Commodification Of Information Research Articles

Precision Farming: Environmental Legitimation, Commodification of Information, and Industrial Coordination1

Abstract Precision farming—use of digital geographically referenced data in farming operations—is the leading example of a cluster of emerging information technologies in agriculture. To date, the vast majority of academic and promotional literature addressing precision farming has focused on the field and farm‐level economic and environmental benefits of site‐specific allocation of crop inputs (fertilizer, pesticides, and seeds). In this paper, we question popular perceptions of the technology and pursue a sociological analysis through identification of consistencies between precision farming and the political and economic requirements of an industrializing agriculture. Through promotion of a public commitment and a technical mechanism to mitigate farm chemical pollution, precision farming legitimates chemically‐based agriculture in an era of rising environmentalism. Further, precision farming is based on, and will advance, the commodification of agricultural information—appropriation of field and farm‐level decision processes through substitution of capital for local knowledge. By automating farm‐level data collection and information management and by reducing agriculturalists' reliance on public sector agricultural research and extension, precision farming supports further integration of on‐farm activity into a coordinated system of industrial manufacture.

The Information Society: From Fordism to Gatesism: The 1995 Southam Lecture

The information society model claims that the new information hegemony is transforming industrial society. But is it not the case that the major change has to do with the increasingly greater integration of information and communication into the functioning of the economy and society, in the submission of information and communication to the operative rules of industrial society, in sum, in the commodification of information, culture, and communication? Rather than a “post-industrial society,” the period of transition which we are experiencing consists more modestly in the shift from one industrial mode of organization to another mode of industrial organization, that is, from Fordism to Gatesism.

The Ethics of GIS

There has so far been little discussion of the ethics of geographic information systems (GIS), yet they are complex and driven by conflicting goals. This paper argues for an ethical analysis of GIS which goes beyond “intemalist” judgements of good behavior and adherence to accuracy standards to a contextualized “extemalist” one. Only when spatial technologies such as GIS are understood as part of a nexus of relations which includes academia in the commodification of information can GIS practice by fully analyzed. A four-stage sequence of ethical practice is proposed, in which GIS has achieved the second stage. GIS practice and use is a fluctuating, contested area, which, therefore, is not suited to a rigid code of ethics. A better approach is based in the internalist and externalist dialectic.

Some Implications of the Commodification of Information and the Emerging Information Economy for Applied Geographical Analysis in the United Kingdom

This paper contains a consideration of some of the implications of the emerging information economy for quantitative geography. The vast increase in computer data bases creates exciting new prospects for applied analysis relevant to public policy and private organisations. An attempt is made to identify where these new opportunities are located, to discuss some of the reasons for previous failures, to exploit the intrinsic value of geographical analysis techniques, and to outline a research agenda for the future.