Triggers of Collaborative Innovation in Online User Communities

This study contributes to the understanding of collaborative innovation in online user communities. Aside from providing evidence for the existence of these communities, prior research focused on users’ motivations, backgrounds, and roles at the micro level but largely neglected to examine the effects of individual user activities on joint activities at the community level. By applying a netnographic research design, which is followed by a content analysis step and logistic regression analysis, we explore to what degree different user activities trigger collaborative innovation inside a community. We find two factors inherent to the initial post of a thread, problem complexity and collaboration intention, which explain the probability of collaborative innovation. The likelihood of joint activities is raised significantly if the contribution of a user ranks high on both dimensions. By quantifying collaborative user innovation, we hope to encourage the inclusion of user activities in future policy considerations. Moreover, understanding the effects of individual user activities at the community level may help companies to understand users of technologies better and to identify opportunities for collaboration.

Design of Intelligent Winding Machine for Tassel Thread Based on Stepping Motor

On account of the end splitting and dropping thread problem for domestic winding machine during tassel thread production process at present, an intelligent system with subdivision driving module TB6560AHQ and SANYO stepping motor was designed, which adopted the ATMEL89S52 MCU as the core controller. The system achieved precise control of some parameters during the course of tassel thread winding such as torque, direction of rotation, speed, cycle laps, twist, etc. It also reduced the worker’s labour intensity and improved the production quality and efficiency of the tassel manufacturing, moreover, this winding machine has the advantages of simple structure, high torque, high reliability and low cost. It can meet the various control requirements for different tassel thread winding and have a considerable market prospect.

An isoperimetric inequality for the thread problem

Given a fixed curve C0 in Rn of length L0 and a variable curve C of fixed length L ≤ L0, the thread problem seeks a least-area surface bounded by C0 + C. We show that an extreme case is a circular arc and its chord. We provide some counterexamples and generalisations to higher dimensions.