The rate of rReaction Essay Example for Free

The rate of rReaction Essay These results also support my prediction and I believe that the collision theory is quite accurate even though it is only a theory as it gives a very good explanation of what should happen and it has happened in my experiment. I am going to include 0. 25M in my main experiment as I believe that this will give a better range of results and also increase the accuracy of my results. I will keep the amount of time the same as I believe it was the best amount of time to get an accurate reading. I will do my main experiment results to one decimal place as I believe that this will give me the most precise results. When reading the amount of gas in the cylinder I will take any number that is whole e. g. 14 to be 14. 0. To improve my reliability I will repeat each concentration three times as I believe this will give me a reliable average. Results Table Results To Show How Much Gas Is Given Off In 5 Minutes Volume of Gas Collected (cm ) Time in minutes Test Concentration Test Any number highlighted are not counted in the average as I believe that the are either to high, to low or do not fit into the pattern. Result that I believe is causing the results for this time to be inaccurate. ( see level of confidence) I will not include this result in my new average. I have found out that 2M is the best strength of hydrochloric acid to use when you want a fast reaction, as it released the most gas in 5 minutes compared to 0.5M, 1M and 1. 5M. I can make the statement the stronger/higher molar(M) the acid the faster the reaction and the weaker/lower molar(M) the acid the slower the reaction. Conclusion I conclude 2M is the best concentration of acid. You can see this on my graph, my graph shows that 2M is the best concentration of acid out of all the ones that I tested as it had the quickest reaction time compared to all of the other concentrations. You can see this from the graph as 2M has got the steepest slope. I believe that the activation energy (see background information for detailed explanation) has effected my results. I believe that the concentration of the acid makes it easier for the particles to react. But what does this have to do with the activation energy? Each molecule has a certain amount of energy and for the molecule to react it must collide with another molecule. It must also generate more energy that it already has. In a low concentrated solution, there are less molecules so it hard for a molecule to find other molecules to collide with, but in a high concentrated solution collisions are more frequent and even if the molecule does not collide with enough energy to react it will soon hit another molecule and have a high possibility of reacting. I predicted that the 2. 0 molar acid would have the quickest reaction time and the 0. 25 molar would have the slowest reaction time I also said that the other concentrations would go in order of their concentrations, the higher the concentration the more gas there will be released and the lower the concentration the less gas there will be released. I believe my predictions were accurate as I based them on the collision theory and even though it is a theory I believe it is an accurate theory and explains what is believed to happen when reactions take place very well. 0. 5M and 1M start off wrong in my opinion as until 3 minutes 0. 5M had released more gas where as I believe according to the collision theory 1M should have released more gas and reacted faster, but in the end 1M released more gas. This also happened in the first 30 seconds of the 0. 25M where it also released more gas than the 1M. This leads me to believe that the 1M may have been the wrong concentration. It is because of this reason I am going to work out the confidence levels for my results. I will take 0 as 100% accurate and 100 as 0% accurate. Level Of Confidence I am going to work out the inaccuracy of my results I will do this by doing the sum Range multiplied by 100= level of inaccuracy Average I have chosen to do the inaccuracy of time   as I believe that I can get a good reading of how inaccurate my results are by doing a selected number of times. Time Concentration Range of gas Average Amount of Times Equals (minutes) of acid(M) released(cm ) gas released(cm ). I am going to look at   my results table and 1 Level of confidence for sum that I believed was inaccurate I have now changed the range of the gas released at 4. 5 minutes.   This inaccuracy level is a lot lower than the other one. This means that that volume of gas released was to low, many things could have caused this . e. g. the temperature of the room could have been lower than when I did the other two experiments. Evaluation I believe my results are quite accurate and would be considered reliable as non of my results have a high inaccuracy level or have a 50% chance of being wrong. I have highlighted the results that I believe are wrong on my results table and have not included them in my averages. On my graph my points go up in curves or in some sort of curve. I have joined all of the point on my graph together but on some of my curves I have done a curve of best fit, I have done this because it will show me if any results are slightly wrong. If you look at the green curve for 0. 5M you will see that the points at 2 and 2. 5 minutes look slightly to high, the curve of best fit shows where the points should have been. The trend I see from the graph is that the higher the concentration of the hydrochloric acid the steeper the slop of the graph is. I believe that the way in which I carried out my experiment was good as I followed my method exactly. To improve the accuracy of my method I could have said I would use a bulb pipette or a graduate pipette as these are more accurate than a measuring cylinder, I could make sure that the marble chips all have the same surface area because the marble chips with the bigger surface areas could have reacted more than the marble chips with the smaller surface areas. I could have also make sure that the room was the same temperature for each experiment because if the room was hot for one experiment and cold for another then the results would be inaccurate as the molecules would have been moving and reacting at different speeds. The results I have support my conclusion and my prediction, as what I predicted would happen did happen. The order of the concentrations for the most gas released in 5 minutes was also accurate, as it was in the order that I predicted. To extend my investigation I could test if the temperature had any effect on the amount of gas released, I believe this would provide me with the relevant information about what the optimum temperature is for a reaction to take place. I could then test the optimum concentration and the optimum temperature together and see how much gas is released in 5 minutes and compare it to the separate results of the concentration and temperature. Show preview only The above preview is unformatted text This student written piece of work is one of many that can be found in our GCSE Patterns of Behaviour section.

