Richmond Wong is an Assistant Professor of Digital Media at Georgia Tech's School of Literature, Media, and Communication. He directs the Creating Ethics Infrastructures Lab where his research seeks to create social, cultural, and organizational environments that can support technologists and designers in ethical decisionmaking.
This includes creating design approaches that propose alternate ways to consider human values, supporting worker and community-led actions, improving organizational ethics review practices, and understanding the role of law and policy. Recent projects include studying the technology workers’ organizational practices related to ethics, and creating design activities to help people talk through issues related to privacy and surveillance.
Richmond's work utilizes qualitative and design-based methods, drawing from critically-oriented human computer interaction, science & technology studies, and speculative and critical design. He completed his PhD at the University of California Berkeley School of Information, a postdoc at the UC Berkeley Center for Long-Term Cybersecurity, and has undergraduate degrees in Information Science and Science & Technology Studies from Cornell University.
Contact Me
Email: rwong34@gatech.edu
Mastodon: @richmondywong@hci.social
Twitter: @richmondywong
Pronouns: he / him / his
Latest News
May 2024 - A paper led by my PhD student Inha Cha, co-authored with Ajit Pillai and myself, was accepted into the 2024 ACM Designing Interactive Systems (DIS) conference, Ethics Pathways: A Design Activity for Reflecting on Ethics Engagement in HCI Research!
Mar 2024 - I'm a co-author on a new CHI 2024 paper, The Future of HCI-Policy Collaboration, led by Qian Yang.
Dec 2023 - We have a new lab website for the Creating Ethics Infrastructures Lab at Georgia Tech!
Fall 2023 - I'm not actively recruiting new PhD students this year, but I encourage students with interests that align broadly with the Georgia Tech Digital Media Program to apply! (There may be opportunities to collaborate in the future, even if I am not your primary advisor - current areas of research that I'm doing can be found on my lab website).
Upcoming Talks
May 31, 2024 - I will be attending the Privacy Law Scholars Conference in Washington DC, feel free to say hi!
Jul 5, 2024 - I will be attending the ACM Designing Interactive Systems (DIS) conference
All News
May 2024 - A paper led by my PhD student Inha Cha, co-authored with Ajit Pillai and myself, was accepted into the 2024 ACM Designing Interactive Systems (DIS) conference, Ethics Pathways: A Design Activity for Reflecting on Ethics Engagement in HCI Research!
Mar 2024 - I'm a co-author on a new CHI 2024 paper, The Future of HCI-Policy Collaboration, led by Qian Yang.
Dec 2023 - We have a new lab website for the Creating Ethics Infrastructures Lab at Georgia Tech!
Fall 2023 - I'm not actively recruiting new PhD students this year, but I encourage students with interests that align broadly with the Georgia Tech Digital Media Program to apply! (There may be opportunities to collaborate in the future, even if I am not your primary advisor - current areas of research that I'm doing can be found on my lab website).
Jul 2023 - Our paper Broadening Privacy and Surveillance: Eliciting Interconnected Values with a Scenarios Workbook on Smart Home Cameras recieved an Honorable Mention award at DIS 2023 (co-authored with Jason Caleb Valdez, Ashten Alexander, Ariel Chiang, Olivia Quesada, and James Pierce)!
Jun 2023 - Preprint available for a new collaborative paper accepted at the ACM Designing Interactive Systems Conference: Broadening Privacy and Surveillance: Eliciting Interconnected Values with a Scenarios Workbook on Smart Home Cameras, co-authored with Jason Caleb Valdez, Ashten Alexander, Ariel Chiang, Olivia Quesada, and James Pierce.
Feb 2023 - Preprints available for 2 papers accepted in the Proceedings of the ACM - CSCW Journal! Privacy Legislation as Business Risks: How GDPR and CCPA are Represented in Technology Companies’ Investment Risk Disclosures with Andrew Chong and R. Cooper Aspegren, and Seeing Like a Toolkit: How Toolkits Envision the Work of AI Ethics with Michael Madaio and Nick Merrill.
