David Kreps

• PhD
• Associate Professor at Ollscoil na Gaillimhe – University of Galway

Against Nature – Chapter Abstracts Chapter 1. A Transdisciplinary Approach. In this short book you will find philosophy – metaphysical and political - economics, critical theory, complexity theory, ecology, sociology, journalism, and much else besides, along with the signposts and reference texts of the Information Systems field. Such transdiscipl...

Current market dynamics require organisations to compete in a hypercompetitive environment that is constantly reshaped by digital transformation. At the same time, organisations face growing pressure to implement more sustainable practices in their day-to-day operations and contribute to the UN Sustainable Development Goals. This has led to two dis...

This chapter delves into the environmental concerns associated with Information and Communications Technology (ICT) along its value chain, understood as the series of activities that need to be undertaken to produce, use and dispose of ICT. These activities have their respective challenges in terms of environmental sustainability, including greenho...

Digitalisation and environmental sustainability are two of the megatrends impacting industry and society. This open access Pivot is a timely exploration of some of the challenges and prospects related to digital sustainability from two main perspectives: how digital technologies can be used and maintained in a way that is environmentally sustainabl...

What if reality is fundamentally consisting in events and processes, rather than things? All actions are situated within processes, influenced by a broader set of preceding and concomitant flows of digital information and other actions. This paper offers a process philosophy perspective that sees things as merely constellations of processes. Decisi...

Herein we place the International Federation for Information Processing Code of Ethics in the context of the history of ethics, then discuss the code in terms of contemporary concerns with the professionalization of computing, what it aims to achieve, and its importance in professional practice.

The Dark Side of Information Systems (IS) is a school of thought which explores the detrimental consequences that can arise from IS phenomena such as digital transformation (DT). Critical Realism (CR), meanwhile, is a philosophical approach which can lend a deeper understanding of dark phenomena thanks to its emphasis upon the role of deep-lying, g...

Ephemerality should be a significant concept for the information systems (IS) discipline but has not been developed as such. On the one hand, ephemerality is considered a characteristic of the IS “core” and focus, of data, information, and knowledge, and of digital material and the experience of digital technologies. On the other, IS reference to e...

The Covid-19 pandemic has accelerated business use of digital technology with ephemeral functionality. However, ephemerality as a concept is not well defined in the information systems (IS) literature, making application and operationalization challenging. We conduct an interdisciplinary review of the temporal and material qualities of the ephemera...

This book is the first collection that offers an overview and case studies around understandings and manifestations of penises and phalluses in the early twenty-first century. It examines how penises and phalluses are experienced and represented, drawing on examples from pornography, stripping, music video, film, surgery, and comedy. The penis—alon...

The metaverse has the potential to extend the physical world using augmented and virtual reality technologies allowing users to seamlessly interact within real and simulated environments using avatars and holograms. Virtual environments and immersive games (such as, Second Life, Fortnite, Roblox and VRChat) have been described as antecedents of the...

If agency is the core capacity to act and autonomy is the capacity to act in an uncoerced manner, then free will is the condition of possibility in which agency and autonomy may occur. Greater philosophical clarity concerning free will – and determinism – can benefit a critical view of digital determinism, represented by the move toward dystopian f...

In this chapter we briefly recount the history of the Human Choice and Computers conference series, and of Technical Committee 9, and show that not only has there been a marked focus, over more than four decades, on a critical and sociotechnical approach to understanding the relationship between ICTs and society, but that HCC and TC9 might be regar...

A short introduction to the creation of the IFIP Code of Ethics, followed by the Code itself.

Taking a long look back through the philosophical underpinnings of contemporary hyper-masculinity, from renaissance writers such as Hobbes and Locke up to modern American philosopher, Nozick, this chapter maps out the key philosophical fault-lines of the possessive individualism driving the hyper-masculinised competitive capitalism that has brought...

Data Analytics needs to have ethical standards. There are numerous examples of why this is so, and the paper cites four particularly egregious ones. The paper offers both reasons why such standards are currently missing or inadequate, and how they might best be introduced, or refined. Some Codes of Ethics, such as the Software Engineering Code of E...

With the goal of finding new philosophical foundations upon which indigenous theory can be built in information systems (IS), this chapter proposes building around the notion of infomateriality inspired from Henri Bergson’s focus on our experience of time that is both objective and subjective. Infomateriality may be understood via a process philoso...

