Sorry if some of these comments sound naive and idealistic. But what would
it mean if we couldn't dream about new tools anymore?
Most of you are already experts in QDA. But it seems that a lot of us,
Ph.D. students, would benefit from QDA if only they were given the chance
to really try it. The current requirements in time, money, expertise,
platform and methodology, combined with the lack of exposure to QDA in a
number of fields make this benefit the priviledge of a few who are
introduced to QDA for specific reasons. A simple QDA package would
counteract this trend and hopefully bring more students to QDA, thereby
increasing potential market and intensifying communication on QDAS.
The comparison between SPSS and Nud*ist as to the needs for QDA training
seems quite helpful. If Qual. DA were as pervasive as Quant. DA, the need
for a really affordable qual. package would be even easier to justify.
Turning this arguement on its head, it's possible that a really affordable
qual. package may help make Qual. Research more attractive and, eventually,
more pervasive throughout different fields of research (academic and even
commercial).
Yes, demo versions do give a very good idea of what specific packages can
do. But for someone who is relatively new to QDA, there might be a need to
experiment with real data, just to see if the use of QDAS is justified. In
this sense, the qual. equivalent of the student version of SPSS would help
justify the relatively high cost of purchasing a standard QDA package.
Not to mention the fact that a feature-limited version could be less
rebarbative as to its interface. This could be a great way to make the
learning curve a little less steep. And a free version doesn't need to be
supported in the same way, which diminishes the cost and may actually
increase attendance to advanced training sessions.
Making older version free to use could be a very interesting solution,
especially if the difference is mostly one of features.
BTW, a QDA viewer (for NVivo) is a very good initiative. If only it could
be cross-platform, the viewer would really be an excellent idea.
Again, sorry for "dreaming out loud".
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