He does what ???

[Pat]

I just got a flyer for a conference. I just read the bio of the
"Featured Speaker" and I can't figure out what it means:

<name excluded> is the founding director of
CoolTown Beta Communities, a
crowdsource-based placemaking and
economic development firm that specializes
in codeveloping natural cultural districts with
creatives.

Can someone explain this to me? Too, too much jargon for me.

[HVS]

Post by Pat
I just got a flyer for a conference. I just read the bio of the
<name excluded> is the founding director of
CoolTown Beta Communities, a
crowdsource-based placemaking and
economic development firm that specializes
in codeveloping natural cultural districts with
creatives.
Can someone explain this to me? Too, too much jargon for me.

He's a flim-flam man.

Betcha.

[Don]

Post by Pat
I just got a flyer for a conference. I just read the bio of the
<name excluded> is the founding director of
CoolTown Beta Communities, a
crowdsource-based placemaking and
economic development firm that specializes
in codeveloping natural cultural districts with
creatives.
Can someone explain this to me? Too, too much jargon for me.

I just encountered those words *cultural districts* recently and combined
with the other silliness that was written couldn't figure out what it was
all about.
Harvey probably has it right.

Try this on for size:
We help provide established communities of pre-development buyers, tenants
and patrons for progressive, urban real estate developments targeting
creatives committed to a triple bottom line vision. We apply the modern
market and product development system of crowdsourcing (ie Wikipedia,
YouTube, Linux), which when applied to the vision of building natural
cultural districts is known as beta communities. For a more complete
description of the program, check out our visual guide to crowdsourced
placemaking and economic development, Crowdsourcing Cool Places for
Creatives.

http://www.cooltownbeta.com/

[Don]

Post by Pat
I just got a flyer for a conference. I just read the bio of the
<name excluded> is the founding director of
CoolTown Beta Communities, a
crowdsource-based placemaking and
economic development firm that specializes
in codeveloping natural cultural districts with
creatives.
Can someone explain this to me? Too, too much jargon for me.

The impact of 'natural cultural districts'
Maybe you should think twice about investing millions in that fancy new
performing arts building to revitalize your city. While Richard Florida has
long de-emphasized such large-scale investments, professor Mark Stern,
Co-Director of the Urban Studies Program at the University of Pennsylvania
provides a detailed answer below to the question, "Well then, now what?"
"While the arts are commerce, they revitalize cities not through their
bottom-line but through their social role. The arts build ties that bind -
neighbor-to-neighbor and community-to-community. It is these social networks
that translate cultural vitality into economic dynamism.
Culture generates many types of social networks. When artists work with
eight or nine different organizations during the year - as many do, they
build networks. When community residents are involved in arts programs as
well as churches, civic associations, and book clubs, they build networks.
When a community development organization reaches out simultaneously to
downtown financial institutions and local residents, it builds a network."
What happens when creatives build a social network? You'd be fortunate to
experience a natural cultural district.
A natural cultural district is a geographically-defined social network
created by the presence of a density of cultural assets in a particular
neighborhood. Descriptively, a "natural" cultural district simply identifies
a neighborhood that has naturally, organically spawned a density of unique
cultural assets - organizations, businesses, participants, and artists -
that sets it apart from other neighborhoods.
"Analytically, these districts are of interest because of density's
side-effects. Economic developers note that clusters encourage innovation
and creativity - a spur to cultural production. At the same time, a cluster
of cultural assets often pushes a neighborhood to a regeneration
tipping-point, attracting new services and residents.
What is striking about this phenomenon is that it occurs without policy
intent."

[george conklin]

Post by Don

Post by Pat
I just got a flyer for a conference. I just read the bio of the
<name excluded> is the founding director of
CoolTown Beta Communities, a
crowdsource-based placemaking and
economic development firm that specializes
in codeveloping natural cultural districts with
creatives.
Can someone explain this to me? Too, too much jargon for me.

The impact of 'natural cultural districts'
Maybe you should think twice about investing millions in that fancy new
performing arts building to revitalize your city. While Richard Florida
has long de-emphasized such large-scale investments, professor Mark Stern,
Co-Director of the Urban Studies Program at the University of Pennsylvania
provides a detailed answer below to the question, "Well then, now what?"
"While the arts are commerce, they revitalize cities not through their
bottom-line but through their social role. The arts build ties that bind -
neighbor-to-neighbor and community-to-community. It is these social
networks that translate cultural vitality into economic dynamism.
Culture generates many types of social networks. When artists work with
eight or nine different organizations during the year - as many do, they
build networks. When community residents are involved in arts programs as
well as churches, civic associations, and book clubs, they build networks.
When a community development organization reaches out simultaneously to
downtown financial institutions and local residents, it builds a network."
What happens when creatives build a social network? You'd be fortunate to
experience a natural cultural district.
A natural cultural district is a geographically-defined social network
created by the presence of a density of cultural assets in a particular
neighborhood. Descriptively, a "natural" cultural district simply
identifies a neighborhood that has naturally, organically spawned a
density of unique cultural assets - organizations, businesses,
participants, and artists - that sets it apart from other neighborhoods.
"Analytically, these districts are of interest because of density's
side-effects. Economic developers note that clusters encourage innovation
and creativity - a spur to cultural production. At the same time, a
cluster of cultural assets often pushes a neighborhood to a regeneration
tipping-point, attracting new services and residents.
What is striking about this phenomenon is that it occurs without policy
intent."

