The Stuff of Bits: An Essay on the Materialities of Information
The Stuff of Bits: An Essay on the Materialities of Information
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比特的东西：关于信息的重要性的文章
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发表时间：
2017
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通讯作者：
Paul Dourish
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作者：
Paul Dourish
一种观点认为，信息的物质安排--如何表示和解释--对我们对信息和信息系统的体验具有重要意义。电子书、虚拟世界和在线商店等虚拟实体充斥着我们的数字体验，它们得到了服务器群、光缆、发电厂和微波链路等大规模物理基础设施的支持。但物质限制的另一个领域也塑造了数字生活：数字表示在白板上勾勒出来，编码成软件，存储在数据库中，加载到计算机内存中，并在网络上传输。这些数字表示编码了我们日常世界的方方面面，并使它们可用于数字处理。这些代表的限制和能力对数字社会产生了重大影响。在《比特的东西》一书中，保罗·杜里什研究了某些数字对象所展示的具体物质。他介绍了四个案例研究：仿真、在另一台计算机内创建“虚拟”计算机；数字电子表格及其在组织实践中的作用；关系数据库和“可数据库”问题；以及数字网络的演变和网络协议的代表性蕴含。这些案例研究展示了唯物主义的描述如何为更广泛的关注--数字领域的权力、政策和政治问题提供了一个切入点。
An argument that the material arrangements of information -- how it is represented and interpreted -- matter significantly for our experience of information and information systems. Virtual entities that populate our digital experience, like e-books, virtual worlds, and online stores, are backed by the large-scale physical infrastructures of server farms, fiber optic cables, power plants, and microwave links. But another domain of material constraints also shapes digital living: the digital representations sketched on whiteboards, encoded into software, stored in databases, loaded into computer memory, and transmitted on networks. These digital representations encode aspects of our everyday world and make them available for digital processing. The limits and capacities of those representations carry significant consequences for digital society. In The Stuff of Bits, Paul Dourish examines the specific materialities that certain digital objects exhibit. He presents four case studies:emulation, the creation of a "virtual" computer inside another; digital spreadsheets and their role in organizational practice; relational databases and the issue of "the databaseable"; and the evolution of digital networking and the representational entailments of network protocols. These case studies demonstrate how a materialist account can offer an entry point to broader concerns -- questions of power, policy, and polity in the realm of the digital.