Social Networking Sites (SNS)

As SNS spread into every corner of our lives, SNS addiction gain increasing recognition as social problem. But, there are quiet few studies from marketing and international perspectives. Thus, the purpose of this paper is to investigate the impact of SNS addiction to consumer attitude and intention in different cultural context with following manners. First, we review previous study on SNS addiction and propose our conceptual framework which mainly shows the relationship between SNS addiction and marketing-related variables (advertisement appeals, attitude toward SNS advertisement, eWOM, impulsive buying and purchase intention). Second, we propose the findings of empirical and comparative study conducted in Thailand and Japan: the effect of SNS addiction on consumer attitudes/intentions differs in two countries and different advertising appeals mediate the impact of SNS addiction on purchase intention across two countries. Finally, we suggest theoretical and managerial implication and the direction of future study.

This paper investigates the perceptions about creativity and Social Networking Sites (SNS) among undergraduate design students. This is an under-researched area, and the use of phenomenography to examine this topic was deemed appropriate due to the objective of the study, which is to unpack the spectrum of views (referential aspects) and the respective causes (structural aspects) of the latter. The literature on creativity provides different perspectives on what can foster it. There is a lack of a commonly agreed definition of what creativity is. However, there is no dispute about the potential instructional benefits of SNS. The outcomes of this study suggest that there is a relationship between on the one hand the limited perceptions of SNS visa -vis creativity and on the other hand the lack of exposure to instructional strategies that embed in a systemic and effective manner the use of SNS in teaching and learning. If design education is to benefit from the synergies between creativity and SNS, it is suggested that instructional design needs to embed and explore in design curricula the use of SNS in a manner that promotes higher order thinking competencies and skills.

RESUMO
Entendendo a rede social digital Facebook como espaço discursivo propício a variadas
situações comunicativas, a presente dissertação analisa discursivamente posts e a interação
autor-leitor e leitor-leitor na página Quadrinhos Ácidos. A pergunta norteadora procura
entender de que maneira e em que circunstâncias o autor interage com seus leitores na página
do Facebook Quadrinhos Ácidos, bem como quais são as estratégias discursivas usadas pelo
autor na produção, além da atribuição de sentido feita pelos leitores. Para isso, adotamos
pressupostos teóricos relativos ao universo dos estudos sobre Quadrinhos Digitais como
linguagem (EISNER, 2013; FRANCO, 2004; SANTOS, 2013; RAMOS, 2013; etc); trabalhos
sobre redes sociais digitais e conversação em rede (BOYD E ELLISON, 2007, 2013; PARISER,
2012; RECUERO, 2009, 2013; SANTAELLA, 2013; ZAGO, 2014; etc); pesquisas relativas à
análise do discurso francesa (CHARAUDEAU, 2013; ORLANDI, 2012; PECHÊUX, 1995;
etc) – usada, neste trabalho, como uma perspectiva teórico-metodológica – e desdobramentos
de suas noções conceito no ambiente digital (EMEDIATO, 2015; MAINGUENEAU, 2015;
NOGUEIRA, 2015). Para o estudo, foi realizada uma compilação e recorte do material virtual
da página, com o auxílio de print screens, no período de janeiro de 2016 a fevereiro de 2016,
dos quais selecionamos como corpus desta pesquisa as publicações em que Pedro Leite
comenta. Os procedimentos metodológicos combinam as análises qualitativas e quantitativas
(SANTAELLA, 2001), a fim de entender melhor a dinâmica interativa entre os sujeitosusuários na Fanpage. Essa dinâmica é estudada com base nos três tipos de interação definidos
por Fragoso, Recuero e Amaral (2013), bem como analisada por meio da noção de estratégias
discursivas definida por Charaudeau (2009). Tal perspectiva aponta algumas particularidades
dos Quadrinhos Digitais, que, além de possibilitarem um feedback mais rápido dos leitores em
relação às tiras, viabilizam uma troca maior entre leitores e proporcionam o contato deles com
o criador das tiras.

