Users In Online Communities Research Articles

If You Build (and Moderate) It, They Will Come: The Smokefree Women Facebook Page

This analysis explores the impact of modifying the Smokefree Women Facebook social media strategy, from primarily promoting resources to encouraging participation in communications about smoking cessation by posting user-generated content. Analyses were performed using data from the Smokefree Women Facebook page to assess the impact of the revised strategy on reach and engagement. Fan engagement increased 430%, and a strong and statistically significant correlation (P < .05) between the frequency of moderator posts and community engagement was observed. The reach of the page also increased by 420%. Our findings indicate that the strategy shift had a statistically significant and positive effect on the frequency of interactions on the Facebook page, providing an example of an approach that may prove useful for reaching and engaging users in online communities. Additional research is needed to assess the association between engagement in virtual communities and health behavior outcomes.

Robust Reputation Protocol Design for Online Communities: A Stochastic Stability Analysis

This paper proposes a new class of incentive mechanisms aiming at compelling self-interested users in online communities to cooperate with each other by exchanging resources or services. Examples of such communities are social multimedia platforms, social networks, online labor markets, crowdsourcing platforms, etc. To optimize their individual long-term performance, users adapt their strategies by solving individual stochastic control problems. The users' adaptation catalyze a stochastic dynamic process, in which the strategies of users in the community evolve over time. We first characterize the structural properties of the users' best response strategies. Subsequently, using these structural results we design incentive mechanisms based on reputation protocols for governing the online communities, which can “manage” the long-run evolution of the community. We prove that by appropriately penalizing and rewarding users based on their behavior in the community, such incentive mechanisms can eliminate free-riding and ensure that the community converges to a desirable equilibrium selected by the community designer such that social welfare is maximized and in which users find it in their self-interest to cooperate with each other.

Trust prediction from user-item ratings

Trust relationships between users in various online communities are notoriously hard to model for computer scientists. It can be easily verified that trying to infer trust based on the social network alone is often inefficient. Therefore, the avenue we explore is applying Data Mining algorithms to unearth latent relationships and patterns from background data. In this paper, we focus on a case where the background data are user ratings for online product reviews. We consider as a testing ground a large dataset provided by Epinions.com that contains a trust network as well as user ratings for reviews on products from a wide range of categories. In order to predict trust we define and compute a critical set of features, which we show to be highly effective in providing the basis for trust predictions. Then, we show that state-of-the-art classifiers can do an impressive job in predicting trust based on our extracted features. For this, we employ a variety of measures to evaluate the classification based on these features. We show that by carefully collecting and synthesizing readily available background information, such as ratings for online reviews, one can accurately predict social links based on trust.

MY IDEA IS OUR IDEA! SUPPORTING USER-DRIVEN INNOVATION ACTIVITIES IN CROWDSOURCING COMMUNITIES

There is a growing stream of research unraveling individual motivations to participate in idea crowdsourcing and online user communities. While the current research has largely focused on individual user characteristics and overlooked the features of surrounding communities, our research turns the focus onto the actual community where knowledge is shared and created. We investigate the relationships between perceived support from a crowdsourcing community, and the users' intentions to share knowledge. Our research is based on a survey of 241 Chinese users of IdeasProject and shows that (1) for community trust, trust in the hosting firm has a significant effect on knowledge-sharing intentions, while collaborative norms do not; (2) for community support, both technology-based support and knowledge-based support have an effect on knowledge-sharing intentions. From a community management viewpoint, our results demonstrate the importance of providing continued support for knowledge integration, such as more opportunities for user-to-user interaction and features for providing constructive feedback.

Information Exposure, Opportunity Evaluation, and Entrepreneurial Action: An Investigation of an Online User Community

We study how an individual's exposure to external information regulates the evaluation of entrepreneurial opportunities and entrepreneurial action. Combining data from interviews, a survey, and a comprehensive web log of an online user community spanning eight years, we find that technical information shaped opportunity evaluation and that social information about user needs drove individuals to entrepreneurial action. Our empirical findings suggest that reducing demand uncertainty is a central factor regulating entrepreneurial action, an insight that received theories of entrepreneurial action have so far overlooked.

Information Exposure, Opportunity Evaluation and Entrepreneurial Action: An Investigation of an Online User Community

We study how an individual’s exposure to external information regulates the evaluation of entrepreneurial opportunities and entrepreneurial action. Combining data from interviews, a survey, and a comprehensive web log of an online user community spanning eight years, we find that technical information shaped opportunity evaluation, and social information about user needs drove individuals to entrepreneurial action. Our empirical findings suggest that reducing demand uncertainty is a central factor regulating of entrepreneurial action, an insight that received theories of entrepreneurial action have so far overlooked.

