News Consumption of Russian Vkontakte Users: Polarization and News Avoidance

This study explores the patterns of news consumption of Russian users of Vkontakte, the most popular social media platform in Russia, based on a sample of 55,344 users. The analysis is conducted via a combination of network analysis techniques. It demonstrates that the majority of Vkontakte users do not subscribe to news sources, demonstrating that there is a politically apathetic majority and news-interested minority. And news subscribers are polarized along political lines. There is a distinct group of users who subscribe to pro-opposition-leaning politicized sources more than other users do. This study builds on research on polarization, selective exposure, and the role of social media in authoritarian regimes. It provides new empirical evidence on the way that selective exposure and polarization manifest themselves on a non-Western platform in an authoritarian state

Corporate Distributions to Shareholders in Delaware and in Israel

This thesis considers the corporate legal systems of Israel and Delaware as they address the subject of corporate distributions to shareholders. The thesis reviews the significance of cash dividends and the acquisition by corporations of their own stock, in the management and survival of corporations, the effect they have on the disposition of creditors, and the extent to which they are restricted by operation of law. The thesis demonstrates how dividends and share repurchases may translate into a transfer of value from creditors to shareholders. It considers the effectiveness of the legal capital in securing creditors’ interest, and concludes that the legal capital scheme presents no real obstacle to distributions. It is further concluded that despite the recent corporate law reform in Israel, Delaware’s corporate law system continues to surpass Israel in flexibility and broad approach to distributions. Nevertheless it is expected that Israeli courts will consider Delaware’s methodology on the matter

MENINGKATKAN IMTAK DAN HASIL BELAJAR PAI BUDI PEKERTI DENGAN METODE PROBELAM BASED LEARNING PESERTA DIDIK KELAS XII IPA 5 SEMESTER GANJIL SMA NEGERI 3 METRO

Inti pembelajaran Agama Islam dan Budi Pekerti adalah peserta didik kelas XII IPA 5 memiliki kemampuan untuk membaca, menulis ,menyimak, berbicara,memngkomunikasikan khususnya isi kandungan dalam ayat-ayat Alqur’an. Tujuan penelitian untuk mendeskripsikan pembelajaran PAI BK dan metode Problem Based Learning bagi peserta didik kelas XII IPA 5 SMA Negeri 3 Metro. Metode penelitian menggunakan teknik tes - teknik non tes serta obervasi, dokumentasi, dan wawancara. Hasil penelitian dengan metode Problem Based Learning, pembelajaran Imtaq peserta didik kelas XII IPA 5 SMA Negeri 3 Metro hal ini dapat dijelaskan sebagai berikut: 1) membaca Al Qur’an, 2) keimanan/aqidah, 3) akhlah/muamalat, 4 ) fiqih/ibadah, dan 5) menghafal QS. Luqman/QS. Al Baqarah yang digunakan. Proses pembelajaran Imtaq dengan metode Problem Based Learning dari prasiklus, siklus I, siklus II, serta ketekunan hasil belajar meningkat. Dari hasil prasiklus rata-rata 46%, siklus I menjadi 66%. Siklus II menjadi 75%, siklus III meningkat menjadi 80%  peserta didik kelas XII IPA 5 SMA Negeri 3 Metro tahun pelajaran 2018/2019. Ketuntasan belajar pada prasiklus masih 0, pada siklus I terdapat 10 orang ( 31,25% ), siklus II 19 orang (59,37% )dan siklus III 32 orang (100%)

Behavioral Interventions for Aggressive Behaviors in Students with Autism Spectrum Disorder

Chapter 1: Introduction Behavioral interventions are positive and proactive strategies to help students with Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD) gain behavior management skills. Behavior affects how students succeed in the classroom both academically and behaviorally. This review examines the positive effects of behavioral interventions for aggressive behaviors in students with ASD. Research states that physical aggression is more prevalent in individuals with ASD compared to any other developmental disabilities or typically developing peers

The End of the Three Percent Rule: How Structural Changes in the U.S. Economy have Impacted Economic Growth

