UFIE95-20-3 Information Systems in Society
Week 2: Social Informatics

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Summary

Introduction to the major concepts of social informatics.

Key terms and concepts

• Social Informatics
• Major Issues in Social Informatics
• Technological utopianism and Technological distopianism
• Technological determinism
• Social determinism

Sample question

Identify the utopian and distopian perspectives on 'eLearning', 'eCommerce' and 'eGovernment'.

Reading

Learning about Information Technologies and Social Change: The Contribution of Social Informatics, Kling, R, 2000, The Information Society, 16(3).

The limits of information, Seely Brown, John and Duguid, Paul, 2000, Chapter 1 from: The Social Life of Information, HBS Press

Find out more

Kling, R., 1996 Hopes and Horrors: Technologicalanism and Anti-Utopianism in Narratives of Computerization (In: Kling, Computerization and Controversy, 1996)

A 'Technological Idiot'? Raymond Williams and Communications Technology, Freedman, D., Information, Communication and Society, 5(3).

Turning Point. 2000. Technoutopianism (spoof advertisment). The New York Times. Monday (Aug 28, 2000)

Tutorial

The following predictions concerning the impact of information technology on society for the turn of the century were made in a widely read student textbook published in the mid-1980s.

• The paperless office
• The unmanned factory
• The electronic cottage
• The collapse of the city
• The global village
• The demise of the expert
• The leisure society

As a group discuss

• whether these have occurred
• if not, why not
• whether they are likely to occur; and
• whether your or the original author's predictions were influenced by social or techinical determinism.

In the remaining time, try to identify typical contemporary predictions for the impact of information technology on society (eg, 'the death of bricks and mortar')