Browsing by Subject "Social networking"
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Item Club Texas : building community in electronic music fan culture through online collaboration(2012-12) Fancher, Robert A.; Tyner, Kathleen R.; Pennycook, BruceClub Texas: Building Community in Electronic Music Fan Culture through Online Collaboration is a report of results from a content analysis that analyzes the role of online participatory culture for community development and social capital for a local underground EDM ‘scene’ (Electronic Dance Music) in Dallas, TX. This study analyzes DallasDanceMusic.com (DDM), one of the first and largest message board communities to support the EDM community in Dallas, TX since 1994. The study measures participatory culture and social capital using content analysis of the site during high profile activity for a four-month period in 2012.Item Determinants of consumer engagement in electronic word-of-mouth in social networking sites(2009-08) Chu, Shu-Chuan; Choi, Sejung MarinaIn recent years, social networking sites have become a prevailing communication technology in the evolution of the digital era for today’s Internet users (Ipsos Insight 2007). As more and more marketers attempt to harness the power of electronic word-of-mouth (eWOM) in social networking sites (Williamson 2006), rigorous investigation of determinants that lead to consumers’ engagement in eWOM via the social networks is becoming critical. A central question to answer is what factors influence eWOM behavior in social networking sites and what are the underlying processes of eWOM communications in this new social medium. This study focuses on five social relationship variables: social capital, tie strength, homophily, trust, and consumer susceptibility to interpersonal influence that are all related to eWOM behavior in social networking sites. An online survey with a sample drawn from a large southwestern university was conducted to examine predictors of eWOM in social networking sites. Results from a series of multiple regression analyses indicate that certain social relationship variables are significant predictors that relate to social networking site users’ eWOM behavior. Out of the five relationship variables, social capital, homophily, trust, and interpersonal influence were found to significantly relate to users’ engagement in eWOM communications, whereas no effect was found with regard to tie strength. My dissertation research provides a theoretical understanding of consumers’ use of social networking sites as a vehicle for eWOM and contributes to the literature on computer-mediated communication with specific emphasis on online social media. Managerially, findings from this research could provide marketers with valuable information to establish their long-term relationships with consumers and use beneficial eWOM to promote selected brands. In conclusion, examining social relationships in social networking sites could contribute to our understanding of the determinants of consumer engagement in eWOM, which in turn influences the extent and pattern of eWOM and enables companies to deliberate their product diffusion strategies.Item Draftsmanship, social networking, and cultural history : the portrait drawings of Hans Holbein the Elder (ca. 1465-1524)(2015-05) Carlson, Alisa Louise McCusker; Smith, Jeffrey Chipps, 1951-; Hess, Peter; Holladay, Joan A; Morrall, Andrew; Waldman, Louis AHans Holbein the Elder (ca. 1465-1524) was a successful and prolific painter and draftsman, who lived and worked mainly in the southern German city of Augsburg. In addition to being master of a workshop that produced large-scale religious works, Holbein produced numerous drawings, of which over two hundred have been preserved from throughout his career. The vast majority of Holbein’s surviving drawings – about one hundred sixty – are portraits or head studies, originally made in silverpoint in small, portable sketchbooks. The quantity and medium of his drawings indicate that taking portraits was a habitual part of Holbein’s practice, if not a preoccupation for him. His portrait drawings depict a range of Augsburg’s populace, including men, women, and children, representing a variety of social classes and professions. On several drawings he even identified his sitters clearly with inscriptions of their names, ages, occupations, or other claims to fame. Collectively, they offer the artist’s perspective on the bustling urban center in which he lived and worked as well as suggest his place within that milieu. This dissertation examines Holbein’s portrait drawings in terms of their material and technical production as well as their potential historical, social, and cultural significance. This study describes the characteristics that typify Holbein’s portrait drawings and establishes standards for attributing works to him, his workshop, and others, as well as offers paleographical analysis of his drawings’ inscriptions. Because his portraits present so much textual information that has otherwise been overlooked, questions of who the people of Holbein’s portraits are and what their portrayals reveal about themselves and about the artist can be considered. Applying sociological theories of social capital and networking, this study proposes that Holbein’s portrait drawings survive as important records of his social network and reveal insights into his social experiences and practices. Holbein’s portrait drawings also offer numerous social and cultural cues through his depictions of the clothes and adornments of his sitters. Finally, this project considers Holbein’s legacy in European portraiture, especially as inherited by his more famous son, Hans Holbein the Younger (1497/98-1543).Item Effects and implications of changing approaches to information on technical communication(2011-05) Betz, MatthewThe ways that individuals take advantage of information and communication technologies are leading to new approaches