Intangible Properties Research Articles

Investigative research towards the designation of shamanic village rituals as ‘intangible cultural properties’ of the Seoul Metropolitan Governmen

Investigative research towards the designation of shamanic village rituals as ‘intangible cultural properties’ of the Seoul Metropolitan Governmen

Relative measurement and its generalization in decision making why pairwise comparisons are central in mathematics for the measurement of intangible factors the analytic hierarchy/network process

According to the great mathematician Henri Lebesgue, making direct comparisons of objects with regard to a property is a fundamental mathematical process for deriving measurements. Measuring objects by using a known scale first then comparing the measurements works well for properties for which scales of measurement exist. The theme of this paper is that direct comparisons are necessary to establish measurements for intangible properties that have no scales of measurement. In that case the value derived for each element depends on what other elements it is compared with. We show how relative scales can be derived by making pairwise comparisons using numerical judgments from an absolute scale of numbers. Such measurements, when used to represent comparisons can be related and combined to define a cardinal scale of absolute numbers that is stronger than a ratio scale. They are necessary to use when intangible factors need to be added and multiplied among themselves and with tangible factors. To derive and synthesize relative scales systematically, the factors are arranged in a hierarchic or a network structure and measured according to the criteria represented within these structures. The process of making comparisons to derive scales of measurement is illustrated in two types of practical real life decisions, the Iran nuclear show-down with the West in this decade and building a Disney park in Hong Kong in 2005. It is then generalized to the case of making a continuum of comparisons by using Fredholm’s equation of the second kind whose solution gives rise to a functional equation. The Fourier transform of the solution of this equation in the complex domain is a sum of Dirac distributions demonstrating that proportionate response to stimuli is a process of firing and synthesis of firings as neurons in the brain do. The Fourier transform of the solution of the equation in the real domain leads to nearly inverse square responses to natural influences. Various generalizations and critiques of the approach are included.

Relevance of intangible assets to evaluate financial health

PurposeThe purpose of this paper is to examine the relevance of asset composition of a firm (tangible versus intangible properties), when evaluating its financial health. The paper argues that relevance of any asset is a function of how effectively it is used.Design/methodology/approachThe paper uses two distinctive samples: a sample of traditional firms holding primarily traditional physical assets and a sample of technology service firms holding primarily intangible assets and examines the ability of intangible assets to surrogate as financial health signals.FindingsThe results show that when evaluating firms with significant intangible assets, using information about intangible assets to improve financial health evaluation. However, fundamental financial variables continue to be important in signaling financial health, regardless of asset composition.Practical implicationsThe results highlight the importance of both objectively‐measured and reported fundamental financial information and subjectively measured intangible asset values. The results would help managers and markets in using greater caution when evaluating firms with intangible assets.Originality/valueUnlike prior studies, this paper uses both fundamental financial variables and surrogates for intangible asset values in the model. The paper contributes by highlight the importance and limitations of intangible asset values.

The Sociology of a Market Analysis Tool: How Industry Analysts Sort Vendors and Organize Markets

The information technology (IT) marketplace is shaped by new kinds of specialist industry analysts that link technology supply and use through offering a commodified form of knowledge and advice. We focus on the work of one such organisation, the Gartner Group, and with how it produces a market analysis tool called the 'Magic Quadrant'. Widely circulated amongst the IT community, the device compares and sorts vendors according to a number of more or less intangible properties (such as vendor 'competence' and 'vision'). Given that potential adopters of IT systems are drawn to assess the reputation and likely behaviour of vendors, these tools play an important role in mediating choice during procurement. Our interest is in understanding how such objects are constructed and how they wield influence. We draw on the recent 'performativity' debate in Economic Sociology and the Sociology of Finance to show how Magic Quadrants are not simply describing but reshaping aspects of the IT arena. Importantly, in sketching this sociology of a market analysis tool, we also attend to the contested nature of the Magic Quadrant. Whilst Gartner attempt to establish this device as an 'impartial' and 'legitimate' arbiter of vendor performance, it is often viewed sceptically on the grounds that the industry analysts are not independent of those vendors they are assessing.

Supporting dyslexic Scottish university hospitality students: positive actions for the future?

