[Sigia-l] Serious Discussion of IA Research?

[Boniface Lau]

> From: Eric Scheid
>  
> On 4/12/04 1:03 PM, "Boniface Lau" 
> <boniface_lau at compuserve.com> wrote:
> 
> > For a field known as Information Architecture, what is more basic
> > then distinguishing information from data. After all, that field
> > has long been insisting that information is not data.
> 
> has it really?

Are you back-pedalling? "Oh, we didn't really insist that information
is not data. Thus, it is okay for Information Architects not being
able to tell information from data."

Would you consider people molecular biologists if they cannot tell a
molecule from a cell?


> 
> I'm looking back through the archive of 4000+ messages on SIGIA-L
> and the only time the question of distinguishing data from
> information seems to come up is when it is the question of topic
> (like this thread).
> 
> I can't find any other threads discussing IA topics (eg. IA
> deliverables, standards, taxonomies, facetted classification,
> findability) in which the point is made, nay, "insisted" (!), that
> "information is not data".

Insisting about something does not mean that such insistence happens
at a certain frequency.


>
> I posit that the difference just hasn't been relevant for a great
> deal of the IA discussions.

As you yourself have observed, unless being asked what information is,
IAs didn't care to distinguish information from data. No wonder they
couldn't show the pragmatic difference between information and data.

May be when IAs walk their (information not data) talk, they will be
better at showing the difference. But walking the talk without the
required skills to meaningfully distinguish information from data
makes IAs hair-splitters.

To people who wonder why the IA field is in limbo, look no further.


Boniface