For the powers that be, the infrastructure space has become a secret weapon, and everyone else is just beginning to realize it. Victor Hugo once said that books killed architecture. If he were giving a TED talk today, he might add to his assertion that architecture has been resurrected as something even more powerful—as information itself. Keller Easterling argues that if this new space is a secret weapon, it is best kept secret from those who produce it, that is, from the architects themselves. At the same time, entrepreneurs, scientists, programmers and civil activists are creating a kind of software space as a political tool with which they intend to once again outsmart politics. Translation: Dmitry Simanovsky