Subscription Fees Research Articles

Experimental Analysis of ViLTE Service

Long-term evolution (LTE) is a broadband wireless cellular system currently available in about 200 countries. From the mobile network operator point of view, one of the most appealing characteristics of LTE is the possibility of providing the users with mobile broadband services like voice over LTE and video over LTE (ViLTE), with strict quality of service (QoS) guarantees. The success of such services, which usually require a subscription fee, is obviously tightly bound to the users' quality of experience (QoE), that must be significantly better than the quality perceived in case of free services. This paper attempts to evaluate the perceived quality of the ViLTE service. In more detail, we present the results of an experimental test-bed realised at one of the most popular italian MNO, aimed at evaluating the impact of several network layer QoS parameters on the QoE of the ViLTE service.

Open for Business: Open Access Journals in Commercial Databases

ABSTRACTIn this investigation the availability of Open Access journals in three commercial databases commonly licensed by libraries, as verified by reference to the Directory of Open Access Journals title list, ranged from 10.91% to 29.18%. A more in-depth analysis of sample Open Access titles available through these databases revealed that the databases varied from 0% to 96.72% in regards to clearly identifying Open Access content and between 83.33% and 96.72% in enabling full access to these sample titles. The inclusion of Open Access content also increased overall title counts in these commercial databases between 6.24% and 10.40%, raising the question of whether some databases include Open Access content to increase title counts and justify higher subscription fees.

Churn prediction of mobile and online casual games using play log data.

Internet-connected devices, especially mobile devices such as smartphones, have become widely accessible in the past decade. Interaction with such devices has evolved into frequent and short-duration usage, and this phenomenon has resulted in a pervasive popularity of casual games in the game sector. On the other hand, development of casual games has become easier than ever as a result of the advancement of development tools. With the resulting fierce competition, now both acquisition and retention of users are the prime concerns in the field. In this study, we focus on churn prediction of mobile and online casual games. While churn prediction and analysis can provide important insights and action cues on retention, its application using play log data has been primitive or very limited in the casual game area. Most of the existing methods cannot be applied to casual games because casual game players tend to churn very quickly and they do not pay periodic subscription fees. Therefore, we focus on the new players and formally define churn using observation period (OP) and churn prediction period (CP). Using the definition, we develop a standard churn analysis process for casual games. We cover essential topics such as pre-processing of raw data, feature engineering including feature analysis, churn prediction modeling using traditional machine learning algorithms (logistic regression, gradient boosting, and random forests) and two deep learning algorithms (CNN and LSTM), and sensitivity analysis for OP and CP. Play log data of three different casual games are considered by analyzing a total of 193,443 unique player records and 10,874,958 play log records. While the analysis results provide useful insights, the overall results indicate that a small number of well-chosen features used as performance metrics might be sufficient for making important action decisions and that OP and CP should be properly chosen depending on the analysis goal.

Mobile Medical Applications for Dosage Recommendation, Drug Adverse Reaction, and Drug Interaction: Review and Comparison

There is a need for a collation and comparison of the content of the mobile medical applications (apps) to allow health care professionals to know precisely which app they can rely on to gain access to appropriate drugs references. This study aims to evaluate the features of mobile medical apps based on 3 major functions: Dosage recommendation, drug adverse Reaction, And Drug Interaction (DoReADI). A review and comparison of mobile apps available in Google's Play Store (Android system) and Apple's App Store (iOS system) were performed. The comparison was based on the availability of options, especially DoReADI functionalities. The assessment criteria were as follows: requirement for an Internet connection, subscription fee charged, size of app, dose recommendation, drug indication, dose calculator, drug picture, dose adjustment, pregnancy safety, interaction checker, interaction classification, clinical teaching advice, contraindicated drug, black box warning, adverse effect, contraindication or precaution, as well as toxicology and pharmacology information. Eight mobile medical apps were included and used to compare their features and functionalities. The 4 apps that scored the highest (14/17 points) are: Lexicomp®, Epocrates®, Micromedex®, and Drugs.com ®. Lexicomp and Micromedex do not provide the image of the drug and have an access subscription fee. Epocrates does not provide interaction classification and clinical teaching advice, and occupies a large space in the memory to be installed. Meanwhile, My Blue Book® scored the lowest (9/17 points) because certain features such as toxicology information, drug interaction, clinical teaching advice, contraindicated drug, and black box warning were not included. Based on the features assessment criteria of each mobile medical application, Lexicomp, Epocrates, Micromedex, and Drugs.com are the apps that scored the highest. Epocrates and Micromedex are useful for checking drug interactions. In addition, some of the apps have additional features for the DoReADI criteria, for example, dose calculator and interaction classification.

