So, in Dubai they can build a super-futuristic building in about 1 1/2 years, which is typical for them.

Over here it takes about 10 years to rebuild the World Trade Center, if we're lucky.

America Fuck Yea!!!

Maintenance Hell.

Could Dubai share some of it's immense wealth, please, so some of us could enjoy these ridiculously lavish niceties? My nearest megacity has seemingly exhausted its barrage of intriguing corporate and residential architectural amusements.

Oh, but wait until we get off the oil, my friends...they'll be building things with plywood and elmer's glue....

Some folk livin' in the future, some folk livin' in the past, some folk glad to be livin' at all.

Your gas dollars at work.

"- The entire building is mechanically jacked, so each section twists slowly, giving people different views of the oceanfront over time."

Fuck yeah indeed.

Eh, just go work for Halliburton, I'm sure you could live there.

because getting up and walking to the other side of a building is so much work we've got to make buildings that move for us...

@MarlboroTestMonkey7: Would Intelligent Design proponents be considered atheists?

@tetracycloide: so you burned the reichstag bldg, what did you use?

Think how awesome these burned out husks of buildings circa 2025 will be as a basis for future video games!

Awesome! Now they don't have to hire the Russian hackers to reprogram the lighting systems! Tetris for everyone!

Great. Now Dubai needs to worry about The Melding Plague.

I think I once had a Micronaughts toy that looked like that.

Leave it to a HK designer to go all retro ;P

Yay! Tetris!

"the physical shifts that the building parts will make over time" - Mechasm by John Sladek gave me my first view of changeable architecture about 25 years ago. Pretty good sci-fi in general, too.

"Gives people different views of the oceanfront over time?" Dunno what the corner-office CEOs will think about that.

And I just hope that region isn't prone to earthquakes and sinkholes once they pump all the oil out ...

@Tommmcatt: As stated on this here site recently (in the comments about that big round building also planned for Dubai), the United Arab Emirates are a lot more diversified than that: their economy has really left oil behind as the main driver of growth. Do they still make billions every year from oil exports? Sure they do. That revenue is only a fraction of the total nowadays, however. Much of the newer activity centers around ... (drum roll) tourism and construction! ta-da! If anyone thinks the government of a small country such as the UAE can amass an investment fund of about 750 BILLION dollars while at the same time being incompetent or ignorant of economics, well, such an opinion wouldn't be very well founded.
Am I defending the UAE's rulers? Not by a long shot. Obviously undemocratic, repressive, quasi-slaving (URQ) oligarchies deserve no defense. But URQ does not always equal dumb, and the many millionaires from all over the world who are flocking to Dubai to purchase $10,000 gold-encased cellphones and Mcmansions on the fake islands really don't care how such nice things are built for them -- they all have maids and other such low-paid servants back home, no? Plenty of richie riches from the 'democratic' U.S. and EU fall within this category of the see-no-evil elite.
The Dubai bubble may yet burst sometime, but I get tired of hearing about how the evil Middle East keeps taking our money in exchange for their 'damned' or 'filthy' oil, while at the same time so many Americans refuse to drive more fuel-efficient vehicles and American and European oil companies are making just as much money from the expensive oil and gas as any other producers. They too are fleecing us, but where is the outcry? Oh no, it's only those bloody foreigners doing it, right?

Am I the only one who sees a Pac-Man kinda texture in the tower windows?