Information Inflation

Cheney at all, cite the growing value placed on information: "the slickest most futuristic ads...are those touting computers for the office...you have a striking measure of how information has risen in status" (p. 348). To understand why I started thinking about the way that information was gathered and processed prior to computer technology; long hours searching through files, poring over books, sifting through irrelevant data. The expression: "knowledge is power" meant that those who were in posession of the final product were the ones empowered, while those who did the actual work, were likely to be making minimum wage.
The fast and convenient availability of information can be said to have a democratizing effect in that anyone can have instant access to information that was formerly exclusive. In that context it is easy see why the status of information processing has risen in status. The balance of power now seems to have shifted to those who can best evaluate the importance, and manipulate, the wealth of available information.