WEEKEND READING: May 28-June 3, 2011

That's a Wordle of the top ten words from the 50 items that were in my starred folder on Google Reader when I started putting together this post. The order is totally random...and vaguely poetic, no? In other news: how is it time for Weekend Reading again?? Where did this week go? Anyway...

ITEM ONE: Over at the IfUD, we've launched the By the City / For the City design competition, inviting designers, artists, and architects around the world to respond to one (or more!) of the 500+ ideas New Yorkers shared for improving their city. Check out the site at the former link, then register here!

ITEM TWO: Loved Marcus Westbury's article on crowdfunding in The Age. In fact, love everything I've read by this guy. Renew Newcastle is truly amazing. (via @unsungsongs)

ITEM THREE: The Urbanophile features a guest post by Where alum Drew Austin on digitally-tracked taxi cabs as "spandrels," providing data that, as a happy accident, can improve the flow of our cities.

ITEM FOUR: Urbanscale takes an eye-opening swipe at Augmented Reality (and makes promises about some very exciting-sounding upcoming posts). Especially salient point: at least for the foreseeable future, AR actually diminishes the urban environment rather than...well, augmenting it by providing incorrect, incomplete, and commercially-skewed versions of the city.

ITEM FIVE: Matias and Rahul re-post an article that casts a wary eye toward the flavor of the week in silver bullet slum saviors, the $300 House, over at Airoots.

ITEM SIX: The Pop-Up City catalogs some great urban games. Apparently there is one called "Farmville for Real," which is especially interesting given this

ITEM SEVEN: Rhizome points us to New Scientist's May issue on digital archiving and legacy. Your expiration date is now: infinity.

It was my birthday on Wednesday. Drink an extra one for me this weekend. I won't know that you did it, but I'll appreciate it nonetheless.

WEEKEND READING: May 14-20, 2011

It's a week full of revivals. Weekend Reading is back. In truth, it should never have left. Apologies. My Google Reader is overflowing, so most of these are a bit older; we'll catch up soon enough. Anyway, let's get to it—

ITEM ONE: Top billing goes to a guest post by Utazó over at Polis (the ace blog run by former Wherebloggers Peter & Katia) on gentrification and demographic shifts in the Józsefváros district of Budapest.

ITEM TWO: The fabulous Nina Simon writes about Case by Case, an experiment by the San Diego Museum of Natural History that invites museum-goers to affix post-its with questions, comments, etc. to cases containing un-labeled historical artifacts. It gets the artifacts out on the floor faster and helps staff develop exhibits that are more responsive to visitors' interests. Would love to see someone develop an app for doing this in a public space.

ITEM THREE (& 1/2): Richard Florida presents new info supporting his argument that happier cities are more economically prosperous, while Jay Walljasper suggests that neighborhoods with common shared spaces are happier neighborhoods. Happier neighborhoods = happier cities; more proof that Americans need to re-learn the importance of sharing.

ITEM FOUR: Where's friend Mimi Zeiger (@loudpaper) writes at Places about the creative use of posters, pamphlets, and guides in activating the urban environment.

ITEM FIVE: Fascinating article in re:Place about public space in West African cities. Strikes me as especially interesting that the main form of urban social space in Accra is the street—this is also often said of New York. (Union and Madison Squares are nice, but the real action is on the sidewalks).

ITEM SIX: Edwin Heathcote slays ridiculous city rankings (a la Monocle's whitebread circus of a livability list) in The Financial Times. Certainly among the best articles I've read on the subject.

ITEM SEVEN: Flavorwire rounds up a "Retrospective of Interventionists and [Museum] Crashers." Not even the Met is safe from DIY/participatory urbanism. Bwahaha! (via @fastcodesign)

ITEM EIGHT: I've been doing analysis of the data from the @IfUD's By the City / For the City  over at our project blog; add our feed to your RSS reader, there will be a lot of interesting stuff coming over the next couple of months.

Got suggestions for next week? Tweet them to @thewhereblog!