Making Futures Making Futures Marginal Notes on Innovation, Design, and Democracy edited by Pelle Ehn, Elisabet M. Nilsson, and Richard Topgaard The MIT Press Cambridge, Massachusetts London, England © 2014 Massachusetts Institute of Technology This work is licensed to the public under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 3.0 license: http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/3.0/ All rights reserved except as licensed pursuant to the Creative Commons license identified above. Any reproduction or other use not licensed as above, by any electronic or mechanical means (in- cluding but not limited to photocopying, public distribution, online display, and digital informa- tion storage and retrieval) requires permission in writing from the publisher. MIT Press books in print format may be purchased at special quantity discounts for business or sales promotional use. For information, email [email protected]. This book was set in Stone Sans and Stone Serif by the MIT Press. The print edition was printed and bound in the United States of America. Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Making futures : marginal notes on innovation, design, and democracy / edited by Pelle Ehn, Elisabet M. Nilsson, and Richard Topgaard pages cm Includes bibliographical references and index. ISBN 978-0-262-02793-9 (hardcover : alk. paper) 1. Technological innovations. 2. Group work in research. 3. Community development. I. Ehn, Pelle, 1948–, editor of compilation. II. Nilsson, Elisabet M., editor of compilation. III. Topgaard, Richard, editor of compilation. T173.8.M354 2014 303.48’3—dc23 2014008010 10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1 Contents Acknowledgments vii Prologue by Laura Watts, Pelle Ehn, and Lucy Suchman ix 1 Introduction 1 Pelle Ehn, Elisabet M. Nilsson, and Richard Topgaard I Designing Conditions for the Social 2 Designing Conditions for the Social 17 Anders Emilson 3 Designing in the Neighborhood: Beyond (and in the Shadow of) Creative Communities 35 Anders Emilson, Per-Anders Hillgren, and Anna Seravalli 4 Connecting with the Powerful Strangers: From Governance to Agonistic Design Things 63 Anders Emilson and Per-Anders Hillgren II Opening Production—Design and Commons 5 Opening Production: Design and Commons 87 Sanna Marttila, Elisabet M. Nilsson, and Anna Seravalli 6 While Waiting for the Third Industrial Revolution: Attempts at Commoning Production 99 Anna Seravalli 7 Playing with Fire: Collaborating through Digital Sketching in a Creative Community 131 Mads Hobye 8 How Deep Is Your Love? On Open-Source Hardware 153 David Cuartielles III Creative Class Struggles 9 Creative Class Struggles 173 Erling Björgvinsson and Pernilla Severson 10 The Making of Cultural Commons: Nasty Old Film Distribution and Funding 187 Erling Björgvinsson 11 Collaborative Design and Grassroots Journalism: Public Controversies and Controversial Publics 227 Erling Björgvinsson 12 Stories on Future-Making in Everyday Practices from Managers in the Creative Industries 257 Pernilla Severson IV Emerging Publics 13 Emerging Publics: Totem-Poling the ‘We’s and ‘Me’s of Citizen Participation 269 Per Linde 14 Performing the City: Exploring the Bandwidth of Urban Place-Making through New-Media Tactics 277 Per Linde and Karin Book 15 Publics-in-the-Making: Crafting Issues in a Mobile Sewing Circle 303 Kristina Lindström and Åsa Ståhl 16 Emerging Publics and Interventions in Democracy 323 Michael Krona and Måns Adler List of Contributors 345 Index 349 Acknowledgments Our contribution has been to draw this volume together, a modest undertaking in com- parison with the contributions made by others. Still, the editors’ names are the only ones that appear on the front cover. The many authors, who tell their own stories of being involved in innovation, design, and democracy, have their names in the book. Their stories would, however, not have been possible without the contributions of other participants, human and non-human. Numerous books and articles are among these influential participants. They and their authors are named in lists of references throughout the book. But the most central contributors to these marginal notes—the true makers of this book—are the many direct and indirect participants in the various design encounters. Your toils are the stuff that has made these stories possible. We acknowledge your contributions even though most of your names do not shine from the pages of the book and many are missing from the alphabetical list of participants that follows: Aisha, Alima, Aluma, Amaduh Bah, Amanda Dahllöf, Andrea Botero, Ann Light, Anto Tomic, Archipelago of Futures Workshop 2012, Arduino Boards, Artcom, Attendo, Bambuser, Barbara Andrews, Barbro Lindén, Barn i stan, Behrang Miri, Ber- til Björk, Bertil