In these days of globalization, with a higher level of openness and interaction over geographical, cultural and economical borders, the importance of the company?s intangible asset, its brand, is gaining importance as a differentiating factor. Building a strong brand and the emphasis on strategic brand management is something that before was given less attention in firms but today we can see a general increase in awareness and relative emphasis in the strategic work of companies.Countries as brands: Is it possible to consider a nation or a country as a brand the same way you consider a product? Well, looking in to the subject it seems to be a rather complex matter and there are many questions to be asked and answer. Nations around the globe are indeed marketing and positioning themselves for several purposes.

Within today?s organizations there is continual development work to increase efficiency and the power to compete at the market. Production development with focus on continual improvements constitutes an important part of the daily work within a lot of organizations today.The purpose of this study is to contribute to a part of the development process that Volvo Penta factory in Vara has in mind. A description of the current situation was compiled by mapping the internal runnings and material flow throughout the factory. A new suggestion for a layout and a comparison with the current situation will assist with creating a factual basis for the development of a new goods reception.A study was made where the volumes and the quantity of the daily arrival goods were settled.

The thesis discusses new social movements and how they act on the conditions of the late capitalistic society. The purpose is to examine a new social movement trough its own members. What is their view of the movement?s aims and visions? How do they look upon the strategies to achieve these goals? The study is based on eight qualitative interviews with members of Attac Sweden. The results show that the members are highly aware of the movements avowed aims and strategies.

The main purpose of this project was to make a survey of the steam and electricity consumption at Akzo Nobel Functional Chemistry AB and give suggestions of how to minimize them. These three different areas were focused on. First to make a survey of all the most important consumers, second to find the electricity consumption of the air compressors and the amount of waste heat produced from them. The third area was to calculate a model of how much fresh water that is used during a cooling sequence in the water based heating/cooling system of the reactors and give a suggestion of a suitable reuse for this water.The main result is a total survey of the energy consumption in steam and electricity. The survey shows that the second largest group after drying is heating of ventilation which gives big potentials of reducing the total steam consumption if there is a way of being self supporting in ventilation heat.

The present study deals with the importance of play for children's learning in preschool. The purpose is to investigate the importance of play for children's learning in preschool from a pedagogue?s perspective. The study is based on two issues: How does the pedagogue´s who were interviewed reason about the impact the play has on children's development? How does the pedagogue´s approach to make play a learning situation? The empirical data is based on semi-structured interviews with four preschool pedagogue´s.

The company GEMS PET Systems produces cyclotrons which is a type of particle accelerator. The cyclotrons create log files that are analyzed by the company?s employees for different purposes like troubleshooting or installation. The purpose of the project is to with a usage-centered design method create a paper prototype of a tool that will help the employees to analyze the log files in a more efficient way than earlier.The result shows how the usage-centered design method was used to create the paper prototype and how the user interface was created according to human-computer interaction (HCI)..

The Swedish construction industry is dominated by men; however this is starting to change. The average age of Construction Engineers is high and approximately 40 per cent of the employees will retire by the year 2015. Currently, female engineers dominate the graduating classes of Swedish Universities but this is not reflected in the Swedish Construction industry.With so many female engineers available, why is this? Does it require a change in company culture and their condition of work to attract them? Is it the attitude towards women in the industry among the employees that has to be changed? Or is it a woman?s thoughts and prejudices of the industry that creates obstacles?The purpose of this final thesis is to describe how contracting firms in the construction industry can make themselves more attractive for female engineers. To reach the purpose, a study among salaried employees and craftsmen was conducted.

This essay brings up how experienced texture artists in game development can get comfortable in their workflow and therefore not spend time on learning new techniques that in the end could be more efficient. We base this on theories that people often choose the path of least resistance, which in the case of an experienced texture artist would be the path they have learned and are comfortable with. We also talk about the popularity of Photoshop and that many of today?s texture artists in the game industry are using it and that this could be because Photoshop was one of the first programs that could be used well for texturing. Because of this many learned to use it and stuck by it and then taught Photoshop to new texture artists because that is the program that they know.

