The Social Life of Information by John Seely Brown and Paul Duguid seeks to shed light on how information travels in the workplace.  Though the book often raises more questions than it answers (and I think the introduction actually states this), there is much here we can talk about. 

1.  "Similarly, those who talk about having direct, unmediated access to the news sometimes sound equally oblivious to how news is made (Brown and Suguid 6)."  What are some of the potential risks of taking information on its own merit, as truth, without considering the social milieu from which it spawned? 

2.  Local knowledge has been described as knowledge directly related to a particular field.  General knowledge is public knowledge.  Embodied knowledge is, "Knowledge which is incorporated in a product although not explicitly identified," according to one online definition.   Many companies, according to the authors, pay little attention to embodied knowledge.  Where should embodied knowledge fit in relation to local and general knowledge?

3.  Brown and Duguid quote Etienne Wenger's Communities of Practice several times.  Wenger explains his theory of social learning, saying: "Our institutions, to the extent that they address issues of learning explicitly, are largely based on the assumption that learning is an individual process, that it has a beginning and an end, that it is best separated from the rest of our activities, and that it isthe result of teaching (Wenger 3)."  Brown and Duguid would very likely agree with this statement.  Do you feel that learning should largely remain a largely solitary, or should it be a more social endeavor?

4.  The authors say that "[p]ractice, then, both shapes and supports learning (Brown and Duguid 129)."  Has this been the case for you at work and school thus far? 

5.  Much information, as we know, is available online.  Brown and Duguid discuss how colleges and universities are in the business of "credentialing" and suggest that the degrees we earn is at times but a rough approximation of the skills we have developed ( Drown and Duguid 214). Might this growing availability of "free" information (provided you can have a computer and can get on the Internet) erode the value of a college degree?

I'll be adding a response to the text later on. 

Twitter me if you have questions about my questions.