1. Considering the Prisoner’s Dilemma in this chapter, provide your own insight on how sites such as eBay “work” for most participants of this popular online auction site. Do they really work? Or is there too much risk?
I personally do not use eBay for a number of reasons and I suppose that many of them overlap with the idea of the prisoner's dilemma. When applied to a social setting, the prisoner's dilemma according to Shirky is, "whenever we interact with people we could take advantage of, or people who could take advantage of us, yet actually manage to trust one another often enough to accomplish things in groups. The shadow of the future makes it possible for me to act on your behalf today, even at some risk or cost to me, on the expectation that you will remember and reciprocate tomorrow." While eBay does not necessarily have a resounding effect on groups, it can have an effect on individuals. I do not use eBay because I am worried that someone would try to screw me over and not give me the product that they had advertised. While this most likely does not happen most of the time, it is not worth the risk for me to get a faulty product. Just after hearing about a few cases of eBay not working out for some, I was dissuaded from wanting to use it. A friend of mine bought a movie a few months ago from eBay and when it came in the mail the case was of the dvd she was hoping for, but inside was season 6 of Buffy the Vampire Slayer. So she ended up losing about twenty bucks and getting a dvd that she did not want at all. Someone else got the reward for doing something wrong and she got the punishment.
Many people seem to trust the site and it works out quite well for them, but there are others, like myself, who do not like to take the small risk of not getting what they expected.
2. What professional benefits do you see by investing some time in a FOAF-style network?
The opportunities for networking are enormous and the great thing about FOAF networks are that you already have something in common with the people that you are networking with. Professionally, this could be very helpful because it allows you to have access to a whole different "category of people" that you otherwise might not be able to access. Say you are looking for trustworthy IT people to work on your businesses computers. Well your friend, Matt, who happens to be an IT guy probably knows a lot more IT people. If you trust Matt and you have access to all of his friends, well then, you just got yourself potentially a huge market of IT people to work on your company's computers.
Saturday, November 20, 2010
Thursday, November 11, 2010
1. Based on the quote from this chapter, ““revolution doesn’t happen when society adopts new technologies--it happens when society adopts new behaviors,” do you agree or disagree? Cite examples to support your position.
The birth of new technologies does not, itself, bring a revolution. When the movable type was created there was no revolution. When the telephone was created there was no revolution. When the computer, fax machine, internet and cell phones were created and adopted there were no revolutions. Revolutions are not a cause of adopting a new technology, rather they are a result of coordinated behavior changes. In chapter six of Shirky's book, Here Comes Everybody, the idea of forwarding is discussed. Before the internet it was difficult to pass a message in a newspaper on to others because one literally had to cut out a message, copy it, then pass it along. Now information can be passed along with the simple click of a button. When this information gets passed along it can have a resounding impact on what people are talking about, the emotions of people, and even steps of action that people take. All of this, just because of the ability share information quickly, cheaply, and effectively.
2. Look deeper into the concept of a “information cascade.” Can you cite an example of where following the actions of others was a sound idea? Where doing so ended up being a poor choice?
The cascade effect is described in wikipedia as being is a series of secondary extinctions that is triggered by the primary extinction of a key species in an ecosystem. While this definition describes what happens in an ecosystem, there are many similarities between it and an information cascade. When information starts off in one place and gets passed along it can spread and have an effect on many people and possibly organizations. In the case of the priest scandals, passing on information and following the actions of others exposed a very tragic and terrible event that took place in the Catholic Church. Without information cascade, the publicity and the positive action that the church took would never have happened. An example of information cascade being a poor choice was the example of the flash mob that ended up with many people being arrested in the Leipzig protests. While all they were doing was simply smiling at one another, the coordinated effort of all of the people coming together and passing on information to one another scared the government and caused them to act what seems to be very irrationally.