ABSTRACT
Understanding the digital social network Facebook as a discursive space conducive to various
communicative situations, this dissertation analyzes discursively posts, and the interaction
between author and reader and between readers, in the Acid Comics page. The guiding question
seeks to understand how, and under what circumstances, the author interacts with his readers
on the Acid Comics Facebook page, and how the discursive strategies used by the author reflect
in the production and attribution of meaning by the readers. For this, we adopted theoretical
framework related to the universe of studies on Digital Comics as language (EISNER, 2013,
FRANCO, 2004, SANTOS, 2013, RAMOS, 2013, etc.), studies on digital social networks and
online conversation (BOYD AND ELLISON , 2007, 2013, PARISER, 2012, RECUERO, 2009,
2013, SANTAELLA, 2013, ZAGO, 2014, etc.), research on French discourse analysis
(CHARAUDEAU, 2013, ORLANDI, 2012, PECHÊUX, 1995) - used in this work as a
theoretical-methodological perspective-, and as a perspective of the unfolding of its concept
notions in the digital environment (EMEDIATO, 2015, MAINGUENEAU, 2015, NOGUEIRA,
2015). For the study, a compilation and clipping of the virtual material of the page was carried
out, with the help of print screens, from January 2016 to February 2016, from which we selected
as corpus of this research the publications in which Pedro Leite commented. The
methodological procedures combine the qualitative and quantitative analyzes (SANTAELLA,
2001). In order to better understand the interactive dynamics between subjects-users in the
Fanpage, which is studied from the three types of interaction defined by Fragoso, Recuero and
Amaral (2013) as well as analyzed from the notion of discursive strategies defined by
Charaudeau (2009). Such perspective points to some of the peculiarities of the Digital Comics,
which in addition to enabling faster feedback from readers in relation to the comic strips, brings
about a greater exchange between readers as well as providing their contact with the creator of
the strips.

Living Online on the Street: Street-involved Youth
Negotiating Online Access on the Street
Marion Selfridge, University of Victoria, British Columbia
Abstract: Rapidly shifting technologies are challenging assumptions about access to the Internet as communities viewed
as “marginalized” are finding their way to social networking sites and other forms of online connection. This article
draws from a 2014 survey of 135 street-involved youth aged 15 to 24 in three British Columbia, Canada communities and
shows that their use of digital technology and social networking sites is approaching the ubiquitous and persistent use by
their housed peers. The vast majority of street-involved youth are using Facebook to stay connected (94%) and they are
negotiating physical space and social relationships to have computer access through public libraries (64%), friends
(55%), and drop in centers (51%). Youth are also strategically using free wifi (89%) to access the Internet. While cell
phones have become a vital communication and entertainment device, their ownership is transitory and fractured—56
percent of youth surveyed had two or more cell phones in the year and 37 percent carry debts to previous cell phone
providers. The social inequities that bring youth to the complex and risk-filled world of the street may exclude them from
integral parts of society as they are viewed as different and outside the norm. This exploratory research suggests that
street-involved youths’ online expression and communication may be a key means by which they source out social
inclusion by negotiating and, temporarily, transcending the challenges of their daily lives.
Keywords: Street-involved Youth, Cell Phones, Digital Divide, Social Networking Sites, Social Media, Social Exclusion,
Social Inclusion

ملخص الدراسة:
هدفت هذه الدراسة التعرف على الدور الذي تلعبه مواقع الشبكات الاجتماعية في تعزيز قيم المواطنة لدى الشباب الجزائري، واعتمدت الدراسة على المنهج الوصفي، واستخدمت أداة الاستبيان الالكتروني كأداة لجمع البيانات، وتمثلت عينة الدراسة الميدانية في 377 مفردة من الشباب الذكور والإناث المستخدمين الفعليين لمواقع الشبكات الاجتماعية توصلنا إلى العديد من النتائج أهمها:
- أن موقع فايسبوك هو أكثر مواقع الشبكات الاجتماعية استخداما من طرف الشباب عينة الدراسة.
- توصلت الدراسة إلى أن أهم دوافع استخدام عينة الدراسة لمواقع الشبكات الاجتماعية هو سهولة البحث عن المعلومات المختلفة إضافة إلى كونها بديلا لوسائل الإعلام التقليدية الأخرى.
- أظهرت النتائج عدم وجود علاقة ذات دلالة إحصائية عند مستوى دلالة α =0.05 بين إجابات المبحوثين حول تقدير دور مواقع الشبكات الاجتماعية في تعزيز قيم المواطنة تعزى للسمات الشخصية للمبحوثين( الجنس، العمر، المؤهل العلمي).
- أظهرت النتائج وجود علاقة ذات دلالة إحصائية بين استخدام مواقع الشبكات الاجتماعية وتعزيز قيم المواطنة (المشاركة المجتمعية، الديموقراطية، الانتماء الوطني) عند مستوى دلالة α =0.05 .

