Online-offline activities and game-playing behaviors of avatars in a massive multiplayer online role-playing game

Massive multiplayer online role-playing games (MMORPGs) are very popular in China, which provides a potential platform for scientific research. We study the online-offline activities of avatars in an MMORPG to understand their game-playing behavior. The statistical analysis unveils that the active avatars can be classified into three types. The avatars of the first type are owned by game cheaters who go online and offline in preset time intervals with the online duration distributions dominated by pulses. The second type of avatars is characterized by a Weibull distribution in the online durations, which is confirmed by statistical tests. The distributions of online durations of the remaining individual avatars differ from the above two types and cannot be described by a simple form. These findings have potential applications in the game industry.Comment: 6 EPL pages including 10 eps figure

Special Topic Forum on Supply Chain Management in Emerging Markets: Critical Research Issues

Spurred by the rapid development of international markets, w enhanced ease of communications and rapidly developing infrastructure, supply chains that transcend national boundaries have become standard in today's dynamic global environment, causing a number of critical research issues to emerge. The importance of such issues is intensified when considered in the unique environment faced by supply chains in emerging economies, such as Brazil, Russia, India and China. Traditional supply chain management practices may be ineffective, due to the unique characteristics of supply chains in emerging economies or that span developed and emerging economies. In this special topic forum, we seek high quality conceptual and empirical research that addresses critical research issues related to managing supply chains in emerging economies. Conceptual papers should draw upon and extend existing theoretical foundations, developing models and propositions for future research. Empirical research studies that employ survey methodology, structured case research, secondary data analysis, controlled experiments and other empirical approaches are welcomed. In line with JSCM's mission statement, authors must clearly identify how their work extends or contributes to theory relating to global supply chain management, as well as providing implications for practice