ABSTRACT
Much of the industrial practice and literature on innovation presumes that explicit inquiries should be the prime source of information for anticipating the future use (Ulrich and Eppinger 1995; Mallard 2005). Indeed, in linear innovation contexts, developers will need to fi nd ways to represent the future users and their requirements even years before the device will eventually be launched. The technical possibilities and restrictions, not to mention design details, are not yet fully known to the designers themselves at the time of inquiry.
