A Smart-City can be defined as the achievement of maximum quality of life with a minimum use of resources, with the help of the intelligent networking of digital technologies. It is possible to make a city more attractive, more environment-friendly and less wasteful of energy or water, facing several challenges at the same time: social, methodological, technical, organizational and conceptual.
Even if this contemporary utopia for our future cities sounds good, it can be useful to bring in mind that Smart-City and democracy were not primarily related. We are collectively running, worldwide, into this model of living but who asked for it? Mainly IT companies whom business models are based on data exploitation, and governments that sighted a good opportunity to bring private investments in public facilities.
When Artificial Intelligence continues to inspire a lot of innovation debates, we already know that an intelligent decision-making algorithm based on data analysis, would probably not make the same choices than humans, influenced be sensitiveness and natural moral law. What we are living actually is an unprecedented opportunity to up-grade the global efficiency of our urban areas, and implicating all stakeholders in its achievement is the crucial condition to avoid a disastrous bouncing effect against technology in a few decades.
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Manon den Dunnen,
Strategisch specialist digitaal
,
posted
Lezing generatieve AI en deepfakes (Dutch)
Kun je nog weten wat betrouwbaar is in tijden van generatieve AI en deepfakes?
Deze Nederlandstalige lezing is bedoeld voor iedereen die meer wil weten over de risico’s van deepfakes (denk aan stemklonen, plaatjes en chatgpt).
Wat is de globale werking, waar kom je het tegen, wanneer moet je extra voorzichtig zijn en wat kun je doen om jezelf te beschermen en manipulaties te doorzien.
Jorgen Karskens,
Project manager Civic Interaction Design
at Amsterdam University of Applied Sciences,
posted
How can we, as citizens, designers, and policymakers, regain control over the technologies that shape our cities?
Join us for the workshop: Civic Sousveillance & Democratic Oversight of Sensor Technology.
In this interactive workshop, we explore democratic oversight of camera detection and other urban sensors: from citizen initiatives such as the On Camera pocket guide and smart city camera-spotting tours to current policies on data collection in public space.
With contributions by Tom van Arman & Mike de Kreek from the Human Values for Smarter Cities research project, Inge Janse & Arthur De Jaeger from Centre for BOLD Cities, and council member Elisabeth IJmker from GroenLinks-PvdA. Next to talks we will also go outside for a joint camera-spotting tour around Arcam.
Date: Thursday, January 29, 2026
Time: 4:00 p.m. – 6:00 p.m.
Location: Arcam
Address: Prins Hendrikkade 600
Language: Dutch
Registration: free, but mandatory via the registration form which is here
More info on the Human Values for Smarter Cities research project is here
Zéger Nieuweboer,
Founder / Teacher
at Learning is growing.nl,
posted
The Amsterdam Hunger Game
Learn with the case study Amsterdam to anticipate future food disruptions. Understand the city's food supply chain vulnerabilities is critical for enhancing food resilience. Enhance food resilience in empowerment of people in urban food growing.
Thanks for sharing, you can read some more Smart-City articles on my medium.com/@julien.carbonnell
I think limiting smart solutions to digital solutions is not very smart. Minimum resources, quality of life for sure!
There are many analog solutions that are shoved aside as digital is trendy.
A digital billboard is a great example. Sounds great- no printing, no paper but the amount of energy used for one two sided object (bus halt poster) consumes as much energy as 4 average Dutch homes. That is not using minimum resources and is in my opinion, not very smart.
Natural media uses natural materials, generates very little waste and can be produced with zero emissions production units. That just seems a lot smarter to me. But then again, I am a natural media guy!
great article, thanks for sharing!