Wired magazine. All advocate
subverting parliamentary democratic process using
'push-button democracy'. Their declared mission is to circumvent the Washington beltway mentality, which supposedly strangles American politics, but with a subtext to cutback on
state welfare and benefits. Umberto Eco, writing about the notion of Ur-Fascism - the fundamental
essence of fascism - has alluded to the Internet as a potentially dangerous tool for presenting a
synthetic 'Voice of the People', as a tool for challenging the legitimacy of parliament, which for Eco
is a sure sign of proto-Fascism[27]. Europe has a
very different political history and culture to the US, and whilst the current incarnation of our political systems are perhaps felt to be out-of-touch, this
imported anti-state stance seems largely irrelevant to democratising British or European political
culture.[28]
However, if we can detect and avoid these potentially dangerous impulses, we may have a method
for enriched public consultation, which will be invaluable in developing our cities.
Having established a potential for more democratic decision-making, what other aspects of public
access to advanced information and communication technologies are there?
Most policymakers discussing access to cyberspace focus on the numbers, or supply-side, issues i.e.
the obvious, tangible issues of the numbers of available PCs on the streets, the pricing structures, the
cables in the ground and so on. There are less tangible components of access that are often
neglected, which importantly coordinate the demand for
information culture. This demand must be stimulated if cyberspace is to become an inclusive public space. These neglected aspects include the
aforementioned potential for public consultation, to enable citizens to have a say on the quality of
access they require, to enrich cultural policy-making for urban regeneration. Furthermore, the
necessity for specialised training is often ignored. Generalised Internet training takes little account of
local difference in social and business communities. This is especially the case with communities
marginalised by the currently limiting cyberculture.
Presently, the most conspicuous public access space in our cities - the cybercafé - highlights further
neglected subtleties of access - the quality of the interface - virtual and physical - between public space
and cyberspace. Also, the effective dislocation of computers from their original image as techno-
scientific calculator, and their relocation within accessible popular culture. And perhaps most
importantly, the need for an supportive creative local environment to develop skills in productive
digital media, incorporating effective training and purpose-built resource spaces.
3.2 Cybercafés and Reimaging the Computer
Cybercafés enable casual surfing - they provide the postmodern flâneur with more avenues to stroll
down, this time constructed from the cold crystalline perfection of logically-ordered data. Cybercafés
do play an important role, that of reimaging the computer: from calculating tool to cultural tool. This
change in perception of personal computers is needed if they are to become acceptable to a wider
culture. My obligatory reference to cyberpunk writer William Gibson isn't in his fiction, but an
observation of his, regarding a public perception of computers. During the 1992 Los Angeles riots,
Gibson noticed that the looters on the streets of LA were taking TVs and stereos from the bountiful
consumer electronics stores, but ignoring a store full of Apple Powerbooks laptop computers next
door. Whilst it is hardly surprising that the looters didn't pause to consider, say, the counter-
hegemonic potential for empowerment embodied in the machines, to be unaware of even the high
cash value they possess indicates how little these machines were actually understood by the average
citizen. More recently, Manchester's City Life listings magazine ran a questionnaire on the Internet
and consumer technology over two issues in April 1995, with a cash incentive for respondents. The
editor, Mike Hill, related that they received only 150 replies, as opposed to other recent
questionnaires on general consumer-related products, which, running in one issue, usually attracted
around 1000 responses. His conclusion was that the average City Life reader is unaware or
uninterested in this technology as consumer products[29]. Why is this? Bearing in mind Mitchell's work on the interface between public space and cyberspace, it may be that even the aesthetic design of the
machine is indirectly obscuring access for some people. At present the PC still bears the stigma of it's
childhood years in the male-dominated, unrepresentative computer industry. For a "quintessentially
postmodern device"[30], the personal computer has
remained strangely 'unstylish' throughout its lifetime. The Independent's design critic Jonathan Glancey writes:
The pricing model of cybercafés is illogical. One effectively pays around £3 (on average) for a service
for half-an-hour of continuous usage, yet is this how these services are best used? The nature of
cyberspace is ephemeral and non-linear - it is something to be skipped-in and -out of on a whim.
The notion of 'doing half-an-hour of cyberspace' is misplaced. The most obvious solution is to not
charge for access and allow people to come and go. The relatively cheap long-term cost of providing
Internet services suggests that this could be feasible, certainly if underwritten by cultural policy-makers
as an initial 'loss-leader'.
