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Books by sabrina scuri

Territori Empirici è il progetto di un format crossmediale per sistemi di guida al territorio, in... more Territori Empirici è il progetto di un format crossmediale per sistemi di guida al territorio, inserito nel contesto della ricerca del Design della Comunicazione per l'identità territoriale, che si è poi concretizzato in una tesi di Laurea Magistrale. Orientato ad un turismo di tipo esperienziale, indaga soluzioni comunicative atte a rappresentare l'identità profonda dei luoghi e, parallelamente, ad incentivarne la pratica al fine di restituire valore conoscitivo all’esperienza in loco. Si tratta di un modello comunicativo applicabile a tutte le realtà territoriali considerate non turistiche; basato sullo studio dei contenuti e della loro distribuzione all’interno del sistema, sfrutta elementi percettivi e di linguaggio allo scopo di far emergere il “senso” del territorio. Ai fini della ricerca è stato adottato il metodo semiotico, applicato alla guida turistica ed alle sue funzioni, come strumento per organizzare i contenuti, metterli in forma e definire l'architettura del sistema.

by Oana Mitrea, Esther Lefebvre, sabrina scuri, Giorgio Giallocosta, Fiorenza Gamba, carlos bártolo, Stefano Lombardi Vallauri, Sara Colombo, Paolo Magaudda, Francesca Antonacci, Philip Di Salvo, Paolo Rossi, and Valentina V A Anzoise

The present publication contains a selection of the works presented at the 5th STS Italia Confere... more The present publication contains a selection of the works presented at the 5th STS Italia Conference, held in Milan from June, 12–14 2014. The main theme of this STS Italia conference’s edition was the intersection between Design Studies and Science & Technology Studies. The Conference was the main event of STS Italia, the Italian Society for the Study of Science & Technology and the 2014 edition was organized in collaboration with the Design Department of Politecnico di Milano. Thanks to this cooperation, the conference was a unique space for interdisciplinary encounters between different scientific and intellectual milieus, which have interacted on very practical terms, fostering a reflexive account both in Design and STS practices.

Papers by sabrina scuri

Sustainability, Jun 18, 2024

This article is an open access article distributed under the terms and conditions of the Creative... more This article is an open access article distributed under the terms and conditions of the Creative Commons Attribution (CC BY

IASDR 2023: Life-Changing Design, 2023

Distributed Ledger Technology (DLT) has the potential to transform the agri-food sector, empoweri... more Distributed Ledger Technology (DLT) has the potential to transform the agri-food sector, empowering rural and underserved farming communities by enabling the creation of a more environmentally sustainable and socio-economically inclusive food system. Several PoC and pilot projects are running all over the world to test this specific use case. However, the success rate of these initiatives is still limited. A critical analysis of the state-of-the-art suggests as a possible explanation for the observed trend that the current research approach to DLT for agriculture is mostly technology-driven. This limits our ability to develop solutions that provide benefits to the communities they’re meant to serve, while potentially increasing inequalities and further marginalising these underserved groups. Achieving a sustainable and inclusive food supply chain entails a paradigm shift that goes beyond technological development to address how technology is socially constructed, thus implying the need for designing DLT applications around and together with users. By adopting a user-centred perspective to technology-enabled innovation, design can help shift the agri-food industry from being tech-centred to being people-centred. To explore the potential contribution of design for facilitating transformation and technology-enabled social innovation in the agri-food sector, we conducted a case study involving Portuguese small farmers which resulted in DigiFarm, a blockchain-based service concept. In this article, we detail the methodology adopted for the scoping and ideation of DigiFarm, concluding with a discussion highlighting the added value of adopting a design-driven approach to research and practice on DLT applications in the agri-food sector.

