Contact:cdent@burningchrome.com
Dillon, A. & Morris, M. (1996). User acceptance of information
technology: theories and models. _Annual Review of Information
Science and Technology_ (p 3-32). Medford NJ: Information Today, Inc.
Overview of the primary theories involved in the acceptance of IT:
Innovation Diffusion Theory (ID), Theory of Reasoned Action,
Technology Acceptance Model, Theory of Planned Behavior, and
Socio-Technical Systems Theory.
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Why hasn't faceted classification (FC) caught on outside of limited domains?
ID has a possible explanation. Theory has 5 characteristics: relative
advantage, compatibility, complexity, trialability and observability.
In each of these areas FC has missed the mark.
Relative advantage is how much we can gain from the new system
compared to the existing systems. Frequently this is very dependent on
the other characteristics. In large domains FC hasn't caught on
because the systematic changes required to make it go and to learn it
are quite large.
Trialability is the ability to try something before you fully commit
to it. This is difficult with faceted systems for large domains
because the value of the faceting does not shine until a significant
portion of the domain has been classified. It is true that, as Jacob
suggests, LCSH could be used to begin a classification system, but who
is going to do that work and why would they if the relative advantage
can't be proven.
Observability is the degree to which the advantage of the change can
be seen. Unforunately, with many technological or idea-based
innovations the value of the change can only be seen over the long
term. The long term cannot be viewed by most until after something is
implemented. Visionaries who can see over the longer term without
implementation have trouble convincing the entrenched.
Facet classification has the appearance, on the surface of being very
complex. It has proven not as easy to understand as hierachical or
enumerative classification. This is odd because it seems that human
thought is probably more like FC than it is like hierarchical class
systems.
One area where FC does win is that it can be compatible with existing
systems because the citation order may be adjusted on the fly. A
representation of an FC system as some other system would be possible,
if the resources are tagged appropriately. However, again, without an
implementation to observe and try this is easy to resist.
Basically, it's a big change, a shift in paradigms, and those sorts of
things require a demonstration that causes a radical adjustment in
people's conceptual understandings.
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