.. I asked my students "why is Nokia's earnings graph sliding downhill,
and Apple can do as it likes? What is it that you like about Apple? Why
would American and Chinese youth react in seemingly the same way?"
And the immediate answer was: "Apple tells us about our lifestyle ..."
Johann
Dr. Johann van der Merwe
HOD: Research, History & Theory of Design
Faculty of Informatics and Design
Cape Peninsula University of Technology
PO Box 652 Cape Town 8000
South Africa
Tel.: 27 21 460 3442
Fax: 27 21 460 3729
>>> Rosan Chow <[log in to unmask]> 02/14/12 12:41 PM >>>
Dear Derek,
The party has died down a bit and before the next one starts again, I
thought perhaps I could get back to our online colloquium....hope you
are still interested.
I have found two good sources. One scientific study by Kristensen and
Gabrielsen on the relation between product design, logo design, web
design and value creation. The first two types of design are positively
correlated to value creation. So this study gives the basis to choose
question B) to what extent is the design of iPhone (I narrow this down
and don't want to worry about iPod) a factor for Apple market success
between 2007 to 2011.
The other source is a Masters thesis by Holmberg et al. case studying
the important factors for Apple to survive as a niche player in a
network economy. In this thesis, the authors focus on technology and
design, industrial relation and market strategy.
In Holmberg's thesis there is a short story of Apple, from 1975 to 2004
and I learn that PowerMac G4 Cube was NOT a market success although it
was also an innovative design. So I am thinking, instead of doing a
multi-factor analysis on the success of iPhone, I can do a comparative
case study between PowerMac G4 and iPhone.
What do you think?
Thanks,
Rosan
-----Original Message-----
From: Derek B. Miller [mailto:[log in to unmask]]
Sent: Mittwoch, 8. Februar 2012 19:11
Subject: Re: some more questions on research design RE: Is
claim/research on 'success' one-sided?
----Snip---
"Are their designs a success factor." That's starting to become a
researchable question. And your use of the word "factor" is a good one
because you're not asking if they are a determinant of success, but
rather a factor. But we're still not there because the thesis would be,
"the designs are a success factor", and the antithesis would be "the
designs are not a success factor." I'm not versed in this literature,
but I sort of suspect no one is out there suggesting strongly that the
designs were utterly irrelevant top Apple's success with these products.
So it isn't so much whether the designs were a success factor, but
rather A) in what ways, or B) to what extent.
If you choose one of these (and you start from the stated assumption
that the designs were likely a success factor, which would probably find
few detractors), then you can start to make some headway of which of
these is more interesting (to you) to pursue.
You basically have two options. The nominal argument (designs were a
factor vs. designs were not a factor) or you have an issue of
measurement (not whether, but to what extent.). The second is more
interesting, because surely we want to get some sense of the power and
value of good design to Apple's success. So the FUNDAMENTAL question is
HOW to measure that? And that's a research design question.
---snip---
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