Mobile Consumer Research Articles

Mobile Consumers in the Travel Service Industry: Focus on Korean Backpackers

This research paper explores a niche area of travel services industry of international trade in the experience economy – Korean backpackers’ overseas backpacking predisposition may contribute to the understanding and learning of their business activity. According to the most recent statistics, over 28.7 million Koreans which is more than half of the population traveled outside of Korea in 2018 (KTO 2019; MCST 2019). This study employs a grounded analysis approach and an interpretive alternative to deeply investigate the backpacking culture and trends of Korean backpackers based on their experiences abroad through data gathered by in-person interviews and diaries. The research has been conducted based on three distinct backpacker groups in different stages of travel with ethical considerations. First field study was conducted by interviewing the backpackers while they were visiting Europe between 2008 and 2010, the second study over the backpackers who finished their backpacking (post-trip) in 2009 post-trip, and the third study over the experienced backpackers between 2009 and 2017. Throughout the analysis of the examined data about how Korean backpackers sense, feel, think, act, and relate to the things they have experienced in places they have visited it becomes evident that experiential marketing would benefit backpackers and the hospitality industry that services these tourists. Viewing backpacker tourists in general and the niche sub-section of Korean backpackers specifically will aid the hospitality industry to work on building great customer experiences by enhancing the sustainable consumer mobile traveler market.

Vehicular Named Data Networking Framework

Named Data Networking (NDN) might potentially help improve data acquisition efficiency in vehicular environments, so it is introduced into vehicular networks, namely vehicular NDN (VNDN). In the existing VNDN solutions, a large number of vehicles with high mobility are involved in forwarding messages, so it is hard to achieve request aggregation that is the main advantage of NDN and can help reduce the data acquisition delay. Moreover, the solutions employ flooding to achieve data retrieval without consumer mobility support, which increases the data acquisition cost and reduces the data acquisition success rate. In this paper, we propose a novel VNDN framework and aim to reduce the data acquisition delay and cost and improve the data acquisition success rate. In this framework, the cluster-chain vehicular backbone is constructed to enhance the stability of the backbone topology. Based on cluster chains, consumers can employ request aggregation and unicast to acquire data from the nearest provider. Moreover, consumer mobility is supported to guarantee successful retrieval of data in spite of high mobility of vehicles. This framework is quantitatively evaluated. According to the experimental results, compared with the VNDN approaches, our framework reduces the data acquisition cost and delay by nearly 54.6% and 12.3%, respectively, and improves the data retrieval success rate by nearly 7.9%.

Mobility management in content-centric networking

The content-centric networking depends on a forwarding information base (FIB) to forward Interest towards providers and utilizes reverse paths in a pending Interest table (PIT) to send Data back to consumers. If consumers change their locations, reverse paths may disrupt and consequently content-centric communications fail. If providers change their locations, each relevant content router (CR) has to update FIB. This may lead to content-centric communication disruption and FIB pollution. Taking these issues into account, we propose a provider and consumer mobility support scheme and aim to improve the Interest and Data delivery rates. The proposed provider handover algorithm supports the provider mobility by updating FIB in a unicast way. Since only the previous CR and serving CR are involved in updating FIB, the handover is achieved without FIB pollution. As a result, the provider handover cost and latency are reduced and the Interest delivery rate is improved. The proposed consumer handover algorithm supports the consumer mobility by updating PIT in a unicast way. Based on the updated PIT, Data can be sent back to consumers even if they change their locations. Since consumers retrieve Data via one communication process, the Data delivery rate is improved and the retransmission of Interest is avoided. Compared with the existing solution, this scheme reduces the handover cost and latency by nearly 72% and 51% respectively, and increases the delivery rate by nearly 11.5%.

