Hi Guys
I thought I'd share something a bit off topic but nevertheless interesting.
A friend of mine who did his PhD in the early 2000's was one of the first guys who used various research methods to extract meanings from online forums, which were pretty new back then.
One of his case studies was on a coffee forum, and he developed a qualitative research technique to gain insight into the types of people who post in such forums.
It's an interesting read, and it is interesting how someone who is not a coffee drinker, can use algorithms to to understand coffee culture.
P.S. a lot of trashing Starbucks goes on :laugh:
Starts on page 10. This is just a short paper, his dissertation is also available online, the coffee section is a bit bigger. I remember the first time I read it, I was just nodding my head the whole time :laugh:
Google "The Field Behind the Screen: Using Netnography For Marketing Research in Online Communities"
It's on the NYU website, should be the first result, a PDF.
Cheers