Factors determining the flow of information among the online community users

PurposeThe purpose of this descriptive study is to focus on the salient features of perceived sociability and perceived usability that motivates the members to participate repeatedly on social networking online community web site. The paper proposes that each individual relegate different importance on the dimensions of usability and sociability in terms of the quest of knowledge versus causal knowledge.Design/methodology/approachA self‐designed questionnaire administered among 600 sample respondents (users of Facebook.com) through online survey method. Confirmatory factor analysis was performed to examine and improve the usability of the measurement tool followed by structural equation modelling to test the proposed framework.FindingsThe findings indicate that ease of use, behaviour and interaction is been given an equal level of importance by both the groups, while satisfaction is given the least consideration.Research limitations/implicationsThe community used to study the flow of the information belongs to the single general purpose category. Also the target sample size is restricted to active online users belonging to the category of professionals from India.Practical implicationsThe results of this research work will provide a framework of user‐centric strategy for the online managers to maintain the dual directional flow of information, i.e. seeking and contributing, and achieve online success.Originality/valueThe study contributes to the existing knowledge of social networking process on online community web site promoting user participation through continuous flow of information.

A trust prediction framework in rating-based experience sharing social networks without a Web of Trust

As online experience sharing sites have become one of the popular collaborative online communities, people are easily able to share their good and bad experiences on various products and services with a large number of unknown people as well as their friends. These experience sharing communities try to encourage social interaction among people and facilitate experience sharing and dissemination with satisfaction. The social interactions among users in such online communities are constructed based on trust that is established from each user’s subjective perspective on the experiences in the community. Since a robust trust system is vital in experience sharing online communities, we therefore propose a computational trust framework for predicting a degree of trust or trust-connection between a pair of users. The Web of Trust, which consists of explicit trust rating among users, is not always available and is typically sparse, so the proposed framework does not rely on a Web of Trust. The proposed trust system measures a degree of trust based on users’ expertise and preferences regarding topics (i.e. categories), using users feedback rating data which are available and much denser than a Web of Trust. In order to derive a more personalized degree of trust, the expertise- and preference-based trust is refined with each user’s subjective and direct experiences with community members as well as a target user. The empirical experiments show that our proposed trust framework is quite promising in ratings-based online experience sharing communities, even when there are not enough user feedback ratings to predict a degree of trust.

ネットコミュニティの利用者の名乗りとアイデンティティ: 「発言小町」利用者調査分析 (2) :利用姿勢と実名・仮名・匿名

ネットコミュニティの利用者の名乗りとアイデンティティ: 「発言小町」利用者調査分析 (2) :利用姿勢と実名・仮名・匿名

Extending lead-user theory to online brand communities: The case of the community Ducati

While research on user innovations within communities exists mainly in offline contexts, few studies have attempted to define the profile of lead users in online (or virtual) communities, and even fewer have been conducted in the specific context of online brand communities, formed by people with a “common interest in a brand,” in its evolution and in the discourse about it. This study focuses on innovative activities within the Ducati Motor online community. The research reveals the following characteristics as crucial factors for the identification of lead users in online brand communities: willingness to collaborate, product knowledge and strategic alignment with the brand identity. Our sample consists of 2071 messages posted by 572 Ducati Motor virtual community members in a specific blog developed by Ducati Motor with the purpose of involving members in a collaborative innovation process that took nearly 14 months. Several implications for scholars and new product development managers are discussed.

Understanding online community user participation: a social influence perspective

PurposeThe purpose of this study is to examine the determinants of online community user participation from a social influence perspective.Design/methodology/approachBased on 450 valid responses collected from a survey questionnaire, structural equation modeling (SEM) technology was employed to examine the research model.FindingsThe results show that both social identity and group norm have significant effects on user participation. In addition, group norm affects social identity. It was not possible to find the effect of subjective norm on participation intention.Research limitations/implicationsThis research is limited to a particular sample: students. Thus the results need to be generalized to other samples, such as working professionals.Originality/valueExtant research has mainly focused on the effects of user motivations such as perceived usefulness, trust and commitment on online community user behavior, and seldom considered the effects of social processes including compliance, identification and internalization on user behavior. This research tries to fill the gap.

Investigating image usage and tacit knowledge sharing in online communities

The most influential role of the internet today is bringing people together to share experiences and advices. Since experience sharing is a primary source of tacit knowledge, it is possible that online communities’ users from around the world are sharing their tacit knowledge while they are revealing their personal experiences and giving advices. This study investigates how online community users use images to share their tacit knowledge. The results from this study suggests that image usage can assist online community users in tacit knowledge sharing by helping these users share knowledge that is difficult to communicate, problematic, and contextual easier.

