[Air-l] Re: Novelty of Internet and activity theory (Yvonne Waern)

[Yvonne Waern]

Geert,

I take your comments to be ironic. Of course interfaces still fail. 
The interesting thing is that so many people still find a way to 
communicate with each other over Internet in one way or other.

There are various kinds of people - some want order and structure. 
Many of these are computer science people. Others may survive 
disorder and chaos because they get to meet so many interesting 
people. These are the so called "humanists". Unfortunately, these two 
kinds of people do not understand each other."East is east and west 
is west" (Kipling)

We need both!
All the best,
Yvonne



>  >    re: Novelty of Internet and activity theory (Yvonne Waern)
>
>Yvonne Waern <waern at dsv.su.se wrote:
>
>>  I forgot the most important argument: Internet is of course NOTHING
>>  without human beings USING it. Internet is an artefact that mediates
>>  between the human subject and our objects (that may be various
>>  things).
>
>The all too human aspect of the Internet might exactly be point where the
>whole story becomes boring and predictable. An Internet which no longer
>interests human beings could as well be an interesting point of departure.
>Many believe the Internet would be a better place without users. Just
>machines talkin' to each other; a dream come true for many programmers (and
>theorists...). The attempts to 'humanize' have so far not really been
>succesful, despite a decade of human-machine interface research and immense
>discoursive power of gurus such as Jakob Nielsen. After such failures it
>might really be interesting if computer science would FINALLY become post
>modern and shake off its poor humanism.
>
>Geert
>
>
>
>
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-- 
Yvonne Wærn, Professor em, PhD.
Department of Communication Studies,
Linköping University
SE 581 83 Linköping