Creation Of User-generated Content Research Articles

Sang Culture: Social Comparisons of Generation Z Youths in China on Social Media

Sang Culture emerged among Chinese youth, showcasing digital expressions that encompass written words, audio clips, visuals and videos that portray feelings of despair and decadence. This phenomenon offers insight into the lived experiences and attitudes of Chinese Generation Z, commonly known as Gen Z. Rising from the challenges of the 2020 pandemic, the guarded and pessimistic mindset of this generation towards existential fears and uncertainties is distinctive, particularly on social media, where the youth find comfort in a sense of belonging, channelling their expressions through ironic wit and light-hearted jokes, resulting in not only personal healing but also shared amusement. While it is being embraced as a means of self-expression and discourse on societal norms, Sang Culture has faced criticism from conservative Chinese society for its perceived disruptive nature. In stark contrast to traditional beliefs and philosophies, Sang Culture and its cynicism are often considered a societal stain. Nevertheless, as China's youth continue to navigate their place in a rapidly changing society, Sang Culture remains a powerful force, reflecting the aspirations and frustrations of a generation seeking to carve out its own path. This study examined Gen Z through the Sang Culture on social media platforms and analysed social comparisons that emerge from the Sang Culture expressions online. The analysis deployed Festinger’s Social Comparison Theory and findings of this study underline how the creation of user-generated content concerning the Sang Culture compare their perceptions, beliefs, attitudes, and behaviours with those dictated or implied by societal realities. Keywords: Sang culture, generation Z, social media, user-generated content, social comparison theory.

Travel decision making through blogs and vlogs: An empirical investigation on how user-generated content influences destination image

Tourist decision-making is based on the information available before visiting a destination. Although marketing content has a role to play, user-generated content (UGC) has gained momentum in recent years. This study considering the role of travel blogs and vlogs created by the user, aims to comprehend the role of these information sources in the decision-making of their consumers. The present research investigates the preference of travelers for UGC and its role in travel decision-making over other marketing information generated by destination marketing organisations (DMOs). The study is based on responses from 220 Indian tourists via an online web-based survey conducted using a structured questionnaire and applying multi-stage sampling. The study findings reveal a strengthened preference for blogs and vlogs among travelers compared to traditional DMO marketing content. The study provides implications for industry players that can help engage their visitors in UGC creation and dissemination for better marketing by suggesting suitable strategies for tourism.

MetaCube: A Crypto-Based Unique User-Generated Content Editor for Web3 Metaverse

Web3 (also known as Web 3.0) metaverse is a blockchain-driven networked, decentralized, and open virtual world. The key feature of the Web3 metaverse is that the ownership of digital assets is recorded by non-fungible token (NFT) protocol on the blockchain. Thus, users are better encouraged to construct Web3 metaverse due to the ownership of their user-generated content (UGC). However, the existing UGC editors mainly face two challenges: (1) they cannot guarantee the uniqueness of UGC; (2) they are hard to find a trade-off between model granularity and 3D modeling difficulty. In this paper, we design a novel UGC editor for the Web3 metaverse, named MetaCube, to address the aforementioned challenges. MetaCube applies an artificial intelligence (AI) method to assist the UGC creation for decreasing the 3D modeling difficulty while maintaining the model granularity. To guarantee the uniqueness of UGC, this paper proposes 3D Crypto-dropout, a specially designed dropout that can utilize user information to control the UGC creation process and generate unique fine-grained 3D models. Our experimental results demonstrate that the proposed 3D Crypto-dropout can effectively guarantee the uniqueness of UGC from both numerical and human-centered evaluation. Moreover, the existing challenges and open research topics for the uniqueness of UGC are also profoundly discussed.

