by camwiese on 3/16/21, 7:05 PM with 225 comments
by Animats on 3/16/21, 9:23 PM
The 1964 World's Fair had another GM exhibit. Colonization of the Moon. Underwater cities. None of that happened.
What could we have in a World's Fair now that looks ahead? Colonization of Mars? Mars sucks as real estate. There may be research bases there someday, but as a self-sufficient area, it would be tougher than Antarctica or a continental shelf. Robots may some day be a thing, but they still don't work well in unstructured environments.
by poisonborz on 3/16/21, 8:25 PM
by lswainemoore on 3/16/21, 8:17 PM
I do a lot of double/triple clicking to highlight text as I read online (fidgeting, but also helps keep track of where I am). On your site, triple clicking unintentionally hits the twitter share button, which opens a new, unwanted window. Bit annoying.
Medium does something similar, but they offset the button so you have to move cursor in between clicks to actually trigger the button.
by ipsum2 on 3/16/21, 8:21 PM
> After the six-month run, the Expo had attracted well over 70 million visitors. The Expo 2010 is also the most expensive fair in the history of World's Fair, with more than 45 billion US dollars invested from the Chinese Government
by git_configured on 3/16/21, 7:35 PM
by alex_young on 3/16/21, 9:23 PM
If you haven’t been, there are thousands of art projects at a grand scale, things that take up blocks of space a piece, and they are built by artists from around the world, giving everyone a global perspective of what is possible.
I also love the idea of showcasing what is possible for a society. There is a true sense of community, immediacy, and collaboration where everyone there is an active participant.
There are dozens of smaller events with similar properties, likely one nearby.
by Aeolun on 3/16/21, 10:34 PM
I kind of feel that these were the exact goals of the original world fairs too.
by Johnny555 on 3/16/21, 8:51 PM
...wait eagerly for Jessica Watkins to take the first step on Mars
There's an unfortunate name collision, I didn't know who Jessica Watkins was so Googled her, and the top results are for a Jessica Watkins who participated in the attack on the USA Capitol... I spent a moment pondering what her link to Mars was.. but farther down the results list is NASA astronaut Jessica Watkins.
It's a shame that the astronaut has her search results cluttered by the insurrectionist. Back when I was doing online dating, I shared a name (and similar age and nearby city) with the brother of a recently convicted serial killer, searching for my name brought up articles about him... I warned potential dates that if they looked me up online, I'm not that guy (which, I suppose, is exactly what the brother of a serial killer would say).
by dgellow on 3/16/21, 8:34 PM
You lost me at “Hyperloop”. How is that a vision of the future when we know for a fact that the idea doesn’t make practical sense?
by fortran77 on 3/16/21, 8:59 PM
Every school and career choice I've made was based on some inspirational spark that hit me there.
by kaycebasques on 3/16/21, 7:31 PM
by UncleOxidant on 3/16/21, 10:15 PM
by reaperducer on 3/16/21, 7:45 PM
For example, over a hundred years later, Chicago is still making money from the economic, social, and infrastructure benefits of its fairs.
by buzzert on 3/16/21, 11:58 PM
At some point in the last twenty years or so, it became less about companies demoing next year’s products and more about really grand visions of the future (of course, where the company in question was the centerpiece of this grand vision). I believe it was Panasonic in 2020 who had a huge booth showing off a flying car concept, accompanied by a wall-to-wall LED display showing a video of families in the future taking it to work/school/etc.
Once I realized that CES is less of a marketing event and more of a modern World’s Fair, I really started to enjoy it a lot more. Even with the corporatism. Can’t wait to (hopefully) go again next year!
by musicale on 3/16/21, 10:16 PM
by jhu247 on 3/16/21, 10:21 PM
by mattowen_uk on 3/16/21, 8:04 PM
by albertTJames on 3/16/21, 9:13 PM
by u678u on 3/16/21, 8:01 PM
by colecut on 3/16/21, 9:20 PM
But Burning Man to me seems like a bit of a World's Fair. I met some people who brought a massive insect-inspired art car from Australia..
by reactspa on 3/16/21, 7:58 PM
by drivingmenuts on 3/16/21, 10:02 PM
You can see more innovation in an afternoon spent on blogs than you would ever see in a 6-month long, static display of corporate bullshit.
by markdown on 3/16/21, 9:26 PM
by hyko on 3/16/21, 8:25 PM
They had an exhibit called “MoneyZone” which included a tunnel made out of £1 million in crisp fifties.
