Standards and Their Stories: How Quantifying, Classifying, and Formalizing Practices Shape Everyday Life (Cornell Paperbacks)
"Standards and Their Stories is an important, well-written, and extraordinarily provocative examination of a part of the world usually hidden from any sort of public view. The authors show how much of what we take for granted is the result of negotiation, compromise, and occasionally coercion. They do so by inventing a suite of new and innovative research methods. As a result, this book is likely to become not only 'the standard' for studies of this sort but also the starting point for new ways of investigating sociotechnical processes."—Lawrence Busch, Michigan State University"I sat down to read the book, read the first page, and paused while my face broke into a smile and a comfortable warm feeling came over my body. Yup, this was going to be a great book. Further reading confirmed the impression. Standards rule our lives. Yeah, standards, that dull, frustrating, topic studied by 'The Society of People Interested in Boring Things.' But this book proves that far from being dull, the stories behind standards are interesting, insightful, and revealing of the workings of bureaucracy. Standards are essential for different stuff made by different companies in different countries to work well together. Whether it is bananas or chocolate, application forms for terrorist training, or the sizes of people's rear ends (critical for airline seats), standards are essential part of life today (all these are covered in the book). This engaging book serves several purposes. It explains much of the history, rationale, and politics of standards. It shows why they have huge social impact, far beyond what most of us realize, often far beyond what was intended. And best of all, it is fun to read."—Don Norman, Northwestern University, author of The Design of Future Things