Soldiers and Superheroes Needed! Masculine Archetypes and Constrained Commodification in the Sperm Donation Market

Extant research on bodily commodification emphasises contexts where market actors can pursue commodification in relatively unconstrained ways. However, scant research examines how marketers foster bodily commodification in markets where institutional constraints limit the value which can be extracted, produced, and/or exchanged. We fill this gap by studying sperm donation services in the United Kingdom and Australia, where a number of governmental regulations limit bodily commodification and value creation processes. Using an archival analysis of visual and textual material, we find that sperm banks in these constrained contexts strategically rely on the marketing of masculine archetypes as a source of value. This paper delineates the concept of constrained bodily commodification and its marketing implications. Moreover, it evidences sociocultural discursive mechanisms by which marketers attempt to overcome constrained commodification issues. Specifically, we emphasise the role of gender archetypes as a resource which allows sperm banks’ marketers to transfer identity value to the donor and donation experience. Finally, this paper also has implications for the theorising of value creation by expanding our understanding of how value is created during consumer disposition processes

Extracting Double Diode Model Parameters Based on Cross Entropy Optimization Algorithm

A Cross Entropy (CE) optimization technique is suggested in this study in order to extract the optimal parameters of solar cell model. The solar cell model namely Double diode model, is used in this paper in the purpose to verify the proposed method. The seven unknown parameters of double diode model are: the photo-generated current, the diffusion current, saturation current, the series resistance, the shunt resistance, the diffusion ideality factor and recombination diode ideality factor. These parameters were used to determine the corresponding maximum power point (MPP) from the illuminated current–voltage (I–V) characteristic. The metaheuristic algorithms have created a center of attention due to the non-linearity of the solar cell models and the incapability of traditional optimization methods to precisely extract the parameters. Different cases and studies have been done to identify the unknown parameters of the solar cell double model. The efficiency of CE algorithm is investigated by comparing this method with various and different other techniques. This comparison is done using statistical indicators and analysis such as: mean absolute bias error, root mean square error and coefficient of determination. The results show that CE is a very efficient technique to identify the electrical parameters of the PV solar cells and modules

Customer Work Practices and the Productive Third Place

Third places – communal or socializing places such as coffee shops – are confronted with a rising customer segment: customers who use them for work. Prior research is divided on this trend: customer-workers are seen either as a source of added value or a major threat to third places. Relying on a multi-method, qualitative study, we investigate the strategic implications of the rise of customer-workers in third places. We extend prior research by considering customer-workers as a new and valuable segment, with its specific motivations and practices. Building on the co-constitution of practices and places, we show that the rise of the customer-worker segment has fostered market differentiation. We identify four types of third places (archetypal, status quo, compromise, and productive) depending on their targeting strategy and their servicescape adaptation. We delineate how customer-workers transform third places’ value proposition and bring challenges to each type. Specifically, we show that status quo third places are most prone to customer conflicts while compromise third places generate managerial struggles. In contrast, productive third places adapt their servicescape to become work accelerators and a source of professional identity for customer-workers. We provide recommendations for managers to overcome conflicts and benefit from this growing customer base

Social Emotions and the Legitimation of the Fertility Technology Market

Using the sociology of emotions, we investigate the role of social emotions as a legitimating force in the market. In a longitudinal study of the media coverage surrounding U.S. fertility technologies, we find that legitimation involves the establishment of hierarchies among feeling rules, which dictate what social emotions are expressed toward markets, consumers, and technologies. We delineate three mechanisms (polarizing, reifying, and transforming social emotions) that are affected by trigger events such as product innovations and historical developments. These mechanisms work to (re)shape regulatory, normative, and cultural-cognitive legitimacy pillars, influencing the overall cultural attention paid to a market. Consequently, legitimation is ongoing and fragmented as the dominance of feeling rules varies across multiple entities and over time, with negative social emotions and controversies at times aiding this process rather than exclusively hindering it

Reclaiming the witch: Processes and heroic outcomes of consumer mythopoesis

Although previous research has investigated consumer mythopoesis (consumers’ identity work using marketplace myths), little is known about its enactment involving ambiguous myths. Here, we investigate the myth of the witch (predominantly depicted by dominant mythmakers as a villain but recently repositioned more positively) and describe how consumers reclaim the empowering and heroic aspects of the ambiguous witch myth. Based on a qualitative study using archival data and in-depth interviews with self-proclaimed witches, we argue that the witch’s ambiguity originates in different mythopoetic cycles. Then, we describe the following processes through which consumers reclaim positive cycles: incarnating the myth, coming out to selected others and practising myth-related craft. Finally, we show that reclaiming results in new forms of heroic agency that amplify the myth’s ambiguity and identity value. Our results reveal that consumers cope with market-wide paradoxical injunctions, stressful situations and marginalisation by transforming these pressures into acts of self-heroism

Production of Sodium Bose--Einstein condensates in an optical dimple trap

We report on the realization of a sodium Bose--Einstein condensate (BEC) in a combined red-detuned optical dipole trap, formed by two beams crossing in a horizontal plane and a third, tightly focused dimple trap propagating vertically. We produce a BEC in three main steps: loading of the crossed dipole trap from laser-cooled atoms, an intermediate evaporative cooling stage which results in efficient loading of the auxiliary dimple trap, and a final evaporative cooling stage in the dimple trap. Our protocol is implemented in a compact setup and allows us to reach quantum degeneracy even with relatively modest initial atom numbers and available laser power

Solid-state laser system for laser cooling of Sodium

We demonstrate a frequency-stabilized, all-solid laser source at 589 nm with up to 800 mW output power. The laser relies on sum-frequency generation from two laser sources at 1064 nm and 1319 nm through a PPKTP crystal in a doubly-resonant cavity. We obtain conversion efficiency as high as 2 W/W^2 after optimization of the cavity parameters. The output wavelength is tunable over 60 GHz, which is sufficient to lock on the Sodium D2 line. The robustness, beam quality, spectral narrowness and tunability of our source make it an alternative to dye lasers for atomic physics experiments with Sodium atoms