Decentralized ledger technology (DLT) is becoming ubiquitous in today's society. After an in... more Decentralized ledger technology (DLT) is becoming ubiquitous in today's society. After an initial grassroots adoption, enterprises embrace this technology, following the opportunity to expand to new businesses - the technology is maturing. However, organizations need to connect their existing systems and processes to blockchains (centralized - decentralized) securely and reliably, sometimes also implying to connect blockchains (decentralized - decentralized). This challenge is known as blockchain interoperability. Blockchain interoperability comes in three modes: data transfers, asset transfers, and asset exchanges. As blockchain interoperability is still maturing, there are many unsolved challenges across the different interoperability modes. In this \emph{position paper}, we illustrate the remaining challenges of interoperability, focusing on the systematic evaluation of interoperability mechanisms, based on the state of the art and our own experience. We first introduce the ...

IASDR 2023: Life-Changing Design, 2023

Proceedings of the 2023 ACM Conference on Information Technology for Social Good

Strategic Design Research Journal

Web-immersion – i.e., a deep sense of cognitive and perceptual absorption engendered by the conte... more Web-immersion – i.e., a deep sense of cognitive and perceptual absorption engendered by the content and interactive features of a website - plays an important role in our modern, digital world. Yet, this topic has received little attention from design and HCI scholars. The lack of tools to assess and measure immersion in the Web may severely limit our ability to understand the nature of such experience, thereby constraining future research in the area. To address this issue, we designed a questionnaire for assessing immersive websites and conducted a preliminary evaluation on it. In this article, we outline the questionnaire design and report on findings from a preliminary study conducted to analyse its reliability and validity. Moreover, we present results from Factor Analysis performed to investigate the dimensionality of the instrument. Finally, we conclude by discussing the implications of our findings, along with limitations of the study and future work.

CHI Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems

Sustainable Development (SD) in its dimensions-environment, economy, and society-is a growing are... more Sustainable Development (SD) in its dimensions-environment, economy, and society-is a growing area of concern within the HCI community. This paper advances a systematic literature review on sustainability across the Sustainable Human-Computer Interaction (SHCI) body of work. The papers were classifed according to the Triple Bottom Line (TBL) framework to understand how the pillars of SD play into the HCI discourse on sustainability. The economic angle was identifed as a gap in SHCI literature. To meet the TBL of SD, however, a balance needs to be sought across all 'lines'. In this paper, we propose that HCI can advance the discussion and the understanding of the economic concepts around sustainability through taking a sociology perspective on the economic angle of the TBL. We sustain this claim by discussing economic concepts and the role that digital can play in redefning the established foundations of our economic system. CCS CONCEPTS • Human-centered computing → Human computer interaction (HCI); HCI theory, concepts and models.

CHI '22: CHI Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems, 2022

Sustainable Development (SD) in its dimensions – environment, economy, and society – is a growing... more Sustainable Development (SD) in its dimensions – environment, economy, and society – is a growing area of concern within the HCI community. This paper advances a systematic literature review on sustainability across the Sustainable Human-Computer Interaction (SHCI) body of work. The papers were classified according to the Triple Bottom Line (TBL) framework to understand how the pillars of SD play into the HCI discourse on sustainability. The economic angle was identified as a gap in SHCI literature. To meet the TBL of SD, however, a balance needs to be sought across all ‘lines’. In this paper, we propose that HCI can advance the discussion and the understanding of the economic concepts around sustainability through taking a sociology perspective on the economic angle of the TBL. We sustain this claim by discussing economic concepts and the role that digital can play in redefining the established foundations of our economic system.

Sustainability, 2021

The adoption of energy efficiency practices and increased penetration of renewable energy sources... more The adoption of energy efficiency practices and increased penetration of renewable energy sources in the power system are estimated to play a key role in the decarbonization of the energy sector, helping reduce greenhouse gas emissions and ultimately fight climate change. To foster energy transition, energy education initiatives should primarily target the citizens and be designed adopting a User-Centered Design (UCD) approach and HCI methodologies. This paper describes how UCD/HCI can inform the design of citizens’ energy education initiatives by presenting a case study—the development of an information platform targeting Madeiran citizens. The article describes the design process, from ideation to prototype and validation. Methods used in each phase (card sorting, semi-structured interviews, brainstorming sessions, think-aloud protocol and surveys) are described. Results of each phase and how they have informed the following steps are presented, together with a detailed descriptio...