Implicit in the value sensitive design (VSD) approach is a concern for understanding, and where possible, disrupting problematic power relationships. Yet an awareness of the issues and ethics of power relations is a pre-requisite for such a concern to bear fruit. This article provides some insight into the issues, and through a case study of techno...

There is evidence that agile approaches to information system development can improve product quality and developer productivity. However, successful adoption of these approaches appears to depend on adaptation to specific contexts. This research contributes to a broader goal to understand what it means to “be agile” in the presence of adaptations...

This paper argues that the ubiquitous digital networks in which we are increasingly becoming immersed present a threat to our ability to exercise free will. Using process philosophy, and expanding upon understandings of causal autonomy, the paper outlines a thematic analysis of diary studies and interviews gathered in a project exploring the nature...

This book constitutes the refereed proceedings of the 14th IFIP TC 9 International Conference on Human Choice and Computers, HCC14 2020, which was supposed take place in Tokyo, Japan, in September 2020, but the conference was cancelled due to the COVID-19 crisis. The 31 revised full papers presented were carefully reviewed and selected from 55 subm...

This paper suggests that the dominance of northern research paradigms in ICT4D may be viewed as a continuation of colonial sway over the endeavors of the global South. The notion of Southern Theory - as introduced in the work of Raewyn Connell, the Comaroffs, and others - may be a route by which researchers in the global South can reclaim the intel...

This paper presents a conception of personhood as both physical and social, and both as radically contingent upon their respective physical and social environments. In the context of age-related cognitive decline it supports literature suggesting social personhood is occluded rather than deteriorating with brain function. Reviewing the literature o...

The way elderly care is delivered is changing. Attempts are being made to accommodate the increasing number of elderly, and the decline in the number of people available to care for them, with care robots. This change introduces ethical issues into robotics and healthcare. The two-part study (heuristic evaluation and survey) reported here examines...

This book constitutes the refereed proceedings of the 13th IFIP TC 9 International Conference on Human Choice and Computers, HCC13 2018, held at the 24th IFIP World Computer Congress, WCC 2018, in Poznan, Poland, in September 2018 . The 29 revised full papers presented were carefully reviewed and selected from 48 submissions. The papers are based o...

Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to respond to Burmeister's paper on Professionalism in information and communication technology. Design/methodology/approach – This is a short and simple response to an issue that seemed central to Burmeister's paper. Findings – A key conundrum between the definitions of professionalism and corporations needs...

User interface design needs to be revisited for people with dementia. This paper introduces ‘skeuomorphic reassurance’ as a guiding principle for human interfaces in technological design, particularly for older people and people with dementia (PwD). Skeuomorphs exhibit decorative design elements reminiscent of ‘parent’ objects that incorporated suc...

Businesses working with universities are in an optimal position to overcome perceived barriers to the uptake of Responsible Research and Innovation (RRI) for Business and Industry. This paper sets out case study evidence within a particular framework for such university-industry partnerships, to support this assertion, and suggests that the framewo...

Celebrating achievements is an important social ritual. Tracks and themes at conferences such as ETHICOMP 2015 provide opportunities for the careful discussion of challenges facing society in terms of information and communication technology (ICT). This topic provides the underpinning rationale to the body of papers presented throughout the entire...

Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to analyse the broad phases of web development: the read-only Web 1.0, the read-write Web 2.0, and the collaborative and Internet of Things Web 3.0, are examined for the theoretical lenses through which they have been understood and critiqued. Design/methodology/approach – This is a conceptual piece, in the t...

The focus of much academic work on Web accessibility has been concerned with the lack of implementation of the Web Content Accessibility Guidelines. There seems, as yet, however, to have been little critical reflection on the Guidelines themselves - save perhaps some awareness of the heterogeneous nature of the Web, and the difficulties facing Web...

This is a book about evolution – from a post-Darwinian perspective. It recounts the core ideas of one of the great French philosophers, Henri Bergson (1859-1941), and his rediscovery and legacy in the poststructuralist critical philosophies of the 1960s onwards. It explores the confluences of these ideas and approaches with the foundational ideas o...

