Archinect - News

Facebook plans to build their own 59-acre housing development in Silicon Valley

2018-04-06T18:22:00-04:00

Facebook is testing the proposition: Do people love tech companies so much they will live inside of them? When the project was announced last summer, critics dubbed it Facebookville or, in tribute to company co-founder Mark Zuckerberg, Zucktown. [...] If Facebook’s image is permanently sullied by the furor over Cambridge Analytica, the data firm hired by President Trump’s 2016 election campaign, Zucktown will falter before it is finished.

Like Google's Sidewalk Labs for Toronto and Bill Gates' proposed smart city in Arizona, Facebook is working to make their own housing development, Willow Village, a living reality in Silicon Valley. Nicknamed “Zucktown” and “Facebookville” by critics, the project will occupy a 59-acre site in between the gentrified Menlo Park neighborhood and East Palo Alto. The New York Times reports that Willow Village will offer 1,500 apartments, and Facebook made an agreement with Menlo Park to offer 225 of the units at below-market rates.

“It is a project with many precedents in American history, quite a few of them cautionary tales about what happens when a powerful corporation takes control of civic life,” The New York Times article states.

Airbnb intentionally misconstrued data to "garner good press", according to new report

2016-02-18T13:03:00-05:00

In December, Airbnb released a trove of data that showed about 95 percent of its hosts in New York City were playing by the rules. But an independent report released Wednesday cast a shadow on that rosy picture, claiming that the company “misled the media and the public” by removing more than 1,000 listings from its site in November before making available the data [...] The report portrays the December release as a cynical attempt to garner good press...

“Airbnb continues to show a blatant disregard for New York laws designed to protect the rights of tenants and prevent the proliferation of illegal hotels," said Matt Mittenthal, a spokesman for New York’s attorney general, Eric T. Schneiderman.

For more on the "disruptive" influence of Airbnb in cities around the world, check out some past coverage:

A trip in Lavasa, India's developing corporate-built town

2015-12-08T18:37:00-05:00

When fully built, [the New Urbanist, corporate development] Lavasa intends to consume 100 sq km...and will cater to a total population of up to 300,000 in five 'towns' built on seven hills...[But] how does it turn itself from a quirky weekend getaway into a fully fledged 'smart city' where people live and work full time?

Previously on Archinect: Lavasa a new orderly, high-tech "city"

Who owns our cities – and why this urban takeover should concern us all

2015-11-24T12:52:00-05:00

Privatisation in the 90s has resulted in a reduction of public buildings and an escalation in large, corporate ownership

"today, rather than a space for including people from many diverse backgrounds and cultures, our global cities are expelling people and diversity. Their new owners, often part-time inhabitants, are very international – but that does not mean they represent many diverse cultures and traditions. Instead, they represent the new global culture of the successful – and they are astoundingly homogeneous, no matter how diverse their countries of birth and languages. This is not the urban subject that our large, mixed cities have historically produced. This is, above all, a global “corporate” subject."

Editor's note: the cover photo is not showing "Freedom Tower". Here is a link to gettyimages . While at it, check out their "city life" section.