Readiness of Indian Consumers Towards the Adoption of Shared Mobility

Public perceptions on shared mobility has substantially altered human mindsets in current times, gaining widespread popularity, particularly in the context of emerging economies struggling with increasing population density and shrinking infrastructure resources. The purpose of this study is to examine Indian consumers’ readiness towards the adoption of such shared mobility services in metropolitan cities. An online survey questionnaire was implemented to understand consumers’ readiness to adopt, commuting habits, perceived benefits, and challenges while consuming these services. A total of n=257 usable responses received from randomly selected consumers from 5 metro cities in India were critically analyzed for statistical significances. Findings suggest that in terms of readiness to adopt the consumers are showing a willingness to use shared mode of transport, major perceived key benefits are “cost”, “convenience” and “environmentally less polluting” while prominent challenges are “quality of service” and “customer satisfaction” when consumers engage with shared mobility services. Our study results will benefit public/private transport operators, policymakers, government agencies, and shared mobility consumers towards adoption, management, harnessing, and optimizing the potential benefits achieved through shared mobility strategies. The researchers propose an empirical exploration of consumers’ readiness to include multiple perception variables encompassing users from wider geographical contexts for gaining deeper insights into shared mobility adoption patterns as future research directions.

Design of a Consumer Mobile Health App for Heart Failure: Findings From the Nurse-Led Co-Design of Care4myHeart

BackgroundConsumer health care technology shows potential to improve outcomes for community-dwelling persons with chronic conditions, yet health app quality varies considerably. In partnership with patients and family caregivers, hospital clinicians developed Care4myHeart, a mobile health (mHealth) app for heart failure (HF) self-management.ObjectiveThe aim of this paper was to report the outcomes of the nurse-led design process in the form of the features and functions of the developed app, Care4myHeart.MethodsSeven patients, four family caregivers, and seven multidisciplinary hospital clinicians collaborated in a design thinking process of innovation. The co-design process, involving interviews, design workshops, and prototype feedback sessions, incorporated the lived experience of stakeholders and evidence-based literature in a design that would be relevant and developed with rigor.ResultsThe home screen displays the priority HF self-management components with a reminder summary, general information on the condition, and a settings tab. The health management section allows patients to list health care team member’s contact details, schedule medical appointments, and store documents. The My Plan section contains nine important self-management components with a combination of information and advice pages, graphical representation of patient data, feedback, and more. The greatest strength of the co-design process to achieve the design outcomes was the involvement of local patients, family caregivers, and clinicians. Moreover, incorporating the literature, guidelines, and current practices into the design strengthened the relevance of the app to the health care context. However, the strength of context specificity is also a limitation to portability, and the final design is limited to the stakeholders involved in its development.ConclusionsWe recommend health app development teams strategically incorporate relevant stakeholders and literature to design mHealth solutions that are rigorously designed from a solid evidence base and are relevant to those who will use or recommend their use.

Mobile consumers and the retail industry: the resistible advent of a new marketing scene

ABSTRACTOver the last ten years, marketing professionals have invested in various devices aimed at digitalizing the point of sale. Mobile phones, and the connection they open between the digital and physical worlds, are likely to profoundly renew the way organizations build the representations of consumers upon which they operate. This article aims to describe the new, mobile-based market infrastructure that is currently being implemented; the figures of the consumer it builds on and renews for marketing purposes; and the opportunities it offers to create a new marketing scene. We address this question by focusing on the world of physical retail. We show that online commerce websites and http cookies have enabled a connection between three traditionally separate figures of the consumer and associated marketing scenes: the consumer as an audience, as a shopping cart, or as a (loyalty) card. The smartphone carries the promise of pursuing this movement into store aisles. We show, however, that the domestication of physical geography to cultivate mobile consumers is particularly difficult, and so far based on a series of disparate attempts and experiments.

Strategic Spam Call Control and Fraud Management: Transforming Global Communications

With an ever-increasing number of complaints concerning “robo” and spam calls, the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) mandates service providers (SP) or internet telephone SP to filter or block unauthenticated or unverified calls. To U.S. mobile consumers, the “TRACED” law has passed enforcing the carriers to tag and, if needed, block spoofed numbers. The FCC requires major carriers to adopt and implement “STIR-SHAKEN,” a technology aimed at thwarting robocalls. The regulation imposes substantive fines, in the millions of dollars, for carriers that fail to implement. Alternatively, toll fraud hacks are on the rise, crippling telecommunication firms with revenue losses. Given the business problems with fraud and illegal scam calls, the technology aims at establishing a reliable end-to-end call authentication framework. This paper provides additional insight into technology trends to strategize new technology offerings, securing, and protecting telecommunications (telco) business operations.