The Driving Forces Behind Crowdfunding Management Essay

The Driving Forces Behind Crowdfunding Management Essay How can you raise over 10,000,000 in funding for a consumer product, that is not yet produced, without any help from banks, angel investors or venture capitalists. How can you make hundreds of people pay for a meal they just might receive in a distant future? How is it possible to turn thousands of committed customers to also become shareholders without the process of an IPO? The answer is crowdfunding, which is a financing method that has exploded in popularity the last few years and that is changing the way many individuals, start-ups and businesses seek funding (kà ¤lla Forbes). The basic idea of crowdfunding is to raise external finance from a large audience (the crowd), where each individual provides a very small amount, instead of soliciting a small group of sophisticated investors (Schwienbacher Larralde, 2010, p. 1). The individuals, investors, customers or consumers that make up the crowd are called crowdfunders (Schwienbacher Larralde, 2010, p. 4) and usually pool their money together via the Internet (kà ¤lla) An example of how powerful crowdfunding can be is the Pebble E-paper Watch, a smartwatch for iPhone and Android, which raised $10,266,845 in investments during roughly one and a half months on the crowdfunding platform Kickstarter (Kickstarter. 2012c). Another example is the Swedish hamburger restaurant Flippin Burgers, which got hundreds of individuals paying for a hamburger before the restaurant even existed and simultaneously financed the start-up of their now immensely popular venue in Stockholm (kà ¤lla). example of equity crowdfunding The crowdfunding market has grown with 557 % in the last five years and crowdfunding platforms raised a total of almost $1.5 billion in 2011, exceeding one million successful projects (Massolution, 2012). This number is predicted to double in 2012 with the current growth rate, which indicates that this nascent method of financing definitely has the potential to make a substantial change in the way individuals, start-ups and businesses seek financing (kà ¤lla). The long-term potential of crowdfunding is hard to predict, but currently the phenomena of crowdfunding looks promising. With scarce research on the subject, there are many aspects of crowdfunding that are still unexplored and with the projected industry growth, a demand will likely arise for a foundation of which entrepreneurs and managers can make informed decisions when hosting crowdfunding projects. 1.1. Background The background chapter will firstly cover the consumers involvement over time and its implications on crowdfunding, then a definition of crowdfunding will follow and lastly three different types of crowdfunding will be presented. 1.1.1. The Consumers Involvement Consumers have traditionally been positioned at the end of a firms value chain, but last decades their role have changed from not only being a target for marketing activities, to actually being a part of the value creation of a firms products or services (Hunt, Geiger-Oneto Varca, 2012, p. 347). The consumers have subsequently become key information sources, co-producers, partners for innovation and, finally, co-creators of value in the related literature (Ordanini, Miceli, Pizzetti Parasuraman, 2011, p. 444). This shift of focus on the role of the consumer has led to frequent activities by many firms to involve consumers and unidentified individuals in the process of product development and value creation (Zheng, Li, and Hou, 2011, p. 57). Involving consumers as co-producers and co-creators also provides value for the consumers and the process has been positively correlated with the consumers product satisfaction (Hunt et al., 2012, p. 347). This evolution of the consumers role was made possible initially by the rise of the Internet and later by technological innovations associated with Web 2.0 (Kleemann, Voß and Rieder, 2008, p. 5). Web 2.0 is a expression coined in 2004 noting a set of principles and practices that had emerged on the Internet, such as users being co-developers of open source development practices (OReilly, 2007, p. 19 30). Recently, the consumers role has also expanded to include investment support. This phenomenon of collective efforts by consumers and individuals to pool their money together via the Internet to invest in different projects is called crowdfunding (Ordanini et al., 2011, p. 444). Kleemann et al. (2008) argue that we are witnessing an emerge of a new consumer type called the working consumer. Ordanini et al. (2011) also describes the idea of crowdfunding, when consumers and individuals pay for producing and promoting a product instead of buying it, as a further step in the evolution of the consumers role. In association with these initiatives of involving the consumers as investors, there are several issues in the boundaries between marketing and finance, that are not yet fully explored and explained (Ordanini et al., 2011, p. 444). Zheng et al. (2011) have shown that consumers get involved in similar kind of initiatives to a great extent because of their intrinsic motivations. However, the field of crowdfunding is still unexplored when it comes to why and how consumers contribute with monetary investments, the selection of initiatives and what implications these behaviors within crowdfunding should have for firms and managers engaging in these kind of activities (Ordanini et al., 2011, p. 444). 1.1.2. A Definition of Crowdfunding Crowdfunding is defined as: an initiative undertaken to raise money for a new project proposed by someone, by collecting small to medium-size investments from several other people (i.e. a crowd) (Ordanini et al., 2011, p. 444) The actors involved in crowdfunding are the people who propose projects to be funded, the crowdfunding organization and the crowd itself. The crowdfunding organization serves as a form of hub, bringing together those who may want to invest in crowdfunding initiatives and those who seek investments for their projects via crowdfunding (Ordanini et al., 2011, p. 444-445). These crowdfunding organizations typically conduct their business via a website, (compare: http://www.indiegogo.com/, http://www.kickstarter.com/ and https://www.sellaband.com/) in which actors can advertise their crowdfunding initiatives to the crowd. The crowdfunding phenomena is much like regular investments, some efforts are successful and some are not. A popular crowdfunding site at the time of writing, Kickstarter, reports that 43.81 % of the crowdfunding projects at their website are successful   (Kickstarter. 2012d). They also report that they do not accept just any crowdfunding request and that about 25 % of submitted projects are not accepted to the site (Kickstarter. 2012b). This means, in practice, given that their numbers are correct, that about one third (0,75*0,4381à ¢Ã¢â‚¬ °Ã‹â€ 1/3) of the attempted crowdfunding projects at the website in question are successful. One example of such a successful crowdfunding project in 2012 is Pebble E-paper Watch, which in total raised $10,266,845 in investments during roughly one and a half months (Kickstarter. 2012c). This demonstrates that it is indeed possible to obtain large investments from crowdfunding. 