to both information and communication. Recent technological developments, such as cellular phones and wireless-broadband internet are being used to provide instant access to information and networks, allowing users to satisfy their needs or desires almost immediately and from almost any location. More specifically, shifting approaches to information have encouraged a new kind of rapid meaning making in physical and digital spaces that differs in fundamental ways from the sort of quickly-formed view of the world that television and radio brought. Who is producing and distributing this information is of primary concern to technical communicators because amateurs and uninformed users now have access to the same networks, and content production and distribution methods as professionals. Parallel to individuals’ decentralized and true-enough information approaches are concerns over the position of credentialed knowledge workers to information spaces, communities, and cultures, and concerns over new relationships between quality and speed. Due to the growing scale of new approaches to information, the field of technical communication is now faced with a crisis best articulated by one significant question: how do growing trends of personal agency and self-service in technologized societies affect technical communication as a discipline, and individual approaches to knowledge and authority? While the reliability and ethos of professional technical communicators can largely mitigate the threat of untrained, uncredentialed users who have the ability to develop and distribute technical information freely, social networks can contribute to the crisis through striking much of the authority from technical communicators who do not work to form strong or functional identities in those spaces.Item The exploration of motivations in joining a social networking website(2007-05) Hsu, Terri, 1981-; Lee, Wei-na, 1957-This study examines the motivations that drive strangers to join and interact with one another through a message-centric, niche social networking website. Using concepts grounded in word-of-mouth and computer-mediated communication, this study looked to explore the personal relationships built and fostered from social networking sites. Data was collected through observations and in-depth interviews with 12 participants of TheKnot.com's Austin, Texas forum for wedding planning. Results of the study showed an intricate and somewhat cyclical balance of different group members as their role changed over time. Also, the superficial motivations and expectations entering the site morphed into deeper relationships as participants became more involved in the community.Item Extending the online distance course : online student activity beyond the online classroom(2012-12) Barrera, Rachel Edith; Hughes, Joan E.; Svinicki, Marilla; Field, Sherry; Resta, Paul; Lewis, KarronThis study investigated why and how students, who enrolled in fully-online distance course, participated in online activities external to the formal online course (OAEOC) at any point during or after the online course. For this research, OAEOC is defined as any activity pursued by students within an online environment during or after the course that does not take place within their teacher-sponsored online course “home” (such as a Moodle or Blackboard). This research occurred within a fully-online, five-week course that trained journalists in digital tools. Data included: (a) 144 researcher-generated interpretive memos based on activities within the course’s online discussion forums and student chats and (b) 11 student interviews. Results showed that student interactions in course discussion forums were critically important for developing connections between students, which in turn, supported the initiation of online activities external to the online course. During the course, students posted information about their online identities and created a Facebook group and Twitter list, which facilitated online activities external to the course. Data from interviews showed that those students participating in OAEOC did so for social reasons and to continue conversing with classmates. Students who did not participate in OAEOCs indicated work schedule conflicts, lack of interest, and unawareness of the OAEOCs prevented their participation. During the course, OAEOC participants discussed topics related to the course content. However, once the course concluded, OAEOC participants started discussing more personal and professional topics. The phenomenon studied is new to online distance education and holds the potential to extend the online course experience and support lifelong learning.Item Facebook forever : privacy, preservation and social networking records(2013-05) Blaha, Craig Erben; Doty, PhilipFor the first time in history one billion subscribers are creating records using a single software platform: Facebook. Subscribers create historically significant Facebook records every day, yet there is no concerted effort to preserve these records. Archivists do not agree on whether or how these records will continue to exist, nor do they agree on the best way to preserve these records. At the same time, privacy advocates are concerned that social networking records will continue to exist "forever" and therefore have serious privacy implications. In this study I examine the seemingly opposing viewpoints of privacy scholars and archivists. I find that privacy scholars are concerned that the lack of subscriber control over social networking records threatens privacy over time. Archivists address this lack of control through the concepts of donor agreements and the trusted digital repository, but the application of these concepts to the long-term preservation of Facebook records depends on who will preserve these records. I explore four different ways Facebook records may be preserved. I examine whether the U.S. federal government can and should play