Cultural Aspects of Computing?

Sean80 asks: "Recently, my company discovered that cultural aspects impact significantly on the expectations for a piece of software. For example, we found that the features which the Japanese would like differ markedly from those demanded in the US. In one particular instance, the Japanese market seemed far more demanding of functionality which dealt with quality issues. I am trying to find good books or other resources which address this issue. Are there any out there? What other areas of computing are impacted by cultural considerations? Should I consider these differences when building UIs, for example?"

Comments

How did you do your research?

[shoppa]

Recently, my company discovered that cultural aspects impact significantly on the expectations for a piece of software. For example, we found that the features which the Japanese would like differ markedly from those demanded in the US.

You don't say how you discovered and found these things. In my (very limited) experience, most questionnaire-type research about "what do you care about" can be strongly driven by recent bad experiences. In most cases these are isolated events, based on bad experiences with one or two vendors, and not really representative of what the customer really needs.

To determine what the customer really needs, as opposed to what they think they want, you have to do some serious legwork, including in many cases prototyping. It's tough, but it does give results which are less biased by previous "bad" vendors.