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WITH eloquence which we cannot imitate, or repeat, the national loss has been sufficiently expressed by others. It is true, Kipling and William Watson being dead, and Alfred Noyes silent, the poets have not risen to the height of a great occasion, but that is by the way. Our own tribute to the late King must be based on his work for libraries, since any other tribute is general to a whole Empire. Kings can have few hours in which to read and yet some of the stories, true or apocryphal, of King George V. touch upon his reading. He showed, however, a closer interest of late years in libraries than any other of our monarchs has done, and at the opening ceremonies of the National Central Library and the Manchester Public Library he uttered words which are the best slogans that libraries have received. Even if he did not write them—a matter which we have no right to affirm or deny—his utterance of them gave them the royal superscription. We repeat them, as they cannot be too often repeated:—

To identify characteristics of Japanese business culture that differ from China, particularly in the dimensions of ‘high context’ versus ‘low context’’ and collectivism versus individualism.

Application of the concepts in cross‐culture research suggested by Hall (1976), Hofstede (1980) and Trompenaar and Hampden‐Turner (1998) and on the base of comprehensive field visits and observation undertaken in China and Japan over the past several years.

The Japanese culture can be characterized as highly tacit and group‐centered, whereas Chinese culture is more explicit and individualistic.

Arguably the absence of a large body of supporting data represents a limitation in the methodology of this article. Future survey based research and further conceptualization on different kinds of collectivisms and individualisms will supplement this article.

Very useful advice in aspects of communication, human relations management, recruitment, and management control systems for international business management developing business opportunities in Japan and China.

This article elucidates the differences in business culture between Japan and China and shows to the global business community that a differentiated view of international business management in Japan and China is necessary.

The fiercely increasing dynamics in many industries, which are a result of globalization, are main reasons for the increasing number of alliances during the past decade. Firms foster the exploitation as well as the exploration processes by engaging in alliances. To do so, firms need specific capabilities, such as an alliance capability. This contribution aims at describing the development process of alliance capability. Alliance capability will be analyzed in this contribution on a theoretical and qualitative basis by performing a case study on a global acting financial institution, operating in a highly dynamic and coopetitive environment, the Deutsche Börse AG.

One key aspect of commercial‐off‐the‐shelf (COTS) based systems pertains to operations and maintenance training. Therein lies the focus of this paper. Factors necessary in the development of a training program to support rapid COTS insertion at the system and platforms levels are initially identified. Thereafter, this paper summarizes the results of best training practices and metrics survey and presents a rational methodology to support the development and assessment of training programs for this type of environment. The results of a survey focused on assessing and identifying training delivery methods, trainee learning, and training results are also presented. Finally, a framework for evaluating candidate training program alternatives is presented.

Franchising has long been seen as an avenue into small business. For some, it offers opportunities to build up franchise systems, as franchisors, by cloning small business success in exchange for a royalty. For many others, as franchisees, it offers opportunities for self‐employment, combining elements of the independence normally associated with self‐employment allied with the security derived from association with a tried‐and‐tested business system. However, there is an ongoing debate, the ownership redirection thesis, which suggests that franchise systems will only characteristically seek to involve franchisees in their business growth strategies during the early phases of business development. Thereafter, when finance, human capital and local market intelligence resources are no longer at a premium, the thesis predicts, franchisors will reduce their dependence on franchising with franchisees the prime casualties. Assesses the available evidence on the ownership redirection thesis and offers some fresh data on the issue.

The purpose of this paper is to present a methodology for incubating business ideas in rural communities in Portugal. The work provides an example of a bottom‐up approach to rural entrepreneurship.

The paper analyses case study of an entrepreneurial support organisation conceived and used in rural European regions and aiming at local development through entrepreneurial boost.

Although the methodology for incubating business ideas was adapted from a similar situation in France, its originality comes from the description of how the awareness of local specificities requires a calibration of the framework.

The case study is the outcome of a pioneering study of incubation of business ideas in rural areas. Further research needs to be taken in order to claim generalisability of these findings to other less favoured target groups.

The incubation of business ideas can be used to encourage local development in declining rural regions. It is important to calibrate the framework used to the local/regional reality.

Apart from being innovative in providing a supportive entrepreneurial infrastructure with mentoring people‐based support in the creation of new firms in rural areas, it is also a nation‐wide entrepreneurial service innovation.

With the growth of online shopping, during which consumers are not able to touch products, there is much for researchers and marketers to learn about the underlying role of the need for touch (NFT) in driving online shopping decisions. Consumers' emotional state prior to purchase is considered a situational variable that affects their attitude and behaviour. This study explores the effects of consumers' NFT and pre-purchase emotional states on their online decision-making behaviour, examining perceived quality, confidence in product judgment and intention to purchase.

A field experiment was conducted using a scenario presenting buying a sweater as a real purchase opportunity available to participants. A convenience sample of two hundred ninety-eight university students at a university in the southeast of France was used in this study. A 2 (NFT: high/low determined by a median split) × 2 (emotional states: high/low level) analysis of variance (ANOVA) was used to further examine the interaction of NFT and emotional states in consumer decision making.

The results indicate that autotelic NFT and positive emotional states experienced before shopping have an impact on consumers' decisions in relation to perceived quality, confidence in product judgment and intention to purchase. Furthermore, this study demonstrates that instrumental vs autotelic NFT affects consumer decision making, with mixed support found for negative emotional states acting as possible moderators.

This study advances the NFT field and leads to insights regarding online consumer purchase decision making by exploring instrumental vs autotelic NFT and pre-purchase emotional states as antecedents of consumer decisions.

The long-term development of a mobile gaming application (app) depends on its continued use by its users. The expectation–confirmation model of IS continuance was used as the basic framework, to which bi-dimensional consumption emotions were added to help better explain satisfaction judgment and continuance intention in the context of mobile gaming app use. The paper aims to discuss this issue.

The data were analyzed using structural equation models. The effects of positive consumption emotions and negative consumption emotions were examined, respectively, in Models 1 and 2. Competing models (Models 3 and 4) were also examined in order to compare the proposed model.

Both PE and NE have an effect on the satisfaction of mobile gaming app users and their continued usage intention, a finding that represents an important contribution to the extension of technology continuance theory. Comparison with the IS continuance model shows that the new model can explain significantly more variance in continuance intention.

Mobile gaming firms should pay attention to users’ consumption emotions, especially negative emotions. Some specific emotions involved in mobile gaming app use were identified, which could guide firms’ understanding of users’ emotions.

This study offers insight into the role of consumption emotions in forming continuance intentions toward mobile gaming app use in China, a topic that has not previously been investigated.