MIT tech review notices corporate ethnography

[Stephen Guerin]

Mike, you've been outed :-)

http://www.technologyreview.com//wtr_15900,1,p1.html?trk=nl
"The conference was "a coming-out party" for ethnography, said Marietta L. Baba,
an ethnographer at Michigan State University, during a rousing final address."

"Ken Anderson, (of Intel) one of the conference's organizers and a design
anthropologist at Intel Research, who has worked in the field for more than a
decade, says ethnography clearly helps companies define market needs, which can
drive product innovation."

"Ethnography, a form of applied anthropology, sounds way too fuzzy and foreign
to turn the heads of corporate types. Certainly, in the past, it has been
something of an oddity; the only ethnographers inside corporations were holed up
at places like Xerox's Palo Alto Research Center, where they worked on problems
like how to make a photocopier's On button more obvious to users. Today, though,
corporate ethnography is a blossoming field, as evidenced by the first-ever
Ethnographic Praxis in Industry Conference (EPIC), organized by ethnographers at
Intel and Microsoft and held at Microsoft's campus on November 14-15. The
conference drew more than 200 working ethnographers from high-tech firms,
specialist shops such as IDEO, and technology-intensive businesses such as Wells
Fargo."

-S
_____________________________________________________________________
Stephen.Guerin at Redfish.com
www.Redfish.com
624 Agua Fria Street, Santa Fe, NM 87501
mobile: [phone]
office: Santa Fe, NM [phone] / London, UK [phone]

[Michael Agar]

Yep, thought about going but decided not for many reasons. Might have  
been a mistake. Be interesting to look at the publication. Those who  
look at the article, be sure and read the final half of the second page.

Wonder if anyone did a micro-ethnography of how obsession with  
shareholder value on a quarterly basis severely distorts corporate  
decision-making? (:

Mike

On Nov 17, 2005, at 9:28 AM, Stephen Guerin wrote:

> Mike, you've been outed :-)
>
> http://www.technologyreview.com//wtr_15900,1,p1.html?trk=nl
> "The conference was "a coming-out party" for ethnography, said  
> Marietta L. Baba,
> an ethnographer at Michigan State University, during a rousing  
> final address."
>
> "Ken Anderson, (of Intel) one of the conference's organizers and a  
> design
> anthropologist at Intel Research, who has worked in the field for  
> more than a
> decade, says ethnography clearly helps companies define market  
> needs, which can
> drive product innovation."
>
> "Ethnography, a form of applied anthropology, sounds way too fuzzy  
> and foreign
> to turn the heads of corporate types. Certainly, in the past, it  
> has been
> something of an oddity; the only ethnographers inside corporations  
> were holed up
> at places like Xerox's Palo Alto Research Center, where they worked  
> on problems
> like how to make a photocopier's On button more obvious to users.  
> Today, though,
> corporate ethnography is a blossoming field, as evidenced by the  
> first-ever
> Ethnographic Praxis in Industry Conference (EPIC), organized by  
> ethnographers at
> Intel and Microsoft and held at Microsoft's campus on November  
> 14-15. The
> conference drew more than 200 working ethnographers from high-tech  
> firms,
> specialist shops such as IDEO, and technology-intensive businesses  
> such as Wells
> Fargo."
>
> -S
> _____________________________________________________________________
> Stephen.Guerin at Redfish.com
> www.Redfish.com
> 624 Agua Fria Street, Santa Fe, NM 87501
> mobile: [phone]
> office: Santa Fe, NM [phone] / London, UK [phone]
>
>
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