GUILLERMO WECHSLER

October 29, 2006

Services as Tangible Capacities

Let's explore the following thread. Services are not vague, intangible, or subjective. Services seem intangible because of our lack of adequate distinctions to make them intelligible and designable.

Let's start with the following distinction: Services are a specific capacity for action that is specified in a contractual exchange and transferred to a particular customer. The tangibility of a particular service rests in the timely capacities that it delivers to a particular customer.

Information Services such as Reuters offer assertions of events, which expand the capacities of their customer to make interpretations of opportunities or assessments of risks. Educational Services, such as UC Berkeley, promise that after a training period, their students will be able to make and fulfill new valuable promises. Financial Services, such as Intelligent Finance, promise to reorganize the temporal structure of financial obligations and assets of their customer, so they can participate in future exchanges. Auction Services, such as eBay, promise to display your offers, support your transactions, and create performance records to allow risk assessments and reputation building among buyers and sellers. In order to deliver competitive services, the crucial capacity is the understanding of networked customer's identities, and the development of networks of production and delivery.