PurposeThe purpose of the paper is to explore the issues of dyslexia and the management of learning support within two Scottish suppliers of premier HE hospitality education: Napier and QMU universities of Edinburgh.Design/methodology/approachThis exploratory, qualitative fieldwork outlines course managers', teachers' and disabilities support staff perceptions of dyslexia support. Students' views are noted, not interviewed. The paper describes the views of 12 of a sample of (eight female and four male) staff interviewees. Napier University and Queen Margaret University are post‐1990 “new” universities; Napier has a larger student/staff population than QMU.FindingsThe emergent findings in this paper highlight the fact that managers, teachers and support staff operate an under‐resourced and largely ad hoc system of dyslexic support, although Napier, with greater central funding, shows signs of more strategic insight with the appointment of a full‐time dyslexia coordinator with strategic potential. The findings pinpoint the strengths (personal attention) of decentralised support with ambiguity problems and the need for a generic centrally coordinated support system capable of codifying tacit experience into customised support packages for hospitality students.Research limitations/implicationsThe paper is a small exploratory study of the views and perceptions of dyslexia of course managers', hospitality teachers' and support staff from two of Edinburgh's new universities. Both have decades of internationally respected work in hospitality education and elsewhere in higher education.Practical implicationsThe fieldwork draws attention to this situation and suggests ways to make concepts of dyslexia and disability more relevant to academic hospitality managers teaching in higher education and to those practising in the field.Originality/valueThe paper examines the proposition that, while dyslexia is a condition open to support and improvement, it is for many practitioners a vague concept. What emerges from the interviews is that disability and what to do about it seems to be an attitude of mind, a question of perceptions, frames of references, intangible properties: that the essence of enhanced dyslexic support is how to do things better. Napier and QMU give valuable ad hoc examples here on which to design future practice. What is needed is a systematic approach to design, implementation and sustainability, and an understanding of the tacitly held knowledge that underpins experience‐generated systems of knowledge. Bringing out such tacit and explicit notions of the complexity of perceptions of knowledge lies in future studies.

Intellectual capital disclosures and the association with first-day returns in initial public offerings

This study examines the association between first-day returns and intellectual capital (IC) disclosure. Due to valuation difficulties, lower regulatory disclosure control and intangible properties underlying IC, we propose in the absence of sufficient disclosure ex ante uncertainty surrounding IC resources is high. Thus, we hypothesise that as IC disclosure in an initial public offering (IPO) prospectus declines, the extent of first-day returns increases. Contrary to expectations we find, based on data from a sample of 334 Singapore IPOs from 1997 to 2004 and after controlling for other signalling mechanisms, a positive association between IC disclosure and first-day returns. Additional analysis finds the positive IC disclosure/first-day return association persists across key demographic features. An array of sensitivity tests provides further support for the robustness of our main findings. Overall, our findings suggest that issuers in the Singapore IPO market may use IC disclosures as a strategic tool to complement first-day returns.

Feel the Presence: Technologies of Touch and Distance

Haptic devices for computers and video-game consoles aim to reproduce touch and to engage the user with ‘force feedback’. Although physical touch is often associated with proximity and intimacy, technologies of touch can reproduce such sensations over a distance, allowing intricate and detailed operations to be conducted through a network such as the Internet. The ‘virtual handshake’ between Boston and London in 2002 is given as an example. This paper is therefore a critical investigation into some technologies of touch, leading to observations about the sociospatial framework in which this technological touching takes place. Haptic devices have now become routinely included with video-game consoles, and have started to be used in computer-aided design and manufacture, medical simulation, and even the cybersex industry. The implications of these new technologies are enormous, as they remould the human–computer interface from being primarily audiovisual to being more truly multisensory, and thereby enhance the sense of ‘presence’ or immersion. But the main thrust of this paper is the development of ideas of presence over a large distance, and how this is enhanced by the sense of touch. By using the results of empirical research, including interviews with key figures in haptics research and engineering and personal experience of some of the haptic technologies available, I build up a picture of how ‘presence’, ‘copresence’, and ‘immersion’, themselves paradoxically intangible properties, are guiding the design, marketing, and application of haptic devices, and the engendering and engineering of a set of feelings of interacting with virtual objects, across a range of distances.

Perceptions of productivity among Swiss hotel managers: a few steps forward?

PurposeThis paper aims to explore managers' perceptions of labour productivity within a sample of de luxe hotels located in Switzerland.Design/methodology/approachThe exploratory, qualitative fieldwork outlines managers' perceptions of labour productivity. It describes the views of a sample of ten male, senior managers and human resources managers, of several 4‐ and 5‐star hotels.FindingsThe emerging findings highlight the fact that managers perceive productivity as a vague concept. Pessimistically, the harder managers try to understand it, the more nebulous such a notion appears to them.Research limitations/implicationsThis is a small exploratory study of managers' perceptions of labour productivity based on interviews drawn from hotels near Geneva and Lausanne.Practical implicationsThe fieldwork draws attention to this situation and suggests ways to make concepts of productivity more relevant to hospitality managers.Originality/valueEssentially, the work examines the proposition that for hoteliers productivity enhancement in hospitality is, in practice, a vague concept. It is interesting that, apparently, the more effort individual units managers put into an understanding/perception of productivity management, the further the concept recedes. Arguably, Swiss hotel managers tend to confuse productivity with profitability: as such recognition of the management of people as a vital element in successful hotel management is low. What emerges from the interviews is that productivity seems to be essentially an attitude of mind, a question of perceptions, frames of reference, intangible properties: that the essence of productivity enhancement is how to do things better. Are productivity and profitability perhaps not so far apart, after all ?

