The App of Life 手机应用：让城市生活更完美

Simon+Kuper1

I am a late adopter of new technology， so I only recently discovered that an age-old urban problem had been solved. I was in a restaurant with friends. Outside it was cold， and on Sundays the bus ran only every 20 minutes. When to go to the bus stop？ My friend pulled out his smartphone， and told me when my bus would arrive. It was a little trick—like finding another friends house on my smartphones GPS with three tired children in tow2）—but it made urban living easier. Thanks largely to smartphones， this is probably the best time ever to live in a packed city.

As my economics guru3） Stefan Szymanski4） explains， when the internet arrived many pundits5） predicted the decline of cities. After all， why live in a flat in Hackney6） when you could send emails from an old farmhouse overlooking a sheep meadow？ But the prediction was wrong. Overcrowded， overpriced cities only became more popular， which is why Hackney flats have gotten so expensive. Meanwhile the countryside has turned into something of a desert， inhabited by farmers and old people， and used by the rest of us chiefly for long walks. In 2008， for the first time ever， most humans lived in cities.

They are lured by social networks. To be rural is to be isolated. You live in a village or suburb to have space， not to meet people. But cities create contacts. Someone you run into at a party or your kids playground can give you a job or an idea. The perfect one-on-one urban encounter combines mating， education and business development over a cup of good coffee. Mathieu Lefevre， executive director of the New Cities Foundation， says： “In a dense city you have these two-minute chance encounters that make your life richer. You and I have nothing in common， but maybe we meet and start Facebook together.”

For two centuries， technologies damaged cities. Factories brought dirt and noise. Then cars added sprawl7）： Los Angeles creates fewer encounters than dense Manhattan. Even in the 1990s， the desktop computer swallowed valuable space， and chained each person to his own desk. Carlo Ratti， director of the Senseable City Lab at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology， says 20th-century technologies were no use to a dense city such as Venice.

But the internet was perfect for cities. It created new networks that reinforced older urban networks. Patrik Regardh， head of strategic marketing for the mobile-phone operator Ericsson， says urbanites email， phone and use social networks more than people outside cities. After all， they have more contacts， and so they communicate more. In Stockholm， for instance， women use Facebook to team up for safe jogging tours at night.

When laptops arrived， urbanites could use the new networks anywhere—but they often still needed a coffee shop to get online. Starbucks rose thanks to the laptop computer. Now， though， people carry their networks around in a 10-sq-in device. This is transforming city life in countless ways： everything from finding a date to finding a bus in an instant. Greg Clark， the UKs minister for cities， says the London bus finder app “actually makes the transport system hugely more effective.” Now we just need a good app to find parking spots. Clark sighs： “A lot of congestion comes literally from people driving around looking for a parking space.”

In short， smartphones are helping make the densest cities the best places to live， as witnessed by property prices in Hong Kong， New York， Paris and London. By contrast， sprawling cities that rely heavily on cars—Moscow， Istanbul， Beijing—are becoming dysfunctional as roads clog up8）. I recently took three hours on a Saturday afternoon to reach a Moscow airport. If you live like that， your networks shrivel9） because you stop meeting people.

The technological revolution in cities has barely begun. Indian slum-dwellers without electricity will soon use solar-powered phones to find cheap healthcare nearby， says Parag Khanna， who， with his wife Ayesha， just published Hybrid Reality： Thriving in the Emerging Human-Technology Civilization.

The next step is urbanites using technology to help run their cities. Dublin has thrown open its data on everything from water use to transport， hoping that software developers will create apps to improve life. Were starting to see almost an “open-source design” of cities， says Ratti.

Elisée Reclus10）， a 19th-century thinker， said the ideal city would combine rural pleasures with urban pleasures. Ratti says， “And I think that has happened.” In post-industrial London， the war on cars has made the air and the river cleaner. In cities everywhere， tiny or invisible technologies are replacing big old industrial technologies. That has created space for bicycles， new parks， piers and summertime beaches， all packed with people on smartphones. Steve Jobs was a lifelong suburbanite， but it turns out he perfected the city.

我是一个较晚使用新技术的人，所以我直到最近才发现，一个由来已久的城市问题已经得到解决。我和一帮朋友坐在一家餐厅里，外面天气冷，而且是周日，公交车每20分钟才来一趟。该何时前往公交站呢？我的朋友拿出他的智能手机，然后告诉我公交车将于何时到达。这只是一个小把戏——就和我一边带着三个疲惫的孩子，一边用自己智能手机上的GPS找到另一位朋友的住处差不多——但它却让城市生活更加轻松。如今可能是有史以来在一个人满为患的城市里生活的最好时候，而这很大程度上要归功于智能手机。

正如我的经济学导师斯特凡·希曼斯基解释的那样，当互联网时代到来时，很多专家都预言城市将要衰落。毕竟当你住在可以俯瞰一片牧羊场的古朴农舍里就能收发邮件时，你又何必要住在哈克尼的一套公寓里呢？但是这个预言错了。拥挤不堪、物价过高的城市只会变得更受欢迎，这也是为什么哈克尼的公寓售价如此之高。与此同时，乡村已经变得有点荒凉，只有农民和老年人住在那里，其余的人则主要把它当成徒步旅行的场所。2008年，有史以来第一次，大多数人都住在了城市里。

