Writing and other technologies for enhancing human memory and the reach of communication seem, in many instances in the ancient world, to have a special relationship with the rise of ancient urban centers. This chapter compares the diverse instances, in which writing and other forms of record-keeping developed apparently in close coordination with burgeoning cities. The functions to which information technologies were put in early cities run the gamut from economic administration to the performance and commemoration of ritual. One important function of the khipu at Cuzco and other Inka cities and administrative centers is that the technology also served as proof of the official's fulfilment of his duty to execute and document the administrative task so ordered by his superior. In Mesopotamia, pre-writing systems such as different kinds of seals, tokens, and their combinations were already complex enough to require established methods to transfer them, along with other skills, like measuring fields or performing mathematics.