Abstract

This study aims to know the role of social networking sites  in  supporting and consolidating the citizenship values of the Algerian youth , The researcher followed the descriptive analytic approach. The tool of the study was applied on a random sample consisting of (377) wich they are active users of SNS, The results of the study were:
- The study has shown that Facebook  is the most social networking sites used by the study sample.
- The study found that the most important motives for the use of social networking sites by the study sample cause it help them seeking  various informations in addition to being a alternative  for other mainstream media.
- The results showed no statistically significant relation at the level of significance α =0.05 between answers to the respondents on the appreciation of the role of social networking sites in promoting the citizenship values and personal characteristics attributed to ( sex, age, education).
- The results showed statistically significant relation between the use of the social networking sites and promoting the citizenship values (Community Participation, democracy, national affiliation) at the level of significance α =0.05.

The article explores Facebook governance—its mechanisms, motivations and sources of power—while identifying wider patterns and logics that apply to other internet corporations. I suggest that (1) When digital capitalism turns mundane human interactions into biopolitical production, corporations gain interest in governing these interactions to maximize profit, and make decisions on core political issues; (2) Facebook can effectively govern and discipline users since it remolds various field-specific forms of capital into a single form, generalized social capital, and since it can threaten to confiscate generalized social capital accumulated by users; (3) Digital platforms do not simply epitomize a shift from discipline toward neo-liberal decentralized governance. Instead, they engage in intensive legislation, administration of justice and punishment; and develop eclectic governing and legitimation apparatuses consisting of algorithms, proletarian judicial labor and quasi-constitutional governing documents.

ABSTRACT

In recent years, social media has become ubiquitous and most important for social networking, content sharing and online accessing. Marketing which occurs via social media is known as Social Media Marketing (SMM). The study aimed to assess the use of social media marketing in order to measure its effect on resorts business in the Province of Batangas, Philippines. Specifically, it determined the profile of the selected resorts in terms of classification, years of operation, location, and the years media marketing was introduced in the business; identified the forms of social media utilized by the selected resorts; cited the positive and negative effect of social media marketing in the resorts business; specified the problems encountered by customers in using social media; ascended the differences of the responses of the selected resorts on the effects of SMM; and proposed a development plan for the proper utilization of SMM. The descriptive method was used with a self-made questionnaire as the main data gathering instrument. Different statistical tools were used to answer the objectives of the study. Frequency distribution, ranking, weighted mean, and Analysis of Variance (ANOVA) were employed to interpret and analyze the gathered data. It was concluded that the majority of the resort businesses in the Province of Batangas are classified as American Automobile Association ( AAA) which is the highest quality rating for resorts and operates 10 years and above. Most of the resorts are found in the 1st District of the Province of Batangas and have started introducing SMM from 2006 – 2010. All of the Resorts owner and customers were using the Facebook account. Both owners and customers of the resorts strongly agreed that there was positive and negative effect of SMM. Among the problems encountered in the use of SMM, frequent posting as well as account not maintained or updated. A proposed action plan was made for the proper utilization of SMM.

Keywords: Social Media Marketing, Marketing Tool, Social Networking Sites, Descriptive Method, Higher    Education, Philippines

Organizations can suffer attacks designed to take advantage of employee vulnerabilities.  Successful attacks cause firms to suffer financial damage ranging from minor information breaches to severe financial losses.  Cybercriminals focus on organization executives, because the power and influence they wield affords access to more sensitive data and financial resources.  The purpose of this research in progress submission is to identify the types of executive behaviors that information security professionals believe introduce risk to an organization, as well as to explore the degree of risk organizations face as a result of these behaviors.

The prime aim of the study to analyse the Computer, Internet and Social Media Literacy Skills among PG Students of Social Science Departments of Babasaheb Bhimrao Ambedkar University (BBAU), Lucknow. In present four social science departments in BBAU i.e. Sociology, Economics, Political Science, History. Out of the total 120 questionnaires, 30 questionnaires were distributed each department of social sciences, and 100% questionnaires were received by the students. The study analysis and found that the maximum 44.16% of the
students use the computer regularly, and 60% of students familiar with MS-Office application software. The majority 56.67% of students are using Pen Drive/Flash Drive for data storage, and the highest 57.64% of students were using Google Chrome for accessing information on
the Internet. A large number of students group are using facebook social networking site i.e. 56.83%.

