Aren't they already collapsing of their own accord, by virtue of the fact
that they are inadequate to produce systems that work in their social
environment? The question - at least for the more alert academic, if not for
the practitioners who have to carry out their bosses' orders to produce the
perfect system by yesterday because the firm depends on it - is _how_ should
the social be embodied in the practice of technological development. This is
ultimately a political question - cooption, consensus or class conflict,
which should drive the process of technology development? These threads can
be seen in the development of different systems development methodologies
over the last 10-15 years.
On the term information, a lot of assumptions in information systems -
particularly around the functions of particular types of software - are
built around the distinctions between data (no context), information
(context) and knowledge (incorporated into a structure that makes it
applicable). I have never found these distinctions very useful.
Bruce Robinson