Cowboys and Computers: Communicating National Animal Identification in the Beef Industry

Technical communication must develop methods that take into account the various forms of communication that are now available while maintaining an ethnographic perspective and methodology that investigates industries at ground level. Holistic approaches are needed to understanding intricate problems. This chapter is one attempt to do so and also offers a set of tools for research that may give future technological deployments more success. While the beef industry seems perfectly willing to accept some types of innovations, computer technology and animal identification have been shunned. The author narrates his conversations with and observations of livestock market staff that revealed a great deal concerning both technology and the National Animal Identification System (NAIS) within the beef industry. The United States Department of Agriculture (USDA), and others trying to explain the merits and everyday workings of the NAIS to market owners and producers, would have been better served by creating hypothetical situations.