Electrical, Thermal, and Mechanical Characterization of eWLB, Fully Molded Fan-Out Package, and Fan-Out Chip Last Package

Fan-out (FO) packages are widely used in handheld, mobile consumer, and Internet of Things (IoT) devices due to the facility they provide for a greater I/O density and the integration of multiple components in a single package. Various types of FO package are available, including embedded wafer-level BGA (eWLB), fully molded (FM), and a flip-chip-based structure referred to as a fan-out chip-last package (FOCLP). In this paper, ANSYS simulations are performed to examine the warpage, extreme low- $k$ (ELK) interconnect stress and board-level solder joint reliability of the various package types. The validity of the simulation model is confirmed by comparing the numerical results for the warpage of the eWLB and FM packages with the experimental observations. Further simulations are then performed to investigate the heat dissipation performance and electrical crosstalk properties of the three packages. Taguchi experiments are conducted to examine the effects of eight control factors [namely, the inclusion (or otherwise) of a backside laminate film, the board thickness, the joint standoff distance, the ball joint diameter, the under bump metallurgy (UBM) diameter, the joint pitch, the die thickness, and the Cu pillar height] on the thermomechanical reliability of the FM package under accelerated thermal cycling testing. Finally, the Taguchi analysis results are used to determine the optimal geometry design of the FM package.

Remote Purchases & Proximity Payment in Indonesia. Why Grow So Fast?

The phenomenon of the development of mobile payment in Indonesia, especially remote purchases and proximity payments, is decomposed by the Service-Dominant Logic approach. Furthermore, data from socioeconomic characteristics which are the diffusion of mobile phones, internet retailing, and consumer mobile commerce in Indonesia utilize to elaborate on the phenomenon. The results show that this phenomenon is the result of the Service-Dominant Logic oriented mobile commerce system service. Moreover, Indonesia's potential in ASEAN is still tremendous, the number of Indonesian families with smartphones is still 56.6%, smaller than other ASEAN countries, and the infrastructure supported by the Palapa Ring which will improve internet access. Nevertheless, a comprehensive service system also needs to be supported by comprehensive monitoring and supervision of services with the Service-Dominant Logic paradigm. Keywords: Remote Purchase, Proximity Payment, Indonesia DOI : 10.7176/EJBM/11-27-19 Publication date :September 30 th 2019

BlockAuth: BlockChain based distributed producer authentication in ICN

In Information Centric Networking (ICN), consumer mobility is supported by design in virtue of its connection-less pull-based communication model. However, producer mobility management is challenging as it focuses on the named-based resolution mechanism, which applies a dynamic and direct interaction between the producer and forwarding plane. In this paper, we consider the fundamental security issues related to producer mobility in ICN. These security issues exist mainly due to the insecure interaction of producer with the network’s forwarding information management system. We show that the current mobility solutions lack an adequate security mechanism and they invite severe security threats in the network (e.g., prefix hijacking and Denial of Service (DoS) attacks). To address such security threats, we propose a Blockchain based lightweight distributed mobile producer Authentication (BlockAuth) protocol to enable secure and efficient mobility management in ICN. BlockAuth authenticates the producers’ prefix(es) and enforce them to express only genuine routing updates for the prefix(es) to which they are entitled to advertise. The qualitative security analysis confirms that BlockAuth is robust against various security attacks to which mobile network and blockchain are particularly vulnerable (e.g., prefix hijacking, double spending, DoS attack). Additionally, the performance evaluation of BlockAuth shows that it maintains significant performance gain compared to the state-of-the-art prefix attestation proposals. In particular, it maintains up to 94% of the network’s original throughput, while it needs additional storage of just tens of megabytes.