1.1.3. Different Types of Crowdfunding Crowdfunding can be divided into three different types of crowdfunding initiatives: (Schwienbacher Larralde, 2010, p. 13) Donations asking for donations rather than offering some kind of financial or remunerative incentive in exchange of an investment (Schwienbacher Larralde, 2010, p. 13). Example: Raising money for a good cause, like surgery of a diseased child. Passive investments giving some form of incentive in exchange for investments, these incentives can take many forms. In general a higher investments yields a higher incentive. Most crowdfunding like this does not offer any kind of possibility for the investor to participate in the project. This is in other words a form of crowdfunding where the entrepreneurs raise money without giving up control or having the customers actively involved (Schwienbacher Larralde, 2010, p. 13). Example: Pre-ordering of a product (such as a music CD). Active investments offering an active role in the initiative in exchange for investments. This could include offering shares of the profit or voting rights for features of the product. As in the case of passive investments, a higher investment in active investments generally yields a higher incentive. The entrepreneurs can in this way gain insight in their markets and receive valuable information of how the market thinks the product should be customized (Schwienbacher Larralde, 2010, p. 13-14). This type of investment with involvement in co-production, increases product satisfaction (Hunt, Geiger-Oneto Varca, 2012, p. 354). Example: Offering shares of profit from a concert, in proportion to how much money is invested. 1.2. Problem Discussion and Previous Research As a new emerging phenomena, crowdfunding and its consequences for businesses and consumers are not fully understood. For instance: what drives the engagement of consumers to invest in crowdfunding initiatives? (Ordanini et al., 2011, p. 444) One interesting way of approaching this question is stated by Ordanini, Miceli, Pizzetti and Parasuraman (2011, p. 446): Some extant literature streams are helpful in providing an appropriate backdrop for understanding crowd-funding, although insights from each stream only address some but not all aspects of this emerging phenomenon. This method provides an helpful framework for approaching the problem. The actors that invest in crowdfunding projects can be seen as both customers and investors (Schwienbacher Larralde, 2010, p. 13 Ordanini et al., 2011). This, in combination with the statement above, suggests that it is interesting to investigate why people participate and invest in crowdfunding projects both from a customer behavior perspective and an investment behavior perspective. Crowdfunding is as mentioned in 1.1.2 conducted online. If crowdfunders are seen as customers, the act of participating in crowdfunding can be compared to customer behavior in online shopping. Research in online customer behavior suggest that customers are motivated by extrinsic and intrinsic motivations when shopping online (Shang, Chen, Shen,   2005, p. 401). Since crowdfunding is a relatively new phenomena, the literature in the subject is far from extensive. To demonstrate this, examples of searches in Scopus and Thomson Reuters Web of Knowledge as of the 25th of October 2012 will be presented below. Scopus and Web of Knowledge are extensive databases tracking citations with 47 million (SciVerse, 2012) and 49,4 million (Web of Knowledge, 2011) records respectively. A search for the term crowdfunding in Scopus rendered 5 results when limiting the results to articles. The same search in Web of Knowledge rendered 9 articles. Out of all these articles the oldest one was from 2011 (Ley Weaven, 2011), and the rest were published in 2012. This demonstrates that crowdfunding is indeed a new phenomena, and from these quick searches it can be concluded that the literature in crowdfunding is scarce. In a review of the literature found during the literature study which laid the foundation to this thesis (and included broader search terms than the above mentioned) it was found that it was only Ordanini, Miceli, Pizzetti Parasuraman (2011) who have studied how and why people engage in crowdfunding initiatives. The authors did this by conducting interviews with employees at three major crowdfunding platforms. Their findings revealed that crowdfunding participants motivations were very dependent on the type of project. Their study showed that the main motivation is patronage for music projects, monetary return for financial loaning and social participation for charity. However, their findings are based on interviews with informants from the crowdfunding intermediates without including any individual investors in their study. It appears to be a knowledge gap from an investor perspective, investigating the investors motivations to participate in crowdfunding initiatives. Since the actors engaging in crowdfunding initiatives can be seen as both customers and investors (Schwienbacher Larralde, 2010, p. 13 Ordanini et al., 2011), it is interesting to research why individuals get involved in crowdfunding both from a customer behavioral perspective and an investment behavioral perspective. To the extent of our knowledge, this has not been covered in the literature so far.   In summary, the literature on crowdfunding is scarce and while some aspects of crowdfunding has been studied, others remain unexplored. The purpose of this study is to attempt to fill the mentioned knowledge gap about motivations in the literature of crowdfunding and contribute to widening the research on crowdfunding. This thesis will examine the factors that motivate customers/investors to engage in passive crowdfunding projects. 1.3. Research Questions The problem description has resulted in the following research questions: 1. How do crowdfunders intrinsic and extrinsic motivations affect their size of investment in passive crowdfunding projects? 2. How important is the influence of other crowdfunders investments? 1.4. Purpose The purpose of this study is to research the relatively new phenomena of crowdfunding and examine the motivational factors that make people invest in crowdfunding projects. By examining why consumers invest in crowdfunding projects this study is intended to contribute to fill the knowledge gap identified in the problem description. The literature in general about crowdfunding is scarce and to our knowledge this type of study about crowdfunding has not been conducted before. Praktiska tillà ¤mpningar 1.5. Disposition The disposition of the thesis will be as follows, after this section a chapter about the theory used in this thesis will be presented, followed by a chapter about the research design and methods used. After that, the results of our surveys will be presented and a critical discussion about the results will follow. At the very end, the conclusions from the study will be presented and after that a list of references and appendixes will finalize this essay. 2. Theory This chapter will present the theory that lays the foundation to the thesis. First, customer behavior and relevant motivation theory will described and related to crowdfunding, including the important distinction made in this thesis between intrinsic and extrinsic motivation. Second, relevant investment behavior theory related to crowdfunding and an explanation of the phenomena of momentum in crowdfunding will be explained. 