Mapping the resonances, dissonances, and linkages between the thought of Gramsci and Foucault to uncover new tools for socio-political and critical analysis for the twenty-first century, this book reassesses the widely-held view that their work is incompatible. With discussions of Latin American revolutionary politics, indigenous knowledges, techno...

In this final chapter, I wish to present, not a new and further treatment or exegesis, but rather a brief conclusion and summary, and a rounding off of this volume with the sketch of a final idea that draws the others together: creative emergence.

The concept of a ‘system’ is an old one: etymologically it derives from the Greek sustēma, from sun- ‘with’ and histanai ‘set up,’ meaning uniting, putting together. But the scientific use of the term is relatively recent; perhaps Carnot was the first to use the term scientifically, when describing the behaviour of steam in his pioneering study of...

Bergson’s core ideas concern intuition, durée réelle, memory and perception, and the élan vital. In this volume I will mostly be using the terms he used, in French, for durée réelle and élan vital, because the English translations — commonly ‘duration’ or ‘real time’ for durée réelle, and either ‘vital impetus’ or ‘life drive’ (among others) for él...

Why did Bergson, one of the most famous and highly regarded philosophers of the first decades of the 20th century1 — one of the ‘Select Forty’ of the Académie Française and a Nobel Laureate — so swiftly fall from sight, become, to all intents and purposes, a mere footnote and curiosity in histories of philosophy, by the 1980s? In 2000, when I first...

This chapter makes a first attempt to map the ideas of Bergson with those of complexity theory — seeking, if you will, a kind of durée complexe. Complexity theory is multiple and being explored in many different disciplines.1 The complex adaptive systems in environmental biology, also known as ecological complexity, will be our focus; but some of t...

The science of complexity [6], [12], [20, 21], [31, 32] has been introduced to Information Systems (IS) but thus far with seemingly little impact. This paper argues that its application can be located in the burgeoning field of User Experience (UX) in digital business practice [23], [38]. Both these developments are looking at time in a new way, sp...

This chapter discusses the key questions raised by its title—what should we understand by the terms virtuality, humanity, and, thereby, by the term reality? These questions are explored with reference to the work of philosophers such as Henri Bergson, and his concepts of perception and moral obligation, and Michel Foucault, and his concepts of disc...

Social Networking Sites (SNS) have become a key component of users’ experience of the internet. Whilst much has been made of the social dynamics of online SNS, the influence of the structures and operations of these sites – and the business models behind them - on users is rarely accounted for. This paper argues that behind the social behaviours su...

Social Networking Sites (SNS) have become a key component of users’ experience of the internet. Whilst much has been made of the social dynamics of online SNS, the influence of the structures and operations of these sites – and the business models behind them - on users is rarely accounted for. This paper argues that behind the social behaviours su...

The great popularity and rapid diffusion of mobile technologies at worldwide level has also been recognised by the public sector, leading to the creation of m-government. A major challenge for m-government is accessibility – the provision of an equal service to all citizens irrespective of their psychical, mental or technical capabilities. This pap...

This paper offers an introduction to poststructuralist interpretivist research in information systems, through a poststructuralist theoretical reading of the phenomenon and experience of social networking websites, such as Facebook. This is undertaken through an exploration of how loyally a social networking profile can represent the essence of an...

In this paper I introduce the concept of eco-masculinities as a philosophical and critical project to understand the links between gendered and pro-environmental behaviour. The background of the feminist project, the sociology of masculinity, and the post-gendered world to which they both aspire, alongside a brief history of the project of ecofemin...

Virtual Technologies have enabled us all to become publishers and broadcasters. The world of information has become saturated with a multitude of opinions, and opportunities to express them. Track 2 “Virtual Technologies and Social Shaping” of the 9th Conference on Human Choice and Computers (HCC9) explores some of the issues that have arisen in th...

Much of the World Wide Web remains inaccessible or difficult to access by people across a spectrum of disabilities and this may have serious implications for the potential use of the web for increasing social inclusion. We argue that the complexities of web accessibility are best analysed against a set of relevant discourses and that part of the re...

Though sometimes pitted against one another and at times contradictory, the ideas of Michel Foucault and Judith Butler on the nature and expression of our sexuality and our gender identities help us to gain a deeper and more rounded picture of the impact and import of the burgeoning phenomenon of internet dating websites. This paper looks at the us...

