Our premise is that hand sketching can contribute to enhancing ICT4S. Sketches are quick to create, accessible, and can vary in fidelity - making them ideal for the complex stages of the ICT4S design and research process . They are non-linear forms of communication that celebrate system linkages and relationships.
Computing is undeniably complex and often hard to convey. So too is sustainability. Often when intended technical solutions fail to deliver real environmental or social change, we might say that they’ve “failed to see the bigger picture”. We strongly believe that ICT4S can make a major contribution, but the viewpoints it brings together sometimes quarrel and we don’t have a blueprint for how they can play nice.
Communication is key but when we mix in research trends such as everyday practice, design thinking, participatory practice, even agile mindsets, our hitherto static and linear ways of communicating begin to struggle. Add to this mix the holistic concepts of sustainability as a transformational regeneration of complex socioecological systems.
This means picturing relationships. Sometimes this is in formal diagrams but in more freeform approach. We value emergence - think the whiteboards and post-it notes of collaborative workshops - where we value both the process - the act of drawing out an idea - and the realised representation. Further, a move from a mechanistic problem-centred view of sustainability gives an opportunity for providing an integrated vision for ICT4S research and its communication.
The theme of ICT4S2018 is “thriving communities”. From a sustainability perspective, this language is recognition that a mechanistic problem-centred system of communication is detrimental to the bigger goal. Instead a regenerative sustainability based on opportunity is one of celebration and vision - with participation and empowerment based on developing shared understandings. And for this we need better ways of communicating.