Data Design as a Frictional Layer: Data Collections and Design Actions to Produce Discursive Communication Artifacts

This chapter investigates the use of intentional “friction” into data-centric communication artifacts to enhance awareness and critical reflection on the pervasive role of data in everyday life. Contemporary design practices often prioritize usability and seamlessness, which can inadvertently obscure the complexities and ethical implications of data collection and analysis. Drawing on critical and speculative design frameworks, we conceptualize friction as a tool to disrupt these hidden processes and promote deeper engagement with data. Employing Digital Methods — research techniques for collecting and studying digital objects from online platforms — we introduce three “data design” strategies: Retracing, Restructuring, and Rescaling. These strategies aim to uncover concealed aspects of data through various modes of presentation, including logbooks, catalogs, archives, visual essays, and compilations. We demonstrate how these frictional design interventions reveal the opaque mechanisms of digital platforms and facilitate discussions on the socio-technical implications of datafication. By transforming datasets into frictional layers that slow user interaction and encourage critical examination, our framework emphasizes the inherent complexity of data systems and supports the development of data literacy. This chapter positions design as an intermediary between users and the underlying infrastructures of data production, advocating for more reflective interactions with digital technologies. The findings contribute to the discourse on how design interventions can foster critical engagement and societal awareness in an increasingly data-driven world.