Abstract. This paper considers a range of theoretical approaches to the understanding of organisa... more Abstract. This paper considers a range of theoretical approaches to the understanding of organisations and the implications these views have for the design of computer,supported cooperative work,systems. Organisations have often been seen as structures which can be divided into hierarchically ordered parts or as networks of informal relations. Organisational theorists have also considered organisations to resemble organisms,with needs for survival in potentially hostile environments or as information processors, with decision-making as their most important characteristic. More recently, developments in the social sciences have suggested that radical reconceptualisations are necessary for the study of work settings. Consequently, these developments have attracted attention due to their potential to inform system design. This paper reviews some,of these efforts and comments,on some,of the outstanding problems that have to be overcome,if studies of everyday work set- tings are to infor...
Growth and decline of a scientific specialty: The case of radar meteor research
American Geophysical Union eBooks, 1986
This article traces the rise and eventual decline of a field of research devoted to the study of ... more This article traces the rise and eventual decline of a field of research devoted to the study of meteors by radar. It shows how a new experimental tool, radar, provided the impetus for the emergence of a new scientific specialty, and how this specialty later declined after its initial problems had been solved and after most of its participants had moved on to more promising fields. Radar meteor research provides an example of how new fields grow and how scientific developments affect the research careers of scientists. Although meteors ...
DEMOGRAPHY OF ON-LINE COMMUNITIES The case of Wikis Wikis are the most prominent example of onlin... more DEMOGRAPHY OF ON-LINE COMMUNITIES The case of Wikis Wikis are the most prominent example of online communities of collaborative content creation, of which Wikipedia is the largest and most famous. The primacy of research on Wikipedia in the literature has eclipsed the study of the wiki ecosystem, which actually displays a wide variety of demographics, usage patterns, governance, content and population dynamics. Many wikis struggle to survive, competing against one another for quality and contributors, growing in content and population or, conversely, threatened by inactivity or vandalism. This paper is the first empirical assessment of a large sample of wikis, their structure and their evolution over time. We analyse the correlation of various macroscopic indicators, structural features and governance policies of wikis with specific growth patterns, and discuss possible future research on the viability of online communities.
A comparison of the current structures and dynamics of UK and German biotechnology-based industri... more A comparison of the current structures and dynamics of UK and German biotechnology-based industries reveals a striking convergence of industrial organisations and innovation directions in both countries. This counteracts propositions from theoretical frameworks such as the varieties-of-capitalism hypothesis and the national innovation systems approach which suggest substantial differences between the industrial structures of the countries due to differing institutional frameworks. In this paper, we question these approaches and show that the observed structural alignment can be explained by the network organisation of research and production in knowledge-based industries.
Computational and Mathematical Organization Theory, Oct 20, 2010
At the end of the 1980s, a new branch of Artificial Intelligence (AI) reached Europe [1]. Distrib... more At the end of the 1980s, a new branch of Artificial Intelligence (AI) reached Europe [1]. Distributed AI had originated a few years earlier in the USA, and was based on two intertwined areas of research: Distributed Problem Solving and Decentralized AI. Decentralized AI was to become a major area of scientific activity in Europe, principally through the workshop series MAAMAW: Modeling Artificial Agents in a Multi-Agent World. Behind this exciting new area lay ideas and metaphors originating from the Social Sciences. The social world brought to AI an increased level of complexity, with problems that were no longer closed and constrained, but generated from a world populated by autonomous and self-motivated beings: 'agents'. The agent approach to AI started a revolution. Agents have an identity, a unity, a mind of their own and have to deal with a complex, ever-changing world. The agent thread is today the most important in AI, heralded by a series of conferences with a worldwide impact: Agent Theories, Architectures, and Languages (ATAL), the International Conferences on Autonomous Agents (Agents) and on Multiagent Systems (ICMAS), together leading to the International Conference on Autonomous Agents and Multiagent Systems (AAMAS).
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Papers by Nigel Gilbert