English

The study surveyed the use of e-journals by academic staff of Rufus Giwa Polytechnic, Owo, Ondo State, Nigeria. Questionnaire was designed to gather information on the use of e-journals by the academic staff. Data gathered from the respondents were analyzed through the use of frequency table and percentage. From the analysis, it was discovered that all the academic staff use e-journals and it is used for different academic purposes. All the academic staff agrees to the use of e-journals for research purpose. It was also observed from the findings that most of the academic staff uses e-journals occasionally. The advantages derived from the use of e-journals were also revealed in the study. These include good source of information, currency and timeliness of information, ease of access, ease of storage and time saving. The study also identified some problems encountered by the academic staff while accessing e-journals. Among these problems were slow internet connectivity, frequent power outage and high cost of journal subscription. Recommendations were therefore given, this include increase of internet bandwidth, reduction in prize of articles on e-journals, payment of subscription fee for e-journals by the management of the institution and making it available to their academic staff. Key words: Use, e-journals, academic staff, polytechnic.

Enhancing research visibility of academics: the role of academic libraries

Despite so many researches stemming from most African academic institutions, not many are visible. This may be attributed to low quality of research works and lack of subscription fees. This article offers suggestions on libraries’ role in promoting the quality of research in order to increase its visibility. It also offers a brief on the importance of open access and how the results, impact and progress of research is accelerated through open access. Keywords: academic libraries, open access, research, researchers, technology

Endogenous Choice on Advertising Pricing of Media Platforms: Lump-Sum Fee vs. Proportional Fee

Media platforms usually generate revenues from consumers through a subscription fee, but face the choice between lump-sum fees and proportional fees when they charge advertisers. This paper builds a two-stage dynamic game to solve an endogenous choice problem with regard to the advertising pricing instruments of two platforms competing for single-homing consumers and advertisers. If platforms can switch freely between different price instruments, the dominant strategy is that both platforms charge advertisers a proportional fee, from which more profits are generated. If one platform finds it technically infeasible to adopt proportional fee so that it has to charge a lump-sum advertising fee, the rival platform can gain an advantage in terms of both market shares and profits by charging one group a lump-sum fee and the other a proportional fee, but the comparison between the two platforms’ advertising prices is ambiguous.

Privacy Management and Optimal Pricing in People-Centric Sensing

With the emerging sensing technologies such as mobile crowdsensing and Internet of Things (IoT), people-centric data can be efficiently collected and used for analytics and optimization purposes. This data is typically required to develop and render people-centric services. In this paper, we address the privacy implication, optimal pricing, and bundling of people-centric services. We first define the inverse correlation between the service quality and privacy level from data analytics perspectives. We then present the profit maximization models of selling standalone, complementary, and substitute services. Specifically, the closed-form solutions of the optimal privacy level and subscription fee are derived to maximize the gross profit of service providers. For interrelated people-centric services, we show that cooperation by service bundling of complementary services is profitable compared to the separate sales but detrimental for substitutes. We also show that the market value of a service bundle is correlated with the degree of contingency between the interrelated services. Finally, we incorporate the profit sharing models from game theory for dividing the bundling profit among the cooperative service providers.

Fee or Free: When Should Firms Charge for Online Content?

