CALL FOR PARTICIPATION

Designing Technology for Community Appropriation

All around us new devices, environments, and systems are opening themselves up for user adoption and adaptation. The design territory has expanded to include people as re-designers, and Moran has described design as a “negotiated social process”. This process has heightened the understanding of what designers should be designing for, but does not necessarily provide the tools and practices to design technology that is truly open for later appropriation.

This one-day workshop will be held at the Urban Grind coffee shop in Portland, and will involve the participants in a process of design and appropriation, as a tool for reflection. Focus will be placed on openness, transparency and adaptability. The day will be constructed as a series of design exercises intended to engage people in sharing and creating together. We invite participation from designers, technologists, sociologists, theoreticians, policy-makers, community builders; anyone concerned with the design and use of technologies in community settings.

Themes:

·       designing for new and unexpected interactions in ubiquitous computing

·       the role of users as collective re-designers

·       open systems and adaptable products

·       designing for appropriation or ‘hackability’

·       designing the immaterial, particularly energy

Submissions should be sent to Wendy March, wendy.march@intel.com, by January 21st 2005 and should include the following:

·       A brief biography, and photograph.

·       A 250-300 word description of relevant research.

·       A position paper describing your approach to designing for community appropriation, which should include projects that you are currently working on or a place/community you’d like to work with.