The descrip­tion “open-air muse­um” has often been applied, in var­i­ous sens­es both pos­i­tive and neg­a­tive, to the coun­try of Italy in gen­er­al and the city of Rome in par­tic­u­lar. Yet it also takes lit­tle expo­sure to the intense cul­ture of tourism and all it has wrought to won­der how Rome was back when, if you like, Rome was Rome: in the sec­ond cen­tu­ry AD, say, when its built envi­ron­ment reached the height of its glo­ry. His “Vir­tu­al Rome” takes us on not a walk through the Eter­nal City of near­ly two mil­len­nia ago, but a flight: view­ers of mod­ern trav­el doc­u­men­taries will find its cam­era move­ments rem­i­nis­cent of noth­ing so much as drone pho­tog­ra­phy. This tech­nique pro­vides views even the most august ancient Roman cit­i­zens could nev­er have com­mand­ed. He’s the author of the newslet­ter Books on Cities as well as the books 한국 요약 금지 (No Sum­ma­riz­ing Korea) and Kore­an Newtro.