Smart citizens will take responsibility for where they live and value access over ownership. They will ask questions before coming up with answers and help people struggling with smart technologies. The Waag Society supports smart citizens through labs and initiatives that empower people to collect environmental data, understand their surroundings, and enact change through open technologies and collective engagement. Their goal is to encourage bottom-up decision making and embrace complexity.

1. Smart Citizens
Making Sense
Frank Kresin
Research Director
@kresin / frank@waag.org

2. Smart Appliances

3. Smart Assistants
http://www.pixedge.com/lastmoment

4. Smart Cities

5. Smart Citizens

6. Smart Citizens
• Will take responsibility for the place they live, work and love in
• Value access over ownership, contribution over power
• Will ask forgiveness, not permission
• Know where they can get the tools, knowledge and support
• Value empathy, dialogue and trust
• Appropriate technology, rather than accept it as is
• Will help the people that struggle with smart stuff
• Ask questions, before they come up with answers
• Take part in design efforts to come up with better solutions
• Work agile, prototype early, test quickly, start all over
• Will not stop in the face of huge barriers
• Continuously share their knowledge and their learning
http://waag.org/nl/blog/manifesto-smart-citizens

7. Agency

8. • Institute for Art,
Science & Technology
• Since 1994, 63 Staff,
based in Amsterdam
• Artistic Research,
Critical Design &
Social Innovation
• Exploring emergent
technologies &
opening them up
Waag Society
http://www.waag.org/

9. Creative
Care
Creative
Learning
Future
Heritage
Future
Internet
Open
Design
Open
Wetlab
Research Labs

10. Code = Culture

11. http://www.techshop.ws/TheMakerMovementManifesto.html

12. Critical Engineering Manifesto
1. Critical Engineer considers Engineering to be the most transformative language of our
time, shaping the way we move, communicate and think. It is the work of the Critical Engineer
to study and exploit this language, exposing its influence.
2. The Critical Engineer considers any technology depended upon to be both a challenge and
a threat. The greater the dependence on a technology the greater the need to study and
expose its inner workings, regardless of ownership or legal provision.
3. The Critical Engineer raises awareness that with each technological advance our techno-
political literacy is challenged.
4. The Critical Engineer deconstructs and incites suspicion of rich user experiences.
5. The Critical Engineer looks beyond the 'awe of implementation' to determine methods of
influence and their specific effects.
6. The Critical Engineer recognizes that each work of engineering engineers its user,
proportional to that user's dependency upon it.
https://criticalengineering.org/

13. Fablabs, Wetlabs, Maker Spaces
http://fablab.waag.org & https://waag.org/en/lab/open-wetlab

14. More than just Spaces
Laboratory Workshops
Exhibitions Performances
Waag Society - CC-BY-SA 3.0

15. Urban Environmental Challenges

16. http://www.eea.europa.eu/media/newsreleases/air-pollution-still-causing-harm

17. Official Measurement Stations

18. National Measurement Network
http://www.lml.rivm.nl/meetnet/index.php

20. IAAC Smart Citizen Team
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=R90fsItpzT4

21. https://smartcitizen.me
Smart Citizen Kit

23. Participation
Environment Technology

25. https://smartcitizen.me

26. Visualisations
http://waag.org/en/project/smart-citizen-kit

28. Lessons Learned
• Thorough issue
mapping is needed
• From sensing to action
is challenging
• Sensors need
improvement
• However, this is not
about accuracy
• Citizens love it
http://waag.org/sites/waag/files/public/media/publicaties/eindrapportage-sck-asd.pdf

29. Smart Citizens Lab
https://waag.org/en/project/amsterdam-smart-citizens-lab

30. SenseMakers
Amsterdam

31. Empower people to:
• Acquire, Read &
Manipulate Data
• Understand their
environment
• Turn data and insight
into action
• Using public networks
of low cost, open
source sensors

32. Resulting in:
• Better informed, more
engaged citizens
• Impactful dialogues
between citizens and
governments
• More data, more
insight, better policies
• More enjoyable, social,
inclusive, healthy &
livable cities

33. Methods
https://publiclab.org/

36. From Needs to
Knowledge
A reference framework for
smart citizens initiatives
1
AMSTERDAM
SMART
CITIZENS
LAB
LAURENCE HENRIQUEZ NATASHA DE SENAFRANK KRESIN
TOWARDS COMMUNITY DRIVEN DATA COLLECTION
A PUBLICATION BY WAAG SOCIETY & AMS INSTITUTE
author editor editor
https://waag.org/en/news/amsterdam-smart-citizens-lab-publication

37. https://www.waag.org/en/project/making-sense

38. How to join?

39. How open are you?
1. Problem Definition
2. Research Strategy
3. Tools & Sensors
4. Data Acquisition
5. Interpretation

40. Labs (Fab-, Maker, Wet-, Citizen)

41. Use & Promote Open Technologies

42. Enable Collective Engagement

43. Empower
Smart Citizens

44. THE OLD WAY
TOP DOWN DECISION MAKING
LINEAR APPROACH
REDUCING COMPLEXITY
MINIMIZING UNCERTAINTY
STIFLING INNOVATION

45. THE NEW WAY
BOTTOM UP DECISION MAKING
NON-LINEAR APPROACH
ENCOURAGING COMPLEXITY
EMBRACING UNCERTAINTY
ENABLE & BOOST CREATIVITY

46. Sint Antoniesbreestraat 69
1011 HB Amsterdam
waag.org / info@waag.org
Frank Kresin
Research Director
@kresin / frank@waag.org