At the boundary of communities and roles: Boundary objects and knowledge Artifacts as resources for is design

Boundary Objects and Knowledge Artifacts are physical entities that can be found in many socio-material settings in the organizational (and interorganizational) domain, and share many characteristics. We make the point that an increasing number of authors mention either constructs partly unaware of their denotational meaning, i.e., the precise meaning it has been attached to them by their proponents to make them meaningful and useful. The risk is having these concepts lose their rhetorical, descriptive and applicative power. We contribute in stressing the importance to reconsider the denotational meaning in contrast to the metaphorical ones of these two concepts, for their role in the analysis of the functions of real objects supporting collaboration and knowledge work. This is done towards the more accurate elicitation of requirements for the digitization of these objects, as well as for the design and deployment of new IT artifacts in the organizational domain.