Would it not be great, if AI would be the first tech tool that does not glue us to our laptops and phones, but that does give us time back to enjoy laughter, community and connection?

When GenAI was born in the early 2020s, I was hooked. It gave me a glimpse into the future and a hope that I only formulated vaguely and then consistently more clearly:

"Would it be possible to create a future, where we would create time to focus on things that matter to us, while the AI handles the rest? All the things I did not wanted to do myself: the admin, the repetitiveness, the boring stuff?"

What started as a glance as a me that despite having worked in various tech companies, had no idea about programming, AI insides and how that would actually work at all, would soon become more than that:

• I realized that AI allows us to bring our ideas to life

• I dived into all those technical topics - one step at a time, starting with logo creation with AI, then basic websites and automations and soon full-stack applications and creative digital art with AI

I realized, what might have sounded like "no idea of tech" soon changed when AI developed faster in ability and skills than any technology before it and that everyone - irrespective of AI and tech skills - could use AI's skills to do exactly that.

AI became my teacher, my perspective switcher, my assistant and my coder. It became my source for all things that I needed to bring those ideas to life that I was longing to bring to life.

And the question became more relevant again:

"Is it possible to create a world, where a human can give their creative input, but all forms of AI and tech are able via themselves or via agentified characters manage a city, a space, a place, a world, that is entirely autonomous and interconnected within itself as well as self-healing and self-monitoring?"

I have written about AI events in NYC and I will to some degree continue doing that.

But I will also write about the ways of how I solve that question and how I get closer to answering it.

In that process, I share with you all that I build and create in that city that I decided to build for that experiment:

"AURA City" powered by the Creative AI Lab.

Expect to find insights and learnings from the process of building the city:

• How to build worlds with AI, characters, 3D, animation, videos

• How to build tech products that support the operations of the city - an autonomous monitoring app, and content creator app, coding agent and more

• How and where to find inspiration for designs, publishing, tech, and growth

• ... and creative content that in one way or the other is created with a mixture of human and artificial intelligence/ creativity combined

This is not exactly the same as only NYC AI Events and yet, I would be thrilled if you stay on board and dive with me into that experiment and receive one and more insights, inspiration, motivation, connections and learnings from going this journey jointly! :D

What we cover in this edition:

• The 5 NYC AI Events I am excited about next week

• An overview of Google's AI Tools and how you can make the best out of each of them

• A case study: The tools needed to create an autonomous city/space and why that is just the beginning

• The 10 Tools I can't live without in building the AURA City

Let's get started and dive in.

The 5 NYC AI Events I am excited about next week

• ..

Tech Products for the Operations of the City

When you build a city, a place, a world from scratch, you can build in two fashions: Top-Down or Bottoms-Up.

In my case, for the sake of the starting-somewhere idea, I started just somewhere. Creating a city world.

It was an idea that took shape in my head when I built the Creative AI Lab as initially a Portfolio Page of all my Creative AI work. And soon I realized: How do you connect the dots? How do you automate what is repetitive and how to simplify and streamline what is clunky and messy.

The result?

I built my full Creative AI Lab with Lovable.

Then due to some mishap and misalignment with the direction of Lovable as a product and my ambitions, I tried to transition over to Cursor as my coding AI agent.

The result?

My full application broke and I essentially had to start over.

While it felt like a curse at start, it became a blessing soon. I had to think of streamlining the application in a way that it makes sense. To me, to everyone else visiting it.

And in my mind, it did not make sense: 10+ brands, all scattered across different domains and no clear direction or focus? How would anyone find that interesting or even more important - would even I see a clear structure within it?

I didn't and out of that frustration the idea of AURA was born. A city that combines it all. A city of creative innovation. A city as a playground to build with AI.

And then, a short time later, the question arose: And now? Why do I actually have that drive to bring that to life? What is it that keeps me fascinated to not stop and build consistently?