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The paper traces the linked evolution of tools and work organization from the first stone tools to digital technologies. Work organization moved from craftsmen-type work linked to local resources and producing a finished (master)work, to industrial manufacture and now a global network. In the move, organization first controlled the time of work, to allow coordinated activities in the factory, then controlled work gestures through the Taylorian principles and finally digitally controls the information available to the worker and produced by its activity. Information technologies change both the way the worker acts on matter or information, and the cognitive landscape in which the activity develops. We analyze software and networks as work tools impacting control and heteronomy, as well as professional relations and the recognition of work. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]