Dourish discusses Chinese hackerspaces on Danish radio

April 27, 2016

Informatics Professor Paul Dourish was recently featured on the Danish technology radio show Harddisken (hard disk) about hackerspaces—community-operated workspaces where people with common interests, often in computers, machining, technology, science, digital art or electronic art, can meet, socialize and collaborate—in China.

“In China, people talked about the hackerspace not as a place that was going to distance them from commodity capitalism but, in fact, incorporate them into capitalism. That is, the hackerspace was a place where your startup could begin. The hackerspace was a place where you could develop the ideas and products that could potentially become a company and could carry you forward,” said Dourish during the radio interview.

Silvia Lindtner, assistant professor at the University of Michigan’s School of Information, also joined Dourish on the radio panel to discuss research into China’s first hackerspace know as New Factory. Dourish and Lindtner talk about seeing hackerspaces like New Factory offering a potential technology for new ways of working, such as manufacturing products, in China.

Listen to the full radio show with both Dourish and Lindtner here.