The Ethical Contract of Using Online Participation from Vision Videos in Design

In this paper, we examine the different challenges
and possibilities corporate vision videos pose to the ethical contract, which is intentionally or unintentionally, deliberately or accidentally concluded between a corporation and the viewers on the various online communities vision videos are spreading from and to. We seek to initiate the conceptual foundation for ethical considerations needed in using vision videos as a participatory resource. Our findings suggest, that the ethical contract of using user participation from online vision videos both have to account for how the video is rhetorically introduced, and how it is later used by both the user communities as well as by the organisation. The ethical contract consists of two parts: the basic preconditions of a well told narrative and access to platforms which support participatory culture, as well as the company’s respect and acknowledgement of the active participation and content creation by the audience.