The Next Paradigm Shift in the Mobile Ecosystem: Mobile Social Computing and the Increasing Relevance of Users

Social computing has become the paradigm for the increasingly relevant role of users in the Internet world. In this paper, it is argued that mobile social computing will eventually cause an even bigger impact in the mobile ecosystem. We are already at the beginning of the "transference" of a significant part of Internet social computing usage to the mobile domain, where users are no longer passive consumers of content andapplications, but co-creators and even innovators of them. However, mobile social computing will go one step further in the contribution to the development of the mobile ecosystem, since it will put the many situations of users' daily activities at the centre stage. To prove this case, this paper gathers available data and evidence on the patterns of mobile social computing usage and discusses user innovation and user empowerment in the framework of the current mobile ecosystem.Mobile social computing, user innovation, mobile ecosystem.

Digital media and the transformation of content industries

In media and content industries, the main effect of digitization has been a radical transformation of information formats and displays. In fact, these formats and displays are responsible for the shifting perceptions of users-consumers concerning how they relate and interact with information. However, in spite of its considerable relevance, the bidirectional relationship between formats/displays and users has been seldom studied. This brief paper presents an overview of the evolution of displays and devices in some key media and content subsectors -publishing and distribution of books and newspapers- with the main objective of hinting at the next steps in their evolution

Factores clave en los mercados de acceso móvil a contenidos

El propósito de este artículo es la identificación y análisis de los factores (técnicos, económicos, sociales y normativos) que, en la actualidad, y también lo harán en el medio plazo, están contribuyendo o impidiendo el desarrollo de los mercados de acceso a contenidos por medio de redes móviles. Este repaso sirve para establecer un marco general en que encuadrar posteriores investigaciones y, a la vez, hace posible sugerir qué medidas serían convenientes para orientar la futura evolución del sector. The main goal of the analysis summarized in this paper is to identify essential economic, technological, social and legal forces that are currently shaping (and will shape, in the short and middle-term) the mobile content sector. To illustrate the nature of their impact should inform subsequent research and provide policy-makers with a coherent and comprehensive picture of the sector¿s current state and future evolution.JRC.J.3-Information Societ

Human to robot hand motion mapping methods: review and classification

In this article, the variety of approaches proposed in literature to address the problem of mapping human to robot hand motions are summarized and discussed. We particularly attempt to organize under macro-categories the great quantity of presented methods, that are often difficult to be seen from a general point of view due to different fields of application, specific use of algorithms, terminology and declared goals of the mappings. Firstly, a brief historical overview is reported, in order to provide a look on the emergence of the human to robot hand mapping problem as a both conceptual and analytical challenge that is still open nowadays. Thereafter, the survey mainly focuses on a classification of modern mapping methods under six categories: direct joint, direct Cartesian, taskoriented, dimensionality reduction based, pose recognition based and hybrid mappings. For each of these categories, the general view that associates the related reported studies is provided, and representative references are highlighted. Finally, a concluding discussion along with the authors’ point of view regarding future desirable trends are reported.This work was supported in part by the European Commission’s Horizon 2020 Framework Programme with the project REMODEL under Grant 870133 and in part by the Spanish Government under Grant PID2020-114819GB-I00.Peer ReviewedPostprint (published version

Giants with feet of clay: the sustainability of the business models in music streaming services

This paper examines the sustainability of the recorded music industry from the perspective of music performers. Music streaming platforms, or digital music service providers (DMSPs), have changed the recorded music industry paradigm since the middle of the 2010s. Business models for performers have evolved from royalty agreements based on sales to more complex remuneration systems based on revenues from a combination of (ad-based) free and paid subscriptions. Previous research has mainly focused on the examination of the business models of streaming services from the point of view of the innovation players (digital platforms) and/or the traditional dominant intermediaries (record labels and publishers). However, not all innovation-driven transformations are sustainable. In this paper, we argue that the sustainability of the main business models in the music industry demands the consideration of the performers’ perspective. We combine a qualitative approach with primary and secondary data sources to investigate the sustainability of existing trends of business models and business practices for different categories of performers, including both monetary values and a description of how revenues are shared. We conclude that DMSPs foster an asymmetric value chain in which the creative players barely capture value while technology-based innovations increase the capability of DMSPs to generate and capture value. Finally, we outline some alternative business models looking for the long-term sustainability of the digital music marketplace

