Virtual Ecosystem Research Articles

The roadmap to the Islamic state: an ethnographic analysis of sympathisers’ online training

ABSTRACT This article presents an ethnographic analysis of the online training practices IS sympathisers adopt to recruit, indoctrinate, train, and vet new affiliates. The study highlights the carefully crafted virtual ecosystem established by IS unofficial media operatives, which seeks to identify and select converts with specialised digital skills and unwavering commitment to the group’s vision of Islam. Prioritising quality over quantity, the selection process subjects new recruits to rigorous pre-and post-selection trials to ensure their authenticity, devotion, and obedience. Oaths of allegiance are central to membership within this virtual ecosystem, engendering a master-apprentice dynamic that may secure new recruits’ adherence to assigned duties within the network. The instructional scaffolding within this ecosystem comprises two main constituents: theological indoctrination and digital training. The former places emphasis on IS’s allegedly authentic religious sources in teaching Islamic jurisprudence, while the latter includes training on online security and media campaigns. As sympathisers progress through the ranks within the virtual ecosystem, they are empowered by their newly achieved “veteran” status to take on leadership roles within the digital sphere or engage in combat operations. The meticulously engineered architecture of social hierarchies within the network is designed to foster loyalty and obedience, perpetuate a hierarchical fraternity, thereby enhancing the organisation’s resilience and longevity.

Analysing students' concept mapping style and its association with task performance in computer‐based inquiry learning

AbstractBackgroundIn scientific inquiry learning, students often have difficulties conducting hypothetical reasoning with multiple intertwined variables. Concept maps have a potential to facilitate complex thinking and reasoning. However, there is little investigation into the content of student‐constructed concept maps and its association with inquiry task performance.ObjectivesThis study explored students' concept mapping style and its association with task performance in computer‐based inquiry learning.MethodsAn exploratory study was conducted with 80 Grade 11 students, who collaboratively constructed concept maps in a free style to support inquiry learning with a virtual ecosystem. Student‐constructed concept maps was analysed by firstly identifying different types of propositions formed in the maps and then determining the style of each concept map based on the dominant type of propositions in the map. Finally, the association between the concept map style and inquiry task performance was explored.Results and ConclusionsTwo major concept map styles were identified: (1) knowledge‐oriented concept maps (KCMs) mainly representing problem‐related subject knowledge as a set of concepts and their relationships, and (2) problem‐oriented concept maps (PCMs) mainly representing problem situation as a sequence of changes and their causal relationships. Compared with those constructing KCMs, the students constructing PCMs formed higher‐quality propositions in their maps and performed better in hypothesising, reasoning, and drawing conclusions in the inquiry task.ImplicationsBesides KCMs, students in inquiry learning can be encouraged to construct PCMs to foster effective thinking and reasoning; that is, constructing a concept map to represent the problem situation as a sequence of changes and the causal relationships between the changes.

Blowing Seeds across Gardens: Visualizing Implicit Propagation of Cross-Platform Social Media Posts.

Propagation analysis refers to studying how information spreads on social media, a pivotal endeavor for understanding social sentiment and public opinions. Numerous studies contribute to visualizing information spread, but few have considered the implicit and complex diffusion patterns among multiple platforms. To bridge the gap, we summarize cross-platform diffusion patterns with experts and identify significant factors that dissect the mechanisms of cross-platform information spread. Based on that, we propose an information diffusion model that estimates the likelihood of a topic/post spreading among different social media platforms. Moreover, we propose a novel visual metaphor that encapsulates cross-platform propagation in a manner analogous to the spread of seeds across gardens. Specifically, we visualize platforms, posts, implicit cross-platform routes, and salient instances as elements of a virtual ecosystem - gardens, flowers, winds, and seeds, respectively. We further develop a visual analytic system, namely BloomWind, that enables users to quickly identify the cross-platform diffusion patterns and investigate the relevant social media posts. Ultimately, we demonstrate the usage of BloomWind through two case studies and validate its effectiveness using expert interviews.

Potentials of the Metaverse for Robotized Applications in Industry 4.0 and Industry 5.0

As a digital environment of interconnected virtual ecosystems driven by measured and synthesized data, the Metaverse has so far been mostly considered from its gaming perspective that closely aligns with online edutainment. Although it is still in its infancy and more research as well as standardization efforts remain to be done, the Metaverse could provide considerable advantages for smart robotized applications in the industry. Workflow efficiency, collective decision enrichment even for executives, as well as a natural, resilient, and sustainable robotized assistance for the workforce are potential advantages. Hence, the Metaverse could consolidate the connection between Industry 4.0 and Industry 5.0. This paper identifies and puts forward potential advantages of the Metaverse for robotized applications and highlights how these advantages support goals pursued by the Industry 4.0 and Industry 5.0 visions.

Software Engineering and Ethics: Navigating the Ethical Landscape in the Digital Age

In the unexpectedly evolving landscape of software engineering, moral considerations have emerged as an important cornerstone, guiding the moral compass of professionals in the digital age. This summary encapsulates a comprehensive assessment exploring the difficult dating between software engineering and ethics. It navigates through the moral challenges faced by software engineers, inclusive of privateer’s issues, safety vulnerabilities, algorithmic biases, and intellectual property problems. Delving into established moral choice-making frameworks, inclusive of utilitarianism and deontology, this overview analyzes their application in actual global software engineering situations. Through insightful case studies, this paper sheds mild on historic and contemporary moral dilemmas, providing treasured classes for the software program engineering community. The assessment additionally emphasizes the significance of promoting ethical practices within businesses, advocating for transparency, responsibility, and a tradition of obligation. Looking in advance, the paper discusses the future of software engineering and ethics, exploring the moral dimensions of emerging technology like artificial intelligence and the Internet of Things. By supplying a roadmap for ethical software program development, this evaluation underscores the vital for software engineers to navigate the ethical complexities, fostering a moral virtual ecosystem for present-day and future generations.

Designing an infrastructural service to bridging the open science ecosystem and society

Watch VIDEO. The presentation will be centred around lessons learned and experiences from the European project COESO, a double-layer research project providing a framework in support of collaborative engagement on societal issues. COESO supports ten citizen science pilots implementing a participatory approach in several European countries: small scale and high intensity collaborations, starting with the problem formulation and extending through the common analysis. The pilots include contributions from different disciplines of the social sciences and the humanities (history, philosophy, political science, sociology and anthropology) and involve artists, journalists, associative members, local authorities. The support provided to the pilots includes mutual learning sessions and accompaniment in the use of a research blogging platform: not only to share the projects’ results, but also to enhance the teams’ co-research activity. Furthermore, the COESO project develops a Virtual Ecosystem for Research Activation (the VERA platform), conceived as a "collaboratory", a common digital framework supporting the projects’ teams in finding partners, managing their project and finding funding. VERA is included among the "Research for Society" services of the OPERAS research infrastructure, whose mission is to support scholarly communication in the social sciences and the humanities (SSH) across Europe. In the effort to build a sustainable framework to support participatory research in the SSH through a digital platform, the COESO project journey provided insights on the challenges and opportunities of participatory research with and within the SSH, including how a research infrastructure can effectively design a service to foster community engagement, bridging different research practices and systems of knowledge (ensemble of practices, methodologies, vocabularies, concepts, outputs), supporting innovation in output formats and setting the premise of an enhanced network of research data linking. Participatory research and citizen science practices are research approaches that challenge the prevailing research processes, and potentially lead to innovative practices that allow for new bridges between knowledge systems and infrastructures. The presentation will highlight two innovative digital formats explored by two COESO pilots to render their research: (1) a multimodal website proposing an interactive map that guides visitors from the broader public to explore the research findings, which were accomplished through a plurality of participatory research approaches. It also includes the "data" behind: the website spatializes a set of materials: interviews, archives, focus groups, and portraits are displayed in a geographical space, and (2) the digital tool, Memorekall, which starts from a video recording to develop a multi-document (including notes, documents, audio, or web links) to record and document the creative process.

The Relationship Between Innovation, Digital Transformation, Organizational Learning, Perceived Organizational Support, and Employee Performance

This research paper investigates the connections between employee overall performance, organizational getting to know, perceived organizational support, and creativity within the digital age. For a firm to prevail within the dynamic company environment of today, it's miles important to realize these traits. By analyzing how these factors engage, the research hopes to close a expertise gap. This observe uncovers the tremendous have an effect on of innovation, digital transformation, organizational getting to know, and perceived organizational help on employee overall performance through an intensive exam of the literature and