As rituals move into the digital sphere, the technical design of what we call digital ritual infrastructures may affect unplanned moments of social externalities. We empirically ground the notion of digital ritual infrastructure through a study of WellTech, an association of digital start-up organizations whose focus is designing wellbeing-related workplace technologies. To understand how digital rituals are shaped by these technologies, we draw upon interviews, archival and observational data. Our findings suggest that digital ritual infrastructure supports but also rescales and revalues rituals. In this process, technology-mediated ritualized action is directed towards designed function, potentially foreclosing on opportunities for socially creative or unexpected effects. We discuss the implications of our findings for understanding ritual in digitalized workplaces.