a role in encouraging Facebook to preserve records. I find that the U.S. federal government is unlikely to take action. I take a first step in empirically examining the likelihood that individual Facebook subscribers will preserve their own records using both an online survey (n = 144) and focus group to ask Facebook subscribers what they expect to happen to their Facebook records. I find that Facebook subscribers do not trust Facebook, do not think about preservation when they use Facebook, and do not expect their Facebook records to exist forever. This research makes four contributions to existing literature: a discussion of the value of social networking records and whether they should be preserved, a close examination of the differing opinions of archivists and privacy scholars about these records, a discussion of the role public policy might play in the preservation of Facebook records and privacy in the United States, and an empirical exploration of the attitudes and behaviors of a small group of Facebook subscribers related to preservation and privacy.Item Global brands’ social media presence and control(2011-05) Ok, Chang Bong; Sung, Yongjun; Choi, Sejung M.This paper seeks to investigate leading global brands‘ social media presence. The analysis of the Interbrand’s 100 Best Global Brands (2010) social media pages was conducted in the current study. Based on Kaplan & Haenlein‘s classification of social media, seven social media application cases were examined. The findings suggest that there are differences in global brands‘ social media presence by brand categories and social media applications. The findings also suggest that there are different levels of global brands‘ social media control. Managerial implications and guidelines for social media marketing are also provided.Item Learning circles in social networks.(2015-03-27) Ghosh, Debopriya. 1989-; Vaughn, Randal L.Social networks are ubiquitous. One of the main organizing principles in these real world networks is that of network communities, where sets of nodes organize into densely inked clusters. Identifying such close-knit clusters is crucial for the understanding of the structure as well as the function of these real world networks. We implement an efficient variation of Kernel Spectral Clustering to infer the community affiliation by taking a well represented subgraph of the parent network along with a new notion of cluster mining on feature space to harness the vast amount of rich information stored in users' profile. The proposed method is memory and computationally more efficient than prevalent state-of-art methods. We empirically evaluate our approach against several real world datasets like Facebook, Twitter and Google+ and demonstrate its effectiveness in detecting community affiliations in sparse networks.Item Online social networking : exploring the relationship between use of web-based social technologies and community college student engagement(2010-05) Mix, Kerry Keith; Roueche, John E.; Bumphus, Walter G.; Northcutt, Norvell W.; McClenney, Kay M.; Resta, Paul E.Over the last decade, community college researchers and practitioners increasingly have focused on student engagement as a cornerstone of a successful student success agenda. This study investigated community college student engagement using an ex post facto quantitative methodology. This study reports the results of the five special-focus survey items from 2009 CCSSE national administration and data collected from institutional Facebook pages. This study measured student engagement levels based on five constructs from the Community College Survey of Student Engagement (Active and Collaborative Learning, Student-Faculty Interaction, Academic Challenge, Student Effort, and Support for Learners), including more than 170,000 survey respondents. Differences in engagement levels were explored in terms of student characteristics including gender, race/ethnicity, developmental status, weekly preparation, commute time, age (traditional/nontraditional), and enrollment status (full-time/part-time). The results of this study revealed the following: •An institutional Facebook page can provide both academic and non-academic information. An institutional Facebook page is a central location that students, parents, fans, and others can go to ask questions about the college, either general or specific. •Students are using social networking tools for academic purposes. •Students who took honors course(s) and students who commuted six hours or more per week were more likely to use social networking tools to communicate about coursework. •Students’ use of social networking tools for academic purposes is associated with an increase in student-level benchmark scores. A proportional relationship exists between use of SNT and engagement scores. In general, students who frequently used SNT for academic purposes achieved higher engagement scores. •However, a corollary is also true: Student Effort scores tend to be lower among students who use SNT for any purpose multiple times per day.Item sALERT : an intelligent information alerting and notification web service(2012-05) Bhaduri, Sashmit B.; Aziz, Adnan; Miranker, DanielWeb services increasingly serve as large repositories and conduits of information. However, they do not always allow for the efficient dissemination of this information, particularly in a reactive way. In this report, I describe sALERT, a web-based application that allows for targeted information from various web services to be combined and cross-referenced in order to produce a system that is more convenient and more efficient in reactively disseminating information. This dissemination is performed using mobile notification mechanisms such as text messages, and information targeting is performed using data from social networks and geolocation sources. I present the design, implementation, and plans for future improvement for this service within this report.