Are there any known studies which document any of this talk? People bind
together in a variety of ways, but in general "cultural assets" is just
another name for a large-scale subsidy of some kind for people who want the
subsidy.

[RicodJour]

Post by Pat
I just got a flyer for a conference. I just read the bio of the
<name excluded> is the founding director of
CoolTown Beta Communities

Wait for the final version communities to come out.

R

[george conklin]

Post by RicodJour

Post by Pat
I just got a flyer for a conference. I just read the bio of the
<name excluded> is the founding director of
CoolTown Beta Communities

Wait for the final version communities to come out.
R

Do you have a cite to the concept somewhere?

[Pat]

Post by RicodJour

I just got a flyer for a conference.  I just read the bio of the
<name excluded> is the founding director of
CoolTown Beta Communities

Wait for the final version communities to come out.
R

You've got a good point there. Once the final version comes out,
they'll probably stop supporting the beta version. Hopefully, the
community is at least open source and therefore you can tweak it
yourself.

[Kris Krieger]

Post by RicodJour

Post by Pat
I just got a flyer for a conference. I just read the bio of the
<name excluded> is the founding director of
CoolTown Beta Communities

Wait for the final version communities to come out.
R

It jsut dawned on me - they're talking abut Fish. You know, as in Betas -
a.k.a. those Siamese Fighting Fish, the brightly-colored long-finned males
you see languising in teensy bowls in the pet aisle of CheapoMart...

[george conklin]

Post by Pat
I just got a flyer for a conference. I just read the bio of the
<name excluded> is the founding director of
CoolTown Beta Communities, a
crowdsource-based placemaking and
economic development firm that specializes
in codeveloping natural cultural districts with
creatives.
Can someone explain this to me? Too, too much jargon for me.

Well, Google has the following idea that natural cultural districts are AKA
"Car Free Districts;"

California
Santa Monica - Third Street Promenade, 1/2 mile
Riverside - Several blocks of pedestrian mall.
Colorado
Aspen - Pedestrian malls: Three downtown blocks of E. Hyman Ave., S. Mill
St., and E. Cooper Ave. (pictured)
Boulder - Pearl Street Mall - Several blocks at the city center.
Fort Collins - Four streets in downtown.
Florida - Miami - Lincoln Road Mall, 7 blocks in South Beach.
Iowa - Iowa City - Pedestrian mall, several blocks downtown near the
University of Iowa
Louisiana - New Orleans - Several blocks between the French Quarter and the
river
New York - Ithaca - Ithaca Commons pedestrian mall, two blocks
Oregon - Portland - RiverPlace, 1/2 mile downtown waterfront pedestrian
promenade
Texas - San Antonio - River Walk, famous restaurant/shop-lined waterway
Vermont - Burlington - Church Street Marketplace, four blocks
Virginia - Charlottesville - Main Street pedestrian mall, several blocks
Wisconsin - Madison State Street, six blocks, though buses, police cars and
taxis are allowed.
The 'K' Street Mall in Sacramento; 16th Street Mall, Denver; Nicollet Mall,
Minneapolis; Downtown Crossing, Boston and Fremont Street, Las Vegas are
more corporate scale, chain-driven pedestrian malls.



-------



The idea that a main street mall in Charlottesville, VA is a "cultural
district" is a bad joke, just for starts.

[Don]

Post by george conklin
Well, Google has the following idea that natural cultural districts are
AKA "Car Free Districts;"
California
Santa Monica - Third Street Promenade, 1/2 mile

Hmmmm....the Edison Mall in Fort Myers, FL is at least 1/2 mile long and
I've never seen a car driving inside it so does that mean its a *cultural
district*?

[Jack May]

Post by george conklin

Post by Pat
I just got a flyer for a conference. I just read the bio of the
<name excluded> is the founding director of
CoolTown Beta Communities, a
crowdsource-based placemaking and
economic development firm that specializes
in codeveloping natural cultural districts with
creatives.
Can someone explain this to me? Too, too much jargon for me.

Well, Google has the following idea that natural cultural districts are
AKA "Car Free Districts;"

Joey Jolly has invented a job that will make him a lot of money?

[Kris Krieger]

Post by Pat
I just got a flyer for a conference. I just read the bio of the
<name excluded> is the founding director of
CoolTown Beta Communities, a
crowdsource-based placemaking and
economic development firm that specializes
in codeveloping natural cultural districts with
creatives.
Can someone explain this to me? Too, too much jargon for me.

"<name excluded> is a huckster looking to hoodwink you into forking over
big bucks for a bunch of people to do nothing but blither and hasten the
disintegration of the English language until it's little more than strings
of meaningless sounds."

[Kris Krieger]

Post by Pat
I just got a flyer for a conference. I just read the bio of the
<name excluded> is the founding director of
CoolTown Beta Communities, a
crowdsource-based placemaking and
economic development firm that specializes
in codeveloping natural cultural districts with
creatives.
Can someone explain this to me? Too, too much jargon for me.

BTW, that isn't "jargon". The word "jargon" refers to technical terms that
are specific to, and derive their meaning from, a given professional
specialty, but might not have meaning, or might have different meanings,
outside of that specialty.

I think the descriptor you're looking for is "babble".