Assignment 5-Steve Swigut

Orlikowski explains that “when confronted with a new technology individuals try to understand it in terms of their existing technological frames, …if these existing frames are sufficiently different, however, these frames may be inappropriate”. For this reason, I would try and explain to the 40-60 year old individuals that facebook is not just a way to talk to your friends or to email another. If they thought of it in this perspective, they would miss out on all of the collaborative features such as the pictures, messages, calendar options, groups, friending abilities, and other countless applications.

I would explain it to them as one of the most interactive and full ranged social networking sites available. In order to explain how to use FB I would first have to train them on all of the features of FB with a mixed interactive CD and guidebook. They could learn by reading about the different features of FB and then watch the CD and interactively practice the features being shown to them. Orlikowski also states that “training on new technology is central to their understanding of its capabilities and appreciating how it differs from other familiar technologies.” Since frames are so important, I would have the training start with familiar uses such as sending messages/emails and move gradually into harder tasks such as creating events, modifying privacy levels, and finding and friending old acquaintances. This way the learning would stay within their comfort levels and move gradually into its other vague abilities. They could use it to stay in touch with relatives, friends, and everyone else. This could be done through posts on walls, putting up pictures, importing blogs, etc as they became more comfortable.

The main rewards I would stress would be the happiness and social rewards of staying in touch with family, friends, and anyone else in their life. They could morph their frames to understand the different aspects of FB through the training and further understand its other collaborative rewards in time. Their return on investment would be all of the happiness and reduction in future time needed to stay in touch with people from using FB. By learning to use FB they could be exposed to hundreds of friend’s lives without having to make a phone call or write an email just by looking at their profile. This return would be far greater than the time needed to learn FB once they knew how to use all of its features. And also like stated in Grudin’s paper the return on investment does not always involve productivity.