Good times.
by xwdv on 3/16/21, 9:52 PM
by ngcc_hk on 3/16/21, 9:38 PM
by snambi on 3/17/21, 1:12 AM
by harles on 3/16/21, 8:45 PM
Is there supporting evidence of these assertions? There are some interesting ideas in here, but I’m not seeing anything to back them up.
by unixhero on 3/16/21, 10:04 PM
by viksit on 3/16/21, 11:14 PM
Have calls to action/RFPs, and have a conference of some sort - the goal is to have one cohesive demo per track. Distribute this thinking across the world, like Pioneer.app does instead of consolidating it in one country or geographical area.
And live cast it to everyone.
by zestyping on 3/16/21, 9:39 PM
by devoutsalsa on 3/16/21, 10:28 PM
by CaptArmchair on 3/16/21, 8:41 PM
Both takes are missing the mark about what a World Fair is about. Here's why.
The 3 decades after 1945 were a time when economies of formerly allied nations were booming. In France, these years äre known as the "Trente Glorieuses". Many more countries had their own "economic miracle" during this time. Even West-Germany and Austria had their own "Wirtschaftwunder" as their economies bounced back.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Post%E2%80%93World_War_II_econ...
Many parts of the world were still formal colonies to Western nations, or their economies hadn't fully modernized yet to a point where a sizable middle-class has access to democratized /commoditized comforts of a Western lifestyle e.g. aviation, healthcare, education, even sanitation, access to media and so on.
Not to mention the spectre of the Cold War that loomed over these decades.
Against this historic backdrop, the fair is notable because it was a showcase of mid-20th century American culture and technology. That shouldn't really come as a surprise since it was firmly organized within the sphere of influence of America's hegemony.
Such were the times in 1965. And they are incomparable to 2021. The organization of a World Fair in 1965 happened in a vastly different context, with vastly different incentives, interests and motives then it does in 2021.
The author misses that completely and marches blindly onward hence:
> Today, World's Fairs have been rebranded as "International Expositions" that occur every 5 years, and are a hollow shell of their former glory. They no longer showcase the promise of the future or celebrate achievement. Instead, they serve as national branding exercises, infrastructure development projects masquerading as innovation, architecture competitions, and an opportunity to promote tourism. If anything, they're the perfect representation of our current vision for the future: unfocused and uninspiring.
> But it doesn't have to be this way; we can't afford for it to be this way.
> The world has changed dramatically since 1984. We now live in the most incredible time in human history. The internet has brought billions of people together and tech companies have given us supercomputers in our pockets. We're starting to build hyperloops and supersonic jets. We're on the cusp of incredible breakthroughs in genetics, biology, medicine, food science, energy, transportation, manufacturing, computing, and robotics. We're finally going back to the moon and then on to Mars. We've once again seen the power of a collective vision with the record-breaking development of the COVID-19 vaccine.
The World's Fair is a reflection of the World in 2021 and the future. With the complexity of representing 7.8 billion people, an array of sovereign nations which didn't exist in 1965. It's an event which competes with against the complexity of a exploding plethora of modern mass media, new stakeholders, emerging markets, and so on fueled by globalisation, digitization and automatisation.
A Fair isn't just an marketing event, it's a global forum that aims beyond other events that present themselves as global fora or gatherings. It's an opportunity for nations and peoples to present a showcase to the world. It gives them the chance to put a message out. In that regard, the World Fair is akin to that other global event where the world gathers: The Olympics.
The organization of the World Fair is no longer rooted in the political or economical global hegemony of a handful of "first-world" (for lack a better term) nations showing off their industrial might and international prowess, such as it was during the latter half of the 20th century.
The Fair is now also home to many new nations and upcoming economies or regional powers who are making their entrance to the World's stage, and to whom the importance isn't plain "technological innovation" but above all showing themselves to the world, what they have to offer to the world, what their aspirations are, what they hope for the futre, and taking part in the global forum.
In that regard, the vision for World Fair extends far beyond technology per the offical website:
https://www.bie-paris.org/site/en/what-is-an-expo
For sure, there's going to the Moon or Mars, and there are hyperloops and driverless cars, or there's even developing a COVID vaccine. These are wonderful developments. But are they really the developments that need to be put front and center at World's Fair at the expense of everything else? Are these the only developments that should matter to 7.8 billion people in 2021?
The second part from this article seems to voice a want for the World's Fair to limit itself to showcasing technology, engineering and media. To me, it sounds like not much more then a want for being able to indulge in advertising when visiting the Fair. And that comes across as, well, rather tone deaf.
A World Fair isn't about merely basking in the marvels of technology or innovation. It's about the humans and humanity that are represented, visit and meet at a Fair.
by neon_me on 3/16/21, 9:00 PM
by koolk3ychain on 3/16/21, 8:48 PM
by minikites on 3/16/21, 7:40 PM