The Ambivalent Ontology of Digital Artifacts1
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Digital artifacts are embedded in wider and constantly shifting ecosystems such that they become increasingly editable, interactive, reprogrammable, and distributable. This state of flux and constant transfiguration renders the value and utility of these artifacts contingent on shifting webs of functional relations with other artifacts across specific contexts and organizations. By the same token, it apportions control over the development and use of these artifacts over a range of dispersed stakeholders and makes their management a complex technical and social undertaking. These ideas are illustrated with reference to (1) provenance and authenticity of digital documents within the overall context of archiving and social memory and (2) the content dynamics occasioned by the findability of content mediated by Internet search engines. We conclude that the steady change and transfiguration of digital artifacts signal a shift of epochal dimensions that calls for rethinking some of the inherited wisdom in IS research and practice.
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Digital resources can be edited and reprogrammed, and their functionality can be deferred until the point of use.
“At a time when digital resources are readily editable (Kallinikos et al. 2013), reprogrammable (Yoo et al. 2010), and functionality can be procrastinated until the point of use (Eaton et al. 2015;Henfridsson et al. 2014)”
From Recombination in the open-ended value landscape of digital innovation (2018) · cites this paper as Kallinikos et al. 2013
Prior information systems work on cocreation and digital architecture concentrates on design recombination carried out by firms.
“In prior work, such as the literatures on cocreation in the business value of IT (Grover and Kohli 2012;Sarker et al. 2012) and digital architecture (Kallinikos et al. 2013;Shapiro and Varian 1999;Yoo et al. 2010), there is a clear focus on design and recombination being performed by the firm.”
From Recombination in the open-ended value landscape of digital innovation (2018) · cites this paper as Kallinikos et al. 2013
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- Authors
- Kallinikos, J., Aaltonen, A., & Marton, A.
- Affiliations
- London School of Economics and Political Science (GB)
- Hanken School of Economics (FI)
- Department of IT Management, Copenhagen Business School, Howitzvej 60, 2000 Frederiksberg, Denmark
- Venue
- MIS Quarterly
- Publisher
- MIS Quarterly
- Published
- 2013-06-01
- Volume
- 37
- Issue
- 2
- Pages
- 357-370
- ISSN
- 0276-7783 (ISSN-L)
- 2162-9730
- OpenAlex
- W2019920685
- Cited by
- 780
- References
- 71
- Citations by year
- 2026: 73 · 2025: 65 · 2024: 84 · 2023: 107 · 2022: 102 · 2021: 93 · 2020: 69 · 2019: 49 · 2018: 40 · 2017: 25 · 2016: 24 · 2015: 23 · 2014: 18 · 2013: 7 · 2012: 1
- FWCI
- 423.48
- Type
- journal article
- Language
- en
- Open access
- green
- doi.org
- Licence
- cc-by
- Locations
- MIS Quarterly (publishedVersion)
- London School of Economics and Political Science Research Online (London School of Economics and Political Science) (acceptedVersion)
- London School of Economics and Political Science Theses Online (London School of Economics and Political Science) (acceptedVersion)
- Journal of the Association for Information Systems (submittedVersion)
- IRIS - Institutional Research Information System (Libera Università Internazionale degli Studi Sociali Guido Carli) (submittedVersion)
- CBS Research Portal (Copenhagen Business School) (submittedVersion)
- University of Warwick (cc-by)
- Topics
- Social Sciences › Arts and Humanities › Conservation › Digital and Traditional Archives Management
- Social Sciences › Sociology and Political Science › Information Systems Theories and Implementation
- Social Sciences › Business, Management and Accounting › Management Information Systems › Information Systems and Technology Applications
- Keywords
- digital artifacts, ontology, digital archiving, provenance, authenticity, social memory, discoverability, search engines, stakeholder control, information systems research
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