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Analyses the adoption and use of an electronic messaging system (EMS) by members of a large R&D organisation. Develops and tests hypotheses about relationships among job categories, perceived social presence of an EMS, use of the system, and outcomes – such as effectiveness, communication flow and the use of extant media. Discusses lessons learned. Offers further areas of potential research.

The public fascination for private investigators has led to an abundance of imagery in popular culture media. This study aims to examine the views of practising private investigators regarding their professional images of dirty work.

To fill the gap in the literature, this study used data collected from semi-structured interviews with 33 industry practitioners from 3 Australian states. The paper investigates private investigator’s perceptions about themselves/job roles and the public perceptions of private investigators in Australia. Interviews were recorded and transcripts created. A thematic analysis of the interview transcripts was undertaken.

Private investigators were drawn from a range of professions, including public policing and government regulation. The findings indicate that the reality differs from the images typically portrayed in popular culture. Interviewees discussed the contrasts between media images and reality, providing a more complex portrayal of private investigation and what private investigators find satisfying and challenging about their work.

This study is helpful for improving the understanding of private policing, the media views of policing, those who conduct work within an environment considered to be tainted and their views of self.

Using a qualitative research design, this paper offers insights into the challenges facing private investigators and how they reconcile being in a tainted occupation with providing a necessary service to the community.

With the state in Massachusetts in debt, rising taxes, plummeting housing prices, rising unemployment and a recession, complete with bank failures, company closings and bankruptcies, the Miracle, on which its former Governor Dukakis hoped to enter the White House, has become more of a Massachusetts Black Hole. Like most events, its collapse were a result of its apparently great successes. The collapse, which began in 1989 and was readily apparent by 1990, was in fact predestined by a peak which had occurred in the early 1980s. Small events through the middle of the decade also gave plenty of warning to observant watchers.

The case compares two U.S. Department of Defense (DoD) programs from the 1970s and 1980s: (1) “stealth” combat aircraft, capable of evading detection or engagement by anti-aircraft systems, and (2) precision attack of hardened ground vehicles from “standoff” distances, i.e., far behind the battle lines. Conceived at roughly the same time, motivated by the same strategic challenge, and initially driven by the same DoD organization, stealth combat aircraft progressed from idea to deployment in less than eight years---an astounding pace for a complex military system---while a demonstrated system for standoff precision strike against mobile ground targets was not fully implemented. The case highlights the critical role of the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA), part of the DoD, regarded as one of the most innovative entities in the U.S. federal government.

The case highlights factors that facilitate rapid, successful implementation of radically innovative or disruptive concepts. Students are introduced to the organizational realities facing such projects, including issues of strategic clarity, interdepartmental competition and cooperation, executive leadership, and timing. Comparing the differences in implementation of the two programs in the case reveals issues relevant to any large organization seeking to bring innovative concepts to fruition.

Both neoclassical and Keynesian economists have widely favored the use of equilibrium models to understand economic activity, but dramatic periods of change such as the current global economic downturn are poorly understood by assuming equilibrium. The economist Joseph Schumpeter tried to inject dynamism and disequilibrium into economic models by arguing for the role of entrepreneurs in creating microeconomic change, and for examining long-term macroeconomic change as represented in business cycles. No economist, including Schumpeter, has ever connected these two approaches to change and these approaches are not typically used as alternative and complementary ways of viewing transformation over time. We suggest that these theories can be connected in a “mesoeconomic” institutional analysis rooted in economic sociology; we demonstrate this connection by examining the US commercial building industry. This industry has changed in qualitatively distinct ways over the past two centuries in what we call market orders, economic orders sometimes lasting for decades or more. In each market order, entrepreneurs of different sorts are able to flourish and push forward institutional changes that result in long-term economic shifts. Credit and finance have been pivotal influences in each market order, a factor supporting Schumpeter's focus on entrepreneurial action and speculation and one not largely discussed today. We view the recent disruption of financial markets as a signal of the destruction of a reigning market order.

MODERN air travel has produced a breed of passenger whose interest in the aircraft conveying them to their destinations are blase. To most of today's passensers, cabin comfort, decor, the offerings from the galley and bar are the only distinguishing features of the aircraft travelled in. Little interest is shown in the aircraft's technical features, its power‐plants or its advanced avionics. If asked where the aircraft fuel is stored a passenger may vaguely answer: “In the wing — I think.”

A privileged group has been given an opportunity to see the electronic packaging industry in Japan. Stephen McClelland read their report.

All set for a record Farnborough air show.

This study examines the time, place and theme constructs from the viewpoints of their theoretical configurations and potential applications in heritage conservation. The examination taps on the relationship of time to chronology, place to geography and theme to the human agency. Time, place and theme pose challenges in delineating workable definitions and in corroborating the resolvability of the terms into real-world applications. The challenges stem from the metaphysical nature of the constructs and the conjectural interpretability of the associated connotations.

The humanistic setting of the study supports qualitative research and information assessment methods. Information to support the theoretical objective (configurations) comes from the seminal literature on the very nature of time, place and theme and on their relationship with chronology, geography and human agency, respectively. The information to support the applied objective (applications) comes mainly from the works of the US National Park Service heritage programs, particularly the historic context strategy where the members of the triad are applied.

The theoretical knowledge about time, place and theme geared towards framing the constructs' configurations and applications in heritage conservation is lacking. Mediating time into chronology, place into geography and theme into argument provides a useful framework for understanding the constructs' configurations and applications.

The study adds knowledge on time, place and theme that helps delineate the configurations and applications of these constructs to the benefit of heritage conservation planning.