Key to Creating Smarter Cities: Agreeing on the Brand

When communities set out on massive, multidimensional civic improvement projects, a necessary first step is gaining agreement from the principle players in government, business, and the non-profit sphere on what they want the city or region to be–its brand, if you will. This is a conclusion IBM executives have drawn from dozens of... [read more]

Personal Brands and City Brands

Last Friday I posted a link to and a sample of Eric Fischer’s locals vs. tourists maps of geotagged photos. If you missed it, here’s another sample, this one of Chicago:    Someone posted a comment that Fischer was from Indianapolis, and this got me thinking a bit. I can’t confirm where Fischer is from. He doesn’t seem to... [read more]

The New Urban Renewal?

<!--break--> Tim Murphy at the Chicago Maroon published an article in Grey City a couple weeks ago called The New Urban Renewal.  I'm quoted in it thusly:"Often in the corporate world, whenever management wants to do something that wouldn’t be good for [the rest of the company], they say ‘Oh, we just need to communicate about it... [read more]

Is Detroit (the city) a lost cause environmentally? Altogether?

<!--break-->     I hope that, by the end of this week, Red Wings fans are celebrating, and that's nothing against Pittsburgh, a fine city with fine people, at least the ones I know.  But Pittsburgh already has a professional sports champion this year, the Steelers having won the Super Bowl, and Detroit has had nothing... [read more]

Replay: Globalization and the Soft Power of Cities

<!--break--> [ This blog is 2 1/2 years old and has many more readers than it did even a short while ago. Since many of you may not have seen my older postings, I wanted to inaugurate a series of "replays" featuring some of the best from the archives. This post originally ran on October 8, 2008 and is presented in slightly edited... [read more]