Ritual Machines I & II: Making Technology at Home

David Kirk, David Chatting, Paulina Yurman, Jo-Anne Bichard

Research output: Contribution to conferencePaperpeer-review

37 Citations (Scopus)
26 Downloads (Pure)

Abstract

Changing patterns of both work-related mobility and domestic arrangements mean that 'mobile workers' face challenges to support and engage in family life whilst travelling for work. Phatic devices offer some potential to provide connection at a distance alongside existing communications infrastructure. Through a bespoke design process, incorporating phases of design ethnography, critical technical practice and provotyping we have developed Ritual Machines I and II as material explorations of mobile workers' lives and practices. In doing this we sought to reflect upon the practices through which families accomplish mobile living, the values they place in technology for doing 'family' at a distance and to draw insights in to the potential roles of digital technology in supporting them. We frame the design of our phatic devices in discussion of processes of bespoke design, offer advice on supporting mobile workers when travelling and articulate the values of making a technology at home when designing for domestic and mobile settings.
Original languageEnglish
Pages2474-2486
Number of pages10
DOIs
Publication statusPublished - 7 May 2016
EventACM Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems (CHI) 2016 - San Jose, United States
Duration: 7 May 201612 May 2016

Conference

ConferenceACM Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems (CHI) 2016
Abbreviated titleCHI
Country/TerritoryUnited States
CitySan Jose
Period7/05/1612/05/16

Keywords

  • Ritual
  • family
  • phatic
  • bespoke
  • mobility

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