https://steemitimages.com/0x0/http://payload408.cargocollective.com/1/20/642419/10469534/0_Spread_Final_1_4_1800_1000.jpg

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***BLOCKTOWN is an community design project*** *powered through your comments and ideas. It’s an experimental game of city-making, a digital [Madurodam](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Madurodam). With each post, a new layer of buildings will be added to the Town. Your photographs, quotes, stories and feedback are the raw materials that drive construction for each new layer.*

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## Exploring Crypto-QR Codes as Plans
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For the 2.0 phase of BLOCKTOWN (launching next week!) I've been exploring different patterns that could be used for laying out building footprints and town features. This post outlines a bit of that thinking and why the anatomy of QR codes provides a nice backdrop for town planning to take place. 

![171003_QR-Diagrams-03.png](https://steemitimages.com/DQmeXEgDkP4U5aSZVSqSe1GfoBMUfjDqgBzZaGndJPMbRLs/171003_QR-Diagrams-03.png)

https://steemitimages.com/0x0/http://i.imgur.com/ALHyuG1.png

https://steemitimages.com/DQmZqGtAaLRxEoJDUbDb7RxJT8qftf9UR5TPEcZhuL3s1FT/qr-billboard.gif

## Pieces of a Puzzle
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In recent years, the QR code has found an unexpected home within the world of blockchain and cryptocurrency. The black and white QR has become a default method for sharing account (or “wallet”) addresses. With Bitcoin and others, each square black and white puzzle provides a link to a secure wallet account. The pixelated pattern is easily generated, sharable and customizable. Today, these patterns hop between cryptocurrency holders as a secure way of exchanging funds. **Over the last decade, the QR has become a billboard of the visual language that defines Bitcoin and crypto-currency culture.** 

In a QR code, the black and white squares are composed in an language of puzzle-units that are read by a camera in a very specific order. To make sense of this seemingly random grid, there are 3 orientation points at 3 corners of the code, with 1 alignment point that helps the camera keep track as it navigates the landscape of data. There is a start point, end point and indicators that tell the reader what kind of address it is being forwarded to.

![171003_QR-Diagrams-01.png](https://steemitimages.com/DQmcrHJn4KkMrKAgkMZ6Kd3B6ntJC8Fv4yKzFM2wGoRaoEm/171003_QR-Diagrams-01.png)


## A Fabric for Programming Cities?
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This QR pattern-work is a kind of programmable fabric. Maybe even a map? If you look down on it, all of the different hierarchies begin to look a lot like roadways, buildings, skyscrapers and ultimately cities. Steemit provides a unique opportunity to explore the potential here. Comments can be used decide on building types, public spaces and materials. 

Looking below, a time-lapse of Playa Del Carmen (in Mexico) shows how urban development spreads along coastal infrastructure. Different features along the coastline drive clusters of growth. With [BLOCKTOWN](https://steemit.com/art/@voronoi/steemtown-reboot-a-collaborative-art-experiment-in-city-making) we'll be exploring planning features that can attract, push away and challenge. 

https://steemitimages.com/0x0/https://3.bp.blogspot.com/-nsfTgl3cTXo/WD22mw6oCVI/AAAAAAAAI-g/CbEdgia1RBsYBWoJTrxP-CdS_-yuojvfwCLcB/s1600/playa-del-carmen-mexico-4k.gif

* *[Timelapse](https://www.cmu.edu/news/stories/archives/2012/july/july30_landsattool.html) is a project by Google Earth and Carnegie Mellon University CREATE Lab's Time Machine Library. Using the data mined from 5 separate satellites orbiting the Earth, this mapping project compiled 3.95 terapixel global images into over 25,000,000 overlapping multi-resolution video tiles.*

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