Sociotechnical issues for the ubiquitous information society in 2010

Impact of the ubiquitous information technology on our society is so significant that directing technological development and preparing institutional apparatus are quite important and urgent. The present paper elaborates, with the efforts by both humanity and engineering disciplines, to find the sociotechnical issues of ubiquitous information society in 2010 by inspecting social implications of emerging technology as well as social expectations. In order to deliberate the issues, scenarios are developed that describe possible life in ubiquitous information society. The derived issues cover integrating information technology and the human body, producing smart sharable environment, protecting individual rights, fostering new service business, and forming community. © 2008 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. Electr Eng Jpn, 165(1): 60–67, 2008; Published online in Wiley InterScience (www.interscience.wiley.com). DOI 10.1002/eej.20565