Purpose of the study – The study aims to understand the use of social networking sites by the post-graduate students, Departments of Sociology and Social Work, University of Kashmir.
Research Design – The Department of Sociology and Department of Social Work, University of Kashmir were selected as a universe of the study. Later, the survey method of research was applied to conduct the study and questionnaire was used as a data collection tool. In order o obtain the accurate results, 50 percent of the post-graduate students were selected through the systematic random sampling method.
Findings – The students at large have started to widely make use of social networking sites; however, few students have shown reservations due to lack of interest, lack of time, lack of facility and privacy concerns. Students who use SNSs spend 1.43 hours as an average on social networking sites per day and mostly use social networking sites to gain knowledge, to be in touch with family and friends; to share information and promote social, religious, political and environmental awareness; and few for passing time. The social networking sites used by the students are Facebook, Google+, YouTube and Twitter respectively.
Research limitations/implications – This study was conducted in a single academic institution; therefore, findings may not be applicable and reasonable to be generalized on all academic institutions.
Implications – This paper provides valuable insight into the usage of SNSs by a very important client group and disciplines i.e. Post-graduate students of sociology and social work.
Originality/value – The study is original in nature as the data was collected directly from the Post-graduate Students of Sociology, University of Kashmir, Jammu and Kashmir to examine and investigate their usage of SNSs.

Information systems such as social media strongly influencepublic opinion formation. Additionally, communication on the Internet is shaped by individuals and organisations with variousaims. This environment has given rise to phenomena such as manipulated content, fake news, and social bots. To examine the influence of manipulated opinions, we draw on the spiral of silence theory and complex adaptive systems. We translate empirical evidence of individual behaviour into an agent-based model and show that the model results in the emergence of a consensus on the collective level. In contrast to most previous approaches, this model explicitly represents interactions as a network. The most central actor in the network determines the final consensus 60–70% of the time. We then use the model to examine the influence of manipulative actors such as social bots on public opinion formation. The results indicate that, in a highly polarised setting, depending on their network position and the overall network density, bot participation by as little as 2–4% of a communication network can be sufficient to tip over the opinion climate in two out of three cases. These findings demonstrate a mechanism by which bots could shape the norms adopted by social media users.

Warning messages are being discussed as a possible mechanism to contain the circulation of  false  information  on  social  media.  Their  effectiveness  for  this  purpose,  however,  is unclear.  This  article  describes  a survey experiment  carried  out  to  test  two  designs  of warning  messages:  a  simple  one  identical  to  the  one  used  by  Facebook,  and  a  more complex one informed by recent research. We find no evidence that either design is clearly superior  to not  showing  a  warning  message.  This  result  has  serious  implications  for brands  and  politicians,  who  might  find  false  information  about  them  spreading uncontrollably, as well as for managers of social media platforms, who are struggling to find effective means of controlling the diffusion of misinformation.

رشد و گسترش تكنولوژي¬هاي ارتباطی و ظهور شبکه‌های اجتماعی نگرانی زیادی در باره تغییرات هویتی در جوامع برانگیخته است. در این تحقیق تلاش شده است دو هدف سنجش هویت اجتماعی (هویت ملی، قومی، ملی و جهانی) و تاثیر عضویت در شبکه¬های اجتماعی مجازی بر هویت اجتماعی (هویت ملی، قومی، ملی و جهانی) پیگیری شود. روش تحقیق روش پیمایش و جامعه آماری شامل افراد بالای 16 سال کشور است. حجم نمونه برابر با 1300 نمونه است که با روش نمونه‌گیری خوشه¬ای چندمرحله‌ای و به صورت تصادفی از مراکز استان¬های تهران، آذربایجان‌شرقی، گیلان، فارس، کردستان، خراسان و خوزستان انتخاب شده‌اند. داده¬های مورد نیاز نیز از طریق پرسشنامه محقق¬ساخته جمع¬آوری شده است. یافته‌های بدست آمده نشان می‌دهد که میزان هویت¬های ملی، قومی و دینی در جامعه قوی و بالاست. میزان هویت جهانی و قوم¬مداری نیز کمی بالاتر از میانگین و در حد متوسط است. بررسی رابطه بین بهره¬مندی و عضویت در شبکه¬های اجتماعی مجازی و هویت اجتماعی نشان می¬دهد که عضویت در شبکه¬های اجتماعی بر هویت ملی، قومی و دینی تاثیر کاهنده دارد، ولی شدت این رابطه کم و ناچیز است. بین بهره¬مندی از شبکه¬های اجتماعی مجازی با هویت جهانی و قوم¬مداری نیز رابطه معناداری مشاهده نشد.
کلمات کلیدی: هویت اجتماعی، هویت ملی، هویت قومی، هویت دینی، هویت جهانی

