Design Futures, Ecological Citizenship and Public Interest Technologies = HCI Regenerative Interaction Opportunities …?

Design practice(s) improve circumstances applying foresight, instigating creative Human Computer Interaction (HCI) proposals within systems. HCI physically and digitally embodies technologies through human touchpoints. We refer to HCI points as Public-Interest Technology (PITs), a growing field comprising expertise working to ensure technology is created, deployed, and used responsibly. This article reports on design-led opportunities combining Design Futures (Domain 1) and Ecological Citizenship (Domain 2), questioning Public-Interest Technologies (Domain 3). Design Futures navigates ‘preferable futures’ based on real-world, tangible situations within the context of climate futures and stewardship of environment(s) we rely upon for ‘all life’. Ecological Citizen(s) catalyzes empowered agents, informing Public-Interest Technologies as (at this point in history) the people of the UK have never been so excluded, disconnected, and deprived from our natural world(s). Interested parties do both actions; calling out where technologies improve the public good, and questioning whether certain technologies should be created. Insights are appropriate to the HCI community as they cultivate design and community-led opportunities for technologies in the field, through design practice-led approaches. We report on a Regenerative Design Field Kit with Smithery consultancy, deployment with Royal College of Art MDes Design Futures students. We highlight the toolkit’s development, precedents, leading to a Field Kit. The parts: a viewing frame, (teaching tool) facilitating the examination of worlds and 40 core questions based on The Design Council’s systemic design framework and the RSA’s 10 core capabilities. Work yields valuable insights from Domains (1–3), mapping HCI opportunities for Ecological Citizenship within PITs.