Having finished Disaster Nationalism (which I’d recommend as way of framing and phrasing the authoritarian populist attacks on democracy), I wonder about how we can intervene and divert people off the radicalisation pipeline of Resentment, Responsibility and Revenge. Civic Assemblies? From experience lately with civic assembly and deliberation methods, I’d say they could be used […]

Apple Intelligence was helping someone steal my payment details today. In my emails this morning, one had a Priority sticker added with the message that I should deal with it to stop service disruption. It was apparently from Weebly, a website hosting company which I have used in the past. It was early, Apple had […]

In 2024, I learned that civic assemblies succeed not through technology, but through simple tools that give people consequential voice. While tech companies pushed AI solutions, I watched real change happen through paper cards and human conversation. What I did • Developed new frameworks for civic assembly facilitation in UK and Germany • Created deliberation […]

I’ve been designing and facilitating a few new forms of consultation events this year. Mostly I have used a Civic Assembly (CA) format. These types of assembly are trending at the moment as a way of ‘fixing’ the democratic deficit where there seems to be a disconnect between professional politics and people. The disconnect that […]

I posted about micronaming in landscapes that often happens when people do not use maps and would like to clarify how this differs from the technological methodology of atomisation. Information Architecture and labelling Atomisation is something that Information Architecture can get trapped by. The ideal of clarity thru defining and naming elements becoming a spiral […]

We went for 1/2 day walking workshop around the Heavens valley area of Stroud today. This tour was an archaeological trip around the area as a fundraiser for the community purchase of the land. The map as spreadsheet The starting point of the tour was a 1690’s map of the land and its subdivisions into […]

I use a lot of play and experiential activities in workshops I design and facilitate but seriousness has come up lately in public consultation and civic assembly work. I think it’s because, unlike codesign or participatory design, there is no specific lived/living experience element to this work. Everyone is in the room because they are, […]

Still trying to help my mother not get scammed by people who phone her demanding money. They use the classic Triple of authority (I am from the Bank or the Police), emotion (something has happened: a payment missed, a fraud detected) and urgency (do this now, tell me your details quickly). It’s battering rush of […]

Mostly because it is so aggravating, this is about desire paths and design. For some reason, desire paths are viewed as a clear proof of the foolishness of design and standards. Look how the crowd forms a path, made from the unity of their shared desires and how that is better than the path design […]

How to Use Tactile Maps in a Consultation Conversation Engaging blind and visually impaired individuals in public consultations can appear challenging, but accessible tactile maps and respectful conversations can play crucial roles. Here is how to effectively use these maps to foster meaningful conversations in consultations. Understanding Mental Models People’s perceptions of routes and places […]