While the first real experiences of smart cities, dead on arrival for the most part, have been bottomless money pits, Carlos Moreno, a researcher in the fields of complex systems, robotics, and artificial intelligence, contrasts this notion with a new vision of the “living city.” While he is aware of the importance of digital tools in the design and evolution of the urban fabric, he nevertheless criticizes the techno-centric and universalist dimension of the smart city, which erases the place of the living and its interactions, literally generating dead cities. The living city seeks to understand the other and the way that it interacts with its socio-territorial-urban environment. Technological but first and foremost human, the living city advocates relationships and exchange to bring forth new ideas and practices. It is a creative ecosystem not dictated by the vertical nature of technology or of architecture, but based on metabolic exchanges and citizens’ re-appropriation based on a DIY approach.