Talk:Technology adoption life cycle/Archive 1

Quietleader changes
Can you please explain/substantiate your changes around crossing the chasm and McKeown's EdTech model? Thanks Natebailey 23:08, 3 June 2007 (UTC)
 * In his edit change comment, Quietleader raises the issue of verifiability in regards to Crossing the Chasm. I'm not sure how this policy would apply, since clearly the book exists, is relatively well-known and appears to be relevant to the article. Given Quietleader's lack of engagement in discussion on this talk page or his talk page I am requesting a third opinion. Thanks for your help in improving the depth and quality of this article! :-) Natebailey 22:29, 19 June 2007 (UTC)
 * Need a third opinion? :-) I'm willing to help out here. Natebailey, state the problem you see going on. I'll contact Quietleader (unless he sees this) and have him give his opinion. ~   Wi ki  her mit  01:27, 20 June 2007 (UTC)
 * Thanks Wikihermit! :-) This link summarises the disagreement, really. The "original" article (when I came to it), included a reference to a refinement of the model, Crossing the Chasm. Quietleader appears to feel that the inclusion of this text has caused a 'cleanup' flag in the past, and leads to the article failing to meet Wikipedia guidelines. I have endeavoured to seek further discussion about why this would be, but haven't been able to reach him either on his talk page or on this page. He has, however, made a range of comments in the revision history, most recently stating that the Crossing the Chasm text fails verifiability guidelines (which I find hard to understand, but perhaps I am missing something he is seeing). All I really want is a discussion around what is trying to be achieved; in the absence of Quietleader's input, I'm seeking a third opinion to review the above differences ('This link') and provide their view on what is appropriate to include. Thanks for your consideration Natebailey 12:37, 20 June 2007 (UTC)
 * Okay, I read through the article and through the history of this page. First, adding the the reference and text did not cause a clean up tag added to the article. The only tag I saw was in the first few edits, before either of you edited this article. Second, the Crossing the Chasm text does not fail WP:V. If it did, then to my knowledge there wouldn't be an article on it. Since Quietleader has failed to state why the text should not be included, I believe that you have done the right thing. I believe the text you have added is appropriate for the article. If you have any questions, leave them on my talk page. I'll check in periodically. Thanks! ~   Wi ki  her mit  00:14, 21 June 2007 (UTC)
 * Thanks greatly for your assistance Wikihermit! I have reverted to the version that included the text contentious to Quietleader; I am hopeful that he will either allow the changes or engage in discussion on this page now, given your third opinion perspective :-) Natebailey 11:48, 21 June 2007 (UTC)

There are a number of errors and mistakes that have been introduced recently into this definition and the following is a list of reasons they need to be reversed:

1. The title "technology adoption lifecycle" (TALC) is a misnomer. The body of work conducted in 1957 at Iowa State College was a study of purchase patterns of hybrid seed corn by farmers. So the technology adoption lifecycle model is not fundamentally about "technology" as the title would suggest. Recent changes/additions to this article have focused on "technology" which is very misleading for people interested in learning about the adoption model itself.

Above all else, the technology adoption lifecycle is a sociological model. Sociology is the study of the social world, and the behaviour of humans in a variety of situations. It examines the ways in which the forms of social structure -- groups, organizations, communities, social categories (such as class, sex, age, or race), and various social institutions (such as kinship, economic, political, or religious) affect human attitudes, actions, and opportunities. In fact, few fields have such broad scope and relevance for research, theory, and application of knowledge.

To select just one area of human economic behavior (the purchase pattern of technology-based products), which also happens to be the one area that could cause the most confusion, and highlight it as an adaptation of the original model, actually promotes misinterpretation and misunderstanding.

Because of this, any references to Crossing the Chasm should be confined to the "see also" section along with other examples of sociological studies in human buying behavior.

2. The following content is unsubstantiated: "In 1990 a variation of the original Technology Adoption Life Cycle was developed by Lee James while working with Regis McKenna."

I originally added this content, but after someone questioned it, I realized it was a mistake to include it. I happen to know that Lee James was the original developer of the crossing the chasm model because I was a member of the Chasm team at Regis McKenna along with Geoffrey Moore during the time "Crossing the Chasm" was being written. But there is no acceptable source or published information to support this particular fact.

That line should be removed.

3. Prior to being deleted, this article (TALC) had a link to the psychographic profiles of each social sub-group of farmers. Removing this link again helps the reader misinterpret the fundamental nature of the sociological study that took place.

Sociology is also the systematic study of social behavior and human groups, primarily focusing on the influence of social relationships upon attitudes and behaviors and on how societies are established and changed. A major goal of sociology is to identify underlying, recurring patterns of and influences on social behavior. These relationships are absolutely key to understanding the dynamics that lead to sequenced adoption of hybrid seed corn in 1957, and they cannot be "summarized" without losing the essence of the study.

Because copyright issues may prohibit the actual duplication of the psychographic profiles on Wikipedia, the "link" to those profiles should be re-established.

4 In any study of social behavior and human groups, statistics play a central role in organizing, summarizing, and interpreting of data. And standard statistical practices allow us to make inferences about data collected using the normal distribution (i.e. bell curve). In fact anytime data from a population is collected in random fashion, the results will be a bell curve as defined by the "Central Limit Theorem." The inclusion of a pencil-shape (as a footnote) to illustrate the technology adoption lifecycle once again misleads the reader as to the fundamental nature of sociological statistics.