Cybercafés are concerned principally with re-imaging the computer within a context of popular
cultural consumption, or enabling the most basic access. Their essential role, despite the column
inches they have generated, is to stimulate curiosity yet they cannot provide a useful space to further
develop the necessary understanding to take the next step from idle consumer to a skilled producer.
They are currently the most visible aspect of public access to cyberspace, yet how much use is this idle
browsing over a cappuccino when compared to the working information culture enabled by, say, a
purpose-built, 24-hour telematics site based in the city centre, but also with equivalents in locations
out of the café-bar zone? The effects of cybercafés alone are likely to privatise cyberspace in favour of
trendy, well-off socialites, perhaps at the expense of people with less cash, but more interesting and
creative ideas for cultural production.
In this city, a more useful model of universal access is being developed, based around the cultural
industries in the Northern Quarter of Manchester city centre.
As part of a long-term regeneration strategy, the Northern Quarter of Manchester city centre is being
promoted as a 'Creative Quarter', an area of cultural production and consumption with an emphasis
on the innovative and experimental. Within this, the Northern Quarter Network project is intended
to capitalise on the creative potential of new technology. This means developing a working
information culture for the cultural industries of the Northern Quarter, in which networked
organisations use email and the Web and so on but also, fundamentally, understand how to
creatively use productive information technology.
The key element is training. The project offers free training as well as free web pages, as a 'loss
leader' in order to develop an initial level of understanding. These are coordinated by the
Manchester Institute for Popular Culture and Manchester Music Network, who have direct
experience and knowledge of technology-use in the cultural industries - experience often lacking in
more generalised training. This initial interest is intended to be developed by a purpose-built
telematics centre, which is envisaged to include facilities for teleworking, accessible welcoming public
access areas, a venue for digital gigs and performance, video-conferencing areas, and training rooms.
This centre is also intended to be complemented by a variety of other access points in the area.
The project is being augmented by the city's evolving information culture which hopes to combine
accessible training, purpose-built public access space in a variety
of locations[32], managed workspace [33],
the reimaging enabled by cybercafés, a strong digital popular culture built on the existing expertise in
the city, widespread access to both narrow-band and broad-band technology, accessible from city-
centre and suburban sites. The Northern Quarter project in particular fits into more holistic strategies
which are intended to develop the networked mixed-use communities and revitalised public spaces
mentioned earlier, which aim to build on the potential of information and communications
technologies, rather than succumb to the latent marginalising and dislocating forces they possess.
So, cyberspace need not spell the end of cities - far from it. The challenge for post-industrial cities is
encapsulated within a quote from the organiser of the Stormy Waters event in Glasgow last July:
Finally, an optimistic quote, again from William Mitchell (1995), which indicates that cities will not
simply sink into a sea of information, ripped apart by the distancing forces of cyberspace: Mitchell
posits that " ... the activity linkages that now hold large urban
agglomerations together"[35] may well be
weakened by some of the effects of technology, however :
[24] STERLING and VIEMEISTER (1993), op cit.,
p.145
BENEDIKT, M. (1992) Cyberspace: First Steps, MIT Press:
Cambridge, MA.
Send email to: d.p.hill@mmu.ac.uk
"I think that momentum in a machine creates drive, the momentum in a fluid creates
turbulence, and technology is a machine, but society is a fluid. The situation that we face
now is that the machine is immersed in the fluid." [24]
Bruce Sterling's quote indicates that computer technology is shifting into the public domain, and how
this shift may have unpredictable results, in his analogy "turbulence means eddies, backwaters, and
niche environments"[25]. How can we use this
turbulence effectively and creatively? How can computers be dislocated effectively from their original image as techno-scientific calculator, and relocated within
accessible popular culture? And how can information technology enhance cultural policymaking for
urban regeneration?
Modernist design principles, based on the planner as expert, on the
obliteration of difference,
rationalising cities, separating their functions into discrete 'zones' (City Centre Research, 1994), led
to disasters in this city such as the infamous Hulme (the ruins are a few hundred yards to the south of
the Institute for Popular Culture, for real cultural tourists) or the soul-destroying Arndale Centre
(which will be crushingly familiar to devotees of the zombie-movie
Dawn of the Dead). If we are to accept the analyses of
contemporary cultural change which posit a postmodern 'age', more useful models are likely to be based on recognising heterogeneity, on acknowledging the relevance of
culture, on creative interpretations of local tradition, on serious public consultation.
