Situated Software: Designing Applications for Specific Social Contexts
By
Quizzical4230
An everything bagel for the brain. Substantive, layered, well-seasoned.
Summary
Clay Shirky introduces the concept of 'situated software' - software designed specifically for particular social situations or contexts, rather than general-purpose applications. Drawing from his experience teaching at NYU's Interactive Telecommunications Program, he observes students creating software tailored to specific social environments. Shirky contrasts this approach with traditional software development, arguing that situated software is more responsive to immediate social needs and can be developed more quickly and effectively for niche contexts. He explores how this emerging paradigm represents a shift in software development practices toward more context-aware, socially embedded applications.
Key quotes
· 4 pulledThis is software designed in and for a particular social situation or context.
I teach at NYU's Interactive Telecommunications Program (ITP), where the student population is about evenly divided between technologists who care about aesthetics and artists who aren't afraid of machines, which makes it a pretty good place to see the future.
Part of the future I believe I'm seeing is a change in the software ecosystem which, for the moment, I'm calling situated software.
This way of making software is in contrast to the traditional model of creating general-purpose applications.
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