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The Maker movement and its impact in the fight against COVID-19

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dc.contributor.authorCorsini, Lucia
dc.contributor.authorDammicco, Valeria
dc.contributor.authorBowker-Lonnecker, Lin
dc.contributor.authorBlythe, Robbie
dc.date.accessioned2020-11-20T17:10:30Z
dc.date.available2020-11-20T17:10:30Z
dc.date.issued2020-11-05
dc.description.abstractThis study is an initial attempt to document the impact of the Maker movement in addressing the spread and prevention of COVID-19. During the early stages of 2020, extreme shortages of critical items led to an unprecedented global mobilisation of grassroots, community-driven Maker projects. The first part of this study reports on efforts to document Maker projects to tackle COVID-19 between March-June 2020. It analyses the characteristics of 158 projects with respect to project type, geographical region, manufacturing technologies and type of actor involved. The second part of the study provides a more detailed perspective of the challenges that Makers faced during this period, by looking at the UK case. It adopts a digital ethnographic approach, analysing a web-seminar organised and hosted by the authors in collaboration with Make:, one of the most widespread online communities of the Maker movement. The web-seminar took the form of a panel talk and discussion with representatives from four prominent COVID-19 Maker projects in the UK. This study reports on several cross-cutting themes that emerged in the panel talk. To maximise the potential impact of the Maker movement in a crisis, the findings call for: the development of a national network of Makers in the UK that is supported by policy and governance; the creation of a centralised database to manage demand and supply of critical items in times of crisis; and advancements to management of distributed quality control. This paper helps to document the impact of the Maker movement during the COVID-19 pandemic. It also underlines the potential impact of the Maker movement in addressing future crises via the development of distributed innovation actors.
dc.identifier.doi10.17863/CAM.60248
dc.identifier.eissn2058-8887
dc.identifier.other5
dc.identifier.urihttps://www.repository.cam.ac.uk/handle/1810/313163
dc.language.isoen
dc.publisherCentre for Technology Management working paper series
dc.rightsAll Rights Reserved
dc.rights.urihttps://www.rioxx.net/licenses/all-rights-reserved/
dc.subjectmakers
dc.subjectcovid-19
dc.subjectopen hardware
dc.titleThe Maker movement and its impact in the fight against COVID-19
dc.typeWorking Paper
pubs.funder-project-idEPSRC (1935706)
rioxxterms.licenseref.urihttps://www.rioxx.net/licenses/all-rights-reserved/
rioxxterms.versionNA

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