Going means trouble and staying makes it double: the value of licensing recorded music online

This paper discusses whether a copyright compensation system (CCS) for recorded music—endowing private Internet subscribers with the right to download and use works in return for a fee—would be welfare increasing. It reports on the results of a discrete choice experiment conducted with a representative sample of the Dutch population consisting of 4986 participants. Under some conservative assumptions, we find that applied only to recorded music, a mandatory CCS could increase the welfare of rights holders and users in the Netherlands by over €600 million per year (over €35 per capita). This far exceeds current rights holder revenues from the market of recorded music of ca. €144 million per year. A monthly CCS fee of ca. €1.74 as a surcharge on Dutch Internet subscriptions would raise the same amount of revenues to rights holders as the current market for recorded music. With a voluntary CCS, the estimated welfare gains to users and rights holders are even greater for CCS fees below €20 on the user side. A voluntary CCS would also perform better in the long run, as it could retain a greater extent of market coordination. The results of our choice experiment indicate that a well-designed CCS for recorded music would simultaneously make users and rights holders better off. This result holds even if we correct for frequently observed rates of overestimation in contingent valuation studies

Clinical Subtypes of Depression Are Associated with Specific Metabolic Parameters and Circadian Endocrine Profiles in Women: The Power Study

Major depressive disorder (MDD) has been associated with adverse medical consequences, including cardiovascular disease and osteoporosis. Patients with MDD may be classified as having melancholic, atypical, or undifferentiated features. The goal of the present study was to assess whether these clinical subtypes of depression have different endocrine and metabolic features and consequently, varying medical outcomes.Premenopausal women, ages 21 to 45 years, with MDD (N = 89) and healthy controls (N = 44) were recruited for a prospective study of bone turnover. Women with MDD were classified as having melancholic (N = 51), atypical (N = 16), or undifferentiated (N = 22) features. Outcome measures included: metabolic parameters, body composition, bone mineral density (BMD), and 24 hourly sampling of plasma adrenocorticotropin (ACTH), cortisol, and leptin.Compared with control subjects, women with undifferentiated and atypical features of MDD exhibited greater BMI, waist/hip ratio, and whole body and abdominal fat mass. Women with undifferentiated MDD characteristics also had higher lipid and fasting glucose levels in addition to a greater prevalence of low BMD at the femoral neck compared to controls. Elevated ACTH levels were demonstrated in women with atypical features of depression, whereas higher mean 24-hour leptin levels were observed in the melancholic subgroup.Pre-menopausal women with various features of MDD exhibit metabolic, endocrine, and BMD features that may be associated with different health consequences.ClinicalTrials.gov NCT00006180

Altered Effective Connectivity Network of the Amygdala in Social Anxiety Disorder: A Resting-State fMRI Study

The amygdala is often found to be abnormally recruited in social anxiety disorder (SAD) patients. The question whether amygdala activation is primarily abnormal and affects other brain systems or whether it responds “normally” to an abnormal pattern of information conveyed by other brain structures remained unanswered. To address this question, we investigated a network of effective connectivity associated with the amygdala using Granger causality analysis on resting-state functional MRI data of 22 SAD patients and 21 healthy controls (HC). Implications of abnormal effective connectivity and clinical severity were investigated using the Liebowitz Social Anxiety Scale (LSAS). Decreased influence from inferior temporal gyrus (ITG) to amygdala was found in SAD, while bidirectional influences between amygdala and visual cortices were increased compared to HCs. Clinical relevance of decreased effective connectivity from ITG to amygdala was suggested by a negative correlation of LSAS avoidance scores and the value of Granger causality. Our study is the first to reveal a network of abnormal effective connectivity of core structures in SAD. This is in support of a disregulation in predescribed modules involved in affect control. The amygdala is placed in a central position of dysfunction characterized both by decreased regulatory influence of orbitofrontal cortex and increased crosstalk with visual cortex. The model which is proposed based on our results lends neurobiological support towards cognitive models considering disinhibition and an attentional bias towards negative stimuli as a core feature of the disorder

Einführung von Kommunikationsstandards in Unternehmensnetzwerken – ein gestaltungsorientierter Ansatz bei dezentraler Entscheidungsstruktur

Aktuell diskutierte Standards und Technologien (bspw. im Bereich Web Services) werden die IT-gestützte Kommunikation zwischen Unternehmen stark verändern. Die Standardisierungsentscheidung geht jedoch mit dem Risiko einher, einen Standard einzuführen, den andere Unternehmen danach nicht verwenden. Somit entsteht durch die netzeffektbedingte Interdependenz der Standardisierungsentscheidungen ein Koordinationsproblem, das Standardisierungsproblem. Handelt es sich dabei um autonom entscheidende Akteure (bspw. eigenständige Unternehmen), denen die Standardisierungsentscheidungen der anderen Akteure im Netzwerk nicht bekannt sind, liegt das Standardisierungsproblem bei dezentraler Entscheidungsstruktur und unvollständiger Information vor. Die Akteure müssen folglich jeweils unter Unsicherheit über die eigene Einführung eines Standards entscheiden. Um daraus resultierende Ineffizienzen zu reduzieren und Fehlentscheidungen zu vermeiden, wird im Beitrag ein gestaltungsorientierter Ansatz entwickelt. Dieser soll die einzelnen Akteure im Netzwerk unterstützen, die Standardisierungsentscheidungen der anderen Akteure und somit die im Falle einer Standardisierung resultierenden Netzeffekte zu antizipieren. Kern des Ansatzes ist es dabei, die Interdependenz der Entscheidungen modellendogen zu repräsentieren und das resultierende Gleichungssystem zu lösen

Hyperhidrosis Quality of Life Measures : Review and Patient Perspective

Purpose To identify the tools that have been used to measure quality of life in hyperhidrosis research and obtain patient insight on commonly used tools. Methods Twelve databases were searched to identify studies that reported measuring quality of life or described a quality of life tool in the context of hyperhidrosis. Data on the use of the tools were tabulated and hyperhidrosis-specific and dermatology-specific measures were summarised. A workshop was held to obtain the patients’ perspective on the most commonly used tools and the newly developed HidroQoL© tool. Results 182 studies were included in the review. Twenty-two quality of life tools were identified; two or more tools were often used in combination. The most commonly used tools were the Hyperhidrosis Disease Severity Scale, the Dermatology Quality of Life Index and the Hyperhidrosis Quality-of-Life Questionnaire. Patient advisors preferred the new HidroQoL© tool, which was considered to be easy to complete and most relevant to hyperhidrosis patients. Conclusions There are several tools available for assessing quality of life in hyperhidrosis patients; disease specific measures are widely used and appear suitable. It is unclear which tool is the most reliable, although the HidroQoL© tool was preferred by a small group of patient advisors