Collaborative Shopping Networks: Sharing the Wisdom of Crowds in E-Commerce Environments

Social web services have gained enormous popularity over the past years because of a steadily increasing demand for user participation in the whole web sphere. Social networks like MySpace or Facebook and media sites like Flickr or YouTube clearly demonstrate the variety and functionality of social sites. Significantly affected by this trend, online retail and e-commerce environments rapidly changed within the last years. Users were integrated into existing e-shops and mutated from simple buyers to fully integrated customers. Thus, a modern shop visitor can recommend products, leave comments, rate vendors or publish wish lists. This recent phenomenon, called social commerce or social shopping, leads to more customer satisfaction, user participation and social interaction. Accordingly, there is a strong demand for innovative social commerce models and concepts like crowdsourcing, consumer generated content or live shopping. This paper shows the results of an extended analysis of collaborative shopping networks and demonstrates the development of a representative interaction model. An evaluation of social commerce models gave insights into functionalities, interactions and entities of successful social web applications. To create a collaborative shopping network model, conventional web services as well as selected best practice cases were analyzed in detail. To meet the demands of modern consumers, success factors are presented in the final part

Citizen Empowerment on the Basis of the new Freedom of Information Act in Austria - Make Information Freedom Great Again

Austria is the only country in Europe that has official secrecy, so called “Amtsgeheimnis”, as a constitutional principle. In contrast to other countries, this has consequences for citizens in their dealings with the authorities. Information is therefore not free per se, but is only released under certain conditions. These are severely restricted. This leads to a number of problems, for example, Austria is already among the worst 10 countries in terms of freedom of information. A new Freedom of Information Act is intended to change this. In this paper, the authors present a prototype that enables query processing between citizens and government agencies. Cloud services are used, and the data does not leave the respective data sovereignty

SOCIAL ONLINE SHOPPING: NEUE FORMEN DER INTERAKTION UND KOLLABORATION IM ELECTRONIC COMMERCE DER ZUKUNFT

Der große Erfolg von etablierten Social Web Services wie Facebook, Twitter, Wikipedia oder YouTube führte innerhalb der letzten Jahre zu einer massiven Transformation im gesamten Web. Bedingt durch den verstärkten Einsatz von interaktiven und kollaborativen Elementen entwickelte sich parallel dazu der Internetuser von einem passiven Informationskonsumenten zu einem aktiven Inhaltsdistributor. Der anhaltende Trend zur Integration von Social Web Funktionalitäten beinflusst auch maßgeblich die aktuellen Entwicklungen im B2C und C2C Electronic Commerce. Innovative Konzepte im Bereich des Social Online Shopping ermöglichen dem Konsumenten aktive Partizipation und Kommunikation innerhalb interaktiv vernetzter Shopping-Plattformen. Dieser Beitrag veranschaulicht ein innovatives Rahmenwerk für Social Online Shopping-Anwendungen. Die Grundlage für das hier vorgestellte Design bildete eine Analyse von 100 etablierten Services, wobei ein besonderer Schwerpunkt auf vielfältige Integrationsmöglichkeiten und leichte Skalierbarkeit des Modells gelegt wurde. Abschließend werden identifizierte Kernfunktionalitäten, erfolgsversprechende Erlösmodelle und signifikante Metadaten, abgeleitet aus den analysierten Services, präsentiert

The impact of surgical delay on resectability of colorectal cancer: An international prospective cohort study

AIM: The SARS-CoV-2 pandemic has provided a unique opportunity to explore the impact of surgical delays on cancer resectability. This study aimed to compare resectability for colorectal cancer patients undergoing delayed versus non-delayed surgery. METHODS: This was an international prospective cohort study of consecutive colorectal cancer patients with a decision for curative surgery (January-April 2020). Surgical delay was defined as an operation taking place more than 4 weeks after treatment decision, in a patient who did not receive neoadjuvant therapy. A subgroup analysis explored the effects of delay in elective patients only. The impact of longer delays was explored in a sensitivity analysis. The primary outcome was complete resection, defined as curative resection with an R0 margin. RESULTS: Overall, 5453 patients from 304 hospitals in 47 countries were included, of whom 6.6% (358/5453) did not receive their planned operation. Of the 4304 operated patients without neoadjuvant therapy, 40.5% (1744/4304) were delayed beyond 4 weeks. Delayed patients were more likely to be older, men, more comorbid, have higher body mass index and have rectal cancer and early stage disease. Delayed patients had higher unadjusted rates of complete resection (93.7% vs. 91.9%, P = 0.032) and lower rates of emergency surgery (4.5% vs. 22.5%, P < 0.001). After adjustment, delay was not associated with a lower rate of complete resection (OR 1.18, 95% CI 0.90-1.55, P = 0.224), which was consistent in elective patients only (OR 0.94, 95% CI 0.69-1.27, P = 0.672). Longer delays were not associated with poorer outcomes. CONCLUSION: One in 15 colorectal cancer patients did not receive their planned operation during the first wave of COVID-19. Surgical delay did not appear to compromise resectability, raising the hypothesis that any reduction in long-term survival attributable to delays is likely to be due to micro-metastatic disease

Dual-incision minimally invasive fasciotomy of the anterior and peroneal compartments for chronic exertional compartment syndrome of the lower leg

