DRS2012 Bangkok Proceedings Vol 4 - Design Research Society

Andreas UNTEIDIG, Florian SAMETINGER, Jennifer SCHUBERT,
Veronika AUMANN and Max SCHÄTH, Gesche JOOST
This social setting, the unique position in the heart of Berlin, and the Fischerkiez being
exemplarily formed by the historic changes the city faced during the last 60 years, caused
us to choose this neighborhood as the location for setting up the Neighborhood Lab.
We believe that the various heterogeneous assembly of inhabitants have more to share
with one another than is currently occurring, and that different groups would benefit from
each others’ knowledge, skills and perspectives, if conditions that enabled unexpected
encounter, chance discovery, innovation were to happen.
Initial Partners
The project was started by establishing contact with the Senior Computer Club in Berlin’s
Mitte district (SCC) as a community of practice and a co-design partner. Senior volunteer
lecturers run the club, teaching participants the basics about computer use, word
processing, image processing, video telephony, and more, using an emancipatory
teaching approach.
The club is itself a part of the overarching institution Kreativhaus, a theatrical and
pedagogical community center that provides resources and space for privately initiated
projects within the Fischerkiez context.
By arranging regular meetings, a constant research environment was established in the
club setting. We understand this setting as a “living lab”, a research setting placed within
a real-life environment, one that allows close interaction and encounters between
researchers and inhabitants while maintaining the ordinary living context. In this setting
we accomplished a number of workshops, interviews and discussions about possible
applications of future technologies to improve the daily lives of senior citizens within
urban settings. The workshops allowed both researchers and seniors to get in close
contact and learn about mutual interests and motivations; these in turn served as a basis
for all subsequent collaboration.
We will elaborate with more detail about our understanding of ”living labs” further on in
this paper.
Process & Methodology
During the early process of approaching the research topic, we investigated in broad
terms existing sharing systems. Although one can observe an emerging trend towards
concepts of sharing and collaborative consumption, we argue that appropriate systems of
knowledge sharing are still underrepresented – especially within an inter-generational
context.
From the analyzed systems we would like to especially acknowledge the School of
Everything 1 , the Peer 2 Peer University 2 , the Public School 3 and the OurGoods Trade
School 4 in New York City, where actual communities are created through the passing on
of skills and knowledge in return for barter items. All of these initiatives provided an
1 http://schoolofeverything.com
2 http://p2pu.org/en
3 http://all.thepublicschool.org
4 http://tradeschool.ourgoods.org
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