Beautiful and damned. Combined effect of content quality and social ties on user engagement

User participation in online communities is driven by the intertwinement of the social network structure with the crowd-generated content that flows along its links. These aspects are rarely explored jointly and at scale. By looking at how users generate and access pictures of varying beauty on Flickr, we investigate how the production of quality impacts the dynamics of online social systems. We develop a deep learning computer vision model to score images according to their aesthetic value and we validate its output through crowdsourcing. By applying it to over 15B Flickr photos, we study for the first time how image beauty is distributed over a large-scale social system. Beautiful images are evenly distributed in the network, although only a small core of people get social recognition for them. To study the impact of exposure to quality on user engagement, we set up matching experiments aimed at detecting causality from observational data. Exposure to beauty is double-edged: following people who produce high-quality content increases one's probability of uploading better photos; however, an excessive imbalance between the quality generated by a user and the user's neighbors leads to a decline in engagement. Our analysis has practical implications for improving link recommender systems.Comment: 13 pages, 12 figures, final version published in IEEE Transactions on Knowledge and Data Engineering (Volume: PP, Issue: 99

The impact and penetration of location-based services

Since the invention of digital technology, its development has followed an entrenched path ofminiaturisation and decentralisation with increasing focus on individual and niche applications. Computerhardware has moved from remote centres to desktop and hand held devices whilst being embedded invarious material infrastructures. Software has followed the same course. The entire process has convergedon a path where various analogue devices have become digital and are increasingly being embedded inmachines at the smallest scale. In a parallel but essential development, there has been a convergence ofcomputers with communications ensuring that the delivery and interaction mechanisms for computersoftware is now focused on networks of individuals, not simply through the desktop, but in mobilecontexts. Various inert media such as fixed television is becoming more flexible as computers and visualmedia are becoming one.With such massive convergence and miniaturisation, new software and new applications define the cuttingedge. As computers are being increasingly tailored to individual niches, then new digital services areemerging, many of which represent applications which hitherto did not exist or at best were rarely focusedon a mass market. Location based services form one such application and in this paper, we will bothspeculate on and make some initial predictions of the geographical extent to which such services willpenetrate different markets. We define such services in detail below but suffice it to say at this stage thatsuch functions involve the delivery of traditional services using digital media and telecommunications.High profile applications are now being focused on hand held devices, typically involving information onproduct location and entertainment but wider applications involve fixed installations on the desktop whereservices are delivered through traditional fixed infrastructure. Both wire and wireless applications definethis domain. The market for such services is inevitably volatile and unpredictable at this early stage but wewill attempt here to provide some rudimentary estimates of what might happen in the next five to tenyears.The ?network society? which has developed through this convergence, is, according to Castells (1989,2000) changing and re-structuring the material basis of society such that information has come todominate wealth creation in a way that information is both a raw material of production and an outcome ofproduction as a tradable commodity. This has been fuelled by the way technology has expanded followingMoore?s Law and by fundamental changes in the way telecommunications, finance, insurance, utilitiesand so on is being regulated. Location based services are becoming an integral part of this fabric and thesereflect yet another convergence between geographic information systems, global positioning systems, andsatellite remote sensing. The first geographical information system, CGIS, was developed as part of theCanada Land Inventory in 1965 and the acronym ?GIS? was introduced in 1970. 1971 saw the firstcommercial satellite, LANDSAT-1. The 1970s also saw prototypes of ISDN and mobile telephone and theintroduction of TCP/IP as the dominant network protocol. The 1980s saw the IBM XT (1982) and thebeginning of de-regulation in the US, Europe and Japan of key sectors within the economy. Finally in the 1990s, we saw the introduction of the World Wide Web and the ubiquitous pervasion of business andrecreation of networked PC?s, the Internet, mobile communications and the growing use of GPS forlocational positioning and GIS for the organisation and visualisation of spatial data. By the end of the 20thcentury, the number of mobile telephone users had reached 700 million worldwide. The increasingmobility of individuals, the anticipated availability of broadband communications for mobile devices andthe growing volumes of location specific information available in databases will inevitably lead to thedemand for services that will deliver location related information to individuals on the move. Suchlocation based services (LBS) although in a very early stage of development, are likely to play anincreasingly important part in the development of social structures and business in the coming decades.In this paper we begin by defining location based services within the context we have just sketched. Wethen develop a simple model of the market for location-based services developing the standard non-linearsaturation model of market penetration. We illustrate this for mobile devices, namely mobile phones in thefollowing sections and then we develop an analysis of different geographical regimes which arecharacterised by different growth rates and income levels worldwide. This leads us to speculate on theextent to which location based services are beginning to take off and penetrate the market. We concludewith scenarios for future growth through the analogy of GIS and mobile penetration

Understanding information needs of Australian business organisations

Over the past decade, universities have used repositories as channels to create access to research outputs. Increasingly government and universities are seeking to optimise the impact of their research, particularly to improve public policy. This study looks at the impact of access to research from the perspective of business associations and researchers. It finds that business organisations value trusted timely, relevant research. Accessibility and peer-reviewed research outputs are highly valued but little used. Barriers to use of the research include availability (material not openly accessible), discoverability (ranking on search engines) and knowledge by trusted mediators and connectivity (presentation as part of a cohort of scholarly knowledge). Barriers for researchers include lack of rewards and recognition for research outputs focused on these organisations. The theories used in the study include triple helix, Kautto-Koivula and Huhtaniemi’s model for knowledge and competence management and actor network theory. The study concludes that significant work is required to improve the accessibility and discoverability of research. In particular, the search paradigm is insufficient to provide optimal awareness of and impact of research.Australian Library and Information Associatio

Justifying the Origin of Real Options and their Difficult Evaluation in Strategic Management.

