3 ms·

Not that I am disagreeing but would you mind mentioning the social advantages that you are talking about?

tomjen3 15y ago
Face to face conversations [http://headrush.typepad.com/creating_passionate_users/2006/04/why_facetoface_.html http://headrush.typepad.com/creating_passionate_users/2006/0...], bars, theaters, museums, entertainment parks, turist attractions, easy shopping posibilities, etc. There are many advantages to clustering together that electronics and increased communication simply cannot replace yet (and I doubt it ever will, even video calling feels "phony" somehow).
- lachlanj 15y ago
  I'm sorry but I lived an extremely rural town for 10 years with <20k people and all of these thing were available. I'm not convinced these are exclusive to cities.
  - strait 15y ago
    Extremely rural is <500 people. No traffic lights, no Subway sandwiches. Just a country store, 7 churches, and 49 horses.
  - tomjen3 15y ago
    Where my grandparents live there is nothing, no school, no shops no bus stop, only a comunity center and a part time church. 20k is a town. 100 people is nothing.
muhfuhkuh 15y ago
Mass transit precluding the need to own a motorized conveyance, proximity to life's staples (and the varieties available thereof), diversity in culture and ideas (even ethnicity, if that's your bag), architectural variety (nothing beats looking at a giant skyscraper for wondering at the sheer human achievement). It's all subjective, after all; but that's just off the top of my head.
ebiester 15y ago
The ability to find a group of people like you. If you're straight, white, and born in the small town, this isn't a problem. As a gay man, I'd have a lot of trouble in many small towns. The ability to walk down the street at 3 in the morning and see a non-trivial number of people around. A friend was in a small town teaching for the summer, and he said "So then we went to the bar. I say the bar because there was only one." Where I live, there are 171 listed in the phone book.

Face to face conversations [http://headrush.typepad.com/creating_passionate_users/2006/04/why_facetoface_.html http://headrush.typepad.com/creating_passionate_users/2006/0...], bars, theaters, museums, entertainment parks, turist attractions, easy shopping posibilities, etc. There are many advantages to clustering together that electronics and increased communication simply cannot replace yet (and I doubt it ever will, even video calling feels "phony" somehow).

lachlanj 15y ago
I'm sorry but I lived an extremely rural town for 10 years with <20k people and all of these thing were available. I'm not convinced these are exclusive to cities.
- strait 15y ago
  Extremely rural is <500 people. No traffic lights, no Subway sandwiches. Just a country store, 7 churches, and 49 horses.
- tomjen3 15y ago
  Where my grandparents live there is nothing, no school, no shops no bus stop, only a comunity center and a part time church. 20k is a town. 100 people is nothing.

muhfuhkuh 15y ago

Mass transit precluding the need to own a motorized conveyance, proximity to life's staples (and the varieties available thereof), diversity in culture and ideas (even ethnicity, if that's your bag), architectural variety (nothing beats looking at a giant skyscraper for wondering at the sheer human achievement). It's all subjective, after all; but that's just off the top of my head.

ebiester 15y ago

The ability to find a group of people like you. If you're straight, white, and born in the small town, this isn't a problem. As a gay man, I'd have a lot of trouble in many small towns. The ability to walk down the street at 3 in the morning and see a non-trivial number of people around. A friend was in a small town teaching for the summer, and he said "So then we went to the bar. I say the bar because there was only one." Where I live, there are 171 listed in the phone book.