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This paper presents a methodological effort to connect the specifics of technologies to the details of social practices, in an attempt to deepen our understanding of evolving sociotechnical cultures. More specifically, this paper describes a methodological framework that makes use of online discussions as a vital source of data. The reason the paper focuses on online discussion is that the Internet has become a natural habitat for discussions of high-end technologies, be they physical products or online services. The framework combines interpretative research and attribute-consequence-value (ACV) chain theory – a theory commonly applied to market and consumer research – to conceptualize and explore evolving prosumer cultures through online discussions. The benefit of using ACV chain theory is that it explicitly connects products and services to practices and values. The proposed methodological framework identifies three central techniques to elicit and analyse ACV chains from online prosumer discussions: (1) attribute analysis (2) Internet forum data collection and (3) thematic analysis. The paper goes on to exemplify the application of this framework by examining the sociotechnical co-evolution of the friend list – a backbone feature of many social networking services. In summary, this paper shows how ACV chains can be fruitfully applied to explore evolving prosumer cultures and make the vital connection between technical features and emerging cultures.

This article presents conflicts as a central unit of analysis in investigations of online social media sharing. Social media sharing services generate interesting sociotechnical problems as they often make social structures explicit, resulting in observable user experience conflicts. As such, they also present a genre of services where theories of social structure become highlighted and, at times, challenged. Three examples of conflicts, from three different types of networks, are presented. The conflicts were elicited through online, ethnography-inspired, methods. It is argued that the conceptual conflicts help researchers and designers to postulate, find and examine concerns and intentions of users who try to resolve the conflict or move from one end of the conflict to the other. The article also demonstrates three viable ways to communicate analytical conflict insights, intended to inform interaction design, namely use qualities, analytical dimensions and design patterns.

Several digital spaces are now archiving artifacts from the first 1980s home computer boom. These spaces are not only storages but also social venues and "memory banks," and thereby depend on several concurrent practices: software and hardware developed to read, run, and preserve computer code; archiving of old software, magazines, and personal stories; contemporary conferences dedicated to retrocomputing; and making artifacts, which used to be private, publicly available. The article argues that retrocomputing can be seen as a foreshadowing in terms of managing collective digital archives, memories, and relationships to digital material. Taking the Commodore 64 Scene Database as a case, this article (1) engages with both users and cultural techniques in order to (2) theorize collective digital archives as "performative in-betweens" and (3) discuss how retrocomputing may become a default mode for people seeking access to their digital pasts in a time when planned obsolescence is rampant.

This special issue of Confero takes its start in an essay by John Mazarakis who presents an overarching perspective on the underpinning politics of transhumanism. Considering theoretical debates and differences in the transhumanist movement over the last two decades, Mazarakis proposes the emergence of two distinct political stances: the techno-progressive and the technolibertarian. Using Lyotardian concepts, Mazarakis questions the latent legacy of 'the grand narratives of modernism' and their potential to function as a basis for theorizing a transhuman future. ; QC 20220207

This special issue of Confero takes its start in an essay by John Mazarakis who presents an overarching perspective on the underpinning politics of transhumanism. Considering theoretical debates and differences in the transhumanist movement over the last two decades, Mazarakis proposes the emergence of two distinct political stances: the techno-progressive and the technolibertarian. Using Lyotardian concepts, Mazarakis questions the latent legacy of 'the grand narratives of modernism' and their potential to function as a basis for theorizing a transhuman future.