Lower rates of computer adoption and usage in rural areas has been called a "digital divide." This work explores the current state of connectivity within a rural town of the Pacific Northwest with a quantitative and qualitative overview of computer usage and access within civic and activity clubs, ranging from town's Rotarians to its bowling leagues. An Anthropological Rapid Appraisal Process (RAP) leverages focus groups, mini-surveys and ethnographic methods within the clubs to explore the topography of the digital divide. Civic clubs with younger, higher-income, better-educated members have higher rates of e-mail penetration (93%-56%) while activity clubs fare far worse on average (28%). Research establishes a link between club demographics and e-mail penetration rates, by showing that older clubs report less e-mail usage. This work explores the conditions that exacerbate the digital divide as well as highlighting those which may mitigate it. Variables include the presence or absence of technological leadership and the nature of ties to corporate and/or national organizations. Additionally, research shows that rural settings limit and structure the opportunities for computer skill acquisition. Civic clubs are increasingly reliant on computer-mediated communication (CMC) and computer-mediated information (CMI) sources and correspondingly, also upon the computer proficient members who can manage websites, or create and distribute electronic bulletins. "New media" is challenging traditional club norms and favors the contributions of more technological literate members, while handicapping the participation of non-computer using members. Beyond the hyped-up prospects of increased efficiency and communication amongst geographically dispersed members of such clubs, the technology is also creating new forms of exclusion. Recommendations include: 1) a technology decision-making process that ensures consensus among club members by including non-users; 2) creative capacity-building to support computer usage; and 3) by-laws which ensure that members are not marginalized because of a current or chronic lack of computer usage. This work grounds expectations of new technology, by providing a factual account of computer usage within clubs and exploring how clubs are using computers to facilitate their activities. / Graduation date: 2003

E-business is growing rapidly all over the world and especially in China, which now has the largest C2C market in the world. Most studies of users’ experience of E-business either focus on the platform usage, platform adoption or include platform usage and vendors’ behavior as variables in general e-retailing models. However, we do not know much about what effect the interplay between E-business platforms and vendors operating on the platform has on consumers E-business behavior. In this paper, buyers' behavior in terms of choosing platforms and choosing stores is examined separately, while measurements for influencing factors such as size of vendor base and trust of platform owner is included to capture second order effects. Data was gathered through a questionnaire, published on a professional Chinese survey website for collecting data. Afterwards, SPSS was used for analyzing data. Similarities and differences between the outcomes for the two research questions were analyzed. The main patterns in the two models are similar, suggesting that the interaction between platform owners and vendors has impact on buyers as well. Price, which was one of the most important features of E-business, proved to be of minor importance for choosing both E-business platform and vendors. However, there are some differences between adoption of platforms and vendors, range of market is important for platform adoption, while it is not a indicator for consumers to choose a certain vendor. These findings suggest that there are second order effects involved in E-business platforms. Further, they indicate that once an E-business platform has acquired a large enough user base, the owner might consider increasing revenues from vendor fees, as long as they translate to small product price increases rather than a decreased vendor user base.

The largest age group in western society, the baby boomers, was born between 1943 and 1964, considering different definitions for the time span. All these people have an age between 62 and 48 years old. The life expectancy of these people is the highest in history and they will be more and more willing to stay independent as long as possible. The core of independence is being able to provide and take care of oneself. In order to do that, the instruments that surround the person have to be adjusted to the needs of the person and aid as much as possible. This is the report of a Bachelor Degree Project that has the intention to develop a kitchen accessible for all people, both people with full ability and people with limited capabilities, using the inclusive design toolkit. At the same time it has to be appealing enough that people without limited capabilities also enjoy the use of this kitchen, this will be pursued by applying the pleasure design methodology. Apart from the objective to come up with a kitchen concept, attention will be given to study, compare and discuss the relation and compatibility between different methods and design philosophies.   The project resulted in a conceptual kitchen aimed to be suitable for nearly all people. The design was approached through various angles to obtain a broad variety of solutions, which was combined into one kitchen concept, to comply with the demands that a future user may have. The main aspects taken upon are the layout, storage solutions that require minimum effort and a stove and sink solution. The kitchen concept complies with the predetermined requirements set forth in the project specifications. Extra attention was put into the storage methods. Not necessarily in the amount, although most space was taken advantage of, but in the ways the user can use the storage spaces. The stove and sink are located on a height-adjustable platform for maximum comfort and adaptation to the user. The layout was determined according to the space needed for mobility, storage and function.

Thesis (Ph. D.)--University of Missouri-Columbia, 2000. / Typescript. Vita. Includes bibliographical references (leaves 182-192). Also available on the Internet.

Thesis (Ph. D.)--University of Missouri-Columbia, 1999. / Typescript. Vita. Includes bibliographical references (leaves 196-200). Also available on the Internet.

Thesis (M.S.)--West Virginia University, 2002. / Title from document title page. Document formatted into pages; contains iii, 26 p. : ill. Includes abstract. Includes bibliographical references (p. 24-26).

Thesis (Ph. D.)--University of Washington, 2001. / Vita. Includes bibliographical references (leaves 94-104).

Thesis (Ph. D.)--University of Missouri-Columbia, 1999. / Typescript. Vita. Includes bibliographical references (leaves 196-200). Also available on the Internet.

Thesis (M.S.)--Naval Postgraduate School, 2002. / Thesis advisor(s): Cynthia E. Irvine, Floyd Brock. Jasper W. Senter graduated in September, 2002; Cayetano S. Thornton graduated in June, 2002. Includes bibliographical references (p. 59-61). Also available online.

Thesis (M.S. in Computer Science)--Naval Postgraduate School, June 2004. / Thesis advisor(s): Cynthia Irvine, Paul Clark. Includes bibliographical references (p. 189-190). Also available online.