Understanding the world heritage sites’ brand diffusion and formation via social media: a mixed-method study

PurposeBuilding on social media and destination brand-related literature, this study aims to explore World Heritage Sites’ (WHSs) brand diffusion and formation process from long-term and short-term perspectives, which includes brand diffusion, user-generated content (UGC), opinion leaders and brand events’ impact.Design/methodology/approachThis study uses a mixed-method including text mining, keyword analysis and social network analysis to explore the brand formation process of four popular WHSs in Beijing, namely, the Palace Museum, Great Wall, Summer Palace and Temple of Heaven and more than 10,000,000 users’ data on Sina Weibo has been implemented to uncover the underlying social media branding mechanism.FindingsThe results show that the number of postings keeps in a stable range in most months, but, in general, there are no common rules for changing trends among the four WHSs; long-term high-frequency keywords related to history and culture account for a higher percentage; different kinds of accounts have varying impacts on information diffusion, in which media accounts lead to a bigger influence. However, more followers do not necessarily mean more interactions and most of the interaction ratio is much lower than 0.01000; brand events facilitate brand dissemination and have an impact on the creation of UGC.Practical implicationsThis study is valuable for destination marketers to deeper understand brand diffusion and formation and provides valuable insights for developing effective destination marketing strategies.Originality/valueUnlike previous studies that only concern a few parts of destination brand formation via social media (e.g. brand diffusion, brand events or opinion leaders’ impact), this study takes a more comprehensive perspective by systematically analyzing the brand formation process of WHSs on social media. By considering both long-term diffusion and short-term representative events, this study provides a more holistic understanding of the branding mechanism.

Gamification Mechanics Usage for UGC Promotion in Online Library Marketing

The aim of the article is to highlight effective gamification mechanics in the Internet marketing of the information and library industry for stimulating the creation of modern custom content forms, or User Generated Content (UGC), which can improve the position and organic coverage of the official library account in Web 2.0.
 Research methods were based on general scientific principles of theory and practice unity, systematicity, complexity, cognition comprehensiveness. The achievement of this set goal was facilitated by the use of general scientific (description, analysis, synthesis, comparison, generalization), and special (bibliographic, selective observation, grouping, content analysis) methods at the empirical and theoretical research levels.
 Scientific novelty of the study consists in the following: identified gamification mechanics for UGC stimulation that contribute to the Internet marketer’s activity effectiveness in the information and library sphere; suggestions for the use of gamification types approved in other industries, and characteristic features of the game in attracting users to interaction with library institutions in Web 2.0.
 Main conclusions. Among the priority tasks of library Internet marketers is to support the interaction with the existing custom base, and attract new users to information and library institutions. The usage of the latest content formats, as well as the involvement of Web 2.0 customers in its creation and distribution, contribute to these tasks. Regardless of whether the audience is involved in the UGC creation through the gamification activation, other mechanics or its own initiative, the custom content increases the trust in libraries of those people who are tired of direct advertising and do not respond to it. Gamification mechanics are just one of the possible ways to attract an audience to UGC, but the experience of international and Ukrainian companies proves their effectiveness, and the necessity of their usage by Internet marketers of any field, including the information and library industry.

"In the Wild" Video Content as a Special Case of User Generated Content and a System for Its Recognition.

In the five years between 2017 and 2022, IP video traffic tripled, according to Cisco. User-Generated Content (UGC) is mainly responsible for user-generated IP video traffic. The development of widely accessible knowledge and affordable equipment makes it possible to produce UGCs of quality that is practically indistinguishable from professional content, although at the beginning of UGC creation, this content was frequently characterized by amateur acquisition conditions and unprofessional processing. In this research, we focus only on UGC content, whose quality is obviously different from that of professional content. For the purpose of this paper, we refer to "in the wild" as a closely related idea to the general idea of UGC, which is its particular case. Studies on UGC recognition are scarce. According to research in the literature, there are currently no real operational algorithms that distinguish UGC content from other content. In this study, we demonstrate that the XGBoost machine learning algorithm (Extreme Gradient Boosting) can be used to develop a novel objective "in the wild" video content recognition model. The final model is trained and tested using video sequence databases with professional content and "in the wild" content. We have achieved a 0.916 accuracy value for our model. Due to the comparatively high accuracy of the model operation, a free version of its implementation is made accessible to the research community. It is provided via an easy-to-use Python package installable with Pip Installs Packages (pip).

