Beyond the Prototype

Abstract

This paper describes the reparative Internet of Things (Riot), a project investigating the role of IoT devices in maintaining public resource accessibility. Drawing on a mix of interviews, technology development, and ethnographic engagements, we explore the distribution and stratification of menstrual hygiene resources in Seattle, WA. We redesigned menstrual product dispensers placed in public settings by outfitting them with networked sensor inserts to make them easier to stock by custodial staff and easier to access by members of the public. We use this case to show how such newly connected devices structure experiences of hygiene access and help expose important consequences of integrating those devices into the socioeconomic logics and infrastructure of public life. Our interventions further examine the role of public IoT devices once they pass the proof-of-concept stage, revealing their capacity to cultivate and maintain collective responsibility.

Touching and Being in Touch with the Menstruating Body

“…As seen in previous work [27,38,67], menstrual cycles are not isolated and individual experiences, and menstrual technologies increasingly mirror this consideration. For example, menstrual tracking apps like Clue allow for sharing data, recognizing its potential to support social bonding [17].…”

“…Research on women's health in HCI has explored experiences of motherhood [6], breastfeeding [5,19,39], menopause [11,37,47,70], pelvic fitness [3], menstruation [10,15,25,27,67], and abortion [52]. A key element of this work concerns the production of situated and embodied knowledge [2], which is a crucial factor towards advancing women's health [1].…”

Artificial Knowing Otherwise

“…We would argue that a vital part of demystification is exposure to and involvement with feminist AI and its potential to render visible the mechanisms of algorithmic systems. We point to the ongoing work to create feminist makerspaces and hackathons-sites of deliberate, collaborative making and learning about technologies (Fox, Silva, and Rosner 2018;Houston et al 2016). These environments are hardly perfect; they have their own dynamics of power around gender, race, and class.…”

Troubling Design

“…Pluralism is closely linked to feminist trouble as it too resists fixed entities and binaries. Feminist HCI has had a great impact on the HCI field and inspired an increased attention to women's health experiences such as breastfeeding [Balaam et al 2015;Hope et al 2019], intimate care , menstruation [Fox et al 2018], menopause [Bardzell et al 2019;Tutia et al 2019], sexuality [Bardzell and Bardzell 2011], and given rise to attention to gender issues in technology use and design [Strengers et al 2019;Søndergaard and Hansen 2018]. These topics may bring trouble in the ways that they require designers to research and develop technologies in tabooed and sensitive areas.…”