온라인 브랜드 커뮤니티에서의 관계단절행동

Most of studies concerned with on-line Brand community show that it makes users to increase their brand loyalty and brand attachment. But it wouldn`t be explained that on-line brand community could be the field of consumer`s public complaining in service failure. So, this study tried to focus the dimensions of negative emotions and customer characteristics that may cause relationship dissolutions in on-line brand community. The findings of the present study following as, high relationship quality of on-line brand community user directly effects negative emotions, especially, disappointment and betrayal. second, disappointment and betrayal influences the desire of revenge. Third, customer`s negative reactions (for example, negative replies about the brand or public complaining in community) are mediated by customer`s desire of revenge. The analysis was held with brand community customers who has been experienced service recently by using SPSS14K and Smart PLS 2.0. The study verified the structural equation model hypothesizing the between emotional factors and negative reactions. In conclusion, this article provides implications into understanding of customer`s negative emotions and user`s characteristics that cause negative reactions in on-line brand community. thus, this may allow marketers to have managerial insights on handling of on-line brand community independently operated by consumers.

커뮤니티 서비스에서 프라이버시 염려, 자아불일치 및 공동체 의식의 관계

본 연구는 온라인 커뮤니티에서 개인의 프라이버시 염려와 자아불일치 및 커뮤니티의 공동체 의식과의 관계를 고찰해 보고자 한 것이었다. 먼저, 개인의 프라이버시 염려가 자아불일치에 미치는 영향을 살펴보고, 인터넷 사용기간의 조절효과를 분석해 보기로 하였다. 기존 연구를 기반으로 하여 본 연구에서 사용된 개인의 프라이버시 염려 요인은 정보에 대한 수집, 통제, 인식을 고려하였으며, 커뮤니티에 대한 공동체 의식 요인은 소속감과 몰입감을 고려하였다. 온라인 커뮤니티 이용자를 대상으로 설문조사를 실시하였으며, 조절효과를 검정하기 위해 계층적 회귀분석을 이용하였다. 연구 결과, 프라이버시 염려 중 정보에 대한 수집, 통제, 인식의 요인 중 인식의 요인만이 자아불일치에 부(-)의 영향을 주는 것으로 조사되었다. 이때 인터넷 사용기간은 정보의 인식 및 통제가 자아불일치에 주는 영향력을 조절하는 요인인 것으로 조사되었다. 다음으로, 온라인과 오프라인에서의 자아불일치가 커뮤니티에 대한 소속감과 몰입감에 미치는 영향을 분석한 결과, 자아불일치가 소속감에는 부(-)의 영향을 주지만, 몰입감에는 영향을 주지 않는 것으로 나타났다. The objective of this research examines the relationships among privacy concerns, self discrepancy, and sense of virtual communities. According to the relevant literature review, we considered information privacy concerns factor as information collection, control, and awareness of privacy practice, and sense of community factor as membership and immersion on virtual communities. This research surveyed for the online community user and employed hierarchical regression model for the moderating effect test. The results of empirical analysis turns out that awareness of privacy concerns practice has negative impact on the self discrepancy, on the other hand, information collection and control factors do not affect. The next finding is internet use duration has moderating effect on the self discrepancy with information control and awareness of privacy concerns practice. The last findings are self discrepancy affect on the community membership and does not affect on the community immersion. It could be a good guide line for the operational direction on virtual community.

How do young people identify with online and offline peer groups? A comparison between UK, Spain and Japan

Peer groups such as neighbourhoods and hobby circles are important sources of social identity for young people, but their viability is challenged by processes of urbanisation and labour mobility. In recent years, traditional peer groups have been joined by easily accessible computer-mediated groups, which have become an everyday part of life in many countries. In this article, we examine how young people identify with various online and offline peer groups. We compare online and offline identification experiences from the perspective of how socio-demographic position and individual sociability characteristics influence them, and examine how these identification processes differ between national contexts. Empirical analyses are conducted based on a survey of online community users from the UK, Spain and Japan (N=4299). It is found that participants identify as strongly with their online communities as they do with their own families, and stronger than with offline hobby groups. In the mature online societies of the UK and Japan, the online group provides a more socio-demographically inclusive source of identification than traditional leisure-time formations. As friends and family move online, affinity towards online groups is more likely to be a reflection of high sociability than a lack of it. Games, social networking sites and other online environments should be seen as crucial contexts for today's youth's socialisation and identification experiences.

Mobilizing Lurkers with a Targeted Task

Users of online communities are commonly classified into active members versus lurkers. In this work we experiment with a method designed to encourage lurkers to share their acquired social capital with a community through lightweight contribution. The findings from our experiment demonstrate the importance of exploring new ways lurker populations can offer additional benefits to online communities.