This work explores and reviews the introduction of real option in the strategic management literature. The aim is to contribute to a better understanding of the origin of the real option. By distinguishing between shadow and real option, and implementing entrepreneurship in the traditional option valuation framework we obtain a more exhaustive representation of the strategic decision processes in the firm. We explain the creation of a real option as an entrepreneurial process, which transforms inventive ideas into profitable innovation. This constitutes a step toward an option based-theory of the firm by describing the emergence of a firm’s options and the strategic building of new competences for exercising these options. In addition, this approach offers a parallel understanding of why the real option theory is less used in practice than in theory.Real Option, Theory of the Firm, Entrepreneurship, Dynamic Capabilities.

A Primer on Talent Management

{Excerpt} Critical talent is scarce (and about to become scarcer) because of three trends: the ongoing retirement of the Baby Boom Generation , a widening skills gap, and large-scale social integration (driving rapidly changing lifestyles). Talent management has become one of the most pressing topics in organizations (even if very few have strategies and operational programs in place with which to identify, recruit, develop, deploy, and retain the best). The competition for talent will define organizational milieus for a couple of decades to come. Springing from the three trends, several drivers fuel the emphasis: • Workforce demographics are evolving. • The context in which organizations conduct their operations is increasingly complex and dynamic. • More efficient capital markets have enabled the rise of small and medium-sized organizations that offer opportunities few large organizations can match, exerting a pull across the talent spectrum. • In knowledge economies, talent is a rapidly increasing source of value creation. • A demonstrated correlation between talent and organizational performance exists: talented individuals drive a disproportionate share of organizational effectiveness. (Value creation extends beyond individual performance differentials.) • Financial markets and boards of directors demand more. • The mobility of personnel is quickening on a par with changing expectations. If talent is hard to find, it is becoming harder to keep

EGOIST: Overlay Routing Using Selfish Neighbor Selection

A foundational issue underlying many overlay network applications ranging from routing to P2P file sharing is that of connectivity management, i.e., folding new arrivals into an existing overlay, and re-wiring to cope with changing network conditions. Previous work has considered the problem from two perspectives: devising practical heuristics for specific applications designed to work well in real deployments, and providing abstractions for the underlying problem that are analytically tractable, especially via game-theoretic analysis. In this paper, we unify these two thrusts by using insights gleaned from novel, realistic theoretic models in the design of Egoist – a prototype overlay routing system that we implemented, deployed, and evaluated on PlanetLab. Using measurements on PlanetLab and trace-based simulations, we demonstrate that Egoist's neighbor selection primitives significantly outperform existing heuristics on a variety of performance metrics, including delay, available bandwidth, and node utilization. Moreover, we demonstrate that Egoist is competitive with an optimal, but unscalable full-mesh approach, remains highly effective under significant churn, is robust to cheating, and incurs minimal overhead. Finally, we discuss some of the potential benefits Egoist may offer to applications.National Science Foundation (CISE/CSR 0720604, ENG/EFRI 0735974, CISE/CNS 0524477, CNS/NeTS 0520166, CNS/ITR 0205294; CISE/EIA RI 0202067; CAREER 04446522); European Commission (RIDS-011923

Impact in networks and ecosystems: building case studies that make a difference

open accessThis toolkit aims to support the building up of case studies that show the impact of project activities aiming to promote innovation and entrepreneurship. The case studies respond to the challenge of understanding what kinds of interventions work in the Southern African region, where, and why. The toolkit has a specific focus on entrepreneurial ecosystems and proposes a method of mapping out the actors and their relationships over time. The aim is to understand the changes that take place in the ecosystems. These changes are seen to be indicators of impact as increased connectivity and activity in ecosystems are key enablers of innovation. Innovations usually happen together with matching social and institutional adjustments, facilitating the translation of inventions into new or improved products and services. Similarly, the processes supporting entrepreneurship are guided by policies implemented in the common framework provided by innovation systems. Overall, policies related to systems of innovation are by nature networking policies applied throughout the socioeconomic framework of society to pool scarce resources and make various sectors work in coordination with each other. Most participating SAIS countries already have some kinds of identifiable systems of innovation in place both on national and regional levels, but the lack of appropriate institutions, policies, financial instruments, human resources, and support systems, together with underdeveloped markets, create inefficiencies and gaps in systemic cooperation and collaboration. In other words, we do not always know what works and what does not. On another level, engaging users and intermediaries at the local level and driving the development of local innovation ecosystems within which local culture, especially in urban settings, has evident impact on how collaboration and competition is both seen and done. In this complex environment, organisations supporting entrepreneurship and innovation often find it difficult to create or apply relevant knowledge and appropriate networking tools, approaches, and methods needed to put their processes to work for broader developmental goals. To further enable these organisations’ work, it is necessary to understand what works and why in a given environment. Enhanced local and regional cooperation promoted by SAIS Innovation Fund projects can generate new data on this little-explored area in Southern Africa. Data-driven knowledge on entrepreneurship and innovation support best practices as well as effective and efficient management of entrepreneurial ecosystems can support replication and inform policymaking, leading thus to a wider impact than just that of the immediate reported projects and initiatives