Prototypes as Future Artifacts of Today

Towards Prototyping Alternative Futures

Abstract

The design of sociotechnical futures relies on institutionalized visions but also on material artifacts. In this context, prototypes are a materialized means of exploration of potential futures. This article explores interdependencies between irritations by prototypes and critical/speculative design and argues that prototypes problematize a balance between feasibility and their potential for irritation, i.e. being incited to act differently by a prototype that does not fit into familiar practices (e.g. flying cars). We investigate the significance of the feasibility-irritation tension, first, by analyzing two case studies of prototypes from urban mobility as examples of technical feasibility in marketing and testing environments, and second, by contrasting them to the notion of prototypes as deliberately irritating artifacts within critical and speculative design practices. We offer a perspective for understanding their transformative potential. Our discussion shows how prototypes, as they are used in speculative design, might open new negotiation spaces instead of limiting futures to what seems feasible. New, irritating prototypes highlight a contingency, which is necessary to openly discussing feasible and fictional futures together.