Explaining Digital Technology: Digital Artifact Delineation and Coalescence

The literature pertaining to digital transformation, digital innovation, digital infrastructure, and digital platforms heavily relies on digital technology. Information Systems (IS) literature defines digital technologies as technologies that incorporate bitstrings (digital object). However, we contend that digital technologies are complex, multilayered information systems that surpass the simplicity of bitstrings. Bitstrings have existed since the inception of computers, and the contemporary use of bitstrings in IS literature is inconsistent with Computer Science and Engineering literature. We theorize artifact delineation—the capacity to provide unique interfaces and capabilities to distinct users—and coalescence—the ability to virtually integrate multiple IT architectural layers of complex information systems to conceal the details from users—to extend the core on digital technology, but more importantly to provide a better understanding of the complex nature of digital technologies for IS researchers and other domains that borrow from IS.