2.1 Customer Behavior As mentioned in the problem discussion, the individuals participating in crowdfunding projects can be seen as both customers and investors (Schwienbacher Larralde, 2010, p. 13 Ordanini et al., 2011). The first research question of this thesis is What motivates crowdfunders to invest in crowdfunding projects?, therefore motivation theories will be presented below. In general, motivation research   is directed to finding motives for peoples behavior (Sheth Mittal, 2004, p. 234). Within customer behavior, motivation research is aimed at finding out the conscious or subconscious reasons that motivate people to buy or not to buy a particular product, service or brand, or to patronize or avoid a store, or to accept or reject a marketing communication (ibid.). In this study, the research will be aimed at finding out the reasons why customers engage in crowdfunding initiatives, in other words, why they purchased the incentive offered at a given investment level. 2.1.1. Motivation Ryan Deci describes to be motivated as the means to be moved to do something (2000a, p. 54). A person who is motivated is a person who is inspired, energized or activated to act, where as an unmotivated person, feels no drive, incentive or stimulus to act. Motivation can be measured in terms of the level of motivation and the orientation of the motivation. The level of motivation refers to how much motivation an individual has, for example when a potential customer is out shopping for a car, if the salesman who assists the customer get paid in terms of commission it could be expected that this salesman has a higher level of motivation to make the sale than if the same salesman would have a fixed salary and no commission. The orientation of motivation refers to the underlying motives, goals and attitudes of the motivation, in other words why someone is motivated. An example of orientation of motivation is that a student may do her homework because she finds it interesting and intrigu ing, or the student may do her homework because her teacher and parents require her to do it. The student in this example may have equal level of motivation in both cases, but the nature of the motivation is entirely different because of its origin (Ryan Deci, 2000a, p. 54-55). A basic distinction of orientations of motivation is the distinction between intrinsic motivation and extrinsic motivation: (Ryan Deci, 2000a, p. 55) 2.1.1.1. Intrinsic Motivation Intrinsic motivation is an orientation of motivation that origins in doing something for its inherent satisfactions rather than doing something to achieve an outcome. An intrinsically motivated person is a person who is motivated because an activity is fun, challenging, novel, interesting or simply put satisfying psychological needs (Ryan Deci, 2000a, p. 56-57). This can be compared to that children from the date of birth are active, curious and playful in despite of rewards being absent. It is a natural motivation that encourages assimilation, mastery, spontaneous interest and exploration that is so essential to cognitive and social development and that represents a principal source of enjoyment   and vitality throughout life (Ryan Deci, 2000b, p. 70). In crowdfunding, examples of intrinsic motivation could be to fund a technological project of a gadget because it is fun, or funding a project raising money for surgery of a child out of compassion. An important concept in the case of charity is warm-glove giving. Warm-glove giving means that donors are egoistically motivated by the act of giving and not only the altruism  Ã‚  Ã‚   (Andreoni, 1990, p. FIXA). 2.1.1.1. Extrinsic Motivation Extrinsic motivation is in contrast to intrinsic motivation when the origin of motivation lies in obtaining a separable outcome from performing an activity. Satisfying psychological needs is not necessarily related to extrinsic motivation, instead extrinsic motivation covers the continuum between amotivation and intrinsic motivation (Ryan Deci, 2000b, p. 71-72). An illustration of this is that a student may do her homework because she fears sanctions from her parents or because the student sincerely believe that doing the homework will be valuable for her future career. In the latter case intrinsic motivation and feeling of choice is present, while in the prior case external control and compliance is imminent. Even though both cases involves intentional behavior, the types of extrinsic motivation is different because they vary in autonomy. In crowdfunding, examples of extrinsic motivation could be to fund a technological project of a gadget because an incentive given is the actual gadget, or funding an artists concert for a share of the profit. 2.1.2 Shopping experience 2.2. Investment Behavior According to Ordanini et al. (2011), the emerging phenomena of crowdfunding has transformed consumers into investors. The consumers are contributing financially to other peoples or organizations projects and expect either a monetary or non-monetary incentive for their support. Thus, the characteristics of crowdfunding are very similar to financial investments and the behavior of crowdfunders can thereby resemble the investment behavior of individuals in financial markets   (Ordanini et al., 2011, p. 450). Herding Behavior in Online Shopping A large group (a crowd or mob) is likely to show examples of group behaviour 2.2.1. Herding Behavior in Financial Markets Crowdfunding projects seem to follow similar patterns where the financing of the crowdfunders triggers a chain reaction and facilitates rapid growth at a certain point (Ordanini et al., 2011, p. 457-458). This kind of snowball effect in the crowdfunders behavior, of something small building upon itself and becoming larger, can be found and be explained in several investment situations and can be both positive and negative. This investment behavior can be found as a negative effect in bank runs (Iyer Puri, 2012, p. 1414) and as a positive effect in rational herding in financial economics (Devenow Welch, 1996, p. 603). Bank runs are situations when bank customers withdraw their deposits from banks because they dont believe that the bank can keep them safe. This phenomenon has been a recurrent case in the history, from the Great Depression in the 1930s, to the financial crisis recently (Iyer Puri, 2012, p. 1414). The same pattern can be found in rational herding in the financial mark ets, when investors act based on other investors decisions rather than information about the investment itself (Masson, Gotur Lane, 2001, p. 100). Imitation and mimicry are two of the humans most basic instincts, which could partly explain why investors are influenced by the decisions of other investors in financial economics (Devenow Welch, 1996, p. 603). Rational herding occurs because of payoff externalities and information externalities. Payoff externalities is when investors benefit from other investors following their actions and information externalities is when investors gain useful information from observing previous investors decisions to a level where they consider it to be more reliable than their own information (Masson, Gotur Lane, 2001, p. 100). 