Extended Abstracts of the 2019 CHI Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems, 2019

As the electrification of the transportation sector grows the electric grid must handle the new l... more As the electrification of the transportation sector grows the electric grid must handle the new load resulting from electric vehicles (EV) charging. The integration of this new load in the grid has been subject to work in the smart-charging research field, however, while normal-sized EVs often offer chargers or other functions that support smart-charging, smaller EVs do not, which could be problematic. Especially considering that the consumption of small EV when aggregated can be significant. This article presents the motivation and development behind the development of MyTukxi, a hardware and software system that aims at implementing smart-charging algorithms for low consuming electric vehicles (EV), interacting with drivers to compensate for the lack of charging control in such vehicles.

Human-Computer Interaction – INTERACT 2019, 2019

Distributed Ledger Technologies (DLT), such as blockchain, have been gaining increasing attention... more Distributed Ledger Technologies (DLT), such as blockchain, have been gaining increasing attention in the energy sector, where one of their most promising application seems to be Peer-to-Peer (P2P) energy trading. Several proof-of-concept and pilot projects are running all over the world to test this specific use case. However, despite much work being done to address the technical and regulatory aspects related to DLT for P2P energy trading, our understanding of the human aspects affecting the adoption of this new system is still minimal. The development of a decentralized energy market poses interesting challenges to the HCI community and raises important questions that need to be answered: do people trust a system which is, by definition, trust-free? How do they perceive P2P energy trading? What are their needs and motivations for engaging in energy trading? Moreover, are people willing to use cryptocurrencies as a medium of exchange for energy? And, to what extent is fullautomation desirable? To shed light on these and related questions, we developed and tested PowerShare, a decentralized, P2P energy trading platform. In this paper, we report on our findings from interviews with nine families that have used PowerShare for a month. Motivated by our empirical findings, we conclude by highlighting core aspects for designing P2P energy trading platforms and elaborate directions for further research.

We can observe two important changes that involve many territorial realities. On the one hand the... more We can observe two important changes that involve many territorial realities. On the one hand their identity is constantly changing, causing a progressive loss of the sense of belonging. On the other, tourism industry registers an increased interest in experiences which involve at the same time natural, cultural and social aspects of the place. In this context, the communication design for urban environment needs to find new paradigms in order to deal with the ongoing changes. The direction suggested in this paper regards the topic of the ‘communicative access’, intended as a tool to make the urban space comprehensible. In this sense, communication design becomes a meeting point between a functional communication (for the orientation) and the design of in-depth contents at different levels - from the cartographic representation to the ‘perceived space’. Therefore, the suggested design approach is focused on the development of formats and tools for the re-semanticization of places by means of unconventional points of view. The design effort regards content and languages, searching for new interlinks between storytelling and physical spaces.

11th EAD Conference Proceedings: The Value Of Design Research, 2016

Libro de Actas - Systems & Design: Beyond Processes and Thinking (IFDP - SD2016), 2016

The paper discusses the role of Communication Design in promoting cultural heritage and enhancing... more The paper discusses the role of Communication Design in promoting cultural heritage and enhancing local identity. It deals with the need of designing communication systems able to increase people's understanding and engagement with a given place. We argue that a communication strategy able to leverage on both tangible and intangible aspects of place identity leads to a more mindful tourism consumption, and it is a means to strengthen citizens' sense of belonging as well. To this aim, we highlight the importance of blending cultural information with technologies and languages (media form and media content) to make the exploration of a place more accessible and meaningful. Specifically, our research focuses on the contribution given by “immersive languages” and “haptic visuality” to strengthen the relation between human and environment. Here, great emphasis is put on the transformative function of design that lies in the ability of translating and transferring intangible eleme...

