Boston Hospitality Review: Fall 2012

Lodging Update: Greater Boston by Rachel Rogisnky and Matthew Arrants -- A Sense of Place by Rachel Black -- Hospitality, Tourism, and Politics by Stephen W. Litvin -- Paris in Boston by photo essay by Jack Dzamba -- The Cradle of American Hospitality by Bradford Hudson -- Thompon’s Spa: The Most Famous Lunch Counter in the World by Peter Szende and Heather Rule -- The Restaurant as Hybrid: Lean Manufacturer and Service Provider by Christopher Mulle

The Wheel of Business Model Reinvention: How to Reshape Your Business Model and Organizational Fitness to Leapfrog Competitors

In today's rapidly changing business landscapes, new sources of sustainable competitive advantage can often only be attained from business model reinvention, based on disruptive innovation and not incremental change or continuous improvement. Extant literature indicates that business models and their reinvention have recently been the focus of scholarly investigations in the field of strategic management, especially focusing on the search for new bases of building strategic competitive advantage, not only to outperform competitors but to especially leapfrog them into new areas of competitive advantage. While the available results indicate that progress is being made on clarifying the nature and key dimensions of business models, relatively little guidance of how to reshape business models and its organizational fitness dimensions have emerged. This article presents a systemic framework for business model reinvention, illustrates its key dimensions, and proposes a systemic operationalization process. Moreover, it provides a tool that helps organizations to evaluate both existing and proposed new business models.

The UK geography of the E-Society: a national classification

It is simplistic to think of the impacts of new information and communication technologies (ICTs) in terms of a single, or even small number of, 'digital divides'. As developments in what has been termed the ?e-society? reach wider and more generalisedaudiences, so it becomes appropriate to think of digital media as having wider-ranging but differentiated impacts upon consumer transactions, information gathering and citizen participation. This paper describes the development of a detailed, nationwide household classification based on levels of awareness of different ICTs; levels of use of ICTs; andtheir perceived impacts upon human capital formation and the quality of life. It discusses how geodemographic classification makes it possible to provide context for detailed case studies, and hence identify how policy might best improve both the quality and degree ofsociety?s access to ICTs. The primary focus of the paper is methodological, but it alsoillustrates how the classification may be used to investigate a range of regional and subregional policy issues. This paper illustrates the potential contribution of bespoke classifications to evidence-based policy, and the likely benefits of combining the most appropriate methods, techniques, datasets and practices that are used in the public and private sectors. It is simplistic to think of the impacts of new information and communication technologies (ICTs) in terms of a single, or even small number of, 'digital divides'. As developments in what has been termed the ?e-society? reach wider and more generalisedaudiences, so it becomes appropriate to think of digital media as having wider-rangingbut differentiated impacts upon consumer transactions, information gathering and citizen participation. This paper describes the development of a detailed, nationwide household classification based on levels of awareness of different ICTs; levels of use of ICTs; and their perceived impacts upon human capital formation and the quality of life. It discusses how geodemographic classification makes it possible to provide context for detailed case studies, and hence identify how policy might best improve both the quality and degree of society?s access to ICTs. The primary focus of the paper is methodological, but it also illustrates how the classification may be used to investigate a range of regional and subregional policy issues. This paper illustrates the potential contribution of bespoke classifications to evidence-based policy, and the likely benefits of combining the most appropriate methods, techniques, datasets and practices that are used in the public and private sectors

Neologisms in Modern English: study of word-formation processes

http://tartu.ester.ee/record=b2654513~S1*es

Plus Ça Change, Plus C'est la Même Chose

The publication of Euan Sinclair and Ann Stewart, Conveyancing Practice in Scotland (6th edn, 2012) is a reminder of the enduring role of the WS Society's members in supporting best practice in property law for over 200 years. We look at how things began in the 18th century with the remarkable Robert Bell, WS (1760-1816). (Co-authored with Robert Pirrie.

The evolving scholarly record

This report presents a framework to help organize and drive discussions about the evolving scholarly record. The framework provides a high-level view of the categories of material the scholarly record potentially encompasses, as well as the key stakeholder roles associated with the creation, management, and use of the scholarly record. Key highlights: A confluence of trends is accelerating changes to the scholarly record\u27s content and stakeholder roles. Scholarly outcomes are contextualized by materials generated in the process and aftermath of scholarly inquiry. The research process generates materials covering methods employed, evidence used, and formative discussion. The research aftermath generates materials covering discussion, revision, and reuse of scholarly outcomes. The scholarly record is evolving to have greater emphasis on collecting and curating context of scholarly inquiry. The scholarly record’s stakeholder ecosystem encompasses four key roles: create, fix, collect, and use. The stakeholder ecosystem supports thinking about how roles are reconfigured as the scholarly record evolves. The ways and means of scholarly inquiry are experiencing fundamental change, with consequences for scholarly communication and ultimately, the scholarly record. The boundaries of the scholarly record are both expanding and blurring, driven by changes in research practices, as well as changing perceptions of the long-term value of certain forms of scholarly materials. Understanding the nature, scope, and evolutionary trends of the scholarly record is an important concern in many quarters—for libraries, for publishers, for funders, and of course for scholars themselves. Many issues are intrinsic to the scholarly record, such as preservation, citation, replicability, provenance, and data curation. The conceptualization of the scholarly record and its stakeholder ecosystem provided in the report can serve as a common point of reference in discussions within and across domains, and help cultivate the shared understanding and collaborative relationships needed to identify, collect, and make accessible the wide range of materials the scholarly record is evolving to include

An aesthetics of touch: investigating the language of design relating to form

How well can designers communicate qualities of touch? This paper presents evidence that they have some capability to do so, much of which appears to have been learned, but at present make limited use of such language. Interviews with graduate designer-makers suggest that they are aware of and value the importance of touch and materiality in their work, but lack a vocabulary to fully relate to their detailed explanations of other aspects such as their intent or selection of materials. We believe that more attention should be paid to the verbal dialogue that happens in the design process, particularly as other researchers show that even making-based learning also has a strong verbal element to it. However, verbal language alone does not appear to be adequate for a comprehensive language of touch. Graduate designers-makers’ descriptive practices combined non-verbal manipulation within verbal accounts. We thus argue that haptic vocabularies do not simply describe material qualities, but rather are situated competences that physically demonstrate the presence of haptic qualities. Such competencies are more important than groups of verbal vocabularies in isolation. Design support for developing and extending haptic competences must take this wide range of considerations into account to comprehensively improve designers’ capabilities