Social Media Commons^™

What Do We Expect From Our Friends?, Stephen Leider, Markus M. Mobius, Tanya S. Rosenblat, Quoc-Anh Do

Research Collection School Of Economics

We conduct a field experiment in a large real-world social network to examine how subjects expect to be treated by their friends and by strangers who make allocation decisions in modified dictator games. While recipients’ beliefs accurately account for the extent to which friends will choose more generous allocations than strangers (i.e. directed altruism), recipients are not able to anticipate individual differences in the baseline altruism of allocators (measured by giving to an unnamed recipient, which is predictive of generosity towards named recipients). Recipients who are direct friends with the allocator, or even recipients with many common friends, are no …

The Impact Of Mobile Phones On A Student’S Life In Various Cities Of Pakistan, Khair-Uz Zaman, M. Imran Khan

Business Review

This paper examines the impact of mobile phone on the personal, financial, psychological, physical, educational and also the social life of a student. We have taken a sample of hundred students from the various cities of Pakistan, such as, Karachi, Lahore, Islamabad, Peshawar, and Dera Ismail Khan. Mostly their educational level is from Matric to PhD, considering both males and females equally and their age group is from teenager to adulthood. The results of this study show that 65% students have their own mobile phones, while 35% do not have their own. Mostly 28% students are using U-fone, while 23% …

Leveraging Social Context For Searching Social Media, Marc Smith, Vladimir Barash, Lise Getoor, Hady W. Lauw

Research Collection School Of Computing and Information Systems

The ability to utilize and benefit from today's explosion of social media sites depends on providing tools that allow users to productively participate. In order to participate, users must be able to find resources (both people and information) that they find valuable. Here, we argue that in order to do this effectively, we should make use of a user's "social context". A user's social context includes both their personal social context (their friends and the communities to which they belong) and their community social context (their role and identity in different communities).

Do Online Reviews Affect Product Sales? The Role Of Reviewer Characteristics And Temporal Effects, Nan Hu, Ling Liu, Jennifer Zhang

Research Collection School Of Computing and Information Systems

Online product reviews provided by consumers who previously purchased products have become a major information source for consumers and marketers regarding product quality. This study extends previous research by conducting a more compelling test of the effect of online reviews on sales. In particular, we consider both quantitative and qualitative aspects of online reviews, such as reviewer quality, reviewer exposure, product coverage, and temporal effects. Using transaction cost economics and uncertainty reduction theories, this study adopts a portfolio approach to assess the effectiveness of the online review market. We show that consumers understand the value difference between favorable news and …

Protecting Children Online, Deborah J. Weitzenkamp Dr.

Kimmel Education and Research Center: Faculty and Staff Publications

This publication explains potential Internet hazards and how to protect children from them.

In an age where children are using the Internet on a daily basis, parents need to be aware of how children use it, potential online hazards, how to recognize signs that their children might be at risk, and steps that they can take to safeguard their children. While it is important that parents be proactive regarding their children’s use of the Internet, it also is important that parents not overreact to potential threats. Instead, parents need to take a proactive approach toward protecting their children in a …

Library 2.0 And The Problem Of Hate Speech, Margaret Brown-Sica, Jeffrey Beall

E-JASL: Electronic Journal of Academic and Special Librarianship (1999-2009, Volumes 1-10)

[First paragraph]

Library 2.0 applications benefit library users by providing rich, peer-generated content that adds value to online library databases and systems. However, not all of this shared content is beneficial, for it’s possible for library users to abuse library 2.0 applications by uploading words, pictures, or other content that constitutes hate speech. Internet lawyer Christopher Wolf warns of, “ … the sudden and rapidly increasing deployment of Web 2.0 technologies to spread messages, sounds and images of hate across the Internet and around the world” [1]. As academic libraries make available Web 2.0 systems that allow user-generated content, they …

On Profiling Blogs With Representative Entries, Jinfeng Zhuang, Steven C. H. Hoi, Aixin Sun