In July 2015, Twitter users started recounting all their hilarious childhood memories with the hashtags #GrowingUpBlack and #GrowingUpLatino (Finley 2015). On the basis of these comedic trends came a new hashtag for the LGBTIQ+ community aptly titled #GrowingUpGay (Barksdale 2015).
The hashtag, which started trending on July 15, 2015, slowly became an ambient affiliation system (Zappavigna 2012, 2014a, 2014b) providing a space where people could recount their childhood and adolescent memories and experiences. In this way, the hashtag came to be a bonding icon (Stenglin 2004) serving as a device for unification. Indeed, if the concept of iconization can be understood as “a semiotic process whereby interpersonal meaning is condensed and ideational meaning discharged” (Zappavigna 2014a: 142), in this sense, the hashtag foregrounded the interpersonal (i.e., the experience of growing up as an LGBTIQ+ individual as a means to solidify relationships) and backgrounded the ideational (i.e., being an LGBTIQ+ individual) meaning of the tweets.
Indeed, posts about #GrowingUpGay are not just relaying ideational content: they are proposing interactive bonds, realised through specific narratives that humorously combine both verbal and visual means of communication. If on social networking systems (SNSs) “[i]dentities are constructed in active processes of identification and self-understanding, seeking or eschewing commonality, connectedness and groupness” (Leppänen et al. 2014: 112; see also Androutsopoulos and Georgakopoulou 2003; Blommaert 2005: 203–214; Brubaker and Cooper 2000; Krzyzanowski and Wodak 2008), the following investigation seeks out to analyse the way users on Twitter commune and share their experiences of growing up as gay people.
More specifically, this contribution focuses on the analysis of a corpus of tweets collected during the week from July 15, 2015, to July 22, 2015. In line with Zappavigna and Martin’s (2017) discursive system of communing affiliation, our investigation aims to interpret how particular values linked to the experience of being a young LGBTIQ+ individual are positioned as bondable in the ambient environment set out through the hashtag #GrowingUpGay. The focus is mainly on understanding “how people are forging alignments and negotiating meaning through social tagging practices” (Zappavigna and Martin 2017: 1). In doing so, homophobic discursive loci may be highlighted in the way users represent the struggles they have jointly experienced and, therefore, it will be possible to see how forms of homophobia and discrimination impact individuals’ lives.

The US Supreme Court ruling on the Obergefell v. Hodges case on June 26, 2015 led to the recognition of same-sex marriage in all fifty States, declaring it a constitutional right under the Fourteenth Amendment. The event received huge media coverage and gave rise to animated discussions on digital media platforms. In this context, if the fear of isolation due to spirals of silence (Noelle-Neumann 1974) is increasingly subdued thanks to the anonymity and ephemeral nature of the online environment, studying how users communicate on social media platforms can help researchers highlight how discourses on given minorities are linguistically conveyed in this fluid environment (Zappavigna 2012, 2013). Drawing on these observations, our investigation will focus on how the US Supreme Court ruling was framed by social media users. A corpus was collected of all Facebook comments related to the first news story reporting the event published online by leading US, UK and Italian newspapers. This Facebook user-generated corpus on marriage equality (FugMar) was then uploaded to the corpus analysis platform Sketch Engine (Kilgarriff et al. 2004, 2014) to analyse the discourses surrounding the event in a fluid and boundary-free environment such as that provided by new digital media in relation to news framing. The analysis of the news values (Fruttaldo and Venuti 2017; Venuti and Fruttaldo 2017), which discursively construe the event in the newspapers, and the way they have been, or have not been, picked up by social media users when they discursively respond to and construe the event, enable us to reflect on the relationship between an event, its news framing, and the echo the framing has on audiences through social media. Ultimately, given the cross-cultural nature of the corpus under investigation, the following contribution sets out to compare and contrast how users discursively construct the US Supreme Court ruling on same-sex marriage in the US, UK and Italy.

Users’ work enables the functioning of sharing platforms, as they dedicate a sizable amount of time to read reviews to select a suitable partner to exchange with. Moreover, they provide ratings and evaluations collected by reputational algorithms, helping users to overcome informational asymmetries. The goal of this paper is to understand whether there are additional side benefits linked to users’ work on platforms, the key hypothesis being that users’ work on platform produces social capital. To investigate this, data from a EU-based multi country survey on participation to the sharing economy will be used, as well as data from focus groups. Empirical results show that as users engage with others they develop a loose common identification based on a common set of ethics. Furthermore, users undertaking more work are more likely to repeat interactions with selected partners.