Privacy research in the field of HCI is predominantly based on theories that view privacy as an individual decision, interpersonal boundary regulation, or adherence to context-specific norms. While these approaches have provided valuable insights, they do not sufficiently take into account the structural and relational power asymmetries that shape the emergence and restriction of privacy. This paper proposes a relational power framework of privacy that reconceptualizes privacy as an outcome of power‑laden interactions among individuals, institutions, communities, and technological infrastructures. Drawing on critical theory and actor-network theory, we show how widespread privacy models obscure dominance by overemphasising users’ agency, assuming symmetrical relationships, and depoliticizing contextual conditions. We argue that privacy should be viewed as shaped by power, which requires consideration of structures such as institutional arrangements and infrastructural configurations. Our framework provides HCI researchers and designers with an analytical tool to uncover and address power asymmetries.

Collecting unique items is a common practice to display one's social status through conspicuous consumption. However, a new form of ownership has recently surfaced, where platforms sell multiple shares of, e.g., one rare Pokémon card or artwork to numerous users for investment aims. This division of collectibles seems to be a paradox since the limited nature of the goods usually characterizes them, which challenges the definition of consumption and ownership. Therefore, through a qualitative interview study with 14 individuals, we investigate the perception of the first encounter with digital shared ownership in the interplay between collecting and investing from a CSCW perspective. Our interviewees emphasized a need for attachment, knowledge-sharing, and procedural transparency to make sense of this novel form of fractional ownership. Further, we propose to foster collaborative decision-making and exchange between users to design a meaningful online investment experience in the context of exaggerated liquid consumption.

Investigating digital privacy behavior requires consideration of its contextual nuances and the underlying social norms. This study delves into users' joint articulation of such norms by probing their implicit assumptions and "common sense" surrounding privacy conventions. To achieve this, we introduce Privacy Taboo, a card game designed to serve as a playful breaching interview method, fostering discourse on unwritten privacy rules. Through nine interviews involving pairs of participants (n=18), we explore the decision-making and collective negotiation of privacy's vagueness. Our findings demonstrate individuals' ability to articulate their information needs when consenting to fictive data requests, even when contextual cues are limited. By shedding light on the social construction of privacy, this research contributes to a more comprehensive understanding of usable privacy, thereby facilitating the development of democratic privacy frameworks. Moreover, we posit Privacy Taboo as a versatile tool adaptable to diverse domains of application and research.

Foreseeing the impact of augmented and virtual reality applications on users and society is challenging. Thus, efforts to establish an ethical mindset and include technology assessment techniques in HCI education are increasing. However, XR educational courses fostering students’ reasoning and perceived responsibility in designing ethical applications are lacking. We, therefore, developed the explorative design method Reality Composer to investigate and foster the students’ assessment of the ethical impact of and responsibilities in XR application design. We conducted a workshop with 40 international HCI master students applying this method and analyzed the resulting application concepts regarding the students’ ethical assessment. Our findings show that they critically discussed their concepts’ impact and identified potential countermeasures for negative social implications. However, they overestimated the users’ responsibility to securely use XR applications as well as a positive design intention. We contribute with our findings and developed method to understand students’ potential and derive future course design implications.

There has been a growing interest in taste research in the HCI and CSCW communities. However, the focus is more on stimulating the senses, while the socio-cultural aspects have received less attention. However, individual taste perception is mediated through social interaction and collective negotiation and is not only dependent on physical stimulation. Therefore, we study the digital mediation of taste by drawing on ethnographic research of four online wine tastings and one self-organized event. Hence, we investigated the materials, associated meanings, competences, procedures, and engagements that shaped the performative character of tasting practices. We illustrate how the tastings are built around the taste-making process and how online contexts differ in providing a more diverse and distributed environment. We then explore the implications of our findings for the further mediation of taste as a social and democratized phenomenon through online interaction.