Using data from government sources (FRED, BEA, BLS), the thesis explores the underlying reasons for declining U.S. economic growth. A long standing trend of annual 3% growth no longer seems to hold true for the economy. The paper summarizes current theory as to why the growth has slowed and finds new explanations by analyzing the various major industries which make up GDP. The results show that sectoral shifts in employment from high paying industries to low paying industries help to explain a significant portion of the decline in national growth rates. The decline in growth is primarily driven by about ten poor performing states

Political polarisation on social media in different national contexts

The present dissertation examines the phenomenon of political polarisation on social media. Specifically, the dissertation addresses the question of how the intensity of polarisation and the ideological lines along which it occurs might vary between different national contexts. First, it explores the differences in the intensity of political polarisation on Twitter in 16 democratic countries (Article 1). Second, it examines the ideological lines along which polarisation occurs in two non-Western contexts, specifically among Russian (Article 2) and Ukrainian (Article 3) users of Vkontakte – a social media platform popular among users from post-Soviet states. The dissertation demonstrates that the levels of political polarisation differ dramatically between countries. In democracies, polarisation tends to be lowest in multi-party systems with proportional electoral rules (e.g., Sweden), and the highest in pluralist two-party systems (e.g., United States). It also shows that, in non-democratic non- Western contexts, polarisation does not necessarily run along the left–right spectrum or party system lines. In authoritarian regimes or those with less stable party systems, polarisation runs along the lines of other issues that are more politically relevant in a given context. In Russia, polarisation manifests itself along pro-regime vs anti-regimes lines, whereas in Ukraine, polarisation happens around geopolitical issues. Polarisation on social media thus tends to reflect existing political cleavages and their intensity, in line with the theory of political parallelism. The major implication of this dissertation in the context of research into polarisation on social media is that findings on the topic from single-country studies that come from Western democratic contexts should be interpreted with caution, as they are not necessarily generalisable. To make generalisable inferences about the relationship between social media and political polarisation, more comparative studies are needed, as well as studies that take into account platform affordances and the causal mechanisms that might drive polarisation

How transparent are transparency reports? Comparative analysis of transparency reporting across online platforms

Over the last decade, transparency reports have been adopted by most large information technology companies. These reports provide important information on the requests tech companies receive from state actors around the world and the ways they respond to these requests, including what content the companies remove from platforms they own. In theory, such reports shall make inner workings of companies more transparent, in particular with respect to their collaboration with state actors. They shall also allow users and external entities (e.g., researchers or watchdogs) to assess to what extent companies adhere to their own policies on user privacy and content moderation as well as to the principles formulated by global entities that advocate for the freedom of expression and privacy online such as the Global Network Initiative or Santa Clara Principles. However, whether the current state of transparency reports actually is conducive to meaningful transparency remains an open question. In this paper, we aim to address this through a critical comparative analysis of transparency reports using Santa Clara Principles 2.0 (SCP 2.0) as the main analytical framework. Specifically, we aim to make three contributions: first, we conduct a comparative analysis of the types of data disclosed by major tech companies and social media platforms in their transparency reports. The companies and platforms analyzed include Google (incl. YouTube), Microsoft (incl. its subsidiaries Github and LinkedIn), Apple, Meta (prev. Facebook), TikTok, Twitter, Snapchat, Pinterest, Reddit and Amazon (incl. subsidiary Twitch). Second, we evaluate to what degree the released information complies with SCP 2.0 and how it aligns with different purposes of transparency. Finally, we outline recommendations that could improve the level of transparency within the reports and beyond, and contextualize our recommendations with regard to the Digital Services Act (DSA) that received the final approval of the European Council in October 2022

There can be only one truth: Ideological segregation and online news communities in Ukraine

The paper examines ideological segregation among Ukrainian users in online environments, using as a case study partisan news communities on Vkontakte, the largest online platform in post-communist states. Its findings suggest that despite their insignificant numbers, partisan news communities attract substantial attention from Ukrainian users and can encourage the formation of isolated ideological cliques – or ‘echo chambers’ – that increase societal polarisation. The paper also investigates factors that predict users’ interest in partisan content and establishes that the region of residence is the key predictor of selective consumption of pro-Ukrainian or pro-Russian partisan news content