A future I love is more village than city.

Perhaps there's a sci-fi version here where humans become much much better at cities, but the version I like at the moment is Village 2.0.

I want to keep networked, light-speed global communication, so knowledge can continue to evolve, enrich, and compound. But I want to situate our actual living in smaller communities – at least while Dunbar's number still operates within us.

Walking

In these villages, we walk around. Maybe there's high-speed travel between villages, but within a village, people-powered locomotion is the norm. We walk and we run and we play. More outside than not.

Nature

An idea-worm that I got from somewhere on the internet is that until pretty recently in human history, all of human life was just one long camping trip.

There's something stark and terrifying about the comparison between what it's like for us now compared to that. There is easy wonder and enchantment in the "outside". Let's bring it back in.

So, these villages would, without regressing human progress, be in greater dialogue with the immediate environment. Would flow into and out of the earth rather than meeting it with 90-degree angles (this is mostly a metaphor). Would be in trade with the earth instead of at war with it.

Village isn't just a place

There are virtual villages overlaid across, between, and through the physical villages.

Human expression can find multiple "tribes" in this way.

Themes

The metaphor here is theme park – villages would/could have a theme, or focus. 

Maybe there's something like a university at the heart of the theme, carrying its flag, training its practitioners, spreading its word.

Constellations

Villages are constellated within with the various needs of its denizens, and without to form groups of mutually beneficial, communicating clusters.

Governance

I have no real ideas here, but I want a variety of experiments and attempts.

Okay, that's about it for now. I could keep going, but I'm hungry and it's time for lunch. I'm also a bit self-conscious about how silly some of this seems. Maybe a little loathe to admit to some of my childish dreams and how much I believe I'd love them. 

Meta: I'm really enjoying the focusing and forcing function of attempting to write things like this down. It's an interesting challenge, and feels like self-discovery in a surprising and delightful way.

#FutureYouLove