Consultant Kurt Scherf, vice president and principal analyst at Parks Associates in Dallas, agreed that not all early adopters are alike, even though they may be similar in many ways. He cited the case of the people who first built computer networks in their homes.

"The home network adopter is clearly more tech savvy than most other people because they had to be," Mr. Scherf said. "These were people who had to be absolutely comfortable with technology because Geek Squad didn't exist and, quite frankly, the products didn't work as well."

For high-end consumer electronics such as high-definition television, home theaters and multi-room sound systems, "a lot of these people may have more money than common sense," he said. "They just like the stuff so much that they wanted to go out and do it, and may have had enough money to hire someone to come in, install it and configure it so it works well."

From the article "Firms prize early adopters," by Terry Maxon.

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