이동통신계약에서 청약철회와 소비자단체소송 - 서울고등법원 2018. 2. 2. 선고 2017나2051458 판결을 중심으로 -

소비자의 권익을 침해하는 사업자의 위법행위를 금지 또는 중지하는 것을 내용으로 하는 소비자단체소송제도가 소비자기본법에 도입된 지 10여년이 경과하였다. 예상과 달리 소비자단체소송은 활성화되지 못하였지만, 2015년에 제기된 4건의 단체소송은 이를 활성화시키는 계기가 되었다. 이 중 이동통신 3사를 대상으로 한 소송은 1심 및 2심 모두 원고가 패소하였으며, 대법원에 계류 중이다. 그 청구의 취지는 모두 동일하며, 주된 내용은 통신사의 약관 등에서 소비자의 청약철회등을 인정하지 않은 것이 위법하다는 것이다. 이에 법원은 소비자의 청약철회등을 인정하지 않은 통신사의 행위가 방문판매법 및 전자상거래법을 위반한 것이 아니라고 판단하였다. 이 논문에서는 SKT 사건을 중심으로 원고의 주장과 법원의 판단에 대해 살펴보았다. 이를 정리하면 다음과 같다. 첫째, 법원은 피고가 소비자의 청약철회등을 인정하지 않음에 대한 증명책임을 원고에게 부과하였다. 그러나 민사소송법상 증명책임의 배분원칙에 있어서 권리발생요건은 권리를 주장하는 자가 증명할 책임이 있으며, 권리소멸을 주장하는 자는 그에 대한 증명책임이 있다. 또한 방문판매법과 전자상거래법에서는 청약철회등의 배제사유 및 배제조치에 관한 증명책임을 사업자에게 부과하고 있다. 그럼에도 불구하고 그 배제조치의 미이행에 대해 원고가 증명할 책임이 있다는 법원의 판단은 잘못된 것이다. 둘째, 소비자가 전화 등을 이용하여 이동통신계약에 대해 해지의 의사를 표시하였을 경우에 임시적으로 정지하고 14일 이내에 신분증 등을 제출하지 않았을 때에 이동통신서비스를 재개하는 행위에 대해 원고는 소비자의 해지권 행사를 제한하는 것으로 주장하였다. 이에 법원은 해지권의 행사는 의사표시이지만, 그 해지권자의 신원이 증명되지 않은 경우에 임시중지하였던 이동통신서비스를 재개하는 행위가 해지권의 행사를 제한하는 것이 아니라고 판단하였다. 해지권은 형성권이기 때문에 상대방에 대한 의사표시로 행사하지만, 비대면의 경우에 그 해지를 한 자가 해지권자에 해당하는지에 대한 증명을 요구하는 것은 당연하다. 따라서 이를 증명하지 않은 경우에 중지하였던 이동통신서비스를 재개하는 행위는 위법하지 않다. 마지막으로 원고는 피고의 약관 등에서 방문판매법등에서 규정하고 있는 청약철회등을 소비자에게 인정하지 않다고 주장하였다. 이에 법원은 이동통신서비스는 방문판매법등에서 규정하고 있는 청약철회등의 배제사유에 해당한다는 점을 이유로 원고의 주장을 배척하였다. 그러나 이동통신이 개통되었다고 하더라도 아직 제공되지 않은 부분은 사용에 의해 또는 시간의 경과에 의해 재판매가 곤란할 정도로 그 가치가 현저히 감소되었다고 볼 수 없다. 또한 전자상거래법에서는 가분적 용역의 경우에 미제공된 부분에 대한 청약철회등을 인정하고 있다. 따라서 이동통신계약에 대해 청약철회등을 부정한 법원의 판단은 방문판매법등의 내용을 오해한 것이다. 다만, 이동통신약관에서는 소비자의 해지권을 인정하고 있으며, 그 기간 및 요건에 대해서는 제한을 두고 있지 않다. 따라서 이를 청약철회등으로 볼 수 있는가의 문제가 제기되며, 약관에서는 소비자가 해지하였을 경우에 위약금을 부과하고 있다. 물론 형식적으로만 본다면 해지시 위약금을 부과하고 있기 때문에 청약철회등이 아니라고 할 수 있다. 그러나 약관상 위약금은 소비자의 중도해지에 따라 통신사에게 발생한 손해에 대한 배상이 아닌 약정기간동안 사용을 조건으로 지급한 보조금등의 반환에 해당한다. 따라서 이는 손해배상의 청구가 아닌 해제조건의 성취로 인해 지급한 보조금등의 반환이기 때문에 부당이득반환에 해당한다. 그 결과, 소비자의 중도해지시 피고는 위약금을 부과하고 있지 않으며, 약관상 해지권은 방문판매법등에서 규정하고 있는 청약철회등에 해당한다.

