Reading M. Christine Boyer’s text, “The Imaginary Real World of CyberCities,” introduced me to some new perspectives on our future in modern cities. Here, I want to share my feelings about the concept of “CyberCities” and the imagination of future individuals.
Boyer uses the term “CyberCities” to describe the blending of virtual and physical spaces, where the traditional understanding of geography is disrupted by digital networks. We should note that the article was written in 1992, when social media had not yet gone viral around the world. It seems that Boyer assumed that what social media would bring to people was more likely to be random information, not content selected by algorithms. This assumption is evident in the part where the author discusses the pros and cons of CyberCities. For example, the author focused on the most basic characteristics of the digital realm, like anonymity and the reduced need to visit public spaces, without mentioning the algorithms that could strongly support the views mentioned. I believe that CyberCities is not just a simple blurring of reality landscapes but is a name for a space for everyone, where people’s current views are extended, challenged, and reinforced. Perhaps this is because we haven’t yet stepped into a post-modern CyberCity, but the situation seems not to bring as much freedom to people’s minds as Boyer suggested.
I want to write a short imagination about future individuals; they will all end up pursuing love. We often use a social member’s perspective to imagine the future, but people must be infants sometimes in their lives. At this time, as they cannot understand symbols, they will probably construct their conceptual families in reality, engaging in physical interaction. This makes the physical family still exist in CyberCities. These characteristics and loves shared between the family can be the last shelter for people in a world of anonymity, who are vulnerable in terms of self-identity.