Lowering the barriers for online cross-media usage: Scenarios for a Belgian single sign-on solution

The digitization has led to an ecosystem in which an online media portal has become an essential extension of traditional media and users are enabled to consume news and entertainment via different platforms. These evolutions pose some challenges for the media companies in terms of shifting business models, but they also bring them new possibilities in managing their relations with users. An important first step here is to identify the online users and turn anonymous users into registered ones. Today, however, there is a myriad of logins and passwords one needs when surfing the web, which can make the management of these logins a challenge for users. The Belgian media industry seeks to deal with this challenge by introducing a collaborative nation-wide single sign-on (SSO) system across their digital platforms, called Media ID. This paper provides four scenarios describing the potential outcomes in terms of user adoption and hence market potential of the integration of a SSO service into a regional media system. The scenarios are built upon focus group interviews with media users and in-depth interviews with the stakeholders from the involved media companies. They describe to what extent the innovative service can influence user’s online media consumption behaviour but also to what extent the media companies can implement it, two factors that mutually shape each other. In the discussion of the scenarios, requirements to ensure the broad applicability of a SSO service by both media users and media organizations are identified

Perceptual quality of 4K-resolution video content compared to HD

With the introduction of 4K UHD video and display resolution, questions arise on the perceptual differences between 4K UHD and upsampled HD video content. In this paper, a striped pair comparison has been performed on a diverse set of 4K UHD video sources. The goal was to subjectively assess the perceived sharpness of 4K UHD and downscaled/upscaled HD video. A striped pair comparison has been applied in order to make the test as straightforward as possible for a non-expert participant population. Under these conditions and over this set of sequences, on average, on 54.8% of the sequences (17 out of 31), 4K UHD resolution content could be identified as being sharper compared to its HD down and upsampled alternative. The probabilities in which 4K UHD could be differentiated from downscaled/upscaled HD range from 83.3% for the easiest to assess sequence down to 39.7% for the most difficult sequence. Although significance tests demonstrate there is a positive sharpness difference from camera quality 4K UHD content compared to the HD downscaled/upscaled variations, it is very content dependent and all circumstances have been chosen in favor of the 4K UHD representation. The results of this test can contribute to the research process of developing metrics indicating visibility of high resolution features within specific content

Data mining in the development of mobile health apps : assessing in-app navigation through Markov chain analysis

Background: Mobile apps generate vast amounts of user data. In the mobile health (mHealth) domain, researchers are increasingly discovering the opportunities of log data to assess the usage of their mobile apps. To date, however, the analysis of these data are often limited to descriptive statistics. Using data mining techniques, log data can offer significantly deeper insights. Objective: The purpose of this study was to assess how Markov Chain and sequence clustering analysis can be used to find meaningful usage patterns of mHealth apps. Methods: Using the data of a 25-day field trial (n=22) of the Start2Cycle app, an app developed to encourage recreational cycling in adults, a transition matrix between the different pages of the app was composed. From this matrix, a Markov Chain was constructed, enabling intuitive user behavior analysis. Results: Through visual inspection of the transitions, 3 types of app use could be distinguished (route tracking, gamification, and bug reporting). Markov Chain-based sequence clustering was subsequently used to demonstrate how clusters of session types can otherwise be obtained. Conclusions: Using Markov Chains to assess in-app navigation presents a sound method to evaluate use of mHealth interventions. The insights can be used to evaluate app use and improve user experience

Towards a Belgian single sign-on media solution: Four scenarios from the market and consumer perspective

In October 2014, the big players of the Belgian media industry will introduce a collaborative nation-wide innovation to tackle collectively the challenges of the digital age. The Belgian media industry will introduce a single sign-on (SSO) system across their digital platforms, called Media ID. The Media ID service aims to provide a common federated identity management framework for user authentication and advanced user management for a diverse range of major players and their web- and mobile platforms, hereby giving Media ID the potential to have a market-wide impact.This paper concentrates on the creation of scenarios describing the potential outcome in terms of user adoption and hence market potential of the integration of a SSO service into the media industry. The scenarios built upon in-depth interviews with media stakeholders on the one hand and focus group interviews with media users on the other hand describe to what extent the innovative service can be implemented by media companies, and how this can change user's online media consumption behaviour and experience. In the discussion of the scenarios, identified requirements for success from the user perspective are privacy (transparency/user control), added value, ease of use, payment integration and security. Requirements for a widespread adaptation from the organisation perspective are integration of additional services/content, the usage of SSO provided user data and the integration of additional digital revenue streams. These requirements to ensure the broad applicability of a SSO service in the media industry have been identified and discussed

Location-sharing applications and information privacy: examining users' willingness to share location information

In today’s data-driven world, the user’s location is becoming an important feature within the creation of mobile services. The implementation of more accurate localization techniques has made it possible to develop new service concepts, and offer more appropriate services to users as information gets adjusted to the context. These location-based services (LBS) offer at first glance greater connectivity and efficiency gains, but seem to question the users’ information privacy as well. Possible privacy breaches through tracking and collecting preferences, behavior or identity, makes users concerned to disclose information and fully adopt these services. To address these privacy concerns, this study builds upon the privacy calculus theory to investigate the perceived risks and benefits resulting from the location information disclosure when using LBS. In addition, the role of privacy intervention approaches used by location-based service providers is examined, by including incentive provision, privacy control and privacy policy . The research model was tested using data gathered from a survey, filled in by 909 respondents. Structural equitation modeling reveals that privacy policy and privacy control both help in reducing privacy concerns, and subsequently the willingness to share location information. Extrinsic benefits have a positive, but moderate effect on willingness to share; while the intrinsic benefit of being aware of someone’s activities or presence has the greatest effect. These results enrich privacy research within the LBS context and provide a better understanding of how users can be empowered with regard to the management of their personal data