Fall 2022 - I am currently recruiting PhD students to join the Georgia Tech Digital Media Program (applications due December 2022 for a start date in Fall 2023) to do research in one or more of these research areas related to Creating Ethics Infrastructures
Jun 2022 - This fall I will be joining Georgia Tech's School of Literature, Media, and Communication as an Assistant Professor of Digital Media!
Apr 2022 - Happy to be a co-author on a CHI'22 paper led by Neilly Tan studying uses of smart home cameras, Monitoring Pets, Deterring Intruders, and Casually Spying on Neighbors: Everyday Uses of Smart Home Cameras
Oct 2021 - Attending the virtual CSCW conference, presenting my paper Tactics of Soft Resistance in User Experience Professionals' Values Work (which recieved an Honorable Mention award!) and helping to co-organize the Designing for Data Awareness privacy workshop.
Oct 2021 - Excited to give a presentation at the Society for the Social Studies of Science (4S) conference on the values and ethics work of UX professionals, and present a Making and Doing video exhibit exploring the politics of smart cameras in collaboration with Neilly Herrera Tan, Nathaniel Gray, Jason Valdez, and James Pierce.
Sep 2021 - Excited to be leading a project funded by a grant from the Rose Foundation to conduct participatory research focusing on how communities of color experience smart home surveillance devices
Sep 2021 - I've posted a pre-print of a paper accepted to CSCW, Tactics of Soft Resistance in User Experience Professionals’ Values Work, which documents tactics UX professionals deploy to attempt to enact values and ethics oriented change from within technology companies
May 2021 - I'm giving 2 presentations at CHI 2021, Timelines: A World-Building Activity for Values Advocacy and Using Design Fiction Memos to Analyze UX Professionals' Values Work Practices: A Case Study Bridging Ethnographic and Design Futuring Methods.
May 2021 - I'm currently recruiting participants for a study to understand how technologists address privacy in their work.
Feb 2021 - We've posted materials for our Timelines activity in a public Google Drive Folder or a direct .zip download. Timelines is a design fiction and scenario creating activity for groups to talk about values and ethical issues of technology in settings such as classrooms, research groups, workshops, and product teams.
Jan 2021 - 2 pre-prints for CHI 2021 are available! Timelines: A World-Building Activity for Values Advocacy co-authored with Tonya Nguyen, and Using Design Fiction Memos to Analyze UX Professionals' Values Work Practices: A Case Study Bridging Ethnographic and Design Futuring Methods
Dec 2020 - Very excited and honored to have two papers conditionally accepted to CHI 2021! Including a paper with Tonya Nguyen titled Timelines: A Speculative World-Building Activity for Discussing Values and Ethics and a paper titled Using Design Fiction Memos to Analyze UX Professionals' Values Work Practices: A Case Study Bridging Ethnographic and Design Futuring Methods. Pre-prints coming soon!
Dec 2020 - I co-authored a blog post with Nick Merrill for ACM interactions magazine, Cultivating Activism with Speculative Design
July 2020 - I filed my dissertation, Values by Design Imaginaries!
July 2020 - Consider applying to our virtual CSCW 2020 workshop, Beyond Checklist Approaches to Ethics in Design
May 2020 - I'm happy to announce that in Fall 2020 I will be joining the UC Berkeley Center for Long-Term Cybersecurity as a postdoctoral scholar
Jan 2020 - A pre-print of our CHI 2020 paper, Expanding Modes of Reflection in Design Futuring is now available, written with wonderful collaborators Sandjar Kozubaev, Chris Elsden, Britta Schulte, Marie Louise Juul Sondergaard, Noura Howell, and Nick Merrill.
Jan 2020 - Honored to be a 2020 Fellow with the Center for Technology, Society & Policy to start developing a project looking at the intersection of tech companies, public transit, and design futures!
Jan 2020 - A pre-print of our CHI 2020 paper, Infrastructural Speculations: Tactics for Designing and Interrogating Lifeworlds is now available, written with colleagues Vera Khovanskaya, Sarah Fox, Nick Merrill, and Phoebe Sengers.