Löwgren, Birgitte Hoffmann, Birthe Muller, Bjarne Stenquist, Björn Wäst, Bo Reimer, Carin Hernqvist, Caroline Lundholm, Catalina Alzate, Centre for Sci- ence Studies at Lancaster University, Centrum för publikt entreprenörskap, Charlotte Petersson, Charlotte Ziethen, Cristiano Storni, Christina Merker-Siesjö, Cia Borgström, Coompanion, Cykelköket, David Hakken, Delia Grenville, Do-Fi, DoDream, Ebrima Jameh, Embroidery machine, Endre Dányi, Epsilon, Eva Brandt, Eva Renhammar, Fab- riken, Fabriken machines (laser-cutter, CNC mill, sewing machines, overlock machines, saw, belt sander), Fabriken handtools, Feedus, Fiona Winders, Forskningsavdelningen, Fredrik Björk, Fredrik Rakar, Good World, Hanna Sigsjö, Helene Broms, Helene Gran- qvist, Herrgårds Kvinnoförening, Hjalmar Falk, Hungerprojektet, illutron, Ingemar Holm, Inkonst, Jennie Järvå, Jila Moradi, Joakim Halse, Johan Dahlén, Johan Salo, Jonas Löwgren, Kommission för ett socialt hållbart Malmö, Lars Flygare, Lena Eriks- son, Lene Alsbjørn, Leverhulme Trust, Li Jönsson, Lisa Lundström, Louise Brønnum, Lucy’s laptop (without which it would all be very different), Luisa Carbonelli, Malmö viii Acknowledgments stad, Malmö University, Maria Foverskov, Marie Aakjer, Maurizio Teli, Medea Collabor- ative Media Initiative, Media Evolution, Mette Agger Eriksen, Mette Gislev Kjærsgaard, Michaela Green, Miljonprocessen, Mobile phones, Mona Masri, National Federation of Rural Community Centres, Nätverket Göran, Needles, Nicoras Ljogu, Nils Phillips, Nokia N95, Ola Persson, Oyuki Matsumoto, Ozma, Pallets and scrap lying around STPLN, Paula Kermfors, RGRA, Rhefab Management, Righteous Fashion, Röda korset, Sabina Dethorey, Safija Imsirovic, School of Arts and Communication, Selfmade, Skåne stadsmission, Sissel Olander, Social Incubator Workshop, Stefan Löfgren, Stella Boess, STPLN, Studieförbundet vuxenskolan, Svenjohan Davidsson, Swedish Traveling Exhi- bitions, Tangram Film, Tanja Rosenqvist, TempoS Workshop on Making Futures 2012, Textildepartementet, The Pirate Bay, Thomas Binder, Threads, Tiina Suopajärvi, Tine Damsholt, Tommy Wegbratt, Tösabidarna, Ulrik Jørgensen, Ulrika Forsgren Högman, Unsworn Industries, Vi unga, Viktoria Günes, Xerox PARC (rest in peace), Yanki Lee, Yvonne Dittrich, Åsa Skogström Feldt, Återskapa. We thank you all. Pelle Ehn, Elisabet M. Nilsson, and Richard Topgaard Malmö Prologue Laura Watts, Pelle Ehn, and Lucy Suchman This prologue is carried by a Design Mailboat. It was originally destined for the opening of the 2012 Design and Displacement conference (organized by the Society for Social Studies of Science and the European Association for Studies of Science and Technology) in Copenhagen, where the exchange was performed. Here the Design Mailboat has been redirected, serving as a prologue to the coming marginal notes on innovation, design, and democracy. Mailboats are message-sized vessels, originally sent from remote islands to reach unknown shores, designed to carry words on the tide from one beach to another, to send questions and receive floating replies. The Design Mailboat is one such word-bearing ship. We have been sending it back and forth between three coasts with a passion for design and its futures. The Design Mailboat has floated from the islands of Orkney (off the northeast coast of Scotland), through the Öresund (between Denmark and Sweden), to Silicon Valley (in California). Silicon Valley is the mythic place of ori- gin of the design of the mouse, the graphical user interface, and the big green button on the photocopier. Öresund is a mythic center of Scandinavian Design, the place of origin of the ‘white style,’ a home of legendary designers and beautiful functional objects, but maybe also the home of the Thing and its agonistic collectives. The islands of Orkney are a mythic place of origin for wave and tidal renewable energy, and for the design of monumental stone circles, built more than 5,000 years ago. From our various locations as the future archaeologist, the collective designer, and the anthropologist of technosci- ence, we have been asking one another what “design” is in these far-apart places. From the Future Archaeologist—Message 1 I write this message to be taken in the ocean currents to that far-off continental coast, to that mythic place of Silicon Valley. You echo in the wireless network wind on my cheeks, from the metal chamfers around my keyboard, in logos that litter my web win- dows, in the very essence and existence of my mouse. I know your world by its absent presence in mine. You haunt me. Your home haunts me. Where does Silicon Valley not haunt? x Watts, Ehn, and Suchman Figure P.1 View over the European Marine Energy Centre, wave energy test site, Orkney. Laura Watts (CC:BY-NC). You live in that place where my future is imagined and