2.2.2. Investment Momentum in Crowdfunding Ordanini et al. (2011) have found that a similar momentum in crowdfunding occurs at a recurrent stage of the crowdfunding process and they have identified three distinct phases in the investment process that are applicable to most crowdfunding projects. The first phase includes the investments reaching approximately half of the projects target capital and mostly consists of investments from people who are directly connected to the project or the network of the creator of the project. The emphasis in this phase is the involvement of people related to the project or the creator to accumulate a start funding underlying the rest of the crowdfunding process (Ordanini et al., 2011, p. 457-458). The second stage usually slows down in investment growth and is considered to be the most delicate and important phase, since it typically determines if a project fails or succeeds. Motivating and involving people in this phase is crucial to trigger the crowding process and the inability to do so is a very common reason for failure (Ordanini et al., 2011, p. 457-458). The third and last phase is when a project triggers a chain reaction that facilitates rapid growth to reach and, in some cases, exceed the investment target. The crowdfunders in this phase are primarily people without any original connection to the project and the investment process usually speeds up when it comes closer to the accumulated target investment. Ordanini et al. (2011) claim that the reason for this is that in many cases, the opportunity to invest will disappear as the project reaches its target investment. In this situation, the crowdfunders act very similar to investors in the financial markets and nobody want to miss the opportunity to invest and be a part of the project, which results in a chain reaction triggering more and more people to invest (Ordanini et al., 2011, p. 457-458). Crowdfunding momentum graph? (Ordanini) 3. Method This chapter will explain the method used in this thesis. Firstly a broad perspecitve of the method used will be presented, the Research approach and Research design. After that a more narrow view and thesis specific details will be presented; the Research strategy using surveys, the conduction of the survey and the data analysis. Finally the reliability, validity and replicability of this study and the presentation of data will be presented. 3.1. Research Approach As shown, crowdfunding is a subject on which there is little existing literature and scarce knowledge. Because of the insufficient prior research on the topic, it is simply not possible to define a theoretical framework for a hypothesis, which precludes a deductive research approach (Saunders et al., 2007, p. 127). The research questions emphasizes on why something is happening, rather than being able to describe what is happening, which implies that a more inductive approach would be appropriate (Saunders et al., 2007, p. 126). Although, an inductive approach involves drawing generalizable inferences out of observations (Bryman Bell, 2007, p. 14), which is not an accurate relationship between the theory and data in the study since the research questions are based on previous studies. The objective of the study is to discover new variables and relationships and to stress theory development, rather than theory generation or confirmation of existing theory. For such a study, Dubois G adde (2002) suggest an abductive approach which enables continuous interplay between theory and empirical observations. The abductive approach also allows the framework to be successively modified as a result of unanticipated findings and insights during the research process, which enables new conclusions when theoretical models and new concepts encounter the reality (Dubois Gadde, 2002, p. 559). 3.2. Research Design The research desigend is intended to generate evidence to answer the research questions that are established and to act as a framework for the research process (Bryman Bell, 2007, p. 39-40). The study entails data from several cases at a single point in time in order to collect quantifiable data to detect patterns of associations. Because of this, this study is based on a cross-sectional design, which is the study of a phenomena in a given point in time (Saunders, 2007, p. 155).   A cross-sectional design enables examining several variables to explore potential variations, which suits the research questions of identifying motivations and distinguishing differences between different categories in crowdfunding. In cross-sectional design research, the data is also collected simultaneously, in contrast to experimental design, and the data is quantifiable by a systematic method for measurement and benchmarking. However, with the cross-sectional design it is only possible to examine rel ationships without being certain of the casual influence, in contrast to an experimental design where variables are manipulated (Bryman Bell, 2007, p. 55). Although a cross-sectional research design is sufficiently adequate to serve as a foundation for drawing certain inferences (Bryman Bell, 2007, p. 56). 3.3. Sampling This study has been conducted on the following crowdfunding websites: http://www.rockthepost.com/ http://www.sponsume.com/ http://www.helpersunite.com/ http://peerbackers.com/ https://www.sellaband.com/ The reason for choosing the above mentioned crowdfunding websites is that they permit contacting the participants in their crowdfunding projects via the websites respective internal mail systems. There are a few more crowdfunding websites in which it is possible to contact investors, but some require that you have invested in the same project as the users that you want to contact and others have no compulsory contact information, meaning that the users manually would have to post their contact information in their description to be contactable through the website. Worth noting is that even in the websites chosen for this study, there are some users that can not be contacted because of the option of being anonymous when investing. The study is also, as mentioned in the research questions, limited to passive investments in crowdfunding. Within passive investments this thesis is also limited to only successful crowdfunding projects, because the crowdfunding websites appear to remove the unsuccessful projects as to not discourage potential clients. This makes it impossible to access information about unsuccessful crowdfunding projects without the owners of the websites collaboration. Collaborating with the crowdfunding websites themselves has though been judged to be out of the scope for this study due to time restrictions. A consequence of studying only successful crowdfunding projects is that the participants in our study are asked about their motivations retrospectively. This means that the participants investment motivations rather are their retrospective rationalization of their investments, than their decision making process prior to the investment. Therefore, it is impossible to determine to what degree the customers/investors were affected by any post-purchase rationalization or dissonance to justify their investments. In an attempt to counter this problem, only crowdfunders that have participated in crowdfunding projects that have recently ended has been contacted. The time frame chosen for this was one week. Within the crowdfunding projects chosen within the different categories of crowdfunding no sampling were made, instead all participants that were not anonymous were contacted. 