Open Source vs. Proprietary Software: Competition and Compatibility

We use a Hotelling linear city model to study competition between open source and proprietary software, where only the producer of the proprietary software aims at maximizing the profit. The producer of the proprietary software must decide on compatibility. Different compatibility strategies will lead to different network externality, and thus result in different profit for the producer of the proprietary software. We found that the proprietary producer¡¯s choice of compatibility strategy depends on the market coverage conditions. When the market is fully covered, one-way compatibility is the best strategy for the proprietary software. When the market is partly covered, two-way compatibility is the best strategy. Such results are not affected by software quality. Furthermore, when the provider of the open source software pursues the maximum market share rather than reacts passively, two-way compatibility would be the best choice for both the open source and the proprietary software. Moreover, the proprietary software producer does not favor its proprietary rival changing to open source software. Such a change may lower the social welfare.Open Source Software, Proprietary Software, Compatibility, Competition

Open Source vs. Proprietary Software: Competition and Compatibility

e use a Hotelling linear city model to study competition between open source and proprietary software, where only the producer of the proprietary software aims at maximizing the profit. The producer of the proprietary software must decide on compatibility. Different compatibility strategies will lead to different network externality, and thus result in different profit for the producer of the proprietary software. We found that the proprietary producer¡¯s choice of compatibility strategy depends on the market coverage conditions. When the market is fully covered, one-way compatibility is the best strategy for the proprietary software. When the market is partly covered, two-way compatibility is the best strategy. Such results are not affected by software quality. Furthermore, when the provider of the open source software pursues the maximum market share rather than reacts passively, two-way compatibility would be the best choice for both the open source and the proprietary software. Moreover, the proprietary software producer does not favor its proprietary rival changing to open source software. Such a change may lower the social welfare.Open Source Software, Proprietary Software, Compatibility, Competition

Understanding suppliers\u27 participation in business-to-government (B2G) electronic auction markets in the thai context

This paper investigates online knowledge sharing behaviour in Baidu Knows, a platform sponsored by the largest search engine company Baidu in China. We developed a spider engine to collect data from over 2 million questions posted at Baidu Knows. The data collected allows us to profile registered members, to answer questions such as who are the main driving force of those online communities and their attributes, and who are the free-riders seldom posting and answering questions. We also test several hypotheses in explaining the motivations of knowledge sharing, and the quality of such knowledge sharing. Our results indicate that there is a large proportion of users who seldom answer questions, but always ask questions. Although their behaviour seems selfish at the surface, they are actually the key factors driving the growth of online knowledge sharing communitie

Three applications of economic theory and methodology in information systems research

Ph.DDOCTOR OF PHILOSOPH

Calculated Based Trust and Social Welfare

Trust building has been acknowledged as one of the critical factor for the success of e-commerce. However, few sources of trust were identified in online transaction. This paper tries to fill the gap by investigating calculative-based trust. Specifically, an infinitely repeated game model is built to illustrate how strangers in online transaction build trust relationship based on the calculation of their own benefits. Furthermore, we relate the strategies of trading parties to social welfare and provide policy implications on how to control the cheating behaviors without jeopardizing social welfare

Categorisation of Tinnitus Severity for the Mandarin Tinnitus Questionnaire

Background: The Tinnitus Questionnaire is commonly used to evaluate the psychological impact of tinnitus and has been translated into Mandarin. The original English version of the Tinnitus Questionnaire was translated into Mandarin (MTQ). The MTQ included not the same items compared with original version. Thus, MTQ should have its own severity categorization. Aims/objectives: The objective of this research was to develop a method to categorize tinnitus patients by clinical severity using scores from the Mandarin Tinnitus Questionnaire (MTQ). Material and Methods: A total of 192 participants with primary complaint of tinnitus were enrolled. Cross-tabulation was used to compare two categorization approaches of tinnitus severity. With the first approach, categories were assigned based purely on quartiles of MTQ scores. In the second approach, severity was determined based on Ordinal logistic regression. The two approaches were verified by comparing the consistency with clinical judgement. Results: Categorization based on quartiles showed low consistency with clinical assessment(kappa=0.33), while categorization based on ordinal logistic regression showed good consistency with clinical assessment(kappa = 0.86).Regression-based MTQ score cut-offs were 47 for severe tinnitus. Conclusions and significance: Tinnitus severity can be categorized accurately using ordinal logistic regression analysis of MTQ scores

Effects of Different Pickling Methods on the Water Retention and Protein Oxidation of Salted Goose Raw Material

This study aimed to investigate the impact of different pickling methods on the water retention and protein structure of salted goose raw material. Five pickling methods, namely conventional curing, vacuum tumbling curing, ultrasound curing, ultrasound combined with tumbling curing, and salt and tumbling curing, were employed, with a curing duration of 2 hours. The cured goose meat samples were analyzed for cooking loss, centrifugal loss, microstructure, as well as the carbonyl content, surface hydrophobicity, total sulfhydryl content, and sodium dodecyl sulfate-polyacrylamide gel electrophoresis (SDS-PAGE) of the myofibrillar proteins. The results indicated that the ultrasound combined with tumbling curing method exhibited superior water-holding capacity, resulting in significant enhancement of the tenderness of goose meat. Additionally, this curing method caused the most notable damage to the microstructure of muscle fibers. The myofibrillar proteins in the ultrasound combined with tumbling cured goose meat exhibited lower surface hydrophobicity (5.17 μg) and carbonyl content (0.92 nmol/mg) compared to the vacuum tumbling, salt and tumbling, and ultrasound curing groups. Conversely, the total sulfhydryl content was highest (87.9 nmol/mg), indicating lower protein oxidation levels. SDS-PAGE analysis revealed prominent diffusion of protein bands at the 43 kDa position and denser bands between 26 and 43 kDa for the ultrasound combined with tumbling cured samples, indicating protein degradation. In conclusion, ultrasound combined with tumbling curing represents the optimum curing method