More, Faster, and Better? Effects of Rewards on Incentivizing the Creation of User-Generated Content

More, Faster, and Better? Effects of Rewards on Incentivizing the Creation of User-Generated Content

Turning users into ‘unofficial brand ambassadors’: marketing of unhealthy food and non-alcoholic beverages on TikTok

IntroductionTikTok has over one billion monthly users and is particularly popular among children. We examined the (1) use of owned media by major unhealthy food and non-alcoholic beverage brands on...

Mobile dependency and uncertainty reduction: influence on showrooming behaviours and user-generated content creation

PurposeThe expanded use of mobile devices for shopping has made mobile showrooming a frequent practice among omnichannel shoppers. This paper aims to shed light on the role of mobile dependency and uncertainty reduction strategies together with the motivation of getting the best value for money in showrooming behaviours and user-generated content (UGC) creation.Design/methodology/approachData were collected by means of a questionnaire answered by 659 shoppers in two product categories: clothing and consumer electronics. The research model was tested through partial least squares.FindingsThe results suggest that mobile showrooming attitude is positively affected by mobile dependency, value consciousness and need for touch, and negatively by perceived risk of mobile shopping. The results also reveal how UGC is created by showroomers and suggest this behaviour is linked to mobile dependency in the clothing category.Research limitations/implicationsAll the individuals in the sample had some experience in showrooming, which could affect the results regarding showrooming attitude and intentions. Future research should consider the role of experience and also validate the results across a larger number of product categories.Practical implicationsMobile showrooming is a challenge for multichannel retailers. This paper reveals certain ways in which multichannel retailers could deal with showroomers as potential customers.Originality/valueThis study is the first to analyse the role of mobile dependency in showrooming and the chain of effects towards mobile showrooming attitude, behaviour and UGC creation in two different product categories.

Online cultural backlash? sexism and political user-generated content

ABSTRACT Prior research highlights substantial beneficial effects of political user-generated content (UGC) in society, such as diversifying political viewpoints, mobilizing the electorate, and fostering citizens’ civic engagement. However, important user asymmetries exist when creating political content. Gender, age, media uses, and skills gaps have been identified as key variables predicting UGC. This study addressed the political UGC gender gap from a political perspective. We build on previous theory about feminist media studies, political polarization, and cultural backlash theory to disentangle whether hostile sexism predicts UGC creation. Drawing on online survey data from four well-established democracies, we find that those individuals holding hostile sexist views are more likely to generate political content online. Further implications for democracy and the role of women in the digital sphere are discussed.

Chinese Social Media Platforms and Microblogging in the Context of Public Diplomacy

The term “digital public diplomacy” that appeared in the 21st century owes much to the emergence and development of the concept of Web 2.0 (interactive communication on the Internet). The principle of network interaction, in which the system becomes better with an increase in the number of users and the creation of user-generated content, made it possible to create social media platforms where news and entertainment content is created and moderated by the user. Such platforms have become an expression of the opinions of various groups of people in many countries of the world, including China. The Chinese segment of the Internet is “closed”, and many popular Western services are blocked in it. Studying the structure of Chinese social media platforms and microblogging, as well as analyzing targeted content is necessary to understand China’s public opinion, choose the right message channels and receive feedback for promoting the country’s public diplomacy. This paper reveals the main Chinese social media platforms and microblogging and provides the assessment of their popularity, as well as possibility of analyzing China’s public opinion based on “listening” to social media platforms and microblogging.

Marketing for Next Gen Extension Clientele Through the Use of Geofilters

Research supports Extension educators' use of social media as an engagement, outreach, and marketing tool beyond posts shared by staff and faculty. This article highlights the practical use of Snapchat geofilters at county and statewide Extension events to support the creation of user-generated content and increase Extension's visibility with the public. The development and implementation of an innovative statewide marketing project resulted in data and recommendations that can help Extension educators make meaningful marketing decisions.

