Enriching living lab-approaches For ICT innovation by introducing different user roles: a case study on the gap between adoption diffusion and use diffusion of digital TV in Flanders
Year: 2010
Type: conference-paper
Study design: Observational Study
Abstract: We can characterize the contemporary ICT environment as an innovation spiral, with more and more innovative products, services and applications coming to the market, but also with a growing number of them not able to reach mass market or even a large enough market, resulting in a lot of innovations as well as failures.These failures become apparent through a lacking diffusion of the innovation, but also in terms of the incorporation of the innovation into the everyday life of the users, the so-called domestication or use diffusion.Attempts to cope with the inherent uncertainty and increasing complexity in the field of ICT innovation have influenced the rise of new, user-driven and open innovation-approaches.We contend that the Living Lab-approach can be seen as a systemic, methodological instrument incorporating a number of crucial insights linked to advances in innovation management and user research-literature.Currently however, the literature dealing with the "user" as key stakeholder in the innovation process is still rather fragmented.Within this paper we review a selection of user typologies that might play an important role for ICT-innovation: adoption diffusion segments, use diffusion segments and Lead Users.We investigate the occurrence of these user roles by means of a large scale survey for an important ICT innovation that is making its way into mass market adoption, but that however appears to lag behind in terms of use diffusion: digital television.Based on the results and observations, the relevance of these typologies within a Living Lab-research approach and the implications of the similarities and differences between them are discussed.
Authors: Dimitri Schuurman, Lieven De Marez
Language: English
Subfield: Management of Technology and Innovation
Domain: Social Sciences
Open Access status: green
OpenAlex ID: W2303427810