Martin Brynskov: Thank you, Manu, Tobias and Han, for giving us your initial shot (across the bow?) at what Urban Interaction design is and can be as a field, and how you personally and professionally feel related to it.
Manu focuses on the confluence of fields, letting new agents into the processes of making cities, essentially saying that we're all city makers. Tobias, in a similar vein, characterizes the ways of urban ixd'ers as "cajoling, goading, occasionally provoking responses" towards a "healthy cross-contamination and inter-breeding of tools and ideas". And Han trumpets the pirates' fanfare and hopes that urban ixd "can rise above the fray of a single design language or singular solution to the urban challenges."
In short, and unreasonably condensed.
Hearing these quite positive characterizations, indicating both the need for urban ixd and contours of thoughtful mobilization, I would like to ask of you where you see the flipside of this trajectory. What is missing? Certainly the rhetoric may rub against some established professions and, rightfully, earned positions within the processes of urban planning and architizing. Where are the urban planners? The artists? We the people, the policy makers? Are we all here?
How would you, reflecting on the responses in this conversation, point to challenges within the field of urban interaction design moving ahead?
This post is part of the online conversation about urban interaction design: June 2014