Emergent practice as a methodological lens for public displays in-the-wild

In this paper, we seek to complement the current public display evaluation toolbox with the analytical lens of emergent practices . This evaluation method facilitates capturing the variety of ways in which a public display operates and creates value in a given context. From this viewpoint, a public display appears as a material resource for the urban practice, as well as a site for socio-cultural enactment. Our main argument is that this type of evaluation can lead to extraction of more sustained value from actual use of public displays. We discuss the theoretical foundations of emergent practices, their place and use within the public display evaluation toolbox, and situate practices as a valuable next step of in-the-wild studies. Through an empirical dataset, we also discuss real world emergent practices observed as part of the UBI-display network in Oulu, Finland.