The birth of new technologies does not, itself, bring a revolution. When the movable type was created there was no revolution. When the telephone was created there was no revolution. When the computer, fax machine, internet and cell phones were created and adopted there were no revolutions. Revolutions are not a cause of adopting a new technology, rather they are a result of coordinated behavior changes. In chapter six of Shirky's book, Here Comes Everybody, the idea of forwarding is discussed. Before the internet it was difficult to pass a message in a newspaper on to others because one literally had to cut out a message, copy it, then pass it along. Now information can be passed along with the simple click of a button. When this information gets passed along it can have a resounding impact on what people are talking about, the emotions of people, and even steps of action that people take. All of this, just because of the ability share information quickly, cheaply, and effectively.
2. Look deeper into the concept of a “information cascade.” Can you cite an example of where following the actions of others was a sound idea? Where doing so ended up being a poor choice?
The cascade effect is described in wikipedia as being is a series of secondary extinctions that is triggered by the primary extinction of a key species in an ecosystem. While this definition describes what happens in an ecosystem, there are many similarities between it and an information cascade. When information starts off in one place and gets passed along it can spread and have an effect on many people and possibly organizations. In the case of the priest scandals, passing on information and following the actions of others exposed a very tragic and terrible event that took place in the Catholic Church. Without information cascade, the publicity and the positive action that the church took would never have happened. An example of information cascade being a poor choice was the example of the flash mob that ended up with many people being arrested in the Leipzig protests. While all they were doing was simply smiling at one another, the coordinated effort of all of the people coming together and passing on information to one another scared the government and caused them to act what seems to be very irrationally.
Tuesday, November 2, 2010
From the audio book chapter on Free:
1. Why is “zero” such a hot-button word?
Zero is such an interesting word because it has so many different implications. Although it does not always mean poor quality, there are many times when that is what people assume. Usually poor quality is linked with free when something used to cost something, but now costs the consumer nothing. For some reason people associate that with the product losing quality, even if that is not the case at all.
There are some things that are free and we do not expect them to have less quality. Google was an example of this. It is a free online service that no one expects to have to pay for and just because it is free does not mean that it has poor quality.
2. Explain and give an example of a mental transaction cost.
A mental transaction cost is a "cost" that consumers have to take into account when deciding whether or not to purchase something. Choosing the type of thing you want to buy, deciding where to buy it, and waiting in line to buy the item are all transaction costs.
An example of a mental transaction cost from the lecture is when someone offers a truffle at the price of $0.15 or a hershey kiss at a price of $.01. Most people will choose the truffle because the mental transaction cost is not more than what the truffle is worth. However, when you lower the price of each of the chocolates by one cent, the mental transaction cost becomes a lot greater for buying a truffle, and therefore more people will take one of the kisses because it is free. The mental transaction cost was more than the benefits of buying the truffle.
1. Why is “zero” such a hot-button word?
Zero is such an interesting word because it has so many different implications. Although it does not always mean poor quality, there are many times when that is what people assume. Usually poor quality is linked with free when something used to cost something, but now costs the consumer nothing. For some reason people associate that with the product losing quality, even if that is not the case at all.
There are some things that are free and we do not expect them to have less quality. Google was an example of this. It is a free online service that no one expects to have to pay for and just because it is free does not mean that it has poor quality.
2. Explain and give an example of a mental transaction cost.
A mental transaction cost is a "cost" that consumers have to take into account when deciding whether or not to purchase something. Choosing the type of thing you want to buy, deciding where to buy it, and waiting in line to buy the item are all transaction costs.
An example of a mental transaction cost from the lecture is when someone offers a truffle at the price of $0.15 or a hershey kiss at a price of $.01. Most people will choose the truffle because the mental transaction cost is not more than what the truffle is worth. However, when you lower the price of each of the chocolates by one cent, the mental transaction cost becomes a lot greater for buying a truffle, and therefore more people will take one of the kisses because it is free. The mental transaction cost was more than the benefits of buying the truffle.
Subscribe to:
Comments (Atom)