Dec 2019 - Very honored and excited to have multiple papers conditionally accepted to CHI 2020! Including my paper bringing together lenses from infrastructure studies & speculative design with Vera Khovanskaya, Sarah Fox, Nick Merrill, and Phoebe Sengers entitled Infrastructural Speculations: Tactics for Designing and Interrogating Lifeworlds. And a paper co-authored paper with Sandjar Kozubaev, Chris Elsden, Britta Schulte, Marie Louise Juul Sondergaard, Noura Howell, and Nick Merrill, Expanding Modes of Reflection in Design Futuring. Look for pre-prints here soon!
Oct 2019 - Happy to share a pre-print of our upcoming CSCW 2019 paper in which we present an analytic tool to grapple with the value of fairness, This Thing Called Fairness: Disciplinary ConfusionRealizing a Value in Technology, a collaboration with Deirdre Mulligan, Joshua Kroll, and Nitin Kohli.
Sep 2019 - Our workshop, Ubiquitous Privacy: Research and Design for Mobile and IoT Platforms was accepted for CSCW 2019. Consider applying if you are interested in design approaches to privacy!
Aug 2019 - Quoted in Risk Management Magazine on the risks of pregnancy-tracking apps.
May 2019 - A pictorial documenting research done in collaboration with Sarah Fox, Noura Howell, and Franchesca Spektor, Vivewell: Speculating Near-Future Menstrual Tracking through Current Data Practices has been accepted for the DIS 2019 Conference
Mar 2019 - I will be co-leading a Session for Interactivity and Engagement with Nick Merrill at the 2019 iConference, entitled "Engaging Speculative Practices to Probe Values & Ethics in Sociotechnical Systems"
Jan 2019 - My CHI 2019 paper with Deirdre Mulligan, Bringing Design to the Privacy Table: Broadening "Design" in "Privacy by Design" has recieved an Honorable Mention Award
Jan 2019 - I am a 2019 Berkeley Center for Long-Term Cybersecurity Research Grantee and Center for Technology, Society & Policy fellow for projects in collaboration with James Pierce, Sarah Fox, Nick Merrill, Noura Howell, and Franchesca Spektor.
Jan 2019 - My paper with Deirdre Mulligan, Bringing Design to the Privacy Table: Broadening "Design" in "Privacy by Design" has been accepted to CHI 2019
Oct 2018 - My CSCW 2018 paper with Deirdre Mulligan, Ellen Van Wyk, James Pierce, and John Chuang, Eliciting Values Reflections by Engaging Privacy Futures Using Design Workbooks, has received a Best Paper Award
Sep 2018 - Research done in collaboration with James Pierce, Sarah Fox, and Nick Merrill, Differential Vulnerabilities and a Diversity of Tactics: What toolkits teach us about cybersecurity, has been accepted to CSCW 2018
Jul 2018 - A book chapter in collaboration with Elaine Sedenberg and John Chuang on biosensing privacy in public spaces has been published, A window into the soul: Biosensing in public
Jul 2018 - Along with collaborator Vera Khovanskaya, our chapter Speculative Design in HCI: From Corporate Imaginations to Critical Orientations has been published as a part of the book New Directions in Third Wave Human-Computer Interaction: Volume 2 - Methodologies
Jun 2018 - My paper When BCIs have APIs: Design Fictions of Everyday Brain-Computer Interface Adoption with I School co-authors Nick Merrill and John Chuang has recieved an honorable mention award at the 2018 ACM Conference on Designing Interactive Systems (DIS '18)
May 2018 - Our pictorial, An Interface without A User: An Exploratory Design Study of Online Privacy Policies and Digital Legalese, has been accepted to the 2018 ACM Conference on Designing Interactive Systems (DIS '18), with collaborators James Pierce, Sarah Fox, Nick Merrill, and Carl DiSalvo
Mar 2018 - My paper When BCIs have APIs: Design Fictions of Everyday Brain-Computer Interface Adoption with I School co-authors Nick Merrill and John Chuang has been accepted to the 2018 ACM Conference on Designing Interactive Systems (DIS '18)
Mar 2018 - I am honored to have recieved a UC Berkeley Outstanding Graduate Student Instructor (GSI) Award from the GSI Teaching & Resource Center for my work in Prof. Deirdre Mulligan's Technology and Delegation course in Fall 2017.
