Not Long Enough at the Fair

As previously noted in this blog, Olympics suck. But what about World’s Fairs?

Strikingly unlike the Olympics, International Expositions have a happy legacy.

To World’s Fairs we owe much of our culture. They have been responsible, either for the first introduction or for their popularization, for the hamburger, ketchup, the ice cream cone, cotton candy, iced tea, Belgian waffles, shredded wheat, puffed wheat, Dr. Pepper, ragtime, “colonial” architecture, television, motion pictures, talking pictures, neon lighting, and Hires Root Beet. Take these away from American culture, and what’s left?

How about elevators, escalators, Imax (and Cinerama before it), x-rays, or alternating current electric lighting? All were developed and unveiled for World’s Fairs.

What about French culture? Paris’s expositions gave them the Eiffel Tower, Art Nouveau, the Gare D’Orsay, the system for classifying wines, the metro, and ambient music. Consider Paris without them.

Olympics have done nothing to improve the world. World’s Fairs certainly have.

And, unlike the Olympics, they have never been successfully used by disreputable regimes for self-promotion. Mussolini did have plans for one, cancelled by the Second World War; so did Japan. But it’s a funny thing about International Expositions: by their nature, they don’t work well for totalitarians. The air of openness, new ideas, and greater knowledge they require and promote cannot, in the end, coexist with oppression.

When disreputable regimes have sought to host one, it has been a failure. The first great Exposition, by popular estimation, was London’s Crystal Palace Exhibition in 1851. Napoleon III, a scoundrel and a warmonger although not a dictator, sought, in 1855, to imitate and surpass London’s success. His Exposition Universelle returned only 10% on the original investment. London then again held one in 1862, and again turned a profit. Napoleon tried again in 1867, and lost half his investment.

His regime soon fell. Paris, though, tried again in 1878, without him. France was now a democratic republic. And the fair was a spectacular success. Among other things, it gave us the international system of copyright, international mail, and braille. It was the first of three truly great World’s Fairs in Paris, all under the republic, which probably created Paris’s reputation last century as a centre of world culture.

The US, too, of course, has a record of success with them: Philadelphia in 1876, Chicago’s Century of Progress, New York in 1939 and 1964, San Francisco in 1915 and 1939, St. Louis in 1904.

A World’s Fair is, in sum, generally the crowning achievement of a democracy and an open, free society. Things get better in the wake of a world’s fair.

Both happily and sadly, though, unlike the Olympics, the days of the great expositions are probably over. There are two reasons: with the Internet, television, and international travel, they are now much less necessary to spread good ideas. And unlike the Olympics, they have no visual hook that can be sold to TV. Most of the Olympics’ revenue comes from this.

Which brings me back to my idea of a “robot Olympics.” Direct competitions between engineered creations could generate much interest and much TV. After all, the space race garnered some media attention, didn’t it?

Events could be chosen for visual appeal as well as practical benefit. We might have national entries, as in the Olympics, or open it to all comers: individuals, universities, corporations, governments, NGOs. In this way, we might also form some judgements as to which organizational principles are most effective in encouraging innovation as well.

Consider solar-powered vehicles in various weight classes racing against one another—on land, sea, and air. Consider robots battling similarly. “Marathon” events could involve going farthest on a given input of energy. Materials tests in various weight categories might involve firing explosive shells at the entrants—great TV.

Computer chess competitions are a natural—computer program against computer program. Other strategy games might also be suitable: poker, go, Scrabble, and so forth.

Competitions in the arts have always been a part of World’s Fairs; all that is needed is to do them up in proper “reality TV” style, a la American idol. Those actually attending the fair would have the chance to see the finals live.

How about competitions to develop recipes based on inexpensive and highly nutritious foods, as a mix of arts and engineering? Architects could be challenged to design homes using cheap materials and methods, which viewers could watch being constructed, and fair visitors could tour. Designers and artists could be challenged to create something in a new medium—many are available now thanks to computers—to be shown on TV, judged by a panel of experts and seen by the general public visiting the fair.

It’s time for a celebration of the mind.