Robin waited before she bought voice over the Internet protocol (VOIP) phone service. Several friends were the first to use VOIP but many other friends were interested in Robin's opinions of the new phone service. Robin is a(n) in this product category.

The returns on the common stock of maynard cosmetic specialties are quite cyclical. in a boom economy, the stock is expected to return 22 percent in comparison to 9 percent in a normal economy and a negative 14 percent in a recessionary period. the probability of a recession is 35 percent while the probability of a boom is 10 percent. what is the standard deviation of the returns on this stock?

David burdick is the ceo of acme bubblegum, a successful public company. as one of the cofounders of the company, burdick has enjoyed speaking and writing about the success of acme bubblegum for several years. typically, he speaks at conferences or directly to the press, but recently, he has been blogging about his firm anonymously. specifically, he defended a recent advertising campaign that was unpopular among consumers and pointedly attacked one of acme bubblegum’s competitors. burdick deeply enjoys his anonymous blogging and believes that none of his readers actually know that he works for acme bubblegum. should burdick be allowed to praise his company’s performance anonymously online? should he be allowed to attack his competitors without disclosing his relationship with the company? how would you feel if the ceo of a company at which you shopped was secretly writing criticisms of his or her competition? how would you feel if you knew a writer for your favorite blog was actually closely involved in a company that the blog discussed? 1. define the ethical issue? 2. who are the primary stakeholders? 3. what are the possible alternatives? 4. how could you evaluate the ethical implications of the alternative actions (use appropriate decision rules)? 5. what action would you recommend and why?

Amanufacturer has paid an engineering firm $200,000 to design a new plant, and it will cost another $2 million to build the plant. in the meantime, however, the manufacturer has learned of a foreign company that offers to build an equivalent plant for $2,100,000. what should the manufacturer do?