This graduate thesis deals with the challenges facing us as we gradually make our urban environments withtheir many public buildings, such as shops, cafés and cinemas, more accessible for disabled people. Theperspective taken is that of the conservationist, who in her or his profession looks to the cultural andhistorical characteristics in buildings and building environments. In order to gain better accessibility, changesin the physical fabric need to be made, with consideration for the cultural and historical characteristics.The introduction presents the subject of considarate accessibility. The second chapter deals with the legalaspects concerning the protection of buildings as well as the accessibility for disabled people. Severalinterviews with different participants are presented here, aiming to tie the legislation to the reality of theconservationist, the disabled, the civil servant working with accessibility issues and the property owner,whose responsibility it is to make the adjustments necessary to improve accessibility.

This is an investigation into the ways in which a group of librarians experience and make use of the intranet in their vocational role. The theoretical frame of reference consists of a model of how professionals seek information, which is based on a role-theory. As a method, I have applied a qualitative case-study. Using semi-structured qualitative interviews I have interviewed five librarians and the webmaster responsible for the intranet in their library. I have investigated how elements such as the age and vocational role of the librarians affect their use of the intranet.

AbstractTitle: When book becomes film... ? a comparative analysis of the book and film Catch me if you can (När bok blir till film?En jämförande analys av boken och filmen Catch me if you can)Number of pages: 46Author: Majlinda JunikuTutor: Amelie HössjerCourse: Media and Communication Studies CPeriod: Autumn term 2007University: Division of Media and Communication, Department of Information Science, Uppsala University.Purpose/Aim: To study what model of dramaturgy belongs to the film Catch me if you can and to see what has been crossed out, altered and added from the book so the narrative will fit this model.Material/Method: The film Catch me if you can and the book with the same name has been used to analyze the differences between them. I have divided the differences into three categories: Crossed out, Altered and Added. In the analysis section these have been presented in each section of the film.Main results: Catch me if you can is definetly a film made with the design of the Anglosaxon model, mostly because of its timestructure and that it portrays an action and not just a condition which is normal in the epic-lyric model.

One could argue that the most discussed topic in finance is whether or not it is possible to ?beat the market?. Even though many people claim to do this, there is little evidence to support the idea that one can consistently beat the market over a long period of time. There are indeed several examples of investors who have managed to outperform the market consistently for a long time, but the efforts of these individuals or institutions could by many be considered to be pure luck.One of the many strategies that have been evaluated by several researchers and is said to generate a risk adjusted return greater than that of the market, is one based on the P/E-effect. This strategy is based on the financial ratio P/E ? price divided by earnings ? and used by constructing portfolios consisting of stocks with low P/E ratios.

The horse has been domesticated for several thousand years. It has gone from being used primarily for food and transportation, to become one of the most popular pets in Sweden. With over 150,000 practitioners, horseback riding is one of the biggest sports in Sweden and there is a variety of specializations to choose from. One orientation is western riding which is a broad sport with several disciplines where most originate in cattle work and other ranch tasks. Western riding is a growing sport in Sweden with an increasing number of practitioners and with many different organizations and associations, it is important that the correct knowledge of the equipment used is disseminated. Artificial aids are available in a variety of designs and the most common variants used by western riders in Sweden is draw reins or some forms of martingale.

erspective [80][upps-01.gif] This is a thesis on the Swedish Public Lending Right PLR, from a historical perspective. Some of the questions which are investigated in this thesis are: why did the State decide to introduce a PLR and why did it take about 20 years to make the decision? The question why the PLR was not introduced on a copyright basis is also discussed. The focus of this study is during the period of 1934-1956 and it is a literature-study. Mainly there are four reports made by different committees that have been examined.

AbstractMaster thesis in Business Administration, School of Business and Economics at Linneaus UniversityAuthors: Patrik Larsson and Pontus GislénSupervisor: Håkan LockingExaminer: Sven-Olof CollinTitle: The index effect- a study on Nasdaq OMXS30 and OMXH25Introduction: A significant part of the financial literature is based on the Efficient Market Hypothesis which assumes that prices in the market reflects all available information. Anomalies, such as the index effect, indicate weaknesses in this theory as it has been proved that it is possible to outperform the market using public information. Hence, the index effect can be linked to market efficiency which makes it interesting to study from a theoretical perspective. The mapping of the index effect is also interesting from a practical perspective, as it leads to a better understanding of whether investors and firms should take this anomaly into account.Problem: Is there an index effect, how does it behave and what can explain this effect?Purpose: The aim of this study is to investigate the index effect.