Andy Crabtree

Andy Crabtree

This is the authors response to commentaries on the original article H is for Human and How (Not) to Evaluate Qualitative Research in HCI, https://doi.org/10.1080/07370024.2025.2475743 Commentaries were provided by: Jeffrey Bardzell, https://doi.org/10.1080/07370024.2025.2612474 Alan Blackwell, https://doi.org/10.1080/07370024.2025.2591878 Paul Dourish, https://doi.org/10.1080/07370024.2025.2594529 Bonnie Nardi, https://doi.org/10.1080/07370024.2025.2596752 Peter Pirolli, https://doi.org/10.1080/07370024.2025.2596745 Jennifer Rode, https://doi.org/10.1080/07370024.2025.2598800 Peter Tolmie, https://doi.org/10.1080/07370024.2025.2591872 Please feel free to copy, redistribute, adapt, and build on any part of this article in accordance with the CC BY 4.0 license: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/

Tommy Nilsson, Joel E. Fischer, Andy Crabtree et al.

UbiComp has been envisioned to bring about a future dominated by calm computing technologies making our everyday lives ever more convenient. Yet the same vision has also attracted criticism for encouraging a solitary and passive lifestyle. The aim of this paper is to explore and elaborate these tensions further by examining the human values surrounding future domestic UbiComp solutions. Drawing on envisioning and contravisioning, we probe members of the public (N=28) through the presentation and focus group discussion of two contrasting animated video scenarios, where one is inspired by "calm" and the other by "engaging" visions of future UbiComp technology. By analysing the reasoning of our participants, we identify and elaborate a number of relevant values involved in balancing the two perspectives. In conclusion, we articulate practically applicable takeaways in the form of a set of key design questions and challenges.

Tommy Nilsson, Andy Crabtree, Joel Fischer et al.

The domestic environment is a key area for the design and deployment of autonomous systems. Yet research indicates their adoption is already being hampered by a variety of critical issues including trust, privacy and security. This paper explores how potential users relate to the concept of autonomous systems in the home and elaborates further points of friction. It makes two contributions. One methodological, focusing on the use of provocative utopian and dystopian scenarios of future autonomous systems in the home. These are used to drive an innovative workshop-based approach to breaching experiments, which surfaces the usually tacit and unspoken background expectancies implicated in the organisation of everyday life that have a powerful impact on the acceptability of future and emerging technologies. The other contribution is substantive, produced through participants efforts to repair the incongruity or "reality disjuncture" created by utopian and dystopian visions, and highlights the need to build social as well as computational accountability into autonomous systems, and to enable coordination and control.

Thomas Lodge, Anthony Brown, Andy Crabtree

We present the Databox application development environment or SDK as a means of enabling trusted IoT app development at the network edge. The Databox platform is a dedicated domestic platform that stores IoT, mobile and cloud data and executes local data processing by third party apps to provide end-user control over data flow and enable data minimisation. Key challenges for building apps in edge environments concern i. the complexity of IoT devices and user requirements, and ii. supporting privacy preserving features that meet new data protection regulations. We show how the Databox SDK can ease the burden of regulatory compliance and be used to sensitize developers to privacy related issues in the very course of building apps. We present feedback on the SDK's exposure to over 3000 people across a range of developer and industry events.

Lachlan Urquhart, Tom Lodge, Andy Crabtree

This paper explores the importance of accountability to data protection, and how it can be built into the Internet of Things (IoT). The need to build accountability into the IoT is motivated by the opaque nature of distributed data flows, inadequate consent mechanisms, and lack of interfaces enabling end-user control over the behaviours of internet-enabled devices. The lack of accountability precludes meaningful engagement by end-users with their personal data and poses a key challenge to creating user trust in the IoT and the reciprocal development of the digital economy. The EU General Data Protection Regulation 2016 (GDPR) seeks to remedy this particular problem by mandating that a rapidly developing technological ecosystem be made accountable. In doing so it foregrounds new responsibilities for data controllers, including data protection by design and default, and new data subject rights such as the right to data portability. While GDPR is technologically neutral, it is nevertheless anticipated that realising the vision will turn upon effective technological development. Accordingly, this paper examines the notion of accountability, how it has been translated into systems design recommendations for the IoT, and how the IoT Databox puts key data protection principles into practice.