When high similarity copycats lose and moderate similarity copycats gain: The impact of comparative evaluation

Copycats imitate features of leading brands to free ride on their equity. The prevailing belief is that the more similar copycats are to the leader brand, the more positive their evaluation is, and thus the more they free ride. Three studies demonstrate when the reverse holds true: Moderate-similarity copycats are actually evaluated more positively than high-similarity copycats when evaluation takes place comparatively, such as when the leader brand is present rather than absent. The results demonstrate that blatant copycats can be less and subtle copycats can be more perilous than is commonly believed. This finding has implications for marketing theory and practice and trademark law

ICDP workshop on the Lake Tanganyika Scientific Drilling Project: a late Miocene–present record of climate, rifting, and ecosystem evolution from the world's oldest tropical lake

The Neogene and Quaternary are characterized by enormous changes in global climate and environments, including global cooling and the establishment of northern high-latitude glaciers. These changes reshaped global ecosystems, including the emergence of tropical dry forests and savannahs that are found in Africa today, which in turn may have influenced the evolution of humans and their ancestors. However, despite decades of research we lack long, continuous, well-resolved records of tropical climate, ecosystem changes, and surface processes necessary to understand their interactions and influences on evolutionary processes. Lake Tanganyika, Africa, contains the most continuous, long continental climate record from the mid-Miocene (∼10 Ma) to the present anywhere in the tropics and has long been recognized as a top-priority site for scientific drilling. The lake is surrounded by the Miombo woodlands, part of the largest dry tropical biome on Earth. Lake Tanganyika also harbors incredibly diverse endemic biota and an entirely unexplored deep microbial biosphere, and it provides textbook examples of rift segmentation, fault behavior, and associated surface processes. To evaluate the interdisciplinary scientific opportunities that an ICDP drilling program at Lake Tanganyika could offer, more than 70 scientists representing 12 countries and a variety of scientific disciplines met in Dar es Salaam, Tanzania, in June 2019. The team developed key research objectives in basin evolution, source-to-sink sedimentology, organismal evolution, geomicrobiology, paleoclimatology, paleolimnology, terrestrial paleoecology, paleoanthropology, and geochronology to be addressed through scientific drilling on Lake Tanganyika. They also identified drilling targets and strategies, logistical challenges, and education and capacity building programs to be carried out through the project. Participants concluded that a drilling program at Lake Tanganyika would produce the first continuous Miocene–present record from the tropics, transforming our understanding of global environmental change, the environmental context of human origins in Africa, and providing a detailed window into the dynamics, tempo and mode of biological diversification and adaptive radiations.© Author(s) 2020. This open access article is distributed under the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 License

Dynamic Decision-Making: A Cross-Cultural Comparison of U.S. and Peruvian Export Managers

Export managers from the U.S. and Peru completed a survey designed to measure cooperative decisions during a sequence of three simulated interactions with business partners. During the initial stage of the relationship the decisions of Peruvian export managers reflect less trust than do those of their U.S. counterparts. During the second stage Peruvian exporters respond differently to weak cheating. Results generally are consistent with cultural differences in attitudes toward in-group v. out-group members. However, the influence of cultural differences gradually erodes in favor of personal characteristics and relationship-specific history, suggesting that cultural differences between business partners decline in importance as they get to know each other.© 2001 JIBS. Journal of International Business Studies (2001) 32, 873–893

Values, Brands, and Image

In this chapter, we deal with brands and two related concepts, an image and a personal (or social) value. Specifically, we organize the chapter in terms of three relationships: a) values and images, b) brands and images, and c) brands and values