What makes territory important: tangible and intangible dimensions

Conflicts over territory have resulted in innumerable wars and other violent incidents, but the reasons that some territory is more highly valued or volatile than other areas may not be obvious. This paper demonstrates a taxonomy for analyzing international territorial disputes that seeks to capture their tangible and symbolic dimensions and to weigh them as the international community might. Twenty-six territorial disputes, including offshore areas and separatist issues, were examined and scored according to 15 criteria for objective prominence and 7 criteria related to how a country might view the dispute in terms of its national interest. The taxonomy used Saaty’s Analytic Hierarchy Process to identify tangible and intangible properties, measure their interrelations, and produce intermediate and overall ranks. Each dispute was evaluated for prominence by examining intensifying (symbolic) factors, measures of magnitude, and characteristics that retard resolution. The magnitude of a dispute was judged to contribute the most to overall prominence, having twice the weight of the other two factors. The top five disputes in terms of prominence were the Kurdish issue, Kashmir, Tibet, Nagorno-Karabakh, and Xinjiang. The second hierarchy evaluated the disputes from the perspective of an international actor, in this case the United States. When judged by U.S. national interest, the most important factors were the deployment of U.S. forces in the claimant countries and if one of the claimants were a U.S. ally. Finally, the results from the two hierarchies were compared.

Conditioning from an information processing perspective.

The framework provided by Claude Shannon's [Bell Syst. Technol. J. 27 (1948) 623] theory of information leads to a quantitatively oriented reconceptualization of the processes that mediate conditioning. The focus shifts from processes set in motion by individual events to processes sensitive to the information carried by the flow of events. The conception of what properties of the conditioned and unconditioned stimuli are important shifts from the tangible properties to the intangible properties of number, duration, frequency and contingency. In this view, a stimulus becomes a CS if its onset substantially reduces the subject's uncertainty about the time of occurrence of the next US. One way to represent the subject's knowledge of that time of occurrence is by the cumulative probability function, which has two limiting forms: (1) The state of maximal uncertainty (minimal knowledge) is represented by the inverse exponential function for the random rate condition, in which the US is equally likely at any moment. (2) The limit to the subject's attainable certainty is represented by the cumulative normal function, whose momentary expectation is the CS-US latency minus the time elapsed since CS onset. Its standard deviation is the Weber fraction times the CS-US latency.

The Revival of Folksongs in South Korea: The Case of "Tondollari"

Since the 1960s, activities on the South Korean traditional music scene have been increasingly geared to reaching the same objectives. While singing folksongs has generally become an unpopular form of entertainment, those now actively performing them take their art very seriously. They all hope to increase the status and recognition of their art, and many, particularly the male performers, wish to ensure a proper income. The success of some individuals and groups has given them a status that personified their tradition and enables them to reinterpret their art more freely. The A. examines the activities of the Pukch'ong Society that has successfully revived the tradition of the folksong Tondollari by choosing the right stages, propagating anti-Japanese sentiments, and learning from the success of two Kanggangsullae groups that were both appointed Important Intangible Cultural Properties (no. 8) in 1966.

An intangible energy in the functioning biosystem. I: A search for its fate and a proposed method of delivery

This paper treats evidence for an increasing recognition of a force with intangible properties in biosystems with special reference to its ability to transport electrons at near 0° Kelvin. It is implied that such force, whose demonstration at these temperatures is an experimental contrivance to emphasise its strictly quantal status, can be operative at room temperature. A discussion is entered as to a mode for delivery of intangible energy from demonstrable non-local origins, locally to the cell to provide for structure and function. Extensive use is made of theory of the structure of the photon from de Broglie and others to accommodate a co-existence of real (electromagnetic) and quantal (intangible) fields within the photon and to discuss how such co-existence may have been copied or otherwise made manifest in a macroscopic structure such as the cell. Cell function is then viewed as concurrent real and intangible effects following stimuli derived from perturbation of the real or electromagnetic component.