Available:*
Library | Item Barcode | Call Number | Material Type | Item Category 1 | Status |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
Searching... | 30000010285224 | QA76.5915 D68 2011 | Open Access Book | Book | Searching... |
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Summary
Summary
A sociotechnical investigation of ubiquitous computing as a research enterprise and as a lived reality. Ubiquitous computing (or ubicomp) is the label for a "third wave" of computing technologies. Following the eras of the mainframe computer and the desktop PC, ubicomp is characterized by small and powerful computing devices that are worn, carried, or embedded in the world around us. The ubicomp research agenda originated at Xerox PARC in the late 1980s; these days, some form of that vision is a reality for the millions of users of Internet-enabled phones, GPS devices, wireless networks, and "smart" domestic appliances. In Divining a Digital Future , computer scientist Paul Dourish and cultural anthropologist Genevieve Bell explore the vision that has driven the ubiquitous computing research program and the contemporary practices that have emerged-both the motivating mythology and the everyday messiness of lived experience.
Reflecting the interdisciplinary nature of the authors' collaboration, the book takes seriously the need to understand ubicomp not only technically but also culturally, socially, politically, and economically. Dourish and Bell map the terrain of contemporary ubiquitous computing, in the research community and in daily life; explore dominant narratives in ubicomp around such topics as infrastructure, mobility, privacy, and domesticity; and suggest directions for future investigation, particularly with respect to methodology and conceptual foundations.
Author Notes
Paul Dourish is Professor of Informatics in the Donald Bren School of Information and Computer Sciences with courtesy appointments in Computer Science and in Anthropology at the University of California, Irvine. He is the author of Where the Action Is: The Foundations of Embodied Interaction (MIT Press, 2001, 2004). Genevieve Bell is an Intel Fellow and the Director of Intel's first user-focused research and development lab, Interactions and Experiences Research.
Reviews 1
Choice Review
Mark Weiser first articulated a vision of ubiquitous computing ("ubicomp") in 1991. Having moved beyond the age of mainframes into the era of personal computing and the dawn of the "information age," Weiser argued that in the next era of computing, resources would be embedded in the world around us (clothes, structures, everyday items), a simultaneously practical and extraordinary ubiquity. Dourish (Univ. of California, Irvine) and Bell (Intel) contend this "technomyth" has provided a road map of sorts for academia, government, and industry worldwide for 20-plus years, and they explore the complex process of "divining" future events. As they succinctly state, this book "is about the stories that have been told [about ubicomp], and about all the stories that haven't been." But there is also the mess of ubicomp, and the practical reality of technology in the world at large. This includes not only those pesky details such as infrastructure, regulations, standards, and more, but also the competing readings of what the "technological reality" is. Thoroughly researched, this work touches on issues of privacy, mobility, sociality, and ubicomp in the domestic and urban realms; it concludes with a "reimagining" of ubicomp by offering a framework for the next 20 years. Summing Up: Highly recommended. Upper-division undergraduates through researchers/faculty. J. A. Bullian Hillsborough Community College
Table of Contents
| Preface | p. vii |
| Acknowledgments | p. ix |
| 1 Introduction: The Myth and Mess of Ubiquitous Computing | p. 1 |
| I p. 7 | |
| 2 Contextualizing Ubiquitous Computing | p. 9 |
| 3 Making Room for the Social and Cultural | p. 45 |
| 4 A Role for Ethnography: Methodology and Theory | p. 61 |
| II p. 91 | |
| 5 What Lies Beneath | p. 95 |
| 6 Mobility and Urbanism | p. 117 |
| 7 Rethinking Privacy | p. 137 |
| 8 Domesticity and Its Discontents | p. 161 |
| III p. 185 | |
| 9 Reimagining Ubiquitous Computing: A Conclusion | p. 187 |
| References | p. 211 |
| Index | p. 245 |
