Request for research from Technische Universität München?

[Volusiano]

I was contacted via PM 3 times. The first time I ignored, assuming that they would take a non-response as a no. But then they PM'ed me again for the second time which I replied and politely declined. Yet they still contacted me again for the third time, using greetings like "Hey buddy" which I think is unprofessional, beside not respecting my clear wish not to participate, and I again had to strongly decline again.

 

[GaslessInSeattle]

responded, have skype date in December. they seem legit and I'm glad to share my thoughts and experience... wish Nissan was the one doing this, they are missing a huge opportunity, IMHO.

 

[edatoakrun]

Just completed the interview.

Mostly general questions re MNL and the BEV community, The LEAF itself, and BEVs in general.

The interviewers stated the results would be anonymous, they encouraged extended comments, and it was a pleasant conversation.

In answer to my question about how the information would be used in their research, they stated that it was still to be determined, but said they would contact me through MNL, when and if any publications of the interview results occurred.

 

[thankyouOB]

i had a 75-minute chat with the TUM guys.
i found it interesting.
there were some issues with the skype and we talked via landline.
the questions were what has already been hilited, including: why the mnl site works for me, why i use it and why my usage has dropped, why i talk to them or people here, why an ev, the good and the bad of evs, how we would make them better, how we would make them more marketable and/or consumer friendly, what regulation would help to make them a simpler purchase, value of site.

most interesting thing to me was the conclusion; until we get realistic gas taxes to cover the real cost of gasoline usage including road impact, health impacts, pollution impacts, we will be fighting uphill against gasoline- and diesel-powered products.

 

[LakeLeaf]

Glad to hear this is as advertised.

I received several PM's also, but have no real interest in spending time on a survey.

 

[GeekEV]

Yeah, I got that too. I said "yeah, anything in the public forums is fair game as far as I'm concerned." I didn't want to do a video interview but offered to do a chat session. They never responded.

 

[evnow]

most interesting thing to me was the conclusion; until we get realistic gas taxes to cover the real cost of gasoline usage including road impact, health impacts, pollution impacts, we will be fighting uphill against gasoline- and diesel-powered products.

That isn't neccessarily true. The $7.5k ctredit would arguably offset those social costs of gas.

 

[ebill3]

In answer to my question about how the information would be used in their research, they stated that it was still to be determined, but said they would contact me through MNL, when and if any publications of the interview results occurred.

Isn't that a bit odd? Gathering information for an unknown use?

 

[DaveinOlyWA]

In answer to my question about how the information would be used in their research, they stated that it was still to be determined, but said they would contact me through MNL, when and if any publications of the interview results occurred.

Isn't that a bit odd? Gathering information for an unknown use?

well, could be. but at the same time, if they had a set agenda and was only looking for certain types of information it might alter the response and taint the data.

in most of the surveys I have been involved in that where the questions primarily "impression-based" I was not told what the information would be used for. generally, one can guess but I think we have had several members here who were part of focus groups and were not told what the information would be used for.

 

[GaslessInSeattle]

had my interview this morning with Anne, Laura and Corinna of Munich Germany Via skype. a group of adventurous college students looking at how and why we interact on this forum. their interest in EV's seems secondary to understanding why we all spend so much time on line together :ugeek:

it was fun, I'd encourage others to go for it and respond to the IM, it's easy and only takes about 20 minutes. I found no indication of malice intent, just a nice group of college folks working on a project.

 

[ttweed]

had my interview this morning with Anne, Laura and Corinna of Munich Germany Via skype. a group of adventurous college students looking at how and why we interact on this forum. their interest in EV's seems secondary to understanding why we all spend so much time on line together :ugeek:

it was fun, I'd encourage others to go for it and respond to the IM, it's easy and only takes about 20 minutes. I found no indication of malice intent, just a nice group of college folks working on a project.

+1.
I spent 30 minutes on Skype last Saturday w/ Amro, Veronika, and Sandro, 3 other students in this project, and it was entirely pleasant and fun. They were bright, friendly, young students who were a pleasure to talk to, and seem to be focusing more on the sociological aspects of why I use this MNL internet forum. I told them that there was no better way of broadening my knowledge of the Nissan Leaf than interacting with thousands of owners from all over the world--far better than any available information source from the manufacturers, dealers, bloggers, etc., as it includes extensive real-world/real-time knowledge based on first-person experience surrounding our common interest in the Leaf, and EVs in general. I explained that I have been using the internet for such learning experiences and social interaction since the 1980s, with the advent of bulletin board services and the Usenet, even before the creation of the WWW. I had to spell out U-S-E-N-E-T for them and explain about newsgroups--that it was a text-based forerunner of the internet forums that exist today. They were too young to know what it was. I didn't bother telling them how easy they have it these days, being able to post and see their pretty little pictures without having to deal with binaries and uuencoding. I would have just sounded like a grumpy old guy....

TT

 

[Boomer23]

I just finished with my call with Sabrina, Lena and Johanna. I used my iPhone for the Skype call and it worked well, except that I could never get video from the students' computer, only audio, so I missed seeing their smiling faces. They promised to send me a photo.

The call was easy, relaxed and fun and one of the students, I believe it was Johanna, has some experience working at BMW, so I was able to ask a few questions about the adoption of EVs in Germany and her opinion about the future prospects for EVs there. She said that there is a general desire to adopt green transportation technology among that German people, but that few EVs are seen on the roads there and so EVs have a low profile at the present time. I asked her whether she feels that BMW has a strong commitment to the i sub-brand, given news reports several months ago that the company's commitment was wavering in light of slow global EV sales. She said that she thought that BMW was very committed and that the i project has a high public profile in the country.

The discussion was much as Tom mentioned above, talking about my reasons for reading and contributing to this forum and for writing my blog, and secondly about my satisfaction with my ownership ( or "leasorship"? ) experience with our LEAF.

I was promised a transcript or recording of the call and an opportunity to approve the final draft of my comments, as well as a copy of their final report.