more actor-network theory

It was nice to see actor-network theory applied to something that’s a seemingly less-complicated (in its history, at least) artifact than Aramis—and if it wasn’t, Ittersum certainly made his approach a little more coherent. I’m going to credit the smaller space of the article, along with the fact that a translation isn’t getting in the way of meaning (at least I think it isn’t). So this article ended up being a much better introduction to actor-network theory than Aramis—sorry, Latour.

Anyway, this quote on page 160 stuck with me:

“The case of the NLS, then, suggests that judging writing technologies solely, or even predominantly, on the criteria of ease of learning tends to support existing infrastructures and practices.”

A lot of the failure behind NLS stemmed from its method of input; even though it was more intuitive than the keyboard; and the fact that it required the user to learn it like an instrument (seriously, it seemed like guitar lessons would have come in handy) made it less appealing. As Ittersum indicates, people would rather produce things than learn a system—and I’ve had very similar experiences in my own life. My friend was talking about learning the Dvorak keyboard a while back, and I saw it as a waste of time because of the training required. I’d have to break some part of my brain to let go of the muscle memory that allows me to use the Qwerty keyboard blindfolded; Gitelman calls this "cultivated motor automatism," and it seems like I’ve completely ingrained the use of a less-than-optimal input method into my brain.

Note: As my loudness has indicated in class, I’m also proficient with Vista (not the Windows variety), and that definitely feels like the cumbersome, giant-wheeled bike of teaching tools. And for all of my efforts, girls are never impressed with my Vista wizardry.

So is the keyboard the “macho” bicycle of writing technologies, when compared to Engelbart’s creation? It could be; and there’s certainly something to be said about how we have to contort our wrists to an unnatural angle when sitting at most keyboards. I actually have an “ergonomic keyboard,” which is considered non-standard, but really shouldn’t be (and it was much more expensive than a traditional keyboard, but also a necessity due to how much I write). On my keyboard at home, the keys are split down the middle and slanted at 45 degree angles, which is a huge improvement, even though the underlying technology is still built on a foundation that was created based on the mechanical work of metal hitting paper. But I still have to take one of my hands off of the keyboard in order to use the mouse; and after reading Ittersum’s article, this action does seem counter-intuitive.

In the end, I’m left wondering how much of this will apply to me project, or if I’ll even use actor-network theory. It would be nice to use something new, but I’m still unsure if I can do ANT justice. Hopefully we can hash this out as we do more reading.

EDIT: It looks like I might have done the wrong readings, but I was going off of the most recent syllabus (sent on Oct. 6). Were all the assigned readings on Vista? That's what I printed out.