research-article

The Proper Care and Feeding of Hackerspaces: Care Ethics and Cultures of Making

Authors:

Austin L. Toombs,

Shaowen Bardzell,

Jeffrey BardzellAuthors Info & Claims

CHI '15: Proceedings of the 33rd Annual ACM Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems

Pages 629 - 638

https://doi.org/10.1145/2702123.2702522

Published: 18 April 2015 Publication History

Abstract

Communities of making have been at the center of attention in popular, business, political, and academic research circles in recent years. In HCI, they seem to carry the promise of new forms of computer use, education, innovation, and even ways of life. In the West in particular, the maker manifestos of these communities have shown strong elements of a neoliberal ethos, one that prizes self-determination, tech-savvy, independence, freedom from government, suspicion of authority, and so forth. Yet such communities, to function as communities, also require values of collaboration, cooperation, interpersonal support-in a word, care. In this ethnographic study, we studied and participated as members of a hackerspace for 19 months, focusing in particular not on their technical achievements, innovations, or for glimmers of a more sustainable future, but rather to make visible and to analyze the community maintenance labor that helps the hackerspace support the practices that its members, society, and HCI research are so interested in. We found that the maker ethic entails a complex negotiation of both a neoliberal libertarian ethos and a care ethos.

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Cited By

Højgaard CEgholm L(2024)Fluid Forms of Organizing Volunteering: Producing Civic Action Through Organizational MaintenanceNonprofit and Voluntary Sector Quarterly10.1177/08997640241236399Online publication date: 28-Mar-2024
https://doi.org/10.1177/08997640241236399
Popova KDemir APark JComber R(2024)Voicing Discomfort, Communicating Breakdowns: Design Exploration of Felt Ethics in a Body-Based WorkshopProceedings of the 13th Nordic Conference on Human-Computer Interaction10.1145/3679318.3685375(1-13)Online publication date: 13-Oct-2024
https://dl.acm.org/doi/10.1145/3679318.3685375
Suchanek OMeissner JAngelini RSpiel K(2024)From Participation to Solidarity: A Case Study on Access of Maker Spaces from Deaf and Hearing Perspectives: Von Partizipation zu Solidarität: Eine Fallstudie zur Zugänglichkeit von Makerspaces aus Gehörloser und Hörender PerspektiveProceedings of Mensch und Computer 202410.1145/3670653.3670670(140-155)Online publication date: 1-Sep-2024
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Index Terms

The Proper Care and Feeding of Hackerspaces: Care Ethics and Cultures of Making
1. Human-centered computing

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Published In

cover image ACM Conferences

CHI '15: Proceedings of the 33rd Annual ACM Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems

April 2015

4290 pages

ISBN:9781450331456

DOI:10.1145/2702123

General Chairs:
Bo Begole
Huawei, USA
,
Jinwoo Kim
Yonsei University, Korea
,
Program Chairs:
Kori Inkpen
Microsoft Research, USA
,
Woontack Woo
KAIST, Korea

Copyright © 2015 ACM.

Permission to make digital or hard copies of all or part of this work for personal or classroom use is granted without fee provided that copies are not made or distributed for profit or commercial advantage and that copies bear this notice and the full citation on the first page. Copyrights for components of this work owned by others than ACM must be honored. Abstracting with credit is permitted. To copy otherwise, or republish, to post on servers or to redistribute to lists, requires prior specific permission and/or a fee. Request permissions from [email protected]

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Published: 18 April 2015

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National Science Foundation
Intel Science and Technology Center for Social Computing

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CHI '15

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CHI '15: CHI Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems

April 18 - 23, 2015

Seoul, Republic of Korea

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CHI '15 Paper Acceptance Rate 486 of 2,120 submissions, 23%;

Overall Acceptance Rate 6,199 of 26,314 submissions, 24%

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Cited By

Højgaard CEgholm L(2024)Fluid Forms of Organizing Volunteering: Producing Civic Action Through Organizational MaintenanceNonprofit and Voluntary Sector Quarterly10.1177/08997640241236399Online publication date: 28-Mar-2024
https://doi.org/10.1177/08997640241236399
Popova KDemir APark JComber R(2024)Voicing Discomfort, Communicating Breakdowns: Design Exploration of Felt Ethics in a Body-Based WorkshopProceedings of the 13th Nordic Conference on Human-Computer Interaction10.1145/3679318.3685375(1-13)Online publication date: 13-Oct-2024
https://dl.acm.org/doi/10.1145/3679318.3685375
Suchanek OMeissner JAngelini RSpiel K(2024)From Participation to Solidarity: A Case Study on Access of Maker Spaces from Deaf and Hearing Perspectives: Von Partizipation zu Solidarität: Eine Fallstudie zur Zugänglichkeit von Makerspaces aus Gehörloser und Hörender PerspektiveProceedings of Mensch und Computer 202410.1145/3670653.3670670(140-155)Online publication date: 1-Sep-2024
https://dl.acm.org/doi/10.1145/3670653.3670670
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Smit DRegal GGerdenitsch CCiolfi LHogan TDöring TJenkins Tvan Dijk JHuron SLi ZCoyle DSigner B(2024)Making Your Makerspace: A Tale of TensionProceedings of the Eighteenth International Conference on Tangible, Embedded, and Embodied Interaction10.1145/3623509.3633369(1-13)Online publication date: 11-Feb-2024
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Do KDe Los Santos MMuller MSavage S(2024)Designing Gig Worker Sousveillance ToolsProceedings of the 2024 CHI Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems10.1145/3613904.3642614(1-19)Online publication date: 11-May-2024
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Petterson AJaimes Rodriguez IDoggett OChandra P(2024)Networks of care in digital domestic labour economiesProceedings of the 2024 CHI Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems10.1145/3613904.3642200(1-16)Online publication date: 11-May-2024
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Zakharova IJarke J(2024)Care-ful data studies: or, what do we see, when we look at datafied societies through the lens of care?Information, Communication & Society10.1080/1369118X.2024.231675827:4(651-664)Online publication date: 19-Feb-2024
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