Exploring and mitigating social loafing in online communities

The motivation to share members’ knowledge is critical to an online community’s survival and success. Previous research has established that knowledge sharing intentions are based on group cohesion. Several studies also suggested that social loafing behavior will seriously corrode group cohesion. Therefore, social loafing is a key obstacle to fostering online community development. Although substantial studies have been performed on the critical factors that affect social loafing in the learning group, those on online communities are still lacking. By integrating two perspectives, social capital and perceived risk, a richer understanding of social loafing behavior can be gained. In the research model, social ties and perceived risk have been driven by anonymity, offline activities, knowledge quality, and media richness. Social ties and perceived risk are hypothesized to affect social loafing in the online community, which, in turn, is hypothesized as negatively affecting group cohesion. Data collected from 323 online users in online communities provide support for the proposed model. The study shows that social loafing is a significant negative predictor of the users’ group cohesion. The study also shows that social ties and perceived risk are important components of social loafing. Anonymity, offline activities, knowledge quality, and media richness all have strong effects on social ties and perceived risk in the online community. Implications for theory and practice and suggestions for future research are discussed.

Developing Integrated Marketing Communication (IMC) in online communities: a conceptual perspective from search, experience and credence segmentation

Consumers and marketers can jointly build online communities. Several properties of such communities are challenging the accumulated wisdom on how to produce Integrated Marketing Communication (IMC) and manage trust. This paper contributes to the development of IMC strategies in online communities from a Search, Experience and Credence (SEC) segmentation framework. Communication types in an online community are divided along three dimensions: individualisation (Personal/Impersonal), interactivity (Interactive/Non-interactive) and partiality (Impartial/Partial). This paper proposes that impersonal and non-interactive communications (partial or impartial) will work best in search segments; impersonal and interactive communications through the use of frequent retail promotion like free or inexpensive trials will work best in experience segments; heavy reliance on personal and interactive communications will work best in credence segments; and strong efforts to facilitate impartial sources such as educating consumers and developing a reputation reporting system and professional rating system will work best also in credence segments. This paper concludes by discussing the implications for the managers and users of current and future online communities and identifies some important open issues for future research.

Ballot box communication in online communities

The participation of individual users in online communities is one of the most noted features in the recent explosive growth of popular online communities ranging from picture and video sharing (Flickr.com and YouTube.com) and collective music recommendation (Last.fm) to news voting (Digg. com) and social bookmarking (del.icio.us). Unlike traditional online communities, these sites feature little message exchange among users. Nevertheless, users' involvement and their contribution through non-message-based interactions have become a major force behind successful online communities. Recognition of this new type of user participation is crucial to understanding the dynamics of online social communities and community monetization. The new communication features in online communities can be best summarized as Ballot Box Communication (BBC), which is an aggregation mechanism that reflects the common experience and opinions among individuals. By offering a limited number of choices such as voting, rating and tagging, BBC creates a new medium to effectively reveal the interests of mass population (see Table 1). Compared with traditional Computer Mediated Communication (CMC) such as email, Web publishing, and online forums, BBC influences user preferences by simplifying the mass sharing of individual preferences. These technologies offer new ways for information consumers to be involved in community activities. In traditional online communities, users only have two levels of participation: "watching from the sidelines" or "playing in the game," for example, they are either passive readers or active participants in conversations. However, BBC presents a new choice -- "shouting from the stands" -- in which each user can express his opinion through BBC and their collective preferences can be heard as a dominant voice. For instance, Digg readers can vote on news and promote it to the front page for millions of visitors to see. In spite of the increasing significance of non-message-based online communication, very little is known about BBC-enabled communities. As entrepreneurs build and manage new online communities, they have no choice but to look for the "right" technologies by trial-and-error. Not surprisingly, the result is hit-or-miss: some of the grandest failures of the dot com bust featured online communities. Only after costly failures, it has been recognized that not all technologies can benefit the growth and sustainability of a community. Extant theories on online communities and communication networks may offer some guidance on understanding of the emergence of new online communities (such as YouTube). Whitaker et al. identify online communities as "intense interactions, strong emotional ties and shared activities." In addition, Monge and Contractor define communication networks as "the patterns of contact that are created by the flow of messages among communicators through time and space." Both study the social interaction aspect of communities such as user commenting and discussing. However, the nonsocial interaction aspect, which is the focus of BBC and often dominant in contemporary online communities, has not received much attention.

Social Factors in User Perceptions and Responses to Advertising in Online Social Networking Communities

ABSTRACTWith the advent of popular Web destinations such as MySpace and Facebook, online social networking communities now occupy the center stage of e-commerce. Yet these online social networking communities must balance the trade-off between advertising revenue and user experience. Drawing on the sociology and advertising literature, this study investigates the impacts of social identity and group norms on community users’ group intentions to accept advertising in online social networking communities. By outlining how this type of group intention could influence community members’ perceptions and value judgments of such advertising, this study delineates possible mechanisms by which community members may respond positively to community advertising. The authors test the proposed theoretical framework on a sample of 327 popular online community users in China and obtain general support. Implications for the prospect of advertising in online social networking communities are discussed.