Social responsibility scandals and trade

Abstract This paper studies the effect of social responsibility scandals on the imports of consumer products, by focusing on an event which generated massive consumer mobilization against neglecting firms, namely the collapse of the Rana Plaza building affecting the textile industry in Bangladesh. We investigate the import repercussions of this major shock in the perceived quality of clothing producers sourcing in Bangladesh. In line with the well-documented home bias in trade and home-country media slant, we assume that consumers’ reaction will be stronger when domestic firms are named and shamed. Our empirical strategy uses a difference-in-difference approach that compares imports from Bangladesh of countries according to whether some of their companies were directly associated with the collapse of the Rana Plaza. Our results are consistent with demand being sensitive to social responsibility scandals. While aggregate imports from Bangladesh continue to increase during the whole period (2010–2016), there is a marked disruption that affects countries whose brands were named and shamed by activists and the media after the disaster. In addition, the decline in imports is all the greater as the number of NGO campaigns on the misbehavior of national textile retailers is high.

Portable technology and multi-domain energy practices

This article complements the concept of embedded security by proposing disembedded security to capture consumers’ energy practices when travelling across multiple domains of energy accessibility. Consumer mobility outside the home produces misalignments between infrastructure and portable technology experienced as ‘hysteresis of the battery’. Hysteresis captures how respondents are subject to ‘unpleasant unpredictability’ about battery-based technology and infrastructure, which spurs hermeneutic reflection about energy, location and sociality. Multi-domain energy practices therefore bring energy consumers to ‘reembed’ or create a sense of psychological comfort on the move. Charge levels on battery icons not only structure daily patterns of consumer life through planning efforts but become interpretively entangled in issues of duration, distance and sociality as energy demands in portable technology push consumers to avoid disruption.

A Qualitative Study of the Stimuli on Consumer Emotion in Mobile Shopping

In mobile shopping, consumer emotion can be influenced by various stimuli more easily than before. Understanding the methods to stimulate consumer emotions can help companies to push consumers to mobile shopping. However, this has been rarely discussed in the previous studies. By applying ATLAS.ti 7 to conduct three levels coding of interview data and analyze the relationships between different level codes, the qualitative study was used to discuss and identify the factors that influenced consumer emotion in mobile shopping. The study showed that at the social level, mobile technology, convenience and entertainment of mobile shopping, and mobile friends circle influenced all consumer emotions, while sharing of mobile shopping only influenced consumer’s pleasure and arousal emotions. At the organizational level, both interface quality and integrity of mobile sales terminal influenced all consumer emotions, while sales promotion in mobile sales terminal only influenced consumer’s pleasure and arousal emotions. The conclusions can enrich the theories of mobile shopping behavior and consumer emotion.

