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Lucy Suchman's paper occasioned considerable debate when first published at ECSCW'93, a debate that continues with the latest version, published along with Terry Winograd's rebuttal (Suchman, 1994; Winograd, 1994) in this journal. Both versions, despite revision in the later paper, contain some elusive arguments which Suchman treats either as indivisible, or at least as very closely related, and which perhaps need separation if their merits are to be ascertained. Firstly, she suggests the political force of the speech acts embodied in Winograd and Flores' Coordinator should be critically examined because as principled persons we may have objections to the politics they embody, a politics which for Suchman has to do with discipline, surveillance, and control. That ethical/political: matters should be part of the CSCW agenda is not something that I wish to take issue with for it seems to me that there is nothing …