In the research about the Communication Design of urban environment, the current transformation o... more In the research about the Communication Design of urban environment, the current transformation of the cities and its representation are often topics of interest. These topics are mainly focussed both into the Communication Design researches and into studies related to tourism. The urban space is involved in social and political transformations that are always changing the perceived identity more rapidly. The projects developed on urban common spaces are not only regarding physical planning but also on the creation of a virtual sharing of contents and information. To do that, languages and technologies are useful tools for the Communication Design. The city can be defined as an “organism in transformation” and so communication design project has to be flexible and dynamic in order to gather and represent several typologies of contents. Over the years the Multimedia Format Research Unit of Indaco Department is researching on the developing and implementation of languages, device, int...

Decentralized ledger technology (DLT), in particular blockchain, is becoming ubiquitous in today&... more Decentralized ledger technology (DLT), in particular blockchain, is becoming ubiquitous in today's society. Just in the second quarter of 2021, centralized and decentralized exchanges had a volume of around $600 billion. Enterprises are adopting this technology, following the opportunity to expand to new businesses. However, they need to connect their existing systems and processes to blockchains securely and reliably. Blockchain interoperability (BI) is emerging as one of the crucial features of blockchain technology. Fueled by the need to eliminate data and value silos, they realize the necessary bridge between centralized and decentralized systems.As BI is still maturing, there are many unsolved challenges. In particular, it is still difficult for developers and practitioners to have control over processes spawning across several DLTs.In this report, we focus on the problem of managing cross-chain state in an integrated manner. First, we introduce the concept of cross-chain l...

Proceedings of the International Conference on Advanced Visual Interfaces

Sustainability, Jun 18, 2024

IASDR 2023: Life-Changing Design, 2023

Proceedings of the 2023 ACM Conference on Information Technology for Social Good

Strategic Design Research Journal

CHI Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems

CHI '22: CHI Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems, 2022

Sustainability, 2021

Extended Abstracts of the 2019 CHI Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems, 2019

Human-Computer Interaction – INTERACT 2019, 2019

11th EAD Conference Proceedings: The Value Of Design Research, 2016

Libro de Actas - Systems & Design: Beyond Processes and Thinking (IFDP - SD2016), 2016

Proceedings of the International Conference on Advanced Visual Interfaces

A Matter of Design Making Society Through Science and Technology, Jun 6, 2014

Sustainability, 2024

Portugal is the country in Europe where the death rate in winter and summer has the highest corre... more Portugal is the country in Europe where the death rate in winter and summer has the highest correlation with outdoor temperatures. The Portuguese National Institute of Public Health Ricardo Jorge has developed a national warning system for heat waves called ICARO, which has been in place since 1999 (and is the oldest in Europe). However, it presents some limitations, namely, the low spatial resolution (five regions in Portugal’s mainland), the low temporal forecasting period (one day), and the fact that it was only accessible to health authorities until very recently. This work describes the development of a new public dashboard that uses a new early warning index for extreme weather events, the CLIMAEXTREMO index, which extends the current warning system by improving the current forecasting models for risk by integrating new sources of public data and increasing the spatial and time resolution of the warnings to the municipality or the parish level. The new index is a combination of a new model to estimate the relative mortality increase (updating the model used in ICARO) together with a model of the indoor temperature of building archetypes for all municipalities and a vulnerability index that considers socio-demographic economic indicators. This work discusses the results of the new risk indicator for the heat waves that occurred in Portugal at the end of June and mid-August 2023, and it shows that the index was able to indicate a high risk for the municipalities that had an increase in the number of deaths during that period.

Strategic Design Research Journal, 2022

Sustainability, 13(14), 2021

Strategic Design Research Journal, 2015

Nowadays the relationship between people, culture and territories is changing. On the one hand, g... more Nowadays the relationship between people, culture and territories is changing. On the one hand, great emphasis is placed on the value of cultural heritage and local identity as means for social cohesion and economic growth. On the other hand, experience-based tourism is growing and, consequently, it increases the need of an experience-based communication strategy. This paper explores the contribution of communication design to tourism promotion and the enhancement of cultural identity. It will deal with the topic of communicative access, which is meant as the result of a visual translation of several tourist information. Therefore, it focuses on the design process of digital communication formats aimed at providing "experiential" representations of the territory and its identity. To explain the process, a research project carried out by the authors will be presented as a case study.