Patterns of Discourse about Digital Technologies across levels of Materiality: A Study of Wikipedia Articles

Abstract

The technology lifecycle model has been extensively used to study technology evolution and innovation. However, this model was developed for industrial-age material technologies and does not address nonmaterial digital technologies. Therefore, a question emerges as to whether the level of technological materiality is implicated in different dynamics of innovation, as reflected in the technology lifecycle. Digital technologies evolve through discursive dynamics that involve interactions among multiple stakeholders that shape the evolutionary trajectory of the technology. Therefore we set out to examine if discursive dynamics about digital technologies that vary in their level of materiality manifest in different ways throughout their technology lifecycles. To do so, we conducted a study comparing the discursive dynamics of material and nonmaterial digital technologies at different stages of their technology lifecycles. We identified three aspects of discursive dynamics - volume, volatility, and diversity – and examined them for 10 digital technologies across two levels of materiality by analyzing their corresponding Wikipedia articles. Our findings show that the discursive dynamics of material and nonmaterial technologies are similar in the initial era of the lifecycle, but diverge in the two subsequent eras. In addition, we found that the discursive dynamics around nonmaterial technologies remain higher for longer time periods, compared to material technologies. Based on these results, we put forth propositions that challenge and extend existing research on the relationships between technological level of materiality, discursive dynamics, and trajectories of technology evolution

Biography

Uri Gal is a Professor of Business Information Systems at the University of Sydney Business School. He holds a Ph.D. in Information Systems from Case Western Reserve University and an MSc degree in Organisational Psychology from the London School of Economics and Political Science. His research focuses on organisational processes in the context of the implementation and use of digital technologies. He is particularly interested in the relationship between people and technology in organisations, and in the ethical aspects associated with the application of algorithmic technologies.