What Is An Appropriate Strategy For Mid-Sized Cities?

Wednesday, this week, there was a conference in Puerto Rico, on “The Role of Cities in a Global Economy”.  The New York Fed Bank, in part, played a role in the conference and suggested that I be invited to speak because of my work on economic growth.

The conference materials had a predisposition toward cluster strategy; “agglomeration” was a frequently used term.  Along with this predisposition, there was a feeling that metropolitan regions should learn from the past successes of cities like New York. 

So I first raised what I thought was the big open question: how should a place like Puerto Rico (and its San Juan metropolitan area) advance the economic well being of its residents?  

While New York succeeded in the industrial age because it had the largest agglomeration of resources, this does not mean that Puerto Rico should try to imitate such a large metro area now.  

Rather than trying to “win the last war”, there is an opportunity for Puerto Rico to find a leading role in the future economy by not playing according to industrial era rules.  At least some of Puerto Rico’s economic strategy should focus on this future.

Other speakers and interesting insights:

  • Carlo Ratti, Director of MIT Senseable City, expanded the vision to include Public Participation 2.0 and reminded people again that when technology becomes ubiquitous it becomes invisible and most useful.
  • Martin Fleming, Chief Economist of IBM, recommended that cities decide what brand their city should be and then go about implementing that brand.  (Of course, I liked this statement since I’ve told mayors that they have to start thinking about themselves as brand managers, who need to understand market segmentation.  Everyone does not agree on what is the ideal quality of urban life, so find what your city can offer best and that becomes part of your brand.)
  • Anthony Townsend, Research Director of the Institute of the Future, talked about clusters forming the foundation for economic growth – but innovation clusters.  This is not about the traditional one-industry physical clusters, but instead about networks of creative people.

The conference brought together many of the thought leaders about the future of cities and it was also inspiring to see an audience that intends to act upon what they learned to leapfrog their economy.

© 2012 Norman Jacknis

[http://njacknis.tumblr.com/post/36808228839/what-is-an-appropriate-strategy-for-mid-sized-cities]

Will Higher Education Repeat The History Of Theaters?

According to various reports,  universities are beginning to take serious notice of MOOCs – massive open online courses.  See, for example, the New York Times article “The Year of the MOOC” at http://www.nytimes.com/2012/11/04/education/edlife/massive-open-online-courses-are-multiplying-at-a-rapid-pace.html

Nearly every university administrator and many professors that I talk to realize there is a potential sea change occurring in higher education.  There is, of course, tremendous uncertainty as to where this is all leading – and a hope that, wherever it leads, these folks will retire before they have to go there.

One possible analogy to the problem facing higher education is to compare it to the challenge faced by theater in the 19th century.  During that period, every city of any consequence had one or more theaters that were the venue for actors, singers and other live performers.  

Then along came recorded music and the movies and ultimately television.  Those technological innovations made it possible to deliver performances from the best actors and singers without requiring them to be physically present in each city.  In addition, the revenue that this form of recorded entertainment could generate was much greater than that of any local live theater.  Movie and record companies used that extra revenue to provide “production values” and elaborate staging that isn’t possible in the local live theater.

The result: most of those live stage theaters disappeared or were converted into movie theaters.  Now, technology makes it possible to deliver on a large scale at least that part of a college education that consists of watching a professor deliver lectures in front of a classroom.  Again, it is unlikely that the local university or college will be able to match this global delivery or the “production values” that could enhance these online courses.

Of course, we still have Broadway (plus a few successful regional theaters).   So too there will be Harvard, MIT, Princeton, Stanford and the like.  But most colleges may find it increasingly difficult to justify their continued existence using the current approach.

One significant barrier that has been holding back this transformation is that colleges have had the combined responsibility of both delivering an education to their students and certifying that their students mastered that education (i.e., they provide college degrees).  If that connection starts to break and there can be an independent respected institution that would certify whether someone has mastered a topic, we will see lots more experimentation and rapid change in higher education.

Thus it is interesting that in today’s New York Times there appeared an article “Free Online Courses to Be Evaluated for Possible College Credit” at  http://www.nytimes.com/2012/11/14/education/moocs-to-be-evaluated-for-possible-college-credit.html   The report notes that the the American Council on Education (higher education association) and Coursera (a MOOC consortium of thirty three universities, including Stanford and Princeton) will be evaluating whether to offer college credits for MOOC courses.  Another MOOC consortium, EdX, already provides a certificate of completion.

The change is starting to accelerate.

© 2012 Norman Jacknis

[http://njacknis.tumblr.com/post/35703961387/will-higher-education-repeat-the-history-of-theaters]

Smart Highways?

[Note: with the long power outage in the New York area due to the storm Sandy and the US elections, my blogging time has been limited, so here’s a short post …]

There has been lots of interesting work on making cars smarter, including self-driving cars for the future, cars that can follow a leader creating a sort of train of cars, all sorts of technology built into cars that are sold today, etc.  

But a Dutch designer, Daan Roosegaarde, is instead focusing on increasing the intelligence and technology built into the highway itself.  His concepts include:

  • Glow-in-the-Dark Road that provides extra illumination
  • Dynamic Paint that portrays the true condition of the road surface by showing an image of the danger, for example ice crystals
  • Interactive Light, Induction Priority Lane and Wind Light which provide sustainable solutions to lighting and other roadway needs.

You can learn more at http://www.studioroosegaarde.net/project/smart-highway/info/  

© 2012 Norman Jacknis

[http://njacknis.tumblr.com/post/35269958259/smart-highways]