You are what you can access: Sharing and collaborative consumption online

Access-based consumption, defined as transactions that can be market mediated but where no transfer of ownership takes place, is becoming increasingly popular, yet it is not well theorized. This study examines the nature of access as it contrasts to ownership and sharing, specifically the consumer-object, consumer-consumer, and consumer-marketer relationships. Six dimensions are identified to distinguish among the range of access-based consumptionscapes: temporality, anonymity, market mediation, consumer involvement, the type of accessed object, and political consumerism. Access-based consumption is examined in the context of car sharing via an interpretive study of Zipcar consumers. Four outcomes of these dimensions in the context of car sharing are identified: lack of identification, varying significance of use and sign value, negative reciprocity resulting in a big-brother model of governance, and a deterrence of brand community. The implications of our findings for understanding the nature of exchange, consumption, and brand community are discussed.

Access-Based Consumption: The Case of Car Sharing

Everybody knows that digital technology has revolutionized our economy and our lifestyles. But how many of us really understand the drivers behind the technology – the significance of going digital; the miniaturization of electronic devices; the role of venture capital in financing the revolution; the importance of research and development? How many of us understand what it takes to make money from innovative technologies? Should we worry about manufacturing going offshore? What is the role of India and China in the digital economy? Drawing on a lifetime’s experience in the industry, as an engineer, a senior manager, and as a partner in a global venture capital firm, Henry Kressel offers an expert personalized answer to all these questions. He explains how the technology works, why it matters, how it is financed, and what the key lessons are for public policy.

Competing for the Future

In Search of Brand Image: a Foundation Analysis

https://www.ida.liu.se/~TDDD61/readings/Verganti,%20design,%20innovation.pdf

Design, Meanings, and Radical Innovation: A Metamodel and a Research Agenda*

This article describes an initial, exploratory look at a quickly growing new type of consumption behavior, renting. Insights about renting are generated from a small, qualitative study of rental behavior and motives. As an initial cut at conceptualizing and understanding rental consumption, a wide range of topics are considered, including instant gratification, postpurchase dissonance, self-exploration, cultivation of rental items, and some implications of renting regarding materialism. © 1995 John Wiley & Sons, Inc.

An exploration into renting as consumption behavior

In order to distinguish their brands from other brands in the same category, most consumer products companies attempt to establish a unique personality for each brand. Rather than emphasize that it is a soft drink, Dr. Pepper emphasizes, through its name and advertising, that it is an “oddball” soft drink. This article recommends that these companies instead develop advertising and brand names that communicate the best qualities of the relevant product category. Dr. Pepper, for example, might emphasize that it tastes good and quenches thirst. This article suggests that marketers use free association tests to select advertising symbols and names that best communicate key product category benefits; it suggests that they use product categories and candidate symbols and names as stimuli, then match the answers across stimuli. In a sample test, for example, the stimulus “iced tea” drew the responses “refreshment,” “cool,” and “summer.” In a separate test, the stimulus “plunge into swimming pool” drew identical responses. The Nestle Nestea “plunge” (into a pool) campaign, therefore, is thought to be a highly effective one.

Advertising symbols and brand names that best represent key product meanings

Translating values into product wants

Deep structures: real information requirements determination

Self-esteem advertising is a type of advertising which attempts to alter consumers' attitudes and behavior toward products by stimulating positive feelings toward themselves. For example, one of th...

Jeffrey F. Durgee

Papers

An exploration into renting as consumption behavior

Advertising symbols and brand names that best represent key product meanings

Translating values into product wants

Deep structures: real information requirements determination

Self-Esteem Advertising