因为人们受到社交网络的诱惑。而生活在农村容易被孤立。你住在村庄或郊区能获得空间，却无法与人会面。但是城市能为人们创造接触的机会。你在派对上或者你的孩子们的游乐场上偶遇的人能给你提供一份工作或者一个主意。城市里完美的“一对一”邂逅能让你在品尝一杯美味咖啡的时间里同时进行交友、教育和业务拓展。新城市基金会执行董事马蒂厄·勒费尔说：“在一个人口密集的城市，你拥有很多与人偶遇两分钟便能让你的生活更精彩的机会。你我可能没什么共同之处，但是可能我们相遇后就开始一起开个像Facebook一样的公司。”

在过去的两百年里，技术的进步对城市造成了破坏。工厂带来了灰尘和噪音。接着汽车促使了城市的无序扩张：洛杉矶的偶遇概率要低于人口密集的曼哈顿。即使在上世纪90年代，台式电脑也在占领个人的宝贵空间的同时，把每个人都束缚在各自的书桌前。麻省理工学院感应城市实验室的主任卡洛·拉蒂表示，20世纪发展起来的技术对于诸如威尼斯这样人口密集的城市来说是无益的。

但是互联网技术完全适合城市的发展。它创造了新型的网络，该网络又加强了城市的老式社交网络。手机运营商爱立信公司的战略营销部经理帕特里克·雷高指出，城市居民发邮件、打电话和使用社交网络的频率要高于非城市居民。毕竟，他们有更多接触的机会，因此交流也更多。比如，在斯德哥尔摩，女性利用Facebook组团在晚上慢跑以保证安全。

笔记本电脑出现后，城市居民能在任何地方使用新型网络——但是在很多情况下，他们仍需要走进一家咖啡店才能上网。星巴克的兴起就得益于笔记本电脑。而如今，人们可以通过十平方英寸的设备随时随地上网。这正改变着城市生活的方方面面，从找约会对象到飞快地搜索某辆公交车都可以实现。英国城市大臣格雷格·克拉克指出，伦敦公交搜索应用“实际上大大提高了交通系统的效率”。如今，我们只需要一个不错的应用帮我们寻找停车位。卡拉克感叹道：“很多道路堵塞其实是由人们开车四处寻找停车位所造成的。”

简而言之，智能手机正使得人口最密集的城市成为最宜居的地方，这一点由香港、纽约、巴黎和伦敦的房地产价格可以作证。相比之下，那些严重依赖汽车而无序扩张的城市——莫斯科、伊斯坦布尔和北京——正因为道路拥挤而变得运行不畅。最近一个周六下午，我花了三个小时才到达莫斯科机场。如果你照那样生活，你的社交网络将会缩小，因为你会不愿与他人会面。

城市的技术革命才刚刚开始。保劳格·康纳表示，现在还没用上电的印度贫民窟居民很快就能用太阳能充电的手机来搜索附近价格便宜的医疗服务。保劳格和他的妻子艾莎刚刚一起出版了《混合现实：在新兴的人类技术文明中繁荣》一书。

下一步是城市居民运用技术来协助管理自己的城市。都柏林已经向外公布了从用水到交通的所有数据，希望软件开发者们能研发出改善生活的各种应用。拉蒂称，我们将看到对城市的一次近乎“开源的设计”。

19世纪的思想家埃利泽·勒克吕曾说过，理想型城市应能将田园的乐趣和城市的快乐融合在一起。拉蒂认为：“我想这已经变成了现实。”后工业时代的伦敦对汽车的管制已让空气和河水更干净。在城市的各个地方，微型的或是看不见的技术正在取代大规模的传统工业技术。这已经为自行车、新公园、码头和夏日海滩创造了空间，这些空间将被智能手机的用户们填满。斯蒂芬·乔布斯一生都住在郊区，但结果表明他让城市变得完美。

1. Simon Kuper：西蒙·库珀（1969～），英国撰稿人，欧洲最好的足球记者之一，毕业于英国牛津大学，擅长从人类学的角度来写体育，曾供职于《卫报》及《观察家报》等，现为英国《金融时报》专栏作家。

2. in tow：（被）拖着；随着，陪伴着

3. guru [?ɡ?ru?] n. 导师，指导者

4. Stefan Szymanski：斯特凡·希曼斯基，经济学教授，伦敦卡斯商学院MBA课程主任，著名的体育经济学家，曾与本文作者合著《足球经济学》（Soccernomics）。

5. pundit [?p?nd?t] n. 专家；学者；权威，大师

6. Hackney：哈克尼区，英国英格兰大伦敦内的伦敦自治市之一，位于大伦敦中北部。

7. sprawl [spr??l] n. （城市的）无计划扩展

8. clog up：堵塞

9. shrivel [??r?vl] vi. 变小，减少

10. Elisée Reclus：埃利泽·勒克吕（1830～1905），法国地理学家，著有19卷巨著《宇宙地理》（Universal Geography），并因此获得巴黎地理协会的金奖。