Research Collection School Of Computing and Information Systems

With an explosive growth of blogs, information seeking in blogosphere becomes more and more challenging. One example task is to find the most relevant topical blogs against a given query or an existing blog. Such a task requires concise representation of blogs for effective and efficient searching and matching. In this paper, we investigate a new problem of profiling a blog by choosing a set of m most representative entries from the blog, where m is a predefined number that is application-dependent. With the set of selected representative entries, applications on blogs avoid handling hundreds or even thousands of entries …

Uses And Gratifications Of Webloggers In Egypt, Mona Munir El-Hefnawi

Archived Theses and Dissertations

Since its entrance in Egypt, blogs have had a powerful effect on the political, social, and economic aspects in Egypt. To be able to measure those effects, it is important to know the intentions of those Egyptian bloggers. This study applies the uses and gratifications theoretical framework to this notion of blogging. As it is based on a survey which attempts to examine and explore the different uses and gratifications of blogging in Egypt. This involves why different people with different demographic characteristics actually decide to blog and what needs they seek to gratify. Independent variables studied were age, gender, …

Online Forums As An Arena For Political Discussions: What Politicians And Activists Can Learn From Teachers, Kevin Y. Wang

Scholarship and Professional Work - Communication

This paper discusses the use of online discussion forums in various “e-democratic” practices in light of the lessons learned from the field of education. Informed by a conceptual framework drawn from the role of public sphere in electronic democracy and the ideal learning conditions of a computer-mediated communication environment, the author analyzed two discussion forums maintained by a government and a civil society group. Results suggest that, in both cases, online discussion forums only reflect a few elements of effective online learning and therefore, have yet to reach their full potentials. Implications for future research are discussed.

Photography After The Incidents: We're Not Afraid, Panizza Allmark

Research outputs pre 2011

This article will look at the use of personal photographs that attempt to convey a sense of social activism as a reaction against global terrorism. Moreover, I argue that the photographs uploaded to the site “We’re Not Afraid”, which began after the London bombings in 2005, presents a forum to promote the pleasures of western cultural values as a defence against the anxiety of terror. What is compelling are the ways in which the Website promotes, seemingly, everyday modalities through what may be deemed as the domestic snapshot. Nevertheless, the aura from the context of these images operates to arouse …

About Facebook - Change At The Social-Networking Juggernaut Creates New Opportunities For Law Library Outreach, Jennifer L. Behrens

Faculty Scholarship

No abstract provided.

An Empirical Analysis Of Mobile Voice Service And Sms: A Structural Model, Youngsoo Kim, William B. Vogt, Ramayya Krishnan, Rahul Telang

Research Collection School Of Computing and Information Systems

In addition to the wireless telephony boom, a similar exponential increasing trend in wireless data service - short message service (SMS) - is visible as technology advances. We develop a structural model to understand how mobile users behave, especially how they consume voice, and services. Specifically, we measure the own- and the cross-price elasticities of these services. The cross-price elasticity is of significant importance because marketing activities are critically influenced by whether the goods are substitutes or complements. The research context poses significant econometric challenges due to three-part tariff, sequential discrete plan choice and continuous quantity choices. Using detailed individual …

Ua12/2/1 College Heights Herald, Vol. 83, No. 16, Wku Student Affairs

WKU Administration Documents

WKU campus newspaper reporting campus, athletic and Bowling Green, Kentucky news.

Reaching Students With Facebook: Data And Best Practices, Daniel Mack, Anne Behler, Beth Roberts, Emily Rimland

E-JASL: Electronic Journal of Academic and Special Librarianship (1999-2009, Volumes 1-10)

Abstract

This paper presents data on Facebook inquiries one librarian received over the course of a semester at Pennsylvania State University and discusses best practices for Facebook use as an outreach tool. We discuss ways to reach out to our users through this Social Networking Community and encourage reference questions and requests for research consultations. We recommend that library professionals whose positions require them to interact with undergraduates seriously consider making use of Facebook.