Thermal variability drives synchronicity of an aquatic insect resource pulse

AbstractSpatial heterogeneity in environmental conditions can prolong food availability by desynchronizing the timing of ephemeral, high‐magnitude resource pulses. Spatial patterns of water temperature are highly variable among rivers as determined by both natural and anthropogenic features, but the influence of this variability on freshwater resource pulse phenology is poorly documented. We quantified water temperature and emergence phenology of an aquatic insect (salmonfly, Pteronarcys californica) resource pulse in two rivers characterized by differing catchment topography and human impact. Along both rivers, salmonfly emergence occurred earlier where spring temperatures were warmer. Emergence events were brief (4–8 d) at sites in the more human‐impacted river, but occurred asynchronously along the entire river, lasting 27 d in total. In contrast, emergence events were more prolonged (6–11 d) at sites on the more natural and topographically complex river, but occurred synchronously along the entire river, lasting 13 d in total. These scale‐specific differences in subsidy duration could have opposing consequences for salmonfly consumers depending on their mobility and foraging habits. Asynchronous emergence at a large scale is potentially most important for mobile consumers like birds and fish that can migrate to feed on aquatic insects and track resource waves across a landscape, whereas prolonged emergence duration at a smaller scale may be most important for immobile or opportunistic consumers like spiders and ants. Relating environmental heterogeneity and resource pulse phenology across a gradient of human impact and at multiple spatial scales is needed for a better understanding of how food availability, aquatic–terrestrial linkages, and consumer–resource dynamics may change with climate variability and increasing human activity in the future.

Emerging Trends in M-Commerce Consumer Behavior

By 2021, the volume of global transactions conducted by m-commerce is expected to increase. However, despite the rapid growth in the use of mobile devices, m-commerce still faces several constraints, and its integration in the consumers' everyday behavior is still less than expected in many countries. The work has a two-fold general objective: on the one hand, one wishes to describe the mobile commerce concept, and on the other hand, it is to review the relevant literature on mobile consumer behavior. This paper describes the concept of mobile commerce (m-commerce), makes the difference between e-commerce and m-commerce, and highlights its benefits and constraints. Then it reviews the relevant literature on m-consumer behavior in the stage of initial adoption and continuous use. Finally, it proposes future avenues of research in the form of research agenda. Crucially, this research urges future researchers to examine the perceived value, design, aesthetics, and experiential aspects of m-commerce and their outcomes in terms of attitude, satisfaction, loyalty, and behavioral intention.

Semi-Interpenetrating Networks for All-Solid-State Lithium Metal Batteries

In the past two decades, exponentially growing markets of mobile consumer electronics and electric vehicles caused an increasing demand towards higher energy and power density in energy storage technologies. Aiming to overcome the intrinsic limitations of state of the art liquid organic carbonate-based electrolytes with regard to higher energy densities and cost efficient cells solid state electrolytes are a promising topic of research. Enabling not only the use of electrolyte layers in the range of a few micrometers and a reduction of needed security features of the cell housing, but also the utilization of lithium metal as anode. Besides the prominent classes of oxidic ceramic and sulfidic glassy electrolytes, the class of lithium ion conducting polymer electrolytes comprises a large variety of different subclasses. The subclass of semi-interpenetrating networks (s-IPNs) defines a combination of at least two polymer networks penetrating each other without a covalent bonding between the different polymer species. Thanks to its excellent interface wetting ability, processability and lithium metal compatibility, polyethylene oxide (PEO) was selected as lithium ion conducting polymer.[1] This combination of different polymer types allows the tailoring of vital physicochemical and electrochemical properties of the resulting s-IPN membranes. Possible benefits of a second interwoven polymer matrix refer to the reduction/suppression of PEO crystallization inside of confinements, thus allowing the utilization of polymer membranes at ambient temperature, an enhanced mechanical stability of thin film membranes compared to single polymer materials and the improved homogeneity of lithium precipitation by a more defined interface structure.[2] Depending on the preparation route of the s-IPN, not only the polymer itself but also the polymer interfaces can be tuned selectively by introduction of, for example, highly hydrophobic substances like siloxanes, which tend to accumulate at the membrane surfaces.[3] The prepared s-IPN membranes in this work were investigated by means of selected thermal, electrochemical and spectroscopy techniques including differential scanning calorimetry, galvanostatic and potentiostatic experiments as well as impedance spectroscopy. This work aims for an economic approach to tailor vital physicochemical properties of s-IPN electrolyte membranes by utilization of PEO as lithium ion conductor and lithium metal as anode material using a single-step solution casting synthesis route towards advanced all-solid-state lithium metal batteries.

