Technology Development Ratios
This something that may be strange to some but I am quite fascinated by – the idea of what technologies are most readily accessed into everyday use and why. The ‘why’ is dependent on so many things – region, infrastructure, security, complimentary technology, and educational level of the population – and the technology itself. The amount of time it takes for a new technology to go from Preferred (or luxury) technology to Common (or everyday) is quite interesting.
Microwave ovens exploded in the U.S. but took much longer to become common in Europe and are still a luxury in the Third World – but cell phones expanded rapidly throughout Africa and Bangladesh with speed comparable to the early U.S. consumption rate, and are now seen as a potential counter-agent to poverty.
The rate at which previously unknown technology goes Preferred-to-Common in a given region - I am calling a Technology Consumption Ratio, or TCR. Now, this might be measured by calculating the time it takes for a Technology to enter 75% of all homes, like a television, or perhaps the time it take for a technology to reduce to 25% of its original consumer cost, like a plasma screen television. Or some combination thereof – that is what the project should be to work out.
The reduction in the TCR that can be directly attributed to the utility of the technology itself I am calling the Technology Utility Factor, or TUF - and this would be hard to determine but if a formula was created it would dramatically effect market research across the boards, and allow for important, manageable 'benchmarks' for developmental assessments. Cell phones move much faster into consumption due to an obvious basic utility that surpasses that of a plasma screen television, etc. Quantify that in a measurable way, and you've got something.
And then, the ranking of a region's ability to create completely new technologies and incorporate them into their own or other regions would be the upper eschelon of the theory - the measurable technological 'friendliness' of a nation state or region - the Technological Development Ratio or a TDR whereby even major industrial-technological nations could thereby be compared along measurable, quantifiable factors, and perhaps even that Holy Grail of economics, predictions could be made.
So, anyway, I’m knocking this around. Comments appreciated.
Microwave ovens exploded in the U.S. but took much longer to become common in Europe and are still a luxury in the Third World – but cell phones expanded rapidly throughout Africa and Bangladesh with speed comparable to the early U.S. consumption rate, and are now seen as a potential counter-agent to poverty.
The rate at which previously unknown technology goes Preferred-to-Common in a given region - I am calling a Technology Consumption Ratio, or TCR. Now, this might be measured by calculating the time it takes for a Technology to enter 75% of all homes, like a television, or perhaps the time it take for a technology to reduce to 25% of its original consumer cost, like a plasma screen television. Or some combination thereof – that is what the project should be to work out.
The reduction in the TCR that can be directly attributed to the utility of the technology itself I am calling the Technology Utility Factor, or TUF - and this would be hard to determine but if a formula was created it would dramatically effect market research across the boards, and allow for important, manageable 'benchmarks' for developmental assessments. Cell phones move much faster into consumption due to an obvious basic utility that surpasses that of a plasma screen television, etc. Quantify that in a measurable way, and you've got something.
And then, the ranking of a region's ability to create completely new technologies and incorporate them into their own or other regions would be the upper eschelon of the theory - the measurable technological 'friendliness' of a nation state or region - the Technological Development Ratio or a TDR whereby even major industrial-technological nations could thereby be compared along measurable, quantifiable factors, and perhaps even that Holy Grail of economics, predictions could be made.
So, anyway, I’m knocking this around. Comments appreciated.
posted by JCH | 2:18 PM
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