Consumer-Generated Media (Cgm): An Exploratory Study Of Various Forms, Value To Consumers, And Marketing Practitioners, And Global Implications, Irene J. Dickey, William F. Lewis

Management and Marketing Faculty Publications

This paper examines consumer-generated media (CGM), also called user-generated Web sites or social media. The Internet is clearly dynamic in nature, and CGM will be of interest to marketers as e-commerce races ahead. The basis for the growth and the importance of such sites will be explored to improve our understanding of their development and use by marketers. Our research will consider the domestic and global behaviors, and findings will be useful for both researchers and marketing practitioners who seek to understand issues relevant to CGM and associated marketing tactics and their ability to accomplish marketing objectives, particularly related to …

Perceived Importance And Future Use Of Online Channels Of Distribution By Small Businesses In The United States And Australia: An Exploratory Study, Irene J. Dickey, William F. Lewis, John Vanbeveren

Management and Marketing Faculty Publications

Online marketing is important to small-business owners and operators because they are typically faced with limited budgets to design and implement traditional marketing programs. This paper compares the perceived importance of specific online marketing tactics and their anticipated future use of online marketing tactics by small businesses in the United States and Australia. Results of the study reveal that both in the United States and in Australia, there is a growing use of online marketing tactics to accomplish marketing objectives. While most online marketing tactics were effective in both the United States and Australia, there were some statistically significant differences.

National Culture And Its Effects On Knowledge Communication In Online Virtual Communities, Keng Siau, Fiona Fui-Hoon Nah, Min Ling

Research Collection School Of Computing and Information Systems

Online virtual communities provide a powerful means of knowledge sharing. Despite the prevalence of online virtual communities, there is a paucity of research to investigate the effect of national culture differences on knowledge sharing in online virtual communities. Are there differences between online virtual communities from different national cultures? This research studies the differences in knowledge-sharing activities between US-based and China-based online virtual communities. Hofstede's dimensions of national culture serve as the theoretical foundation for this research.

A Blogger's Blog: Exploring The Definition Of A Medium, Danah Boyd

Reconstruction: Studies in Contemporary Culture

[First paragraph of Introduction]

While blogging is piquing the interest of mainstream media, youth, academic researchers, and entrepreneurial Silicon Valley, only a fraction of Internet users read blogs and many do not even know what the term means. Reports on how many people read blogs vary (Rainie 2005, Comscore 2005), but even in the United States, less than 50% of Internet users read blogs and many do not even know when they do (Buchwalter 2005). Numerous tools have been built to support blogging and people have extended those tools to do a wide variety of things that may or may …

Thoughts On Blogging By A Poorly Masked Academic, Michael Benton

Reconstruction: Studies in Contemporary Culture

[First paragraph]

My first attempt at blogging was the creation of Dialogic. I was working as an adjunct in 2004 at the University of Kentucky and developing original media literacy projects and assignments online. I had heard reports that universities might start claiming that course work developed on their servers would be technically the property of the university that owned the server. The precarious nature of adjunct life makes us susceptible to rumor, so I began to search for a new, cheap, relatively unmonitored forum to develop course work and to archive the wealth of information I was finding online. …

Blogademia, Craig Saper

Reconstruction: Studies in Contemporary Culture

[First paragraph]

Academics, especially in the arts and humanities, have taken to blogs like ducks to water. At the same time, some of these blogs, especially those produced by graduate students and untenured faculty, have opened themselves to charges of wasting time gossiping about colleagues, and wallowing in unprofessional discourse, instead of working on serious scholarship. One blogger told me confidentially,

I just password-protected my blog for the period of my job search after reading this article in the Chronicle of Higher Ed, I actually got in trouble with my senior colleagues last semester for making a posting about …

[Introduction:] Blogging And (Expatriate) Identity, Lauren Elkin

Reconstruction: Studies in Contemporary Culture

In Lettres parisiennes: Histoires d'exil, an exchange of letters on exile between francophone writers Nancy Huston and Leila Sebbah, Huston, a native of Alberta, Canada who moved to Paris in her early twenties, explains that she doesn't write in cafes because she would hate to be mistaken for the stereotypical "American in Paris": "one of those young women who I resemble a little too closely, with their blue, blue eyes and their bizarrely healthy skin, who you find sitting at café tables scribbling ostensibly in their diaries ("today: Mona Lisa") or filling out postcards ("Dear John, can you believe …

