Characteristics of "Knowledge Work"

  • This is radically simplified to get at broad trends and important characteristics!
  • These items are (generally) not exclusive-- the presence of one doesn't mean the absence of the other two!
  • This table is concerned with "knowledge work" not creative and artistic work in the classic liberal arts sense. Some of this might apply there, much of it would be an indication of what creativity works against... but that's a whole different topic!
Oral Tradition Literacy A Second Orality
Collective Individual Connective
A Live Wire A Closed Circuit A Power Station
Personally experienced 'Objective' (distanced, reflected) Consensus and contingency
Synchronous Asynchronous Distributed presence
Persuasion through presence (intrinsic and peer authority) Persuasion through logic and scientific method (external authority) Persuasion through resilience and resonance (collective authority)
Authority through relationship Authority through citation Authority through continuing interaction and resilience
Improvisational Presentation/Performance "Complete" Authorship Improvisational Content (mixed media, re-purposing, expansion)
Originality Through the Telling Originality through Precise Description Originality in Presentation and Participation
Stewardship Ownership Collaborative sense-making
Associative Hierarchical (Taxonomic) Folksonomic
Shared Narrative Analysis Discovery and Personal Narrative
Clustered Linear Hypertextual
Permutative Unified, Codified, Static ('Complete' and Reproducible) Connected and Generative
Accumulation and Layering Replication and Reproduction Accretion and Organic Growth
Knowing what you can Knowing what you need Knowing enough
At the Time Ahead of Time Just in Time
Memorizing Stories Preparing Reproducible Stories Improvising Stories
Transmission Manipulation (identification and categorization) Participation (process and production)
Immediate Memory Local Storage Network Storage (access)
Technology as Necessity Technology as Application Technology as Environment
Proximal Local Global


Page last modified on March 04, 2009, at 12:39 PM