Home
Education Week: Studies on Multitasking Highlight Value of Self-Control
Shared by Dave Duarte, 1 save total
Making Choices in the Age of Information Overload - NYTimes.com
While online competition generally drives down commodity prices, consumers have proved willing to pay more for their favorite specialty products. And there are many of them. Back when brand signaling tended to travel through broad channels like TV ads or the sides of buses, companies narrowed their offerings. They tended toward a few bland, least-common-denominator goods, like watery beer and one kind of minty toothpaste. The Internet and advances in manufacturing now allow for a much wider range of products aimed at narrower consumer interests. I might pay more for a craft beer and a bar of deluxe chocolate, but I’ll be happier than when I was saving money buying Bud Light and a waxy Hershey’s bar.
Shared by Maximillian Kaizen, Maximillian Kaizen added annotation, 1 save total
-
Port-au-Prince, Haiti, for example, is filled with numerous beautiful commuter buses that are painted with all sorts of bright, bold images — of naked women, Catholic saints, voodoo symbols, soccer players, musicians. Maintaining these paint jobs is enormously expensive. The buses need to be taken out of commission for at least a couple of weeks, and the painters demand hundreds of dollars, often more than a year’s wages in Haiti.
Yet bus owners feel the need to get a fresh paint job once or twice each year because few people will pay to ride an unpainted bus. The extravagant decorations suggest that an owner cares about his business — that he spends money maintaining his engines, tires and brakes (no small matter in a country with steep mountains and lousy roads). My hunch, however, is that many owners, short of cash, are likely to invest in a visible new paint job over invisible brake maintenance. With no external authority — government inspectors or consumer-watchdogs or online consumer forums — there’s no way to know if the signal is accurate.
Making Choices in the Age of Information Overload - NYTimes.com
I figure that it’s less likely to squander its name by skirting the rules or engaging in shoddy manufacturing than a company with less to lose. This peace of mind costs me about $7 per day.
Economists have a name for these cues that companies employ to convey their hidden strength: signaling.
Shared by Maximillian Kaizen, Maximillian Kaizen added annotation, 1 save total
-
it’s less likely to squander its name by skirting the rules or engaging in shoddy manufacturing than a company with less to lose.
-
Economists have a name for these cues that companies employ to convey their hidden strength: signaling.
- 7 more annotation(s)...
Highlighter, Sticky notes, Tagging, Groups and Network: integrated suite dramatically boosting research productivity. Learn more »
Join Diigo