No Wires Attached? Displacement of Power through Information Technology

“What we have learned so far is that there is nothing without the Wireless Network.” This paper explores the extent and consequences of the previous sentence in terms of translating two scientific models into material form. It was uttered as a summary of using Minerva Plaza, a set of facilities built within the University of Helsinki in order to utilise the supposed digital nativity of the students. The stated goal of Minerva Plaza is to weave together collective knowledge construction, emerging communication technologies and inclusion into the scientific community in order to prepare especially future teachers for the challenges they are predicted to meet during their careers. These goals have been somewhat incongruent with The University’s ICT policies and the capacities of the selected soft- and hardware.

The collection of assembled and interconnected components of Minerva Plaza can be aptly described as volatile. They can facilitate very fast transitions from one state or point of interest to another but also being difficult to hold permanently. Some of this explicitly intended in the design. On the other hand the Wireless Local Area Network has managed to hold its position as an unintended obligatory passage point for the sets of translations of using the Plaza as planned. This paper presents an analysis on how dependency on ICT and project funding has displaced the power to decide who participates and how away from the users. This seems to resonate with David R. Johnson’s depiction of technological change as a cause of diminishing professional control within the professoriate. Unlike Johnson I argue this is caused by the volatile nature of the whole assemblage also in cases where the technology use is initiated and endorsed by the teaching professionals.