3.4. Research Strategy: Surveys The research strategy chosen for this thesis is surveys in the form of Internet questionnaires. This research strategy has been chosen because it is common in business and management research and allow for collection of large amounts of data to a relatively small cost (Saunders, 2007, p. 144). Given the quota sampling and the internal mail systems provided by the crowdfunding sites, Internet surveys provided us with a simple solution of reaching out to all participants in selected crowdfunding projects, seeing as it was fairly easy to contact the crowdfunders via the internal mailing system. This allowed for generating findings that are representative for the entire population in the chosen crowdfunding projects. In comparison to interviews this is also a less time consuming strategy and seeing as this is a bachelor thesis, time is of the essence. Surveys allows for collecting large amounts of data for statistical analysis. The data collected from surveys could for example be used for suggesting possible relationships between variables and produce models for these relationships (Saunders, 2007, p. 144) (Bryman Bell, 2007, p. 56). This is much in line with our research questions.    3.4.1 Survey Design When designing a survey it is important to use standardized questions that will are likely to be interpreted in the same way by all respondents (Saunders, 2007, p. 393). The surveys sent out to the different crowdfunding projects where therefore identical. Language non native English speakers The questionnaire consists of XX questions in total, this because a questionnaire should not be longer than is necessary to meet the research objective and that it is generally believed that a shorter questionnaire has a higher response rate than a longer questionnaire (Saunders, Lewis, Thornhill, 2012, p. 436). Designing questions (Bryman Bell, 2007, p. 266-271)

Technology Is The Seed Of Our Destruction :: essays research papers

I agree and disagree with this statement. Technology has become very important in our society recently, and more people are getting involved with it, discovering new technology, and introducing it into society. The big question is whether or not society is ready for all the new techonological advancements. In some cases, the answer is yes. I am quite certain that people can handle TV, computers and radios fairly well. However, some technology would be way too advanced for us, such as a mind-reading room, perhaps? I think with the right knowledge and experience, individual people can handle any new technology that is introduced to them. People in large numbers tend to panic, and not deal with new things very well. It is my opinion that as a crowd of people grows larger, the collective intelligence of the crowd grows smaller. If advanced technology is introduced suddenly to a large number of people, then it will not work. If you introduce it slowly, it might work better. Some tehnology has helped us in many ways, such as: microscopes, electricity, and computers. Other technology has both helped and hindered us, such as the television and the car. Some technology has not helped at all, such as an electric fork or the electric car, the latter being too expensive for any normal person to run. Television is a big thing nowadays, and it has rotted the minds of children and adults alike. However, it has also improved communication, and if viewed in small time slots, it has enhanced some people’s intelligence. Some parents may sit their children in front of the television for hours while they go off somewhere to drink, etc. I don’t think this helps their children’s intelligence, and it eventually distances the children from the parents. For example, if you have children, and a television, what do you think would happen if you removed the TV from the house? The answer is simple: your kids would hate you for it. This is because they have grown accustomed to having the TV there as a distraction, or as entertainment. However, if you had never owned a TV, would your kids miss it? I think that, to a certain extent, technological advancement is a very good thing, because it can enhance and enrich our lives, but when it starts to take over the simple things in life and makes everything instant and electronic, technology can be bad.

Owens Corning Case :: essays research papers

Owens Corning Case 1.  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Data Provisioning OCF conceptualizes the principal IS production activities that produce value for the company as transaction processing, data provisioning, and information delivery. Data provisioning manages the inventory of data and information, using relational database management systems and a data dictionary and data catalog. Transaction processing stores only the current data necessary to provide the status of current operations. Data provisioning receives, stores, and manages all validated transaction data from transaction processing. It also provides data back to transaction processing and information-to-information delivery when requested. Data dictionary and data catalog keep way of what data exists, where it is stored, what it means, and who has authority to access it. That helps data provisioning to protect the data and to provide access to data and information to those who need it. Data provisioning stores the organizational structure regulations in tables in its database, so these regulations can be changed without any difficulties when management decides to modify the organization. OCF created two relational databases to support data provisioning —one to support transaction processing and another to support information delivery. They used for transaction processing technology IBM’s DB2 running on the mainframe, designed to process high transaction volumes fast. For the information delivery technology they used a TERADATA database machine - a combination of hardware and software that is optimized for answering information questions. 2.  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Data warehouse The data warehouse is part of the data provisioning function. It could be described as a big depository. Data warehouse must provide interfaces that accept transaction data from different types of transaction processing systems and move them into the warehouse environment. During this process that data are tested and validated to assure that only high quality data are accepted. On the output side of the data warehouse, there must be interfaces that allow a user to ask for data from the devices (PCs or terminals) that he typically use. The information in the warehouse must be structured, so that users can easily obtain answers to their questions. OCF built data warehouse in 1987. They had selected a combination of IBM’s DB2 relational DBMS, SQL query language, and TERADATA database machine to support the data warehouse. Few months later they built a data warehouse for the Residential and Commercial Insulation Products division that contained product data, sales data, and customer data. After some time they purchased a larger TERADATA machine and related software, which enabled them to expand this data warehouse to serve the other OCF divisions.