Many online content providers aim to compensate for a loss in advertising revenues by charging consumers for access to content. However, such a choice is not straightforward because subscription fees typically deter customers, and a resulting decline in viewership further reduces advertising revenues. This research examines whether firms that offer both free and paid content can benefit from adjusting the amount of content offered for free. We find that firms should offer more free—and not paid—content in periods of high demand. We motivate theoretically that this policy, which we term “countercyclical offering,” may be optimal for firms when consumers are heterogeneous in their valuation of online content and this heterogeneity varies over time. Using unique data from an online content provider, we then provide empirical evidence that firms indeed engage in countercyclical offering and increase the share of free content in periods of high demand. This paper was accepted by Matthew Shum, marketing.

Effects of public broadcasting on the competition among private broadcasters and the total surplus

ABSTRACTThis paper analyses the effect of public service broadcasting on the competition among private broadcasters. A model is constructed to facilitate an evaluation of the effects on investments in the programmes broadcast and the selection of revenue models by private broadcasters: the pay-TV model relying on subscription fees versus the free-TV model relying on advertising revenue. It is shown that increased investment in programmes provided by public broadcasting may deter investments by private broadcasters and may compel broadcasters to change their revenue models from pay-TV to free-TV. Although a public broadcasting station may acquire a considerable number of viewers, it still may not contribute to the total surplus in the industry.

論文投稿・購読：費用の負担は誰が？

論文投稿・購読：費用の負担は誰が？

Leveraging Patent Information to Improve ICT Innovations in Tanzania

Patent information is an essential ingredient for fostering innovations. Although most of developed countries have been using patent information as a source of technological information to assist R&D companies and organizations, Tanzania is lagging behind. Recognizing the critical role of patent information in nurturing innovations, Tanzania has recently engaged in conducting awareness training on patent information to researchers and innovators. Despite the effort, ICT Innovators in Tanzania are not keen in using patent information. The authors' preliminary study indicated that 47% of respondents had knowledge of patent databases and 61% of them believe that the information can improve their innovative ideas. In contrary, 77% of the respondents had never access the databases. These revelations led us to conduct a study to determine factors that hinder ICT Innovators in Tanzania from using patent information to improve their innovative ideas. The study was conducted at BUNI Innovation Hub and DTBi Incubator in Dar es Salaam where 70 ICT Innovators and 3 Innovation Managers were involved. The study employed self-administered questionnaires and interview for collecting data. The study revealed that lack of patent search skills, language used in patent documents, subscription fees, unreliable electricity supply and limited access to the Internet are among the factors.

Bringing 5G into Rural and Low-Income Areas: Is It Feasible?

Nowadays, at least two billion people are experiencing a complete lack of wireless cellular network coverage. These users live in rural areas and low-income regions, where network operators are not keen to invest, mainly due to high capital expenditure and operational expenditure costs, as well as the scarcity of electricity from the grid. We tackle this challenge by proposing a 5G network explicitly designed to serve rural and low-income areas. Our solution investigates the possibility of mounting remote radio heads on top of unmanned aerial vehicles, as well as large cells (LCs) to increase the coverage range. In addition, 5G nodes are powered by solar panels and batteries. Preliminary results, obtained over three representative case studies located in Italy, Cook Islands, and Zimbabwe, show that providing connectivity in rural and low-income areas by means of the proposed 5G architecture is feasible. At the same time, we also show that the monthly subscription fee paid by the users can be kept sufficiently low, that is, less than €1/month in low-income areas, and around €11/month in rural regions.