Simulating digital dividend auctions: Service neutrality versus dedicated licences

The award of the digital dividend can consolidate auctions as the preferred mechanism for spectrum allocation. Knowing in advance an estimate of what the results of an auction with these characteristics could be would be unquestionably useful for those in charge of designing the process, even if at the end another method such as a beauty contest is chosen. This article provides a simulation of a digital dividend auction in a major-type European country. In one of the scenarios, the spectrum is not pre-allocated to any service in particular (service neutrality) while in the remaining four, blocks of spectrum are pre-allocated to DTT, mobile multimedia and mobile broadband communications. The results of the simulations reveal that the service neutrality scenario maximizes revenues for the seller and that, in general, DTT operators would seem to have fewer opportunities as the spectrum packaging is less protective for them

Contact force transitions in regrasp tasks of planar objects

This paper presents a simple and fast solution to the problem of finding the time variations of the forces that keep the object equilibrium when a finger is removed from a three contact point grasp or a finger is added to a two contact point grasp, assuming the existence of an external perturbation force (that can be the object weight itself). The procedure returns force set points for the control system of a manipulator device in a regrasping action. The approach was implemented and a numerical example is included in the paper to illustrate how it works

Unveiling the intricate public-private interplay in next generation communications

For most of the last century, telephone services and telecommunication services more generally were provided by national companies operating as monopolies. The monopolist was in charge of deploying the networks, using criteria that were often more political than economic. The generalisation tends to hold internationally, although at certain times and in certain places, it has not been true. The United States is the most prominent exception. In the mid-1980s, the first tentative efforts to reform the sector began. Once these efforts intensified and spread, they led to an extraordinary transformation process that in most cases included the privatisation of the monopolistic companies. Barely a decade after the first instances of privatisation, with markets being progressively liberalised and companies operating in competition, it seemed that the direct construction of networks by public bodies or companies under their control was definitely left behind. However, almost at the same time as the privatisation process reached its zenith of activity, new policies of unquestionable influence on the industry emerged. The rise of what has been called the knowledge economy or new economy has reinforced the role of telecommunications as a strategic investment. The consensus regarding the importance of telecommunications has changed the reasoning at play. It no longer includes the existence of an adequate infrastructure as a factor affecting regional development. Instead, its absence is considered a sign of underdevelopment. As a result, governments pay particular attention to telecommunications. This renewed interest includes direct intervention in network deploymen

An integrated latent variable and choice model to explore the role of privacy concern on stated behavioural intentions in e-commerce

Consumers' privacy concerns remain the primary barrier for future growth of e-commerce. Research to date has so far considered privacy concerns either as an independent variable to explore consumers' actual (or stated) behavioural intentions (e.g. the decision to purchase goods online) or as dependent variable explained through a number of antecedents (e.g. privacy awareness). However, there has not been a formal link across antecedents, latent constructs and (stated) behavioural intentions. This study establishes this link through a stated choice experiment, and an integrated latent variable and choice model. The proposed approach simultaneously explains individuals' perceptions of privacy and general caution through observed individual characteristics and explores how these perceptions, in the form of latent constructs, may be associated with consumers' decisions to engage with an online transaction. The stated choice experiment is designed to collect consumers' choices across online retailers, a conventional store and an opt-out option in which online retailers are presented with varying levels of personal-information requirements. The data was collected come from over 500 respondents representing the online-user population in the UK. Model estimation results show that the higher an individual's privacy concern, general caution and technical protection, the less likely a consumer is to purchase a product online. In a joint model, the privacy concern variable is found to outweigh the effect of general caution and technical protection. Finally, consumers with higher levels of general caution are more sensitive towards an online retailer that shares their personal data with third parties