Jan 2018 - I am a 2018 joint Research Grantee of the Berkeley Center for Long-Term Cybersecurity and Center for Technology, Society & Policy, along with collaborators James Pierce, Sarah Fox, Noura Howell, and Nick Merrill
Dec 2017 - My CSCW 2018 paper, "Eliciting Values Reflections by Engaging Privacy Futures Using Design Workbooks" with Deirdre Mulligan, Ellen Van Wyk, James Pierce, and John Chuang is now available in the ACM Digital Library
Nov 2017 - I presented a talk covering 2 recent papers, Interrogating Biosensing Privacy Futures with Design Fiction (video), at the Berkeley I School's PhD Research Reception
Sep 2017 - My paper Eliciting Values Reflections by Engaging Privacy Futures Using Design Workbooks, with Deirdre Mulligan, Ellen Van Wyk, James Pierce, and John Chuang, will be published in November in CSCW 2018 Online First in the Proceedings of the ACM Human Computer Interaction.
Sep 2017 - I will be presenting a poster at Ubicomp discussing work done with Deirdre Mulligan and John Chuang.
Aug 2017 - I will be speaking at 4S in Boston, discussing my paper Exploring Biosensing Privacy Futures with Design Fiction and Science Fiction during the Sensing Subjectivities panel.
Apr 2017 - My paper with Ellen Van Wyk and James Pierce, 'Real-Fictional Entanglements: Using Science Fiction and Design Fiction to Interrogate Sensing Technologies' was accepted to the 2017 ACM Designing Interactive Systems (DIS) Conference
Mar 2017 - We will be hosting a workshop on interrogating biosensing at DIS 2017 in Edinburugh in June. See our CfP for more information
Feb 2017 - I will be speaking at the February Privacy Lab talking about the Berkeley Center for Long-Term Cybersecurity scenarios of cybersecurity in the year 2020
Feb 2017 - My paper with Steve Weber, The new world of data: Four provocations on the Internet of Things, has been published in First Monday
Dec 2016 - My paper with Deirdre Mulligan, These Aren’t the Autonomous Drones You’re Looking for: Investigating Privacy Concerns Through Concept Videos, has been published in the Journal of Human-Robot Interaction
Dec 2016 - Co-presented with Lauren Kilgour at the Algorithms in Culture Conference analyzing how algorithms are represented in TED Talks
Sep 2016 - Presented at 4S/EASST 2016, presenting work done by me and Deirdre Mulligan on Framing Future Privacy Concerns through Corporate Concept Videos
Aug 2016 - I will be co-leading a Social Science Matrix Research Team with Anne Jonas this semester entitled 'Assembling Critical Practices in the Social Sciences' to explore the connections and relationships between critical practices and theories from different disciplines
June 2016 - Participated in the Workshop on Privacy Indicators and the Workshop on the Future of Privacy Notices and Indicators at the 2016 Symposium on Usable Privacy and Security
Jun 2016 - Presented my paper with Deirdre Mulligan, 'When a Product Is Still Fictional: Anticipating and Speculating Futures through Concept Videos', at the 2016 ACM Designing Interactive Systems (DIS) Conference
May 2016 - Presented a workshop position paper with Deirdre Mulligan, 'Using Concept Videos and Speculative Design with Privacy by Design' at the CHI 2016 Bridging the Gap between Privacy by Design and Privacy in Practice Workshop
Apr 2016 - My paper with Deirdre Mulligan, 'When a Product Is Still Fictional: Anticipating and Speculating Futures through Concept Videos', was accepted to the 2016 ACM Designing Interactive Systems Conference
Apr 2016 - I was awarded a 2016 NSF Graduate Research Fellowship in Computing & Information Science & Engineering: Computer Security and Privacy
Mar 2016 - I will be moderating a panel on The Future of User Centered Design at this year's Berkeley I School InfoCamp
Feb 2016 - Contributed to a blog post covering privacy by design and tech policy events during early 2016.