The three research methods most commonly used by sociologists are observational techniques, surveys, and experiments. In each case, measurement is involved that yields a set of numbers, which are the findings, or data, produced by the research study. Sociologists and other scientists summarize data, find relationships between sets of data, and determine whether experimental manipulations have had an effect on some variable of interest.

The Central Limit Theorem explains why many data sets and distributions tend to be close to the normal distribution, which is represented by a bell curve. It says: if a large number of random samples of size µ are chosen from virtually any population (with mean µ and standard deviation s), the means (x-'s) of these samples will themselves follow a "Normal Distribution."

The bell curve generated by the findings at Iowa State College in 1957 is a fundamental part of the technology adoption lifecycle. And the introduction of alternate shapes, patterns or diagrams does nothing but mislead the reader as to the actual makeup of the model itself.

Reference to the pencil shape must be removed. Quietleader 08:49, 2 July 2007 (UTC)
 * Firstly, my thanks for engaging in discussion here rather than simply reverting the article (although I see you have, nonetheless, reverted the article...). I am concerned that your changes are not NPOV, but instead reflect your viewpoint on the concept. You are advocating for a purist perspective, but the concept has been extend far beyond its original scope. It is appropriate for (i) people to see how it relates beyond its original scope and (ii) for people to be directed to analogous models that describe similar concepts. The pencil model is a popular one in educational technology contexts; your argument about bell curves and CLT seem quite odd, since it isn't an X-Y graph?
 * I am quite happy for there to be some clear delineation between the 'original scope' section of the page and the 'expanded scope' section of the page to avoid confusion, but I object to your continual removal of content rather than discussing it here and coming to a point of compromise. This is why I sought a third opinion, and the third opinion endorsed the extra content. By all means, feel free to seek a second 'third opinion', pointing them to your discourse above, but please stop rejecting any changes that don't reflect your point of view. Instead, work to change them so that both viewpoints can be reflected.
 * Finally, your argument about profiles is spurious, copyright protects form, not content, so it's quite valid to re-express the concepts, to the appropriate/required level of detail in this article. Indeed, if it were not so, your article would be in violation of copyright. Natebailey 07:22, 11 July 2007 (UTC)

Discrepancy?
If the model described in this article was developed by Bohlen & Beal in 1957, how come there is a reference to the hybrid seed corn study in Rogers Technology Diffusion attributed to Ryan and Gross dated 1943, and another dated 1950? Is someone claiming credit for something someone else did earlier? Dr. Perfessor (talk) 16:04, 28 October 2008 (UTC)

Everett Rogers
The first edition of "Diffusion of Innovations" was published in 1962...not 1943. (This makes sense because Rogers was born in March 6, 1931 and I doubt he published a world-renowned book at age 12.) Any references to Rogers dated in 1943 or 1950 are incorrect. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Quietleader (talk • contribs) 21:21, 28 October 2008 (UTC)
 * The reference was not TO Rogers but is contained IN Rogers Diffusion of Innovations (p. 35 of 4th ed) and it is TO Ryan and Gross (1943), Gross (1942) and Ryan and Gross (1950), ALL of which predate the reference given to Bohlen and Beal (1957)in the first sentence of the article as "originally developed by..." Dr. Perfessor (talk) 16:52, 29 October 2008 (UTC)

The references are:

Ryan, Bryce, and Neal C. Gross (1943) “The diffusion of hybrid seed corn in two Iowa communities.” Rural Sociology 8: 15-24. RS(E)

Ryan, Bryce, and Neal C. Gross (1950) Acceptance and diffusion of hybrid corn seed in two Iowa communities. Research Bulletin 372, Agricultural Experiment Station, Ames, Iowa.

Gross, Neal C. (1942) “The diffusion of a culture trait in two Iowa townships.” M.S. Thesis, Iowa State College, Ames.

They all appear to predate the one given in the article as "originally developed by..." Dr. Perfessor (talk) 21:11, 30 October 2008 (UTC)


 * I've incorporated these references into the beginning of the article. Dr. Perfessor (talk) 00:41, 1 November 2008 (UTC)

Matching Person & Technology Model
Does everyone feel this recent addition ( * Matching Person & Technology Model) is relevant considering The Technology Adoption Lifecycle is about the interaction between social groups? Any thoughts pro or con? —Preceding unsigned comment added by Quietleader (talk • contribs) 17:22, 16 March 2009 (UTC)

The Technology is not the Product
This article confuses technology adoption with product adoption. I'll try and find time to clean it up a bit. RichardVeryard (talk) 17:03, 8 July 2010 (UTC)

Criticism section
This section lacks any verification and is littered with weasel words. It reads like a defensive reaction by an individual. JascalX (talk) 14:42, 17 July 2010 (UTC)

Potential duplication of other articles
What's the difference between Technology acceptance model, Technology adoption life cycle and Technology life cycle? Even the article on the hype cycle seems to have a lot in common with these three? BronHiggs (talk) 04:43, 29 September 2017 (UTC)