Glen Canyon Dam :: Debate Lake Powell Papers

Glen Canyon Dam This extended essay will analyze the rhetoric of authors discussing the Glen Canyon Dam. These authors include: Jeff Rubin (The Place No One Knew), John McPhee (Encounters with the Archdruid), Russell Martin (A story that stands like a dam: Glen Canyon and the struggle for the soul of the West), and Jared Farmer (Glen Canyon dammed: inventing Lake Powell and the Canyon country). There are always two sides to an argument, one for one against. All seven authors write of the Glen Canyon Dam, and the controversy surrounding the draining of Lake Powell. All of the authors do not actually want the dam to be taken down. Each author talks about what was destroyed by filling Glen Canyon up. They all recognize that Glen Canyon can not be saved, but another dam can be prevented from happening again somewhere else. A pamphlet handed out at the visitor’s center of Glen Canyon Dam states: â€Å"The mission of the Bureau of Reclamation is to manage, develop, and protect water and related resources in an environmentally and economically sound manner in the interest of the American public† (Glen Canyon Dam) This statement ensures the reader that the dam was built â€Å"for the people† doing this without stating any facts that prove the statement. This statement also does not state why the U.S. government built Glen Canyon dam. This pamphlet wants to educate people as to the uses of Glen Canyon. The dangers and the fun that can be had on the lake that was made by the Glen Canyon Dam. â€Å"Some of the shoreline around Lake Powell is loose and can slip and fall†. (Glen canyon Dam) warning the public as to what to watch for. The pamphlet goes on to say; â€Å"Dangerous sections of Lake Powell’s shoreline are too numerous to mark and can appear quickly after a change in the water level or after rainy weather†. (Glen Canyon Dam) The author is saying that not every dangerous area can be marked. By writing this the author is ensuring safety against lawsuits. In Glen Canyon Dammed: Inventing Lake Powell and the Canyon Country, Jared Farmer agrees with the draining of Lake Powell. Farmer goes on to write, â€Å"Consider the river that flows through Grand Canyon: it’s not the real thing. It’s the programmed discharge from Glen Canyon Dam†. (Farmer pg. XIII) In this statement Farmer is saying that he does agree with the dam coming down, although saying that people have their own opinions.

Effects of Homosexuals in Schools Essay

In the 19th century, a German psychologist coined the term â€Å"homosexuality†. Basically, homosexuality is often a sexual attraction that is primarily towards the members of the same sex (Pickett, 2006). Oftentimes, homosexual equates to being gay and/or lesbian. There are varying points of view regarding homosexuals and homosexuality. Many religious groups believe that there no one born as a homosexual. However, there are plenty of scientists, particularly psychologists who believe that a person is born this way. Religiously speaking, there are no supporting texts in the Bible that there are homosexuals. Only two genders are made: man and woman. Oftentimes, the greater portion of the homosexual community believe that they were â€Å"born gay† (Worthen, 2004). This belief and perspective oftentimes give them comfort and a sort-of justification for their â€Å"state†. Also, this very same ideology relieves them of any responsibility to change. Nevertheless, there is no firm scientific proof until today that affirm that some people are born homosexual. Genetically speaking, they are just either male or female (Worthen, 2004). Since there are no born homosexuals, many psychologists believe that homosexuality is a learned behavior. There are many factors or reasons why a person becomes homosexual. Primarily, most of these factors involve family. These include a disturbed family life in the early years (of the individual), absence of/in love on the part of either parent or a failure to identify with the same-sex parent. Later, the consequences of these reasons manifest in the individual in varying forms—and one of them is through confusion of their identity that oftentimes lead to homosexuality. But one thing is for sure—that homosexuality has many roots (excluding family). Along with the other factors that cause homosexuality, we must not also take for granted the individual. The individual’s choices also play a key part in transforming and shaping his (homosexual) identity. Majority of causes of being homosexual is rooted with family reasons. In such cases this immensely affects the behavior of the individual particularly in school. Majority of homosexuals that go to school instantly faces the burden of â€Å"coming out†. This is one of the hardest challenges that an individual must face. Since most of homosexuals that go to school are having identity crisis and fear of rejection from their peers (if ever they decided to come out), they have a very high tendency to have unusual behavior from â€Å"straight people†. Most of the time, (with the assumption that the individuals are mostly teenagers since they still go to school) these people is in high risk of suicide, substance abuse, the feeling of isolation and more importantly, school problems. Consequently, because of this kind of behavior, they (and it) inevitably affect their relationship with other people. Because they always need the feel to isolated, the tendency is that, they can be the frequent butt of jokes (especially in schools where homosexuality is not yet a very open and accepted topic) that will in turn can lead into more dangerous behaviors. Moreover, when things go uncontrollable, there is also a huge tendency for the individual to resort to many absurd and unsafe displacement methods (i. . substance abuse, committing crimes, etc). Because of the rising number of individuals (particularly young homosexuals) that is involved in this kind of situations, a great deal of number of individuals and concerned groups were established to help them. Most of these help lines offer counseling but more than that, they also make sure that the individual can pursue his/her way to full acceptance and if worse comes to worse, to their recovery. Before the advent of DNA technology, psychologists and sociologists believe that the cause of homosexuality is influenced by the environment of the individual; but with DNA testing, they were able to pinpoint that somehow, genes has something to do with it. But more importantly, we cannot deny the fact that from the beginning, there were only male and female; but as time pass, some strong environmental factors can bend the reality of life that even Nature herself find it hard to turn back (or at least minimize the bad consequences) time.

