is203 - Social and Organizational Issues of Information

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http://courses.ischool.berkeley.edu/i203/s07/considering-a-technological-singularity/">With the readings fresh in mind, I happened to cross the innovation diffusion notions with the idea of an approaching technological singularity. That is, the acceleration of innovation is so great that we’ll reach a point where the slope of growth will be so steep that many changes will happen in a very very short period of time. This idea has been made popular recently due to the release of Ray Kurzweil’s book, _The Singularity is Near_. Also, one of the original people to talk of singularity, Vernor Vinge, is giving a talk in San Francisco this Thursday evening.

Talk of singularity seems absurd in the light of Rogers et al… For a given innovation, there is so much between introduction and adoption. So how can we possibly talk of some mass adoption that occurs in very little time? Vinge thinks that the singularity will have to to with A.I. achieving some breakthrough, and Kurzweil talks about “spiritual machines.” Perhaps “bots” or “agents” will have something to do with the singularity? What do these programs that we assign trust and agency (not to mention human traits) have to do with the adoption curves?
How can we reconcile these two camps?

Vinge’s Talk:
http://upcoming.org/event/138377/

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http://courses.ischool.berkeley.edu/i203/s07/newsgroups-internet-discussion-groups/">In the early 1990’s Newsgroups (Internet Discussion Groups) played an integral part in the research collaboration. It was comprised for the most part of scientists or university students that had access to Internet communications. The bar consisted of gaining Internet access. There was a level of self-regulation observed by members enjoying the access of an almost utopia online society. If you did not fit in one there were hundreds and eventually thousands of others you could join. What kept it special was your peer group’s devotion to a specified topic; often leading players in a field would be members of their related group. I remember being a part of the ‘fractal’ group. If I had a challenging question there was usually someone who could point me in the right direction. It was a close group. Over time as the group grew it lost its focus and the academic elements became more watered down as more users started posting more general questions. Over time the value that the site provided for users waned and I was back to sending emails to my more intimate circle of fractal mathematician friends.

If academic networks are to work, it is most likely in the context of a core of individuals that derive benefits of the association of its members. When that goes away the value diminishes.

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http://courses.ischool.berkeley.edu/i203/s07/social-construct-of-a-car/ 2149 ">A couple of years ago Volvo presented the first-ever car built by a team of women engineers - some of the features it had (a space between the front seats to fit a handbag is my favorite) would have SCOTists overjoyed by the perfect demonstration that yes, social constructs happen also when building or discovering things/devices/machines, not only when using them. A friend of mine who works as a lab technician in an engineering school, though, would object: engineering school makes everybody engineers ‘inside’, so the engineer perspective (or, engineers as relevant social group) wins over the woman’s perspective. Now, this would explain why despite the increasing number of women engineers, women’s bathrooms in public places are still not thrice as big as men’s…

(p.s. it was a concept car, and it doesn’t look like anything happened after it was presented to the press…)

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http://courses.ischool.berkeley.edu/i203/s07/james-burke-connections-tv-available-on-line/">Here’s a link to on-line streaming video of several episodes of the James Burke TV show connections.

http://clickcaster.com/connections

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http://courses.ischool.berkeley.edu/i203/s07/the-age-of-technological-revolution-is-100-years-dead/">Grumpy Sir Simon Jenkins has lots to say about technological pseudo-progress (as he sees it, anyway) in this article on the Manchester Guardian:

“No, research and development do not equate with economic progress. No, the computer is not a stunning technological advance, just an extension of electronic communication as known for over a century. No, the internet has not transformed most people’s lives, just helped them do faster what they did before. No, weapons technology has not transformed warfare, merely wasted stupefying sums of money while soldiers win or lose by firing rifles.”

No technological determinism here.. (although after reading the article again, the rant against technology seems more like an excuse to make a point about the Iraq war)

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http://courses.ischool.berkeley.edu/i203/s07/uninvention-examples/">Just thought I might abuse the blog for some shameless self-promotion: there’s an interesting discussion going on over at localoaf on the inevitability of technology and the potential for uninvention, in case anyone wants to jump in.

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http://courses.ischool.berkeley.edu/i203/s07/sign-up-for-the-email-list/">If you haven’t done so already, please sign up for the email list for i203 via my.sims.berkeley.edu right away. If you’re not an iSchool student, email Judd and he’ll help get you set up.

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http://courses.ischool.berkeley.edu/i203/s07/a-few-more-comments-about-course-blogging/">I just wanted to post a short note reiterating what we said in class about blogging the weekly readings. The main idea is that we want you to be creative, to think critically about the readings, and simply write it down. Try not to think of this as a course requirement, but rather as an easy opportunity to raise your grade by writing down your thoughts and reflections on the weekly readings.

It may be helpful to think of the blogging excercise as a virtual form of hand-raising in class. That is, it is your chance to pose interesting questions and perhaps offer some answers. It is also an opportunity to express what is interesting to you, what is challenging or difficult, etc. And, just like raising your hand in class, the more you blog the weekly readings the more we will notice you. Happy writing!

-coye

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http://courses.ischool.berkeley.edu/i203/s07/please-create-an-account/">is203ers,

Please register on this site ASAP. We’d like everyone to create an account in the next week or so, and then we’ll close the site to registration.

If you have any trouble with the process, email Judd.

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http://courses.ischool.berkeley.edu/i203/s07/welcome-to-is203/">A few quick comments about this site. First, you’ll find all the usual stuff - syllabus, presentation slides, and assignment information - through the links at the top of the page. Detailed course information, contact information, required texts, office hours and such is available in the about box on the right, and on the detailed page you can reach by clicking on the ‘More’ link at the bottom of the about box.

Regarding the syllabus, you’ll notice links to PDFs of readings where they are available. Access to many of the PDFs is restricted and requires either that you’re on campus or using the library proxy. However, many readings are book sections which are unavailable online, so you’ll need to purchase the course reader as well.

You’ll also notice that this site is a Wordpress blog. Integrating the traditional course website with a blog, we hope, will make it easy to access and discuss information about the course. There are two primary ways we hope you’ll use this blog.

Feel free to post and comment through the traditional blog chronology that appears on the site’s homepage. We hope you’ll share thoughts, ideas, links, and readings you find are related to the course material.
Each week of readings on the syllabus has its own page on which you can discuss and comment on that week’s readings. In fact, participating on these pages is a required part of your class participation grade. You can access the dedicated post for each week by clicking on the ‘Week X’ headers in the syllabus.

We want this site to be what you want it to be, so if you have ideas or feedback to make it easy or better, we want to hear ‘em. Leave a comment or email us.

We’re looking forward to a great semester!

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