Best project. Ever.

Hello folks. This is the other half, Dustin. I thought I would steal the boss's pen and write my own entry in the journal for a change.

I just found out today that I'll be an author on an uber-stellar research project this year. The study involves a certain band in the U.K. that I have the hots for, Radiohead! You see, they released an album ("In Rainbows") on the Internet earlier this year before it hit the stores. That's pretty interesting in itself, but the kicker is that customers were able to name their own price for the album. Everyone purchasing the album (no matter where they were in the world) had to state a price they would like to pay (in British pounds, of course) and then they would pay that price. Yes, people could even pay zero pounds if they wanted.

I'm a social and behavioral researcher, so giving people the decision of what price to pay for an album is really interesting to me. Will people want to pay more if they are huge fans, or could it be that they would feel guilty buying it for free or a low price? Maybe people think that since Radiohead has had plenty of successful albums over the last several years, they don't think the artist really needs the sales?

Okay, so it's an interesting issue to think about, but how could it be studied? Gee, if only I could get my hands on the data. Well, I've got it! My colleague contacted a popular music magazine (to remain nameless) who had access to hundreds of people who bought the album and reasons why they paid what they did.

The plan is to analyze this data and come up with "themes" or categories of rationales for prices. This will take several weeks. The goal is to take these findings and design a lab experiment mapping these themes onto a decision a research subject would make in the lab. For instance, they may be given "points" (or some fictitious currency) and then choose among various alternatives how many points they would offer for some good (for example: a candy bar, an actual music album, a lottery ticket, or whatever - to be determined). Anyways, the point is that we'll use this real-life decision that people made (e.g. buying the Radiohead album) and create a lab experiment to study a similar decision.

We may take these findings and apply them to other contexts, like managers or employees in organizations. Has a coworker ever asked you for a favor, and you weren't sure if you really wanted to donate your time or other resources to help them? Maybe if you really liked the person (like a fan loves Radiohead) or if you felt guilty because they did something nice to you beforehand (like a band being considerate by asking their fans to name their own price), then maybe you'd be more likely to help them (like a fan offering more of their resources, money, for an album). Who would have guessed that a band selling an album could relate to a coworker asking you for a favor?

Pretty nifty.