Animating personalised networking in a student apartment complex through participatory design

摘要

This paper describes the research design of an ongoing case study in an apartment complex comprising approximately 160 interna-tional students in Brisbane, Australia. The objective of the study involves the design and development of an online community network to facilitate the creation and growth of a sustainable resi-dential neighbourhood community. The study is informed by the PAD methodology which combines principles of participatory design with sociocultural animation. Preliminary research findings led to a new design strategy which takes Wellman’s theory of networked individualism into account. The new community build-ing strategy allows for the diversity and individualism of tenants by working towards providing easy and convenient ways for ten-ants to identify birds of a feather and to conduct personalised networking. What may emerge from this process is a complex web of social networks that span the anonymous void of the apartment complex itself, a web of "urban tribes".