Human-Computer Interaction and Computer Supported Cooperative Work researchers seek to understand how humans interact with computers and broader technology systems. Some research investigates how individuals and communities are already using technologies. For example, many studied the Maker Movement that emerged in the early 2000s through the establishment of Make Magazine (2005) and the inaugural Maker Faire (2006). These researchers often focused on topics like understanding collaboration processes and values to design better interfaces and tools. Recent conversations have emerged on how methods such as participatory design can support open science hardware communities by (for example) scaffolding collaborations between tool creators and end-users.

The interests of Human-Computer Interaction, Computer Supported Cooperative Work, and Science & Technology Studies communities overlap, including around how making a technology supports critical reflection through first-hand experience. But while Human-Computer Interaction tends to focus on users and their immediate communities, Computer Supported Cooperative Work and Science & Technology Studies take a broader lens, seeking to understand how social, political, and cultural influences shape how science and technology are used by, and embedded within, society. For example, Dr. Max Liboiron coined the term “compromised agency” to analyzes how BabyLegs—an open source hardware device that uses women’s pantyhose for studying marine pollution—both subverts traditional monitoring practices through expanding opportunities for participation, and re-enforces structural sexism by elevating the value of a gendered and often sexualized piece of clothing. Work like this elucidates tensions around the values that are important to many Free and open source software and hardware communities.

Many Human-Computer Interaction, Computer Supported Cooperative Work, and Science & Technology Studies researchers study and collaborate with practice-based communities such as the Gathering for Open Science Hardware and Public Lab. These researchers attend their own disciplinary conferences, as well as convenings facilitated by organizations like the Gathering for Open Science Hardware and Citizen Science Association. Occasionally, the presence of these researchers, or “watchers,” is critiqued if they are perceived to be acting in limited interests, or fail to help the “builders” leading tool creation and use. Increasingly, their presence is valued for offering important lenses to view and analyze the underlying and often problematic challenges and conditions that many builders—including those in certain citizen science or environmental justice communities—are trying to address through their work.

Converging Critical Conditions