The Effect of Free Access on the Diffusion of Scholarly Ideas

This study investigates a relationship between free access to research articles and the diffusion of their ideas as measured by citation counts. By using a dataset from the Social Science Research Network (SSRN), an open repository of research articles, and employing a natural experiment that allows the effect of free access separate from other confounding factors, this study identifies the causal effect of free access on the citation counts. The natural experiment in this study is that a select group of published articles is posted on SSRN at a time chosen by their authors’ affiliated organizations or SSRN, not by their authors. Using a difference-in-difference method and comparing the citation profiles of the articles before and after the posting time on SSRN against a group of control articles with similar characteristics, I estimated the effect of the SSRN posting on citation counts to be 10-20% of total citations

3 essays in the economics of information technology

Thesis (Ph. D.)--Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Sloan School of Management, 2013.Cataloged from PDF version of thesis.Includes bibliographical references.The first chapter is to investigate the impact of a free on-line repository of research articles on the diffusion of their ideas measured by the citation counts. The key questions that this chapter answers are as following: 1) does a free on-line repository of research articles increase the diffusion of their scholarly ideas measured by their citations?; 2) who benefits from the free access? By using a dataset from the Social Science Research Network (SSRN), an open repository of research articles, and employing a natural experiment that allows the effect of free access separate from other confounding factors, this study identifies the causal effect of free access on the citation counts as well as shows a heterogeneous effect of free access on both supply and demand side. The second chapter is to study the correlation between CEO pay and information technology. The hypothesis is that IT increases "effective size" of the firm that a top manager controls and thus her marginal productivity. In turn, in an efficient market, the firms with a higher degree of information technology will reward their CEOs with a higher compensation. The third chapter is to examine whether firms that emphasize decision making based on data and business analytics ("data driven decision making" or DDD) show higher performance. Using detailed survey data on the business practices and information technology investments of 179 large publicly traded firms, this study finds that firms that adopt DDD have output and productivity that is 5-6% higher than what would be expected given their other investments and information technology usage. Furthermore, the relationship between DDD and performance also appears in other performance measures such as asset utilization, return on equity and market value. Using instrumental variables methods, this study finds evidence that the effect of DDD on the productivity do not appear to be due to reverse causality. These results provide some of the first large scale data on the direct connection between data-driven decision making and firm performance.by Heekyung Hellen Kim.Ph.D

Broadband penetration and participatory politics: South korea case

This paper examines the potential impact of the Internet on the political process in a young democracy. Roh Moo-hyun’s dramatic victory on December 19, 2002 represents a major watershed in modern day South Korean politics. The Internet enabled this upset victory. The Internet made available alternative sources of political information unfiltered by the conservative and often biased mass media. Citizens distributed worldwide could express their support for Roh Moo-hyun in the public forums on his official site and many other news and discussion sites. Rohsamo, a group of people who support Roh Moo-hyun, became the focal organizing structure around which the efforts of individual supporters were coordinated. In this paper we draw on primary and secondary data sources and relate broadband penetration to political participation. We suggest that Roh’s election would not have been possible had it not been for the nationwide broadband infrastructure and low costs for household high-speed Internet access. South Korea’s broadband penetration rate is four times higher than the United States, 60 times higher than the United Kingdom and twice that of Canada. As the world’s leader in broadband penetration and Internet usage, the South Korean case illustrates the potential impact of widespread Internet access on the democratization process in developing countries