To evaluate the risk of iatrogenic injury when using a dual-incision minimally invasive technique to decompress the anterior and peroneal compartments of the lower leg. Forty lower extremities from 20 adult cadavers, embalmed with Thiel’s method, were subject to fasciotomy of the anterior and peroneal compartment using a dual-incision minimally invasive fasciotomy. The first incision was made 12 cm proximal to the lateral malleolus to identify and protect the superficial peroneal nerve (SPN). The second incision was made at the mid-point of the Fibula (half-way between the fibular head and the lateral malleolus). Release of the anterior and peroneal compartments was successful in all specimens. Two nerve injuries of the superficial peroneal nerve were reported. More precisely, in these cases the medial dorsal cutaneous nerve got injured during the fascial opening of the extensor compartment. Two incision minimally invasive fasciotomy to decompress the anterior and peroneal compartments of the lower leg appears to be safe with regard to the results of this study

Axillary nerve elongation in humeral fracture plating: A cadaveric study for comparison between straight and helical Philos plates

Helical plating is a known concept in humeral fracture treatment. Attention should be paid to the axillary nerve when inserting a plate underneath the deltoid muscle. The purpose of this cadaveric study was to estimate axillary nerve stretching when introducing the plate. METHODS: On 42 fresh frozen human humeri, an 8-, 10- and 12-hole Philos plate in a straight and a helical shape were compared measuring the maximum plate-bone-distance. RESULTS: For all three plate lengths, the helical plates had a significantly lower plate-bone-distance. CONCLUSION: Indirectly, this suggests a lower axillary nerve elongation and hence less chance of nerve damage.status: publishe

Screw placement in two different implants for proximal humeral fractures regarding regional differences in bone mineral density: An anatomical study.

BACKGROUND: The aim of this study was to investigate proximal humerus plating regarding drill depth and over penetration of the glenohumeral joint and to find a relation between these findings and different areas of bone mineral density (BMD) in the humeral head. MATERIAL & METHODS: The study sample involved 45 upper extremities from human adult cadavers. Two different plates (HOFER; PHILOS) were applied to the proximal humerus. Each hole was drilled until the respective participant thought to have placed the drill bit subchondral. Next, penetration of the far cortex was conducted to determine the residual bone stock. Additionally, the point of screw penetration of the far cortex was identified for each hole of the plates and allocated to five regions with different bone mineral density as described by Tingart et al. RESULTS: The screw penetration rate and the residual bone stock were compared within the 5 BMD regions. A significantly thicker residual bone stock was found at the central region (SD ± 13.1 mm) than in the anterior region (SD ± 9.5 mm) and in the posterior region (SD ± 8.5 mm). The anterior region revealed a significantly higher penetration rate than the posterior region (p = 0.01) and the central region (p = 0.03). CONCLUSION: The anterior region of the humeral head was associated with a higher over penetration rate of the far cortex into the glenohumeral joint and a decreased bone stock after subchondral drilling representing a reduced bone mineral density (BMD). LEVEL OF EVIDENCE: Cadaver Study.status: Published onlin

Evaluation of screw placement in proximal humerus fractures regarding drilling manoeuvre and surgeon's experience.

INTRODUCTION: Following proximal humeral plate osteosynthesis, mechanical complication rates ranging up to 40% have been reported. The study aims to determine the influence of surgeons' experience and the technique of drilling on the complication rate. MATERIALS AND METHODS: The sample involved 45 cadaveric humeri. Six orthopaedic surgeons were divided into two groups with regard to their level of experience (novice versus expert group). On each humerus two different proximal humerus plates were applied. Drillings were performed either with a sharp or worn drill bit (to simulate either sharp or blunt drilling). The respective holes were drilled until the respective participant thought to have placed the drill bit subchondrally, followed by perforation of the cartilage of the humeral head. Both these values and cases of unintended penetration of the articular cavity were evaluated. RESULTS: Fourteen holes (3.6%) were primary penetrated in the joint cavity in the worn-drill-bit-subgroup and 19 holes (5%) in the sharp-drill-bit-group. The latter had an average distance between the chosen subchondral position and the humeral articular surface of 8.3 mm and the worn-drill-bit-subgroup was at 10.6 mm. In the novice group 20 perforations (5.2%) of the joint space occurred and the mean interval between the chosen subchondral point and the humeral articular surface was 4.0 mm. The experienced surgeons showed a perforation rate of 3.4% and were at a mean of 14.9 mm. There were no significant differences regarding drilling manoeuvres and experience. CONCLUSION: Although our results are satisfactory, they can be traced back to the relatively high interval between the respective chosen position of the drill bit and the humeral articular surface which may not guarantee screw stability during ORIF of all fracture patterns.status: Published onlin

Influence of preparation and football skill level on injury incidence during an amateur football tournament

Introduction Scientific studies on injury characteristics are rather common in professional football but not in amateur football despite the thousands of amateur football tournaments taking place worldwide each year. The purpose of this study was to evaluate the preparation and injury patterns of players of two different football skill levels who participated in an international amateur football tournament. Methods In a prospective cohort study, an international amateur football tournament of medical doctors in 2011 was analysed with regard to training and warm-up preparation, the level of football played before the tournament and injury data during the tournament by means of standardised injury definitions and data samples for football. Results: Amateur players of registered football clubs had higher training exposure before the tournament (p < 0.001) than recreational players and had more frequently performed warm-up programmes (p < 0.001). Recreational football players showed a significantly higher overall injury incidence (p < 0.002), particularly of overuse injuries (p < 0.001), during the tournament than amateur players. In almost 75 % of players in both groups, the body region most affected by injuries and complaints was the lower extremities. Orthopaedic and trauma surgeons had the lowest overall injury incidence and anaesthetists the highest (p = 0.049) during the tournament. Conclusion For the first time, this study presents detailed information on the injury incidence and injury patterns of an amateur football tournament. Less-trained recreational players sustained significantly more injuries than better-trained amateur players, probably due to the lack of sufficient preparation before the tournament. Preventive strategies against overuse and traumatic injuries of recreational football players should start with regular training and warm-up programmes in preparation for a tournament