Jo Briggs

I devise and evaluate design practice methodologies (participatory, co-design, and wider interaction design) to investigate complex and/or emergent digital-socio phenomena across two interconnecting themes; designing and demonstrating tools to enable safer online interaction, building on my Phd in digital literacies; and design for the ‘collaborative economy’, building on my earlier crowdfunding research.

I currently lead on design on EPSRC Cumulative Revelations of Personal Data; this is concerned with investigating the potential of prototype tools to support employee awareness of how apparently innocuous personal information collectively represents a significant risk to employer security and reputation. This followed on from TAPESTRY (to Sep 2020), which aimed to develop new ways to enable people to connect safely online by exploiting the ‘tapestry’ of multi-modal signals woven by everyday digital interactions, and visualising this on-screen.

Prior to that, I led on design for The Trust Map (ESRC led), which investigated the potential of designed digital tools in mitigating mistrust in disenfranchised civic-community relations by employing creative, participatory approaches to engagement. I was also Principal Investigator for ESRC crowdfunding research; and an AHRC ‘sprint’ on timebanking. These explored alternative models for cultural operations and publics-building amid rapidly shrinking state budgets, building on earlier research into new business models for ‘digital original’ art. 

I am a Strategic Reviewer for AHRC and a member of the ESRC and AHRC Peer Review Colleges; I also regularly review for other research councils in the UK and abroad. I mostly publish in the areas of design and HCI, including on academic and industy methodologies, and co-produce artifacts as research output informed by more than a decade as a practicing artist.