1st Person Perspective

In design, the first-person perspective (1PP) refers to designing products, services, or experiences from the viewpoint of the designer. The designer does not sit above the ecosystem in which the intervention takes place, but becomes part of the ecosystem itself, embracing the subjectivity and projections of the designer on its own interventions. 

Some might say that the 1PP projects the designer's own bias on his or her intervention. But this exactly the point. Bias is inevitable and inherent to a design intervention. The 1PP helps to highlight bias to better address it, instead of trying to conceal it.

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My Extended Workspace

Mapping my extended workspace helps me identify the tools, skills, people, places or infrastructures in my environment that shape me and my design practice. Through 1PP design, I will inevitably project this workspace onto the design interventions I undertake and will try to embed those within this context.

Roles of Prototyping

What is a prototype? A prototype is a tool that allows a design intervention.
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Role 1: The prototype as an experimental component

When prototypes are designed to test hypotheses that are embedded in the artefact.
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Role 2: The prototype as a means of enquiry

When prototypes are developed as instruments to collect, measure and and record data.
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Role 3: The prototype as a research archetype

When prototypes are embodiments of concepts or understandings. They serve as illustrations of certain scenarios or claims.
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Role 4: The process of prototyping as a vehicle for enquiry

When the process of making the prototype becomes the research contribution, as opposed to the prototype itself.
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Roles of previous prototypes

As I am not a designer by training, I do not have typical examples of previous prototypes to analyse. But my master thesis project could serve as an example of research enquiry that embodies certain prototyping roles. My master thesis consisted in conducting a discourse analysis of populist speech on Twitter to assess whether populist speech varies across the political spectrum (left wing <--> right wing).

To this end, I developed an AI-powered natural language processing tool that performed a sentiment analysis of selected tweets to assess their "emotional load" and the proportion of positive and negative sentiments. This is an example of prototypes as means of enquiry (Role 2) as it collected data to inform the research enquiry.

The final product, my master thesis, could also be considered as a research archetype (Role 3), as the research paper does not have a functional purpose but serves to prove that populist speech varies across the political spectrum as it is influenced by "host ideologies".

Finally, this thesis could also be an example of prototyping as a vehicle for enquiry (Role 4) as the way the data was collected influenced the research outcome. I developed a coding system to label recurring discursive trends within tweets. The labels chosen by subjectively interpreting text significantly shaped my research findings.






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Nicolo's microalgae cultivation enquiry

Microalgae can actively contribute to reducing CO2 emissions through photosynthesis. Nicolo's project aimed to take microalgae cultivation beyond the industrial and research sphere, making the benefits and knowledge associated with this practice accessible to the wider public.

Nicolo´s microalgae cultivation enquiry is an example of role 1 prototypes, where prototypes are experimental components, as after cultivating the algae, he undertook a CO2 absorption experiment to prove that microalgae activity can contribute to reducing CO2 levels.

The toolkit that he produced to help people cultivate microalgae at home is an example of role 3 prototypes, as the toolkit served to prove that the cultivation of microalgae does not only belong in the industrial or research context.

My own microalgae cultivation enquiry

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