Writing just a few years after the birth of the Web, Oldenburg was lamenting the disappearance of cafes, taverns, restaurants, libraries, and other public places that were instrumental to the development of American civic life.

FORBES: 2012: Our Intelligent Return to the Physical World

Funding infrastructure development for public building construction and renovations of schools, community centers, libraries, recreation centers and parks.

CNN: Report sees 'sobering statistics' on racial inequality

CTCs are public housing facilities, libraries and community centers nationwide designed to provide myriad services, including work force development and employment information, pre-school and family programs and adult education, all of which use computers and information technology to meet people's needs.

CNN: Gore asks Congress to fund Community Tech Centers

Artist Luzinterruptus fitted 10, 000 books that had been discarded by public libraries with LED lights and covered the streets of Melbourne with them, and in an exciting development the much-anticipated Low Line underground park in NYC debuted a full-scale model of their incredible fiber-optic solar-concentrating technology in New York City's lower east side.

ENGADGET: Inhabitat's Week in Green: GPS shoes, shape-shifting bicycle and a wheelchair helicopter