“Is this an advertisement or a personal account?” – Commercialisation of lifestyle blogs in Finland

When blogging first appeared on the map of social media in the mid-1990s, the majority of bloggers were male writing for example about the developments of the online world, or if they were political reporters, looking for a new platform to publish their perhaps more controversial work. Today many blogs fall into the category of lifestyle blogs, which have thousands, sometimes even tens of thousands of individual readers per month throughout the world. In fact, professional blogging is one of the fastest growing phenomena online. It is driven mostly by relatively young women and promoted by the commercialisation of the blogging world, also known by bloggers as “the blogosphere”. During the past few years, lifestyle blogs have reached a point where one’s hobby has become – if not a full-time job – then at least a relevant part of professional lifestyle bloggers’ monthly income. The changes Finnish lifestyle bloggers have encountered as they have moved from personal diary-like entries towards corporate models of marketing and advertising have not taken place without their difficulties. Some blog readers criticise lifestyle blogs for becoming inauthentic market places without real content or integrity. There are also problems with the legislation that governs advertising in the blogosphere. The regulations have proven vague or difficult to carry out in social media, forcing professional lifestyle bloggers to defend their new trade not only against some of their readers but also in the eyes of the law. In this article I examine the contradictions between bloggers and advertising: why is it that while many bloggers promote an open relationship towards advertising in their blogs, they do not fully appreciate the existence of some of the regulations or guidelines that control advertising in their blogs? I am interested especially in the intimate relationship bloggers have developed with their readers, which has been greatly underplayed in the previous studies on lifestyle blogging, as well as with the commercial world of marketing in the context of advertising. My ethnographic description also adds to the understanding of the commercial aspects of lifestyle blogging and of the professionalisation of the blogosphere. The research data include the blog posts of 20 professional lifestyle bloggers as well as an ethnographic description of the Finnish blogosphere online. The research materials are analysed by using contextualised thematic analysis. &nbsp

Model for international trade of sawnwood using machine learning models

The study tests the potential of machine learning models to analyse and forecast global bilateral trade flows of soft sawnwood by countries. The empirical trade flow data including annual import and export quantities and prices of soft sawnwood from 2000 to 2014 is obtained from FAOStat. We compare forecasting results from three methods, which can be classified as machine learning models: support vector machines (SVM), Neural networks and Random forests that is an ensemble of decision trees. The significant changes in the global sawnwood markets in the North America, Asia and Western Europe after the financial and economic crises of 2008-2009 raise the question to update the modelling of trade flows. The information on the global trade flow developments are important for decision makers involved in strategic planning and forecasting at the European Union-, national- or industry level. The aim of this study is to test methods previously quite rarely applied in the forest sector market modelling, but which could be helpful for analysts to visualize and examine a large amount of bilateral trade data to have a view on ongoing changes and to assess next years’ developments. The results also support the Finnish Forest Sector Outlook Studies, which are published biannually by the Natural Resources Institute Finland (Luke). As an example we present empirical results for Finland and for some of its main competitor countries and export destinations.201

Обзор конъюнктуры рынка в лесной отрасли Финляндии 2015-2016

Luken kirjat, raportit, oppaat ja esitteet. Metsäsektorin suhdannekatsaus 2015-2016, venäjänkielinen tiivistelmä201

Suomen metsäteollisuus vuonna 2020 - arvio kehityksestä ja vaikutuksista

Artikkeli julkaistu alunperin metla.fi sivustoll

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Artikkeli julkaistu alunperin metla.fi sivustoll

A System for Short Term Forecasting of the Finnish Forest Sector (MESU): The Case of Sawnwood Imports and Sawlog Demand.

64 pp. + appendice

Johtavatko megatrendit biotalouteen?

201

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Tieteen tori: Metsäalan toimintaympäristön muutoksen ennakoint