Tag Archives: david weinberger

Assignment 5B

Posted on October 31, 2016 by | Leave a comment

When Weinberger mentions “the infrastructure of knowledge” he means the coming together of how knowledge is produced. He mentions an attribution of various believers of knowledge and their ideas. For example he mentions one infrastructure of knowledge is to use a data-information-knowledge-wisdom hierarchy pyramid, or (DIKW). As one way to obtain knowledge, Weinberger says “process the data and you get information…information is to data what wine is to vineyard…” (Weinberger, p. 2). Basically data is needed to construct information. According to Weinberger “you’ve refined the data to produce information, and refined the information to generate something of greater value” (Weinberger, p. 2). Infrastructure of knowledge is a process of retrieving data, finding useful information through that data, and then reducing until you have a know-how understanding. Ackoff, proposed this idea of having a know-how for knowledge, “while information is structured data, knowledge “is actionable information” (Weinberger, p. 3). Coming together as a process, knowledge is the part which illustrates an understanding of information.

However, usually this type of infrastructure from data-information-knowledge-wisdom, is not used today. This is apparent since we have an overload or abundant amount of information compared to back then. For example, “Rather than knowing-by-reducing to what fits in a library or a scientific journal, we are now knowing-by-including every draft of every data in vast, loosely connected webs” (Weinberger, p. 5). This means we are not doing an efficient process of elimination when finding information. Since there is an enormous network of any type of data, this data could be hard to configure. When finding useful information leading to valuable knowledge, we could get tripped up by having too much data that is irrelevant. Instead of using this large network such as google, we could examine small scales. What I mean by this, is we could use the process of reducing to have a structured plan when finding research. As researchers if we understood infrastructure, it would force us to choose valuable knowledge over data. We would recognize the difference between these two easily while finding research.

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Assignment 5B

Posted on October 27, 2016 by | Leave a comment

David Weinberger discusses the term “the infrastructure of knowledge” in his book, Too Big to Know. With this term he says that when it comes to finding and gaining knowledge we must first sift through a ton of data that could possibly be meaningless to us at that particular time. There is an order when conducting research, which starts with figuring out what one is trying to gain by conducting research, beginning said research, refining that search, filtering out data or information we do not need, especially in this day and age where we can get too much information, before finding what we wanted to know. There is a difference between information and knowledge.

With so much information being at our fingertips, it would be easy to get or find irrelevant information. As well as, not being able to find accurate information on the subject we may be researching. By understanding how this infrastructure of knowledge works, we can be able to crucial information faster and more efficiently while making sure that whatever we find will be useful to us and our projects. We can put this information to better use and garner more knowledge from it.

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Assignment 5B

Posted on October 26, 2016 by | Leave a comment

In “Too Big To Know,” David Weinberger discusses how the concept of knowledge has changed from us wanting to “know our world” to us really trying to understand what knowledge truly is with the creation and increasing usage of the internet.  Weinberger says our culture has viewed knowledge “as the most profound of human goals”, but knowledge has come to mean different things to everyone and that is what makes the internet the perfect foundation for knowledge to thrive and evolve.  Weinberger states:

“Rather than knowing-by-reducing- to what fits in a library or a scientific journal, we are knowing-by-including every draft of every idea in vast, loosely connected webs.  And that means knowledge is not the same as it was .  Not for science, not for business, not for education, not for government, not for any of us.”

Knowledge is too vast and encompasses so many layers that it has to be contained in some way to be understood.  By using the term, “the infrastructure of knowledge,” Weinberger is referring to the system or platform knowledge relies upon to be understood as knowledge.

Understanding knowledge infrastructure can make us better researchers because we can have the option to use multiple sources and come up with our own interpretation of what we are researching.  This ultimately will allow us to come to our own conclusions and understandings of a topic.  It also helps us see there is no correct way or “one-way” in approaching a subject and that we can pull information from various places to become more knowledgeable about something.  Knowledge is dependent upon connection and networking.

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Assignment 5B: The Infrastructure of Knowledge

Posted on October 26, 2016 by | Leave a comment

David Weinberger discusses in his work “Too Big to Know”, how knowledge has changed over the course of time due to the development of the Internet. He speaks about how people use to have to go to school for long periods of time to achieve their degree and become actual experts in a subject. However, now in this day in age, people are considered experts just by their efforts of blogging and writing a post on social media about a particular matter. When Weinberger speaks about the infrastructure of knowledge, he is referring to the variety of ways knowledge can be achieved or portrayed. By knowledge infrastructure, Weinberger means the organization and structure of knowledge. He believes that knowledge is based on “credentials” such as degrees and publications and not simple opinions.

According to Weinberger the infrastructure of knowledge is the multiple ways people can achieve knowledge and currently the way people achieve it is not really successful. The way we grab knowledge has also changed because of the internet. The way we receive knowledge has also changed by the information given over the internet. Weinberger states that “knowledge is constantly questioned, challenged, rethought, and rewritten.” The infrastructure of knowledge Weinberger is referring to is the way we look for and receive knowledge, because of so many new networks becoming available. We can not rely on the internet too much. We have to research more in order to know if the information is accurate.He further discusses the topic of networking knowledge in his book. “Knowledge now lives not just in libraries and museums and academic journals. It lives not just in the skulls of individuals. Knowledge is now a property of the network, and the network embraces businesses, governments, media, museums, curated collections, and minds in communication.” There is so many different ways of receiving knowledge that it can be a bit overwhelming. Some resources seem more knowledgeable than others and it is up to us to decide which we believe is more accurate and well- informed.

Weinberger does reinforce that knowledge makes us better researchers in a way that we should be aware of credible and reliable information. When we have credible information and we know it is credible, the researching process becomes much easier. Yes, there is an information “overload” as Weinberger puts it, but we have filters. These filters ” increase information and reveal the whole deep sea” ( 13).  There is so much information out there and there is no “running away from knowledge” we just need to know how to require information without overloading our brains. It makes the researcher find information faster by being able to find whatever they are looking for and by using certain keywords. The infrastructure (to knowledge) can be viewed as a better viewing for internet researchers. The reason to that is because there is more access to knowledge on different topics, but the only thing with that is that you would have to research more, in order to make sure that the information is accurate and not just some unreliable information.

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Assignment 5B

Posted on October 26, 2016 by | Leave a comment

In his book, Too Big to Know, David Weinberger describes the concept of knowledge and how we view and understand it. By knowledge infrastructure, Weinberger means the organization and structure of knowledge. He believes that knowledge is bases on “credentials” such as degrees and publications and not simple opinions.  In chapter one of his book, he talks about the evolution of knowledge, how it can  be shaped through technology. This can be a bad thing, as there is just too much information out there and it becomes difficult to credit information as credible sometimes. He states, ” there way too much bad stuff. We can now see every idiotic idea put forward seriously and every serious idea treated idiotically” (12).  We see this going on with the debate right now, instead of looking at the debate and realizing the importance of the election, there are people on the internet who make memes out of both candidates and this goes viral. However, Weinberger does reinforce that knowledge makes us better researchers as we are should be aware of credible information. When we have credible information and we know it is credible, the reaearching process becomes much easier. Yes, there is an information “overload” as Weinberger puts it, but we have filters. These filters ” increase information and reveal the whole deep sea” ( 13).  There is so much information out there and there is no “running away from knowledge” we just need to know how to require information without overloading our brains.

 

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