The Smart City is dead. Long live the Smart Citizen.
As a regular reader of Recurrent Patterns, you’ll know my philosophy: technology should be our servant, not our master. It always should help people in their lives.
A timely example comes from one area of technology that’s close to my heart: Smart Cities.
Cisco CEO Chuck Robbins has some news on this front: ‘Cisco Systems Pulls Back From Smart City Push’.
Why did they make this decision? Because cities never really had any money to spend on these projects (or even to fix all the potholes). Soon, when all the federal, provincial and state stimulus money ends, cities will have to really rethink their priorities.
Cisco could have pulled the plug on that initiative a long time ago. It would have saved tons of money.
I’ve been thinking out loud on this topic for a long time (and am open to your thoughts as well):
