What types of power do Be Seated users use?
Experts have discussed different types of power. Such as:
- Reward: The ability to give rewards.
- Coercive: ability to use punishment as a way to enforce what you want.
- Legitimate: having a position or role of authority.
- Referent: perceived as caring.
- Expert: having superior knowledge.
But do our users exert any sort of power? When reviewing our idea we must contemplate that our users wield influence over the venues themselves. After all, if a majority of users begin to negatively post about the venue on our service then it puts the venue itself under pressure. Their business could be negatively affected if they were offering poor products/services and enough people are vocal about it causing a venues reputation to be diminished.
Thus, do the users exert power and what type of power? I would argue that they exert a type of coercive power but it could easily fall into another category (which is not much of a surprise considering how difficult it is to define power). Users effectively wield a stick to either criticise or compliment. If users criticise then it comes at a cost to the venue, their reputation and their business.
The effect of this might not be inherently bad. It effectively forces venues to provide good service. There are possibilities the crowd turns to a mob and unduly criticises but after research this rarely is the case.
