Content Creators Between Platform Control and User Autonomy. The Role of Algorithms and Revenue Sharing

Content creators generate and upload content on social media platforms. If these platforms have a revenue-sharing policy, content creators earn income from advertising revenue. This income is heavily dependent on the distribution of the content and the resulting view counts. Platform owners may exert algorithmic control that impacts content distribution, advertising income, and, consequently, the behaviour of content creators. The objectives of the platform owners combined with the interests of the content creators may lead to paradoxical tensions between the aims of control and autonomy. The opaque nature of algorithms coupled with the need to be recognised by the algorithm further reinforces this phenomenon. This study follows an interpretive qualitative research approach applying grounded theory methodology. This research uses semi-structured interviews with content creators to develop a theory explaining the tension between control and autonomy on revenue-sharing social media platforms. The study shows that algorithmic control and incentivisation create paradoxical tensions that affect the autonomy of content creators. Content creators attempt to minimise tensions of algorithm versus audience, regularity versus scheduling autonomy, and analytics versus decision-making autonomy in two ways: through self-centred measures such as improving metrics, pre-production, and being a pioneer and extraneous measures involving their own businesses, products, and sponsorships. This study sheds some light on the phenomenon of paradoxical tensions and provides guidance and strategies for content creators and platform owners about proceeding with their relationship. This study’s findings provide platform owners and decision-makers with a deeper understanding of the behaviour of content creators and the hurdles they face in platform work. The findings help them identify challenges, draw conclusions, and implement changes

UNDERSTANDING VIRTUAL EXPERIENCE AND TELEPRESENCE - A REVIEW AND SYNTHESIS OF LITERATURE

To enable buyers to be better informed before purchasing, products and services can be virtually experienced on the internet. Research into virtual experience (VE) and the related construct of telepresence (TP) as means of online marketing has made great progress in recent years. However, there is still disagreement in the literature concerning the exact understanding of these terms. In this study, the two terms are analyzed by means of a systematically executed literature review, differentiated from one another, and their understandings explained. This study is to our knowledge the first to compare the concepts of VE and TP in a systematic way. The analysis shows that TP is regarded as the feeling of presence conveyed by a communication medium. VE, on the other hand, is to be defined as an active state of a consumer through the use of computer-based presentation formats, and constituting a subtype of TP. These findings are intended to help VE and TP become more uniformly understood and make it easier to compare the results of future studies. Finally, from the literature review, it is possible to derive focal points for research in future studies

CRM-Prozess-Outsourcing in der Telekommunikationsindustrie

Zusammenfassung: Die qualitativ-empirische Studie zeigt, ob und welche Customer-Relationship-Management-(CRM-)Prozesse bei Telekommunikationsunternehmen ausgelagert werden. Die Entscheidungen für oder gegen ein Outsourcing lassen sich teilweise auf der Basis des Transaktionskostenansatzes begründen. Im Wesentlichen werden nur operative CRM-Prozesse ausgelagert. Dabei sind vor allem Prozesse von niedrigerer Komplexität und strategischer Bedeutung betroffen. Komplexere Prozesse werden nur dann ausgelagert, wenn sie nicht zugleich von hoher strategischer Bedeutung sind. Allerdings liefert dieses Modell nicht für alle Auslagerungsentscheide bezüglich CRM-Prozessen plausible Begründungen, weshalb weitere Motive und Gründe für ein CRM-Prozess-Outsourcing herangezogen werde

Wertbasiertes Design von Entscheidungsunterstützungssystemen - Von der Wertetabelle zur praktischen Umsetzung

The implementation of complex algorithms in decision support systems (DSS) offers companies new opportunities to reduce cognitive load in decisionmaking processes and to achieve better outcomes. However, voices from research and practice warn of the associated dangers. These include the systematic misjudgement of certain groups, incorrect assessment of (entrepreneurial) risks, and unclear responsibilities in the event of personal or material damage. Values are an increasingly important concept in this regard because algorithms and DSS based on them are not neutral artifacts, they are rather shaped by values and value assumptions arising during the development process. Value Sensitive Design (VSD) is used to account for this “value-ladenness” by creating a list of values that is considered important by users and developers with respect to a DSS. Except conceptual considerations, however, there is currently a lack of concrete practical operationalization of such value-lists. Using predictive policing as a practical example, we detail how a valuelist can be used for the design of a DSS and what difficulties can arise in this process. The employed three-step operationalization process provides clear guidelines to practitioners for considering the value-ladenness and resulting problems already during the development of DSS

Web Analytics: Empirische Untersuchung über den Einsatz, Nutzen und die Probleme der Webanalyse

Eine Expertenbefragung unter 740 Web-Analytics-Spezialisten im deutschsprachigen Raum zeigte, dass die Webanalyse einen hohen Wertbeitrag für das Informationsmanagement im eBusiness liefert. Web Analytics hilft Unternehmen bei der Analyse der Website-Nutzung, bei der Optimierung des eMarketings (Kampagnenmanagement, Suchmaschinenoptimierung) und der Website, d.h. Content, Navigation und Usability. Web Analytics als ein strategisches Steuerungs- und Management-Instrument hilft in 10 von 11 Fällen, die Ziele der Website und des Online-Geschäfts zu messen und zu erreichen. Dazu gehört die Kundengewinnung bzw. -bindung, die Bereitstellung von Informationen und die Kommunikation mit Website-Nutzern. Mangelnde Erfahrung und Ressourcen hindern Firmen daran, die Nutzenpotentiale von Web-Analytics-Software auszuschöpfen und erhöhen verschiedene Anwenderprobleme