Generalizing the Information Systems Artifact
区分信息系统人工制品与信息技术人工制品，提出基于科学理论泛化方法的流程，并通过海地教育项目到尼泊尔医疗项目的实例展示如何将人工制品推广到新场景。
Suppose that a successful information systems (IS) artifact is created by a scholar for use in a research study or by a practitioner for use in an organization; how may the IS artifact be replicated in, or generalized to, another setting? The overall utility of the IS artifact depends on a way to generalize it. To provide such a way, we engage in three things. First, we distinguish an information systems artifact from its better-known sibling, the information technology artifact, by noting that the former includes three mutually supportive subsystems: the technology artifact, the social artifact, and the information artifact, where all three need to be designed and developed for the generalized IS artifact to be successful. Second, we devise a procedure to generalize the IS artifact based on a thorough examination of, and analogy to, generalizing scientific theory. Third, we provide a real-world illustration, involving the generalization of an IS artifact from one setting (the “computer on a stick” for educational purposes in Haiti) to another setting (the “continuing medical education on a stick” in Nepal). The generalization procedure can facilitate the production of working design science artifacts in more than just the original setting.