Using Linguistic Properties of Place Specification for Network Naming to Improve Mobility Performance.

By considering the definitions and properties from the field of linguistics regarding place specification, a questionnaire that can be used to improve naming in networks is obtained. The questionnaire helps introduce the idea of place specification from linguistics and the concept of metric spaces into network naming schemes. The questionnaire results are used to improve the basic Information-Centric Networking (ICN) architecture’s notoriously lax network naming structure. The improvements are realized by leveraging components from the Named-Node Network Architecture, a minor ICN design, to supply the resulting network architecture with the properties the questionnaire highlights. Evaluation results from experiments demonstrate that modifying the network architecture so that the proposed questionnaire is satisfied results in achieving high mobility performance. Specifically, the proposed system can obtain mean application goodput at above of the ideal result, with a delay below 0.104 s and with the network time-out Interest ratio below 0.082 for the proposed single mobile push producer, single mobile consumer scenario, even when the nodes reach the maximum tested speed of 14 m/s.

Point of Care Image Capture with a Custom Smartphone Application: Experience with an Encounter-Based Workflow.

Medical documentation is one of the primary methods by which physicians share clinical information and impressions over time with one another. As the adage says, "a picture is worth a thousand words," and physicians have started leveraging consumer mobile technology to share images with one another. However, image sharing often uses short message service texting and similar methods, which can be noncompliant with privacy regulations and can also limit the ability to communicate information longitudinally and across specialties. Sharing of such information is increasingly important, however, as smaller practices are joining to create large geographically spread out health care networks. To this end, we developed an application to acquire and store images via smartphone and seamlessly transfer into the patient's electronic medical record (EMR) to enable digital consults and longitudinal evaluation in a private and compliant method.

Positive Net Neutrality: Zero-Rating and the Material Reduction of Consumer Choice

Zero-rating is a permitted class of ‘positive’ net neutrality violations under the European Union’s ‘Net Neutrality’ Regulation. Conversely, ‘negative’ net neutrality violations, normally associated with the blocking and throttling of content that threatens an Internet Service Provider’s business model, are strictly prohibited. With the European Commission set for a public consultation on zero-rating, and The Body of European Regulators for Electronic Communications set to issue updated guidelines on the practice, the paper assesses the present state of zero-rating in Europe, focusing on differentiation cases to assess what types of positive net neutrality violations could result in a “material reduction on consumer choice” for mobile consumers. As zero-rating is generally limited to mobile subscriptions that include data caps, the Office of Economic Development has warned regulators to be vigilant against practices that could result in users constantly monitoring their data usage or limiting access to non-zero-rated services. The practice of ‘zero-rating’ in Europe poses a unique challenge to regulatory authorities keen to protect the principle of net neutrality. While consumers perceive free access to certain content, applications and programs as beneficial, zero-rating also contravenes the general aims of the Regulation: that Internet traffic is managed by Internet Service Providers in a non-discriminatory manner and that consumer choice is protected. While the practice might be seen to benefit consumers, zero-rating can also affect the number of providers entering the market and compromise the Regulation’s aim to “guarantee the continued functioning of the internet ecosystem as an engine of innovation”. The paper examines the state of zero-rating services, with specific emphasis on positive net neutrality violations across the European Union. We examine from both a normative perspective and by analysing rulings from National Regulatory Agencies empowered with supervision and enforcement duties by the ‘Net Neutrality’ Regulation. Drawing on behavioural economics and cognitive psychology literature, the paper suggests too much choice in zero-rating services can actually lead to less than optimal decision-making by consumers. Rational theory posits that more choice is good for consumers; yet, in reality, more choice can actually result in a less-informed decisions, inadvertently empowering more recognizable Content and Application Providers at the expense of lesser-known ones. From our critique of the rulings, we conclude with an overview or what amounts to permitted/prohibited zero-rating practices in the European Union and argue that a hybrid regulatory response – involving market- and principle-based regulation is needed alongside command-and-control rules to ensure zero-rating services do not amount to a material reduction in consumer choice.