Predictability Issues in Recommender Systems Based on Web Usage Behavior towards Robust Collaborative Filtering

This paper examines the effect of Recommender Systems in security oriented issues. Currently research has begun to evaluate the vulnerabilities and robustness of various collaborative recommender techniques in the face of profile injection and shilling attacks. Standard collaborative filtering algorithms are vulnerable to attacks. The robustness of recommender system and the impact of attacks are well suited this study and examined in this paper. The predictability issues and the various attack strategies are also discussed. Based on KNN the robustness of the recommender system were examined and the sensitivity of the rating given by the users are also analyzed. Furthermore the robust PLSA also considered for the work

Understanding the Sources of Online Travel Information

Given that online travel media enable multilateral communication patterns in destination marketing, this study investigates technical attributes presenting the number and type of source-related visual cues. From a technological perspective, the sources of online travel information can be conceptualized in terms of specialization, endorsement, and other users’ star rating to reflect technological functions and psychological effects. An experiment with a 2 (specialization: a generalist website vs. a specialist website) × 2 (endorsement: absence vs. presence) × 3 (star rating: low vs. medium vs. high) factorial between-subjects design was conducted to test the relationships between source-related visual cues, cue-induced perceptions, information credibility, and destination images. This study found that each source-related visual cue produced distinctive psychological effects on a tourist’s perceptions. Furthermore, these cue-induced perceptions were influential to tourists’ judgment of information credibility, which was positively related to destination images and behavioral intention

Philippic.com

A recent trend in so-called second generation legal commentary about the Internet suggests that, though it is an unparalleled communication medium and a means of engaging in global e-commerce, it is not an unmitigated force for good. Instead, the Net poses a fundamental danger to democracy. This trend takes shape in works by well-known cyberlaw theorists like Lawrence Lessig, Andrew Shapiro, and Neil Weinstock Netanel, but the most recent and most troubling criticism lies in Professor Cass Sunstein \u27s Republic.com. In this book, Professor Sunstein argues that perfect filtering of information on the Internet will lead to a fractured communications environment. He suggests that this fracturing will lead to group polarization, cascades of false information, and a concomitant rise in extremism. Governmental regulation of the Internet to reduce these features is therefore warranted, and desirable. He suggests that the appropriate regulatory responses should include setting up or supporting public environments for deliberation and debate on the Net, along with a series of disclosure and must-carry rules. This Review finds fault with almost every major feature of Sunstein \u27s argument. First, it dismisses his assumptions that perfect filtering on the Net is either likely to occur, is possible in the sense that he suggests, or is significantly different from the media filtering that we already experience. Second, it argues that Sunstein misapplies the social psychology literature on group polarization toward more extreme positions. Contrary to the fundamental basis of Republic.com, the research on group polarization does not inevitably lead to the conclusion that the Internet creates extremist communications or behavior. Third, it suggests that Sunstein\u27s theory of governance is controversial, and that important features of cyberlibertarian and historicist governance theories seriously undermine his position. And finally, this Review criticizes Sunstein \u27s proposals for reform as utterly meritless. These proposals are either contradicted by his own earlier perfect filtering argument, or by his misunderstanding of the Net as a local broadcast medium

Agenda Cueing in Aggregated Newsfeeds

This dissertation brings together the findings from three experimental studies that seek to understand how exposure to information in an online news aggregating portal can influence users’ perceptions of the relative importance of problems facing society. Theoretically, this investigation relies on two foundational ideas. One is that in today’s high-choice, multi-source media environment communication flows are curated by a variety of gatekeeping actors, such as algorithms and fellow users. Individuals can have varying attitudes toward and perceptions of these gatekeepers, which can influence the effects of exposure to online information, including agenda-setting outcomes. Another is that users of digital news, facing a nearly infinite supply of information, rely heavily on presentation cues embedded in news platforms’ interfaces to navigate the news landscape and make sense of the messages they encounter. These powerful features can communicate the identity of gatekeepers who curate the newsfeed, as well as particular mechanisms of curation. Using the data from a longitudinal experiment where participants were exposed to a dynamic, constantly updated news portal populated with real news, the first study tests the comparative effects of two user-sourced cues representing different logics of content selection. The analysis does not support the expectation of differential agenda-setting effects, yet this finding could be the result of study design that did not allow for sufficient control of all the aspects of the treatment. The second experiment is a pilot test of an alternative experimental design that allows for a cleaner test of interface agenda cues’ differential effects. Its success in influencing users’ issue priorities paves the way for the main experiment that utilizes the same treatment mechanism. This study reveals that different types of interface agenda cues can influence users’ perceptions of issue importance differently in the news portal context. Consistent with the agenda cueing hypothesis, users high in gatekeeping trust are revealed to be especially susceptible to media agenda cues. In conclusion, I argue that interfaces of digital platforms should become the subject of public scrutiny, while news literacy interventions should focus on raising people’s awareness of how digital platforms aggregate and present the news