Jan 2016 - Reviewed Danielle Citron's Hate Crimes in Cyberspace on the Berkeley Center for Technology, Society & Policy Blog.
Feb 2015 - Contributed to a guest blog post on Computing Community Consortium Blog with Nick Doty on a February Privacy by Design Workshop
Jan 2015 - My paper with Steve Jackson, Wireless Visions: Infrastructure, Imagination, and U.S. Spectrum Policy has received an honorable mention best paper award at CSCW 2015
Prior Travel and Talks
May 8, 2024 - I am helping to organize and will be attending the regional Northeast HCI Meeting in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania.
Mar 29, 2024 - Excited to be speaking at Carnegie Mellon University about Creating Ethics Infrastructures for Design
Mar 22, 2024 - Excited to be on a panel exploring regulatory strategies for AI at the Ohio State Technology Law Journal's 2024 Symposium
Mar 19, 2024 - I will be speaking at the University of Toronto's Critical Computing Seminar on Towards Responsible AI by Design in Practice? Imagining AI Regulation on the Ground
Oct 16, 2023 - I will be at the ACM Computer Supported Cooperative Work (CSCW) Conference, presenting two papers: Privacy Legislation as Business Risks: How GDPR and CCPA are Represented in Technology Companies’ Investment Risk Disclosures (co-authored with Andrew Chong and R. Cooper Aspegren) and Seeing Like a Toolkit: How Toolkits Envision the Work of AI Ethics (co-authored with Michael Madaio and Nick Merrill)
Jul 11, 2023 - I will be at the ACM Designing Interactive Systems (DIS) conference presenting our paper Broadening Privacy and Surveillance: Eliciting Interconnected Values with a Scenarios Workbook on Smart Home Cameras
May 17, 2023 - I will be giving a DUB Seminar talk at the University of Washington on Creating Ethics Infrastructures for Design
Apr 23, 2023 - I'm helping co-organize the Designing Platform Technology and Policy Simultaneously workshop at the CHI 2023 conference
May 3, 2022 - I'll be attending the CHI 2022 conference, and be a part of a panel on Considerations for Building Solidarity among Academic and Tech Workers
Apr 6, 2022 - Speaking at Georgia Tech's School of Literature, Media, and Communication
Mar 18, 2022 - I'll be part of a panel discussion on Critical Data Futures: Art, Life and Data in the Metaverse at the Berkeley Art Museum and Pacific Film Archive
Mar 8, 2022 - I will be hosting a virtual interactive workshop on the Timelines speculative design fiction activity to surface discussion of tech ethics issues at this year's MozFest
Mar 3, 2022 - Virtually speaking at the Bristol Interaction Group at the University of Bristol
Feb 23, 2022 - I will be co-moderating an online CLTC panel on inclusive smart home privacy
Feb 22, 2022 - Speaking at Georgia Tech's School of Interactive Computing
Feb 16, 2022 - Speaking at Northwestern's Department of Communication Studies
Dec 7, 2022 - I'll be presenting a talk at the 4S Conference on Discourses of Risk and the Shaping of Technology Ethics Work.
Sep 22, 2022 - I'll be giving a talk at the Georgia Tech GVU Brown Bag Lunch Series.
Jul 29, 2022 - I'll be attending the UC Berkeley Center for Long-Term Cybersecurity's second symposium on GDPR and CCPA/CPRA.
Nov 3, 2021 - I will be virtually speaking at the TAT Lab at the University of Washington about tech worker ethics practices
Jun 10, 2021 - I am giving a virutal talk for Design Informatics at the University of Edinburgh entitled Exploring Values and Ethics in UX Work through Design Futuring