"The desktop varieties are the worst offenders. Designers
have the opportunity to shape their wares in any number of different, likable and ergonomic forms. But do they?
Hardly ever. Nearly every desktop computer is ugly, bulky and designed for a robot
rather than a human being. Colours are nasty - the bureaucratic equivalent of magnolia in
the home ... As bland as the office interiors they dominate, desktop computers have
adopted a form that is meant to be discreet and yet, because it is so low-grade, screams
for attention ..."[31]
The desktop PC could essentially be any shape, but quite obviously the PC has been primarily
designed for the office environment. With its emergence in other public and private domains (in
cybercafés, town halls, leisure facilities, living rooms), the functional and aesthetic design of the
common PC, it's software, and the physical space it is accessed from, may need rethinking. Most
intermediaries of the interface between public space and cyberspace pay little attention to this. It may
be that the effect of ignoring this aspect of space is to scare the curious cautious 'cybervirgin' away.
3.3 The Northern Quarter Network
"I have always been fascinated by networks. You can live
in the north of Europe in a politically disenfranchised city and
become the centre of the world for 20 minutes." [34]
Without wishing to demean what was an extremely innovative and successful event, the fact that a
city can be centre of the world illustrates the potential of
cyberspace, yet here it is only for 20 minutes. As the original functions of post-industrial cities fade, in this case, Glasgow's ship-building
rusting away, and the city is relocated within an information economy, how is it to feed its citizens
by a 20 minute gaze from some portion of the world's cybertourists? The post-industrial city must
seriously think through the implications of the information society. Its repositioning from industrial
space to cyberspace must mean more than privileged
flâneurs
browsing the Web in café-bars. Its spatial representation in information must comprise ubiquitous access for its citizens within a skilled
information-based local economy and popular culture if it is to avoid becoming a virtual ghetto and a
physical ghost-town - a black hole in a digital universe.
"there is no reason to think that this novel condition will make us indifferent to our
immediate surroundings or suddenly eliminate our desire for face-to-face human contact
in congenial settings. We will still care about where we are, and we will still want
company. So cities ... will probably find opportunities to restructure themselves - to
regroup housing, workplaces, and service facilities into reinvigorated small-scale
neighborhoods ... that are effectively nourished by strong electronic links to a wider
world, but simultaneously prize their differences from other places, their local
institutions and hangouts, and their unique ambiences and customs."
[36]
Perhaps this is a possible future for our cities, that we can
find new ways of revitalising the physical city by building on the productive potential of the virtual city, and through the inherent flexibility of
cyberspace enabling fluid use of city-centre space. That well-understood and carefully implemented
models of public access hold the key to finding a new role for our postindustrial cities in an
information society.
[25] Ibid., p.145
[26] LANDRY and BIANCHINI (1995), op cit., p.25
[27] 'Pointing a finger at the fascists', Umberto Eco,
The Guardian, 19 August 1995
[28]For readers interested in pursuing the implications of technology for democracy,
Charles Raab at Edinburgh University is doing excellent work on definitions of democracy and the possible
effects of advanced information and communications technologies. And for those interested in critiques of
Wired's ideologies and of the influences on American
cyberculture in general, an excellent place to start is 'The Pinnochio Theory', an essay by Richard Barbrook of
the HyperMedia Research Centre at the University of Westminster -
available from their website at http://www.hrc.wmin.ac.uk/
[29] From personal phone conversation with Mike Hill,
10:45am, 28 June 1995
[30] From publicity material for the 'Anti*Rom' CD-ROM by SASS multimedia collective.
[31] 'Take me on a flight of fancy' by Jonathan Glancey,
The Independent, 10 July 1995
[32] Such as the innovative Electronic Village Halls
positioned around the city and the existing cybercafes, such as Dry
Bar and Atlas Bar, for complementary support.
[33] Such as the project led by the Idea@Mcr1 consortium
for a city-centre building of managed workspaces for cultural industries
(potentially also in the Norhern Quarter).
[34] 'Glasgow's hi-tech gig Nets a worldwide audience',
The Observer, 23 July 1995
[35] MITCHELL (1995), p.170
[36] Ibid., p.170
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Dan Hill
Manchester Institute for Popular Culture, Manchester Metropolitan University, Oxford Road,
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