My Life In The Panopticon: Blogging From Iran, Esther Herman

Reconstruction: Studies in Contemporary Culture

[First paragraph]

The Panopticon is a prison that was developed in the 19th century. All of the cells face inward toward a tower. Guards sit in the tower where they can see everything that is happening within the cells. The prisoners cannot see the guards. They do not even know if a guard is in the tower or not. The prisoners feel watched whether they are being watched or not. As such, they internalize the notion of being watched and become their own guards.

Why I Blog: Part 1, Michael Benton (Compiler)

Reconstruction: Studies in Contemporary Culture

No abstract provided.

Why I Blog: Part 2, Michael Benton (Compiler)

Reconstruction: Studies in Contemporary Culture

No abstract provided.

Two Papers, Me In Between [External Link], Lilia Efimova

Reconstruction: Studies in Contemporary Culture

No abstract provided.

The Lo(N)G Revolution: The Blogosphere As An Alternative Public Sphere?, Anna Notaro

Reconstruction: Studies in Contemporary Culture

[First paragraph]

It is a familiar argument that we are witnessing a period of major cultural and technological upheaval, yet this recognition is rarely related to a recognition of the long history of critical reflection on the nature of cultural and social change. One of the aims of this essay is to consider the most recent discussions over technology and its political impact in the light of the seminal arguments of Raymond Williams. In Television: Technology and Cultural Form. (1974) Williams writes:

Over a wide range from general television through commercial advertising to centralised information and data-processing systems, the technology …

Webfestschrift For Wealth Bondage [External Link], (Blog) The Happy Tutor

Reconstruction: Studies in Contemporary Culture

No abstract provided.

The Blogging Of Everyday Life, Tama Leaver

Reconstruction: Studies in Contemporary Culture

[First paragraph]

Writing in the early 1980s, Michel de Certeau, one of the most influential theorists of 'the everyday', warned:

Marginality is today no longer limited to minority groups, but is rather massive and pervasive; this cultural activity of the non-producers of culture, an activity that is unsigned, unreadable, and unsymbolized, remains the only one possible for all those who nevertheless buy and pay for the showy products through which a productivist economy articulates itself. Marginality is becoming a universal. A marginal group has now become a silent majority.[1]

Throughout The Practice of Everyday Life, de Certeau argues for …

Internet Pr And New Gratifications In Sports: A New Way Of Communication Between Sports Organizations And Fans, Chang Wan Woo

All-Inclusive List of Electronic Theses and Dissertations

This thesis uses content analysis, specifically thematic analysis, to investigate the message boards on Major League Baseball (MLB) teams' Web sites in order to 1) recognize in what ways sports teams' Internet message boards meet the unique gratifications of sports fans; and, 2) identify ways that sports PR practitioners can use Internet message boards for better (more gratifying) communication with sports fans. Thematic analysis of eight MLB teams' Web sites (the four with the highest winning percentages and the four with the lowest winning percentages) was conducted using Katz, Gurevitch, and Hass (1973) five gratifications categories and one additional "other" …

Library 2.0 Theory: Web 2.0 And Its Implications For Libraries, Jack M. Maness

University Libraries: Faculty Scholarship

This article posits a definition and theory for "Library 2.0". It suggests that recent thinking describing the changing Web as "Web 2.0" will have substantial implications for libraries, and recognizes that while these implications keep very close to the history and mission of libraries, they still necessitate a new paradigm for librarianship. The paper applies the theory and definition to the practice of librarianship, specifically addressing how Web 2.0 technologies such as synchronous messaging and streaming media, blogs, wikis, social networks, tagging, RSS feeds, and mashups might intimate changes in how libraries provide access to their collections and user support …