Business Commons^™

Social Media Usages In Small Not-For-Profit Organizations, Sarah Nolan

MPA/MPP/MPFM Capstone Projects

Effective social media management takes time, effort, and intentionality. Small not-for-profit organizations would benefit from doing this, but often have difficulty with being able to do so. In order to find out how small not-for-profit organizations use their social media and how social media could best be used to accomplish their mission, the following research questions were asked: What communications policies and procedures are followed by small not-for-profits organizations? Are the current social media practices of these organizations effective? What are the primary needs of these organizations in terms of social media and how can they be addressed?

In order …

Crowd-Sourcing The Smart City: Using Big Geosocial Media Metrics In Urban Governance, Matthew Zook

Geography Faculty Publications

Using Big Data to better understand urban questions is an exciting field with challenging methodological and theoretical problems. It is also, however, potentially troubling when Big Data (particularly derived from social media) is applied uncritically to urban governance via the ideas and practices of “smart cities”. This essay reviews both the historical depth of central ideas within smart city governance —particular the idea that enough data/information/knowledge can solve society problems—but also the ways that the most recent version differs. Namely, that the motivations and ideological underpinning behind the goal of urban betterment is largely driven by technology advocates and neoliberalism …

Affect And Value In Critical Examinations Of The Production And ‘Prosumption’ Of Big Data, Daniel G. Cockayne

Geography Faculty Publications

In this paper I explore the relationship between the production and the value of Big Data. In particular I examine the concept of social media ‘prosumption’—which has predominantly been theorized from a Marxist, political economic perspective—to consider what other forms of value Big Data have, imbricated with their often speculative economic value. I take the example of social media firms in their early stages of operation to suggest that, since these firms do not necessarily generate revenue, data collected through user contributions do not always realize economic value, at least in a Marxist sense, and that, in addition to their …