Chanwoo Lee

MAR 2025

Abstract

Information Foraging, a framework developed by Pirolli and Card, has provided insights into how individuals seek information in digital environments, likening the process of foraging in patches guided by "information scent." While this model influenced the design of search engines, recommendation systems, and information architectures, the digital landscape has since evolved into a complex, algorithmically mediated ecosystem characterized by information overload, push-model which diminishes user agency, and challenges to trust and cognitive well-being.

This paper introduces Information Gardening as a complementary paradigm, shifting the focus from immediate retrieval to the intentional cultivation of knowledge over time. Through four stages—collecting, seeding, growing, and harvesting—Information Gardening empowers users to curate and nurture their personal information environments, fostering deep understanding and critical thinking. By integrating principles of sensemaking and digital literacy, this approach addresses contemporary challenges such as filter bubbles, misinformation, and the rise of AI-driven content, offering a path to agency, trust, and intellectual growth in an increasingly intricate digital world.

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JUL 2024

Humanism in the information age.

Technological advancement has accelerated relentlessly, particularly since the advent of the web and consumer artificial intelligence. Today, we must discuss humanism in the information age.

New architects of the information age.

We redefine computer designers, scientists and engineers as new architects of the information age. The computer is a 'machine that we live in and with'. It is both an entity and an environment, and it's the architect's role to design and engineer artefacts based on humanism.

Co-design of behaviour and technology.

It is our duty to question and understand humanism and technology, redefining 'environment' to also encompass information and cognitive spaces.

Data becomes information when interpreted by humans, and we design that relationship with computers.

Computers serve and affect human: behaviour, thinking, cognition, sense, habits, relationships, playing, learning, working, loving, and living.

We must co-design behaviour and technology to build the future.

We stand at a pivotal moment:
What's the essence of humanism?
What kind of life do humans envision?
How can we realise it with computers?

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