Perceived image study with online data from social media: the case of boutique hotels in China

Purpose The purpose of this paper is to deconstruct the multi-faceted dimensions of Chinese travellers’ image of boutique hotels with a large amount of online textual data from social media (53,427 reviews written from 2014 to 2018), reinforcing the value creation of user-generated content via social media. Design/methodology/approach With the aid of Python, a computer language, online textual reviews (53,427 reviews) of 86 high-end boutique hotels in seven cities (Beijing, Shanghai, Hangzhou, Nanjing, Chengdu, Qingdao and Sanya) were collected from the top-ranked online travel agency in China, Ctrip.com. Then, the overall perceived image of boutique hotels was revealed with the aid of Python. Findings The results showed multiple dimensions of the image of boutique hotels. The overall image can be grouped into eight dimensions (room, service, food, environment, entertainment, location, price and value, and uniqueness). An affective image based on eight dimensions was further developed in the Chinese boutique hotel context. It appears that online data from social media are beneficial for hotel managers to learn travellers’ overall perceptions of boutique hotels and help put more effective management strategies in place in the hospitality industry. Research limitations/implications The relationship between cognitive image and affective image should be further investigated in future research. Theoretical implications are discussed from both cognitive image and affective image perspectives in the boutique hotel context. Managerial implications are highlighted to help industry managers understand the travellers’ perceptions of the hotels, via online data from social media, and put more effective hotel strategies in hospitality industry. Originality/value By using textual online data from social media, this paper deconstructs both the cognitive image and the affective image of boutique hotels. The dimensions of the most frequently mentioned concepts related to the Chinese boutique hotel industry are profoundly deconstructed, as is the uniqueness of the image of boutique hotels. The work is valuable for promoting effective marketing strategies in the hotel industry.

Exploring Active Participation in Virtual Communities and the Role of Community Benefits: An Empirical Study of University Students in India

User-generated content (UGC) forms an indispensable part of virtual community (VC) based on marketing. It not only makes the community information-rich, but is also instrumental in generating more interactions on the community platform, involving more number of members, both actively and passively. With this backdrop, the present study aims to explore active participation (AP) of members in a VC, which leads to the creation of UGC for the community. Social media (SM) use being context dependent, the main objective of this article is to study the role of VC benefits in inducing AP among users in the Indian context. The mediating role of member’s satisfaction with the community in the above relationship is also explored. The proposed model is tested on a convenience sample of 170 SM users using structural equation modeling (SEM). The results indicate that of the three benefit categories, selected, social and hedonic benefits, play an important role in inducing AP among community members. A bootstrap analysis is performed to check for mediation, wherein satisfaction is found to partially mediate the relationship between social benefits and AP, and indirect mediation is established between hedonic benefits and AP. The study offers useful insights to community managers, so as to strategically design their community content creating satisfied users and inducing AP.

Extremity Bias in User-Generated Content Creation and Consumption in Social Media

The present research finds support for an extremity bias in social media. User-generated content in social media is found to portray more extreme behavior than what is observed in offline and nonmedia contexts. This bias is observed in the context of makeup-related consumer behavior. Study 1 finds that consumers with higher (lower) self-reported extremity in their makeup style are more likely to create (consume) makeup-related content in social media. Likewise, Study 2 finds that makeup styles portrayed in social media are perceived as more extreme than those portrayed offline. Study 3 finds that the extremity bias, observed in the previous studies, can shift other perception; brief exposure to makeup styles on Instagram was found to lessen the perceived extremity of offline makeup styles. The results suggest that, like traditional media, content in social media may be biased toward extremity. This bias may be the result of motivational differences between creators versus consumers of social media content and may result in exposure to social media shifting social norms to more extreme levels.

What Determines User-Generated Content Creation of College Football? A Big-Data Analysis of Structural Influences

The question of how and why users engage in sport digital communication endures. In this study, structuration theory is employed to examine how social-media users exercise preferences in the creation of content as they respond to a variety of macrolevel factors pertaining to college football—the type of game, team strength, conference membership, market characteristics, etc. Through hierarchical regression analysis, the results indicate that the presence and timing of college football games, as well as team strength and game outcome, are significant determinants for the patterns of online content generation. As such, the study advances the theoretical, methodological, and managerial inquiry of user-generated content on sport social-media platforms through a Big Data analytics approach.