Social Networking Sites (SNSs) are one of the most publicly discussed innovations of the Internet and particularly of ‘Web 2.0’. While community-building and social networking are certainly not new, the speed, scope and reach facilitated by these sites have heralded unprecedented innovation in the ways in which networked individuals approach their...

Though sometimes pitted against one another and at times contradictory, the ideas of Michel Foucault and Judith Butler on the nature and expression of our sexuality and our gender identities help us to gain a deeper and more rounded picture of theimpact and import of the burgeoning phenomenon of internet dating websites. This paper looks at the use...

Companies need to address Web Accessibility with more than just professional standards of code writing, and adherence to the Web Content Accessibility Guidelines. With funding from the European Social Fund a team at Salford University, led by the authors, undertook a research project in 2007 entitled Combating eDiscrimination in the North West. The...

This paper offers a theoretical reading of the phenomenon and experience of the social networking site, Facebook, through an exploration of how loyally a Facebook profile can represent the essence of an individual, and whether such Platonic notions of essence and loyalty of copy are disturbed by the nature of a social networking site profile, in wa...

Virtuality and reality are today sometimes seen as opposites (Sotto, 1997). Yet a look beneath the surface of the concept of virtuality leads us into a much more complex understanding, not only of what virtuality is or might be, but of reality itself. We are left, indeed, unsure of the opposition, and even uncertain of our future in an increasingly...

The focus of this chapter is Web accessibility for disabled people, given that much of the Web remains inaccessible or difficult to access. The topic of disabled people’s Web access is introduced through a consideration of disability discrimination legislation and a description of how the law applies to Web accessibility. There is a tension between...

In the midst of Implementing Electronic Government (IEG), the almost knee-jerk reaction of our political elite seems to be to embrace hugely ambitious Information Systems (IS) solutions to public-sector operations. Problem after problem has been viewed as solvable by throwing some big IT at it. However hindsight and a wealth of evidence and example...

The focus of this paper is Web accessibility for disabled people. Much of the Web remains inaccessible or difficult to access by people across a spectrum of disabilities and this may have serious implications for the potential use of the Web for increasing social inclusion. The topic of disabled Web access is introduced through a consideration of f...

Purpose – The purpose of this article is to analyse the continuing problem of web accessibility for disabled people as a critical information systems issue. Design/methodology/approach – The ways in which the web is used by disabled people, and problems that can arise, are described and related to the development of critical disability theory from...

The focus of this chapter is Web accessibility for disabled people, given that much of the Web remains inaccessible or difficult to access. The topic of disabled people's Web access is introduced through a consideration of disability discrimination legislation and a description of how the law applies to Web accessibility. There is a tension between...

The focus of this chapter is Web accessibility for disabled people, given that much of the Web remains inaccessible or difficult to access. The topic of disabled people’s Web access is introduced through a consideration of disability discrimination legislation and a description of how the law applies to Web accessibility. There is a tension between...

As e-Commerce matures and its tools and applications improve, greater attention is being given to improving the business of public institutions (national and local), and to exploring the potential of what is called e-Government. e-Government is the use of Information Communication Technology to provide citizens and organizations with more convenien...

Despite utopian claims that the internet generally and Social Networking Sites (SNS) (including multi-user virtual environments, or MUVE) in particular herald a challenge to the dominance of capitalist ideologies in technological societies, there is growing evidence that SNS and MUVE are actually part of a hegemonic transnational agenda of conserva...

The Combating eDiscimination in the North West project examined over 100 websites advertising job opportunities both regionally and nationally, and found the vast majority to be largely inaccessible. Professional standards, such as using valid W3C code and adhering to the W3C Web Content Accessibility Guidelines, were largely not followed. The proj...

The digital divide is most often understood as that between the IT haves and have-nots. However, if there is one minority group that can be, and often is excluded from the world wide web, even if they have a computer, it is disabled people. The Special Educational Needs and Disabilities Act 2001 (SENDA) extended the provisions within the Disability...

As the recent and ongoing crisis in the world financial system shows, unregulated markets are dangerous for the world economy. Through the news media we have all become much more familiar with the virtual world of financial transactions in today’s global economy than ever before. In this paper we address the difference between the ‘strong’ virtual...