American Development

The view on the country’s liberty and union has been the point of contention for federalist and anti federalist parties who seek to establish their ideal form of government based on arguments that address the different issues involved and the flaws created by the opposition. During the late 1700’s, both Federalist and anti Federalist papers were published to influence the formation and the people’s sentiment on the interpretation of the government’s power, responsibility and limitation based on the newly formed constitution.Different papers and literary propaganda were published by both Federalist and anti Federalist authors under different pseudonyms. The most notable federalist authors are James Madison, Patrick Henry, Alexander Hamilton and John Jay who wrote the different articles contained in a collection of 85 Federalist papers. The Federalist papers were made to serve as a source to help the people understand the constitution and its implications on the government. Basically, it advocated the establishment of a federal government over the previous leadership based on the articles of confederation.The Federalist were able to confirm and establish the significance and viability of a central government as opposed to the limitations brought about by the separate sovereignty, power and authority of local leadership established within each state (Bailyn 23). The Federal government envisioned by the Federalist Party is considered to be the balancing tool in assigning and redistributing the government powers so as to prevent abuse and misplaced authority by any person in position.As opposed to the articles of confederation which seeks to establish the individual sovereignty and power of each state, the federalist argued that an individual state free from any sanctions and limitations by a central power could possibility overpower a neighboring state without any preemptive legal ramifications. This could be prevented by putting all of the states under one leadership which is subjected to the constitution and implements its decisions with consideration to the implications it has to all the human rights, state and government laws, equality and fairness could be preserved.The government envisioned by the Federalist is to serve for the people and by the people. The concept of liberty and union by the federalist can be summarized through the concept of equal distribution of power within the government. The newly written constitution is interpreted in such a way that the greatest benefit of the governed people could be portrayed as the purpose of the law. The Federalist 1 written by Hamilton is the first among the Federalist papers.The main purpose of this portion is to dispose of the articles of confederation which is depicted as insufficient and lacking of all the positive attributes to render the government effective in uniting the country. The federalist established that the key to the prosperity and development of the country is the creation of a union between the states. Conformity within the whole country will help the people achieve growth in a linear direction that will preserve a lasting relationship among all the citizens from different parts of the country.Liberty from discrimination, poverty and conflicts could be achieved through a truthful union (Bailyn 43). Another issue addressed in the federalist papers is the existence of a faction which is considered a threat to the union and peace in the country. Specifically addressed in the federalist 10, factions could be in the form of a group of people or community which has a special interest contrasting to the general good of the population.Considering the fact that a divide country could easily succumb to war and poverty, people should safeguard the implementation of the constitution as a part of their community and state. The establishment of the concept contained in the federalist paper has helped people define and address the prese nt problems they are encountering under the articles of confederation. Prior to the establishment of the United States constitution, the individualism among the different states serve as the trend in which the people conducted their economic and political policies.This led to disunity and disparity of purpose which most of the time resulted in conflicts and anarchy. The Federalist Party has seen the need to establish a unified consciousness among the localities founding the different states to avoid misunderstanding and selfish objectives which only disrupt the national process of development. The government under the new constitution is not exempt from the laws which are implemented throughout the country. One of the most important aspects of union and liberty is the equal distribution of power within the government.This could be achieved by distributing equal power to the different branches of the government in which they have the capacity to refute and cancel out any form of exce ssiveness that could occur from any of the branches. The constitution is the only limiting factor that sets the borders of what the authorities and officials can do. Contrary to what the anti Federalist Party was claiming, the president is not a king since the judiciary branch could pursue a case of violation against any leader who has violated the law.The function of equality within the government and country is made possible through the processes found within the law and constitution. Among the most famous and influential anti federalists people during the late 1700’s included George Clinton and William West. The anti federalist party was immediately established as soon as the new constitution was published. Conflicts between the viability of the new constitution and the government and its bearing on the liberty of the people have been expressed by the anti federalist as the main issue to be tackled.The individualism created by the previously instituted articles of the conf ederation has established an isolated and localized form of governance within the states that has resulted in disarray and chaos which led some of the politicians to believe that a central government which has the power to govern the whole country would be much more complicated and impossible to achieve. The Federalist Party was composed of varying groups with different beliefs regarding the violation and existence of the constitution.The Borden collection has all the 85 articles regarding the anti federalist movement and how it establishes all the facts and information which seemed to validate the claims of the people involved. Among the claims found in the Borden collection was published and written by George Clinton who was known as â€Å"Cato† during that time. He claims that the central government which was established along with the new constitution could easily violate the individual sovereignty enjoyed by the different states in the country.He believed that the person al freedom of the people could easily be manipulated by the president which he considers as the king of the government. The federalist quickly refuted his claim, since the President elect is subjected to the same laws and restrictions which are set in place for the common person. George Clinton also claimed that the viability and survival of a single government for the whole country as an effective governing body seemed to be impossible and would only waste the resources of the nation (Borden 31).Patrick Henry, a famous and well known revolutionary, was one of the firmest anti federalist during that time. He argues that individualism of the states is violated through the implementation of a linear constitution. He claims that the government could possibly undermine the economic viability of a state since it has no way of monitoring the condition the local conditions present in the area. It is better to have a local government since it could easily implement the ideal laws that suite s the state’s condition. Development could be achieved through micromanaging since it is practical and convenient (Borden 12).By analyzing the collective thoughts of the members of the anti federalist movement, individualism is the key issue which they argue is lost through an absolute central government. Some argue that an ideal government would target the economic viability of the whole country by using the resources of the south and the north to its advantages. Since there is only one government, objectivity to the success, growth and improvement of a state is lost. The Principles of the Declaration of independence is highly critical to the success of the government and the new constitution established.The federal government has taken into account the existence of equality among men and the sacredness of freedom in considering the dignity of a person. That is why the federal government set in place allows the authority and power to be distributed equally and without bias t o its branches to avoid excessiveness and abuse due to misplacement of power and privileges. The main concept of union and equality is perpetrated through the unified linear growth projected from a single federal government for the whole country.The transition from a divided country based on the articles of confederation allowed the American people to view the future of a country from a single unified perspective. The existence of each state is complementary to each other allowing liberty to be preserved. The Declaration of Independence guided the federalist movement in maintaining objectivity in establish a stable and fair government through out the United States of America. Basically, the individualistic claims by the anti Federalist Party has been refuted since the unity and liberty of the country could be preserved through the establishment of equal power through the country.The government itself is subjected to the same laws which govern the different states. The federal govern ment confirms the existence of an absolute constitution which establishes that no man is above the law. References Bailyn, Bernard, The Debate on the Constitution: Federalist and Antifederalist Speeches, Articles, and Letters During the Struggle over Ratification Library of America, 1993. Borden, Morton, The Antifederalist Papers, Michigan State University Press, 1965.