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Workshop on Long(er) Term Design Thinking

February 20, 2018

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CALL FOR PARTICIPATION

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LONG(ER)-TERM DESIGN THINKING

NSF-Sponsored Workshop

Seattle, WA

May 29-31, 2018

Design thinking and approaches to problems that are long(er) term — on the order of 20, 50, or 100 years — have a distinct cast. With this workshop, we seek to enable a conversation at the intersection of long(er) timeframes and the role of design thinking and practice. Increasingly, researchers and designers of technology are investigating both individual and societal problems that require a long(er)-term design thinking approach to grapple with their complex, emergent, and dynamic nature. Yet, embracing a long(er)-term approach to intentionally designing the role, place, and pace of information technologies and systems that might operate over long, indeterminate amounts of time has received less attention in the human-computer interaction, design, and related communities.

The goal of this workshop is to foster an interdisciplinary research community. While focused on the design of information systems, we recognize that long(er) term design thinking surfaces in many fields. Sample fields include but are not limited to: architecture, computer-supported cooperative work and learning, cultural heritage, data curation, design research, human-computer interaction, land restoration, libraries, museology, participatory design, and urban planning.  If you feel your field and perspective is relevant, please consider coming!

In the workshop, we will collaborate on:

(1) Sharing. sharing approaches, case studies, methods, strategies, tactics, and heuristics for engaging design thinking on long(er)-term timeframes, on the order of 20, 50 or 100 years

(2) Reflecting. generating critical and constructive discussions for how to improve current approaches and practices

(3) Envisioning. identifying new opportunities and grand challenges for long(er)-term design thinking approaches

 

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WHO CAN PARTICIPATE?

We invite researchers, designers, and practitioners interested in Long(er)-Term Design Thinking from a broad range of perspectives.

As noted above, sample fields include but are not limited to: architecture, computer-supported cooperative work and learning, cultural heritage, data curation, design research, human-computer interaction, land restoration, libraries, museology, participatory design, and urban planning.  If you feel your field and perspective is relevant, please consider coming!

Sample questions and topics include but are not limited to:

  • How is the ‘long-term’ and ‘multi-lifespan’ conceptualized and attended to in and across the design process?

  • In a field known for cutting edge innovation, where devices over five years old are regarded as legacy, how can we consider processes and solutions that extend robust and enduring human-technology relations? What kind of design processes, methods, heuristics, strategies, tactics could be helpful here?

  • How should design teams approach creating information systems that are intended to be in existence and use well beyond the lives of intended stakeholders (and the original members of the design team itself)?

  • How do we account for multiple generations of stakeholders in a long-term or multi-lifespan design process? Relatedly, how do we account for not-yet-born future stakeholders, who will be impacted by systems designed over the longer-term?

  • What are the practical, ethical, and/or moral issues of creating systems intended to outlive (and be maintained) beyond the lives of those that design them?

  • What roles do technology play in shaping how people experience time? And, what opportunities exist for interactive systems to enable experience of longer, more diverse forms of time?

  • What kinds of methods, tactics, and approaches are used to design technologies and systems that embody temporal expressions alternative to normative Western concepts of time? Where have methodological or practical struggles emerged and how have they been addressed?

  • In what ways can non-human actors and timeframes be scaffolded to support long(er)-term design thinking?

  • What are the grand challenges to and opportunities in researching and practicing long(er)-term and/or multi-lifespan design?

 

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HOW TO APPLY

To apply, please submit a 1-2 page position paper that briefly addresses the following questions:

1. Why do you want to come to this workshop? What conversations would you like to have? If there are one or two key issues, challenges or opportunities that you’re especially interested in discussing during the workshop, please let us know.  Tell us why you think they are important, to you personally and to the field more generally.

2. What do you hope to contribute to others during the workshop? What do you see yourself contributing to the workshop (e.g. Perspectives? Methods? Case studies? Stories? Critical reflections?) What can other participants learn from you, your design approach/experiences, and perspectives?

3. What is your background? Let us know what work (if any) you have done in this area? How is your work related to the long(er) term design thinking theme of this workshop?

4. What is a provocative, inspirational, or generative idea you have about long(er) term design? For this question feel free to submit an image, artifact, URL, text, poem, etc. We’re hoping to collect a wide range of provocative ideas to seed the workshop conversation.

Submissions should be 2 pages maximum (with no format constraints). Please send your submission or questions about the workshop to Daisy Yoo at dyoo@uw.edu

Review of applications will begin on March 10 and continue until all available spots are filled.

 

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KEY DATES

Monday March 10, 2018: Rolling deadline. We will begin to review position papers on March 10.

Friday March 30, 2018: Notification of acceptance

3pm on May 29 – 3pm on May 31, 2018: Workshop

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LOCATION AND TRAVEL

The workshop will take place at the University of Washington campus at Seattle, WA. Travel funding and accommodation in Seattle will be offered to one person for each accepted workshop submission.

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ORGANIZING COMMITTEE

Batya Friedman, Information School, University of Washington

William Odom, School of Interactive Arts + Technology, Simon Fraser University

Daisy Yoo, Information School, University of Washington

 

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Sponsored by NSF, grant no. IIS-1302709: Multi-lifespan Information System Research and Design