The City as Platform

The integration of artificial intelligence (AI) across our devices, information systems, and built environments is reshaping the design and function of the technologies that surround us. From AI-generated designer chairs to smart cities, this shift introduces a range of new relationships, possibilities, and risks into our lives. In this episode, Sara chats with Dr. Beth Coleman, a professor at the University of Toronto and the lead investigator of the City as Platform project: an interdisciplinary research collaboration aimed at understanding existing smart technology infrastructures, and working with municipal, industry, and civic actors to enable a transformation from techno-centric to human-centered design.

Type of research discussed in today’s episode: A combination of science and technology studies (STS), policy analysis, ethnography, philosophy of technology, and action research.

Keywords for today’s episode: AI, machine learning, generative design, algorithmic aesthetics, poesis, data markers, human-centered design, The Bauhaus.

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