Survivor Curve Shape and Internet Revenue: A Laboratory Experiment

Author(s): Aperjis, C; Bosch-Rosa, C; Friedman, D; Huberman, BA | Abstract: When should a necessary inconvenience be introduced gradually, and when should it be imposed all at once? The question is crucial to web content providers, who in order to generate revenue must sooner or later introduce advertisements, subscription fees, or other inconveniences. Assuming that eventually people fully adapt to changes, the answer depends only on the shape of the survivor curve S (x), which represents the fraction of a user population willing to tolerate inconveniences of size x (Aperjis and Huberman 2011). We report a new laboratory experiment that, for the first time, estimates the shape of survivor curves in several different settings. We engage laboratory subjects in a series of six desirable activities, e.g., playing a video game, viewing a chosen video clip, or earning money by answering questions. For each activity we introduce a chosen level x ∈ [xmin ; xmax] of a particular inconvenience, and each subject chooses whether to tolerate the inconvenience or to switch to a bland activity for the remaining time. Our key finding is that, in general, the survivor curve is log-convex. Theory suggests therefore that introducing inconveniences all at once will generally be more profitable for web content providers.

Advantages of JAESE’s Open-Access Strategy

There has been considerable debate in recent years—some well informed and others not so well informed—about the advantages and disadvantages of publishing in online, open-access journals as compared to traditional, subscription-based, print journals. For many professional societies, traditional, subscription-based, page-charge funded, print journals have served as an important service that societies can enthusiastically provide to their members, as well as provide societies with a healthy stream of financial revenue. At the same time as providing revenue to run a society, society members have been able to provide important service to the broader professional community by publishing their own scholarship and conducting peer reviews of others’ research. By far, the majority of a journal’s cost has been born by libraries paying hefty subscription fees.

A Business Model Canvas: Traditional Restaurant “Melayu” in North Sumatra, Indonesia

The research purpose is to evaluate the business model on the traditional restaurant in Tanjung Pura, North Sumatera, Indonesia. Business Model Canvas (BMC) consists of customer segments, value propositions, channels, customer relationship, revenue streams, key resources, key activities, key partnership, and cost structure. The research method was used qualitative descriptive analysis. The data collected using in-depth interviews. Analysis TOWS is to evaluate the business model on a traditional restaurant. The authors recommend increasing the intensity to visit the restaurant with the privilege of membership. The next recommendation is to collaborate with the new business partners such as banking, e-traveler, e-destination, and e-restaurant. The traditional restaurant enables to obtain the other revenues of the subscription fee and advertising space. Also, the authors recommend registering the food recipes as the intellectual property.

Covidence vs Excel for the title and abstract review stage of a systematic review

Background: Although spreadsheet formats such as Excel are commonly used to manage the title and abstract review stage of JBI reviews, these formats necessitate considerable data entry and may be labor intensive. Covidence is a software platform owned by Veritas Health Innovation in Victoria, Australia, and it is the platform used for the conduct of Cochrane Systematic Reviews. Currently the platform is accessed by opening an account online free of charge, and account holders are bound by the terms of use of the platform and the platform can be modified or discontinued without notice. Covidence provides a series of functionalities to facilitate the review process including: importing citations from a variety of reference management systems; removing duplicate entries (sensitivity to deduplication not considered to be high); programming the number of reviewers; recording an audit trail on reviewer decisions; decision choices of yes, no or maybe; assigning conflict resolution when reviewers disagree; and title and abstract inclusion/exclusion criteria and key words. A yes or maybe decision results in a full text article review. Objective: To compare the strengths and limitations of Covidence versus Excel for the conduct of a title and abstract review. Methods: Each team member obtained a Covidence account, and the team's Information Scientist conducted the search as outlined in the systematic review protocol search strategy and uploaded titles and abstracts to the Covidence platform for team member review. The team received training on the use of Covidence and trialled its use on 25 articles. The team will meet once during title and abstract review and once following this review to outline the strengths and limitations of Covidence versus Excel. Our team will begin using the platform in approximately two weeks. The period of title and abstract review will occur over one month. The assessment of strengths and limitations of Covidence and Excel will be conducted with reviewers completing a brief questionnaire based on Covidence functionalities, tracking review times, and through a team discussion following title and abstract review. Results: Preliminary assessments were primarily favorable, such as ease of access, page layout of the abstract, and identification of the reviews completed to date as well as those remaining. Covidence limitations will be assessed via the review process. Discussion/Conclusion: Our training experience indicates that Covidence has the potential to greatly facilitate the title and abstract review stage of a JBI systematic review. While the online platform has been available for free, there will be a subscription fee introduced in May, 2016, which may limit the availability of this program for some researchers in the future.

