Robert Bell, Co-Founder of the Intelligent Community Forum, explains which midsize and small U.S. cities are the next best places to invest. Hosts: Carol Massar and Vincent Cignarella. Producer: Paul Brennan

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The Sunshine Coast has been recognised as one of the Top7 Intelligent Communities of 2019, sharing the global spotlight with communities from Canada, Taiwan and the United States including Chicago.

The announcement made overnight by the Intelligent Community Forum in Quebec, Canada, acknowledges those communities which exemplify best practices in broadband deployment and use, workforce development, innovation, digital inclusion, sustainability and advocacy.

Below are our most popular posts on SmartCitiesWorld in 2018, highlighting smart city priorities such as transportation, governance and partnerships.

For me, the most interesting thing in smart cities in 2018 was the more open discussion around the social risks of smart cities and practical moves to address them. This included more attention on the risks associated with the rise of facial recognition technology, concerns about data privacy, the acknowledgement of unintended consequences and the need to pay attention to growing cyber risks as our cities get more connected.

In areas from traffic management to public safety, Singapore is by far the world’s leading smart city by quantitative measure. Home to 5.8 million people, Singapore ranks as a major global urban area and the world’s most expensive city—two traits that make it ripe for smart city technology.

But what about cities with smaller footprints that might not seem to warrant the effort to produce widespread connectivity via the Internet of Things (IoT)? At least by some perceptions, there’s a clear correlation between smart cities and size. Asked to name the most important factors for the future success of their IoT initiatives in their location, respondents to a Forbes Insights/Intel survey selected population size (27%), population trends (25%) and population density (20%) as three of the top-ranking answers.

You are in a race. A really big, important race. What are you hoping for? To win, of course. Second and third place are all very well, but there is no substitute for coming out on top. That is the mood in the room every year when the Intelligent Community Forum names its Intelligent Community of the Year. In that room are representatives of seven cities and counties, the Top7 Intelligent Communities of the Year: mayors, members of council, city managers, economic development, and IT leaders. They all want to win. In fact, they are already winners, having reached the Top7. But one of them has slightly outscored the others in our year-long evaluation. The moment comes when we reveal who that is – and it leaves in its wake one happy place and six very disappointed ones.

ESPOO, Finland--(BUSINESS WIRE)--The second-largest city in Finland, Espoo has won the international Intelligent Community Awards 2018. The theme of the contest was ‘humanizing data’. This refers to the use of data for people-oriented service development.

Espoo’s strength in the competition lay in its client-oriented way of sustainably developing a smart city – in other words, Espoo wants to involve its residents.

The Intelligent Community Forum (ICF) has named the world’s Top7 Intelligent Communities of 2018. This is the think tank’s 16th annual Top7 list of regions, cities or towns that have gone, in ICF’s words, “from smart city to intelligent community.”

This year’s list includes communities from four nations, with Taiwan contributing three, Canada two communities and Australia and Finland one each. The seven will travel to London in June where one will go on to be named the Intelligent Community of the Year, succeeding Melbourne, Australia, the reigning community.

During a Top7 site visit to Winnipeg, ICF co-founder Louis Zacharilla discussed the city's efforts as one of the Top7 Intelligent Communities of 2018. Click on the image below to watch the clip - the segment begins at 17:18.

A judge who toured Hamilton to determine whether it is the most "intelligent" community in the world said the city is an "astounding" place and its citizens recognize that.

"There's a real pride here," said Robert Bell, co-founder of the Intelligent Community Forum, a U.S.-based think tank founded 15 years ago that studies and promotes the world's best cities and how those models can be reproduced elsewhere.

"The number of people I've talked to who've said, 'I'm a lifelong Hamiltonian, and boy this is just the greatest place on the planet.'"

The IoTCC and InsightaaS have released a major new report that explores challenge and opportunity in the use of the Internet of Things (IoT) in smart communities. IoValue: intelligence in Community Ecosystems is the first report in a series of best practice papers co-developed by members of the IoTCC, led by Mary Allen of InsightaaS.

The concept of “smart” city or community is not new; in fact, city operators have been using network connectivity and computing for a long time, deploying technology to support digital processes for applications ranging from back office records to property tax billing to the control of water and electricity distribution. But 'intelligent community' is another proposition, and one of the first questions addressed by the report working group is how to describe it and who to include – is intelligent community restricted to municipal government, or are there other groups involved, and what are its physical limits? The IoTCC group used the following diagram to illustrate the collaborative nature of the community.