Showrooming, Webrooming, and User-Generated Content Creation in the Omnichannel Era

ABSTRACTOmnichannel retailing characterizes a seamless and integrated approach of diverse retail channels. Showrooming and webrooming are prominent shopping trends among consumers in omnichannel retail. The purpose of this study was to examine (1) whether omnichannel consumers’ psychographic characteristics (i.e., information attainment, price comparison, social interaction, assortment seeking, and convenience seeking) had an influence on showrooming and webrooming, which then had an influence on omnichannel consumers’ user-generated content creation intention on social media and (2) whether the social-local-mobile (SoLoMo) experience moderated the links between omnichannel consumers’ showrooming/webrooming and user-generated content creation intention. An online survey was administered to a total of 680 omnichannel consumers with showrooming and webrooming experience from a U.S. consumer panel. This study found that omnichannel consumers’ showrooming and webrooming positively affected user-generated content creation intention on social media. Omnichannel consumers’ information attainment, price comparison, and social interaction positively affected showrooming. Information attainment, social interaction, and assortment seeking positively affected webrooming. The SoLoMo experience moderated the link between webrooming and user-generated content creation intention on social media. Managerial implications were discussed.

Is vlogging the new stand-up? A compare/contrast of traditional and online models of comedic content distribution

ABSTRACTThe ways in which audiences consume comedic content have drastically changed, as have the ways comedians distribute their material through user-generated content (UGC) online. In this paper, stand-up comedy will be compared to UGC creation, discussing the rising popularity of telling jokes online especially via vlogging. Specific areas of focus include the rationale behind choosing online methods of distribution such as YouTube, starting one's career, dealing with opposition, honing the craft and finding a big break that drastically increases popularity. The central question to be investigated is the following: has vlogging become the new version of stand-up comedy or are both outlets unique enough to continue to exist separately in the future?

Transmedia Archaeology: audiences participation on the expansion of the World War II narratives (case <em>Band of Brothers</em>)

Este documento pretende probar que es posible (y quizá necesario) abordar la investigación sobre lo transmedia en términos de una lógica que busque en las narrativas y relatos (del pasado y presente), aspectos trascendentes de los procesos de comunicación centrados en la participación. Se propone mover el interés de investigación desde el qué (es transmedia) hacia el cuándo (es transmedia), para demostrar que la transmedialidad en los relatos no depende únicamente de su construcción narrativa, sino de toda una organización de elementos y recursos que constituyen un conjunto de funciones que se adquieren a partir de su significación, apropiación y expansión. En este artículo se trabaja una triple articulación de lo transmedial: 1) la dimensión histórica, 2) la dimensión narrativa y 3) la relación entre la recepción y la participación, para lo que se describe y analiza la expansión ficcional y no ficcional de historias de la Segunda Guerra Mundial (tomando como ejemplo el caso de Band of Brothers). Se trabaja, desde una perspectiva crítica, la idea y posibilidad de una Arqueología Transmedia que permita expandir los límites (y usos) del concepto Transmedia Storytelling, más allá de los casos emblemáticos de la cultura popular audiovisual actual. Bajo la premisa de que la recepción nunca ha sido completamente pasiva por parte de las audiencias, se plantea la posibilidad de un tipo de recepción-participación orientada a la creación de contenidos generados por los usuarios, que se hacen visibles en universos narrativos transmediales del pasado y que pueden ser ficcionales o no.

Is audience engagement worth the buzz? The value of audience engagement, comment reading, and content for online news brands

Online audience engagement, such as rating or sharing news, commenting or creating content, can enhance users’ loyalty toward online news brands. Yet recently, uncertainties have been discussed within journalism research and practice concerning the handling of online comment sections and potential negative influences – caused through comment reading – on news brands. From a brand management perspective, audience engagement and comment reading can affect a brand’s equity. This study investigates the value of audience engagement and comment reading for the customer-based brand equity of online news outlets. An online survey with n = 313 users of the digital native cohort revealed that comment reading is neither directly beneficial nor harmful for online news brands. However, for brands providing hard news comment reading seems more likely to have negative than positive relations with CBBE than for brands with other content. Sharing and liking news are associated with a stronger perceived brand quality, loyalty, and associations. User-generated content creation including commenting does not enhance customer-based brand equity. Overall, serious content proved to be a stronger driver of news brand value than any form of audience engagement.