Distromed Bioclean Pvt. Ltd.

Subject area The subject area is operations management. Study level/applicability The case is to be used at master’s level, for example, MBA courses on operations management, operations research, logistics management and supply chain management. Case overview It was the morning of 20 September 2012 and the three directors of Distromed Bioclean Pvt. Ltd. were in the office discussing the developments from past night’s meeting with the Rajkot Chapter of the Indian Medical Association. They are a bio-medical waste treatment facility involved in collection, treatment and disposal services and charge yearly subscription fees. On 13 September 2012, fuel prices had gone up consecutively for the second year. Last year, the doctors resisted the fee hike and seemed reluctant this year again. In response, management of the company was looking for ways to minimize the total distance travelled by its fleet to reduce the operating cost. Expected learning outcomes The paper enables illustration of concepts of routing/scheduling and generation of optimal solutions in a realistic setting; and developing the understanding regarding the travelling salesman problem, Chinese postman problem and the entire family of vehicle routing problems and vehicle scheduling problems. Supplementary materials Teaching notes are available for educators only. Please contact your library to gain login details or email support@emeraldinsight.com to request teaching notes. Subject code CSS 9: Operations and Logistics.

Optimal pricing for new product entry under free strategy

A growing number of firms in software industry are embracing free entry strategy to promote product adoption. The prevalence of free strategy can be partly attributed to the positive network externalities exhibited by the information goods. In this paper, we model a new firm’s entry into an existing market with the free strategy. Consumers can use the new product’s basic functionality for free and pay a subscription fee for accessing the add-ons. The entrant firm’s new product infringes on the market in one of the three ways: homogeneous product competition, high-end encroachment and low-end encroachment. We find that the equilibrium market structure varies across the three settings. In particular, there exists a Bertrand equilibrium when the new firm provides a homogeneous product. When the new firm offers a heterogeneous product, our results show that the network externalities intensify the price competition and thus lead to a reduction in the profits. Moreover, whether the new firm should encroach on the existing market with high-end product or low-end product depends on the level of switching cost. If the switching cost is low, the new firm will benefit more from high-end encroachment and vice versa. We also find that it is not always optimal for the new firm to adopt the free entry strategy. In the high-end encroachment, the new firm will be better off providing a product for free if the network intensity is high enough, whereas in the low-end encroachment, the free strategy is dominant only when the network intensity falls within a given threshold.

A tale of two journals or how Elsevier pushed open access in Linguistics

Watch the VIDEO of the presentation.In this talk I provide the background on the transition of a top journal in Linguistics to open access and discuss open access publishing in Linguistics and the problems of this particular transition.The journal Lingua was hosted and marketed by Elsevier which charges substantial subscription fees for its journals and charges authors who want to have their articles published as open access. In the fall of 2015, the editors of the journal wrote a letter to their publishing house Elsevier to express their discomfort with the pricing policy for their journal and asking for a more reasonable policy. Elsevier's reaction to this letter led to the stepping-down of the editors, followed immediately by the complete editorial board. The entire academic Lingua team immediately founded a new journal, Glossa: a journal of general linguistics, which is completely Open Access, published by Ubiquity Press and funded through the Open Library of Humanities. This new foundation was necessary since Elsevier regards Lingua as one of their products and is continuing to publish the journal with a new editorial team.The case received quite some media attention, among others Times Higher Education, Inside Higher Education, The Independent, Slate, and Wired reported. In this talk I will provide the details of the story and discuss commercial and open access publishing in the relatively small field of Linguistics. The conclusion is that it is doable to move even a high profile journal out from behind a huge paywall. Apparently, the Norwegian higher education system isn't quite rigged for this kind of fast change yet if it involves movement of expertise from one label to another rather than movement of the label. While the NSD has approved Glossa this fall, it was granted only the lower level of the system, while Lingua was, and still is, at the top level.