ABSTRACT
This chapter focuses on information technology (IT) as it has impacted the field since the 1940s. People today live in the digital era. Although written documents are still produced by the printing press and distributed by publishing companies, more documents are now electronically written, printed in PDF format, distributed through networked computers via the Internet, and stored on various computer-related devices such as laptops, smartphones, and the "cloud". Most innovation in networked technology was developed by the federal government or by universities in the 1950s and 1960s. Commercial application of networked solutions began with airline reservation systems as well as stock transactions at a national and international level. The federal government was not unique in its widespread adoption of computers. Cross-sectional statistics allow for a snapshot of computer adoption by state and local governments. At the local level, computers were widely and quickly adopted by government in the 1980s and early 1990s.
