Produsage in hybrid networks: sociotechnical skills in the case of Arduino

In this paper we investigate produsage using Actor-Network Theory with a focus on (produsage) skills, their development, and transformation. We argue that produsage is not a model that determines a change in the traditional consumption/production paradigm through a series of essential preconditions (such as open participation, peer-sharing, or common ownership). Rather, we explain produsage as the open-ended result of a series of heterogeneous actor-networking strategies. In this view, the so-called preconditions do not explain produsage but have to be explained along with its establishment as an actor-network. Drawing on this approach, we discuss a case study of an open hardware project: the Arduino board, and we develop a perspective that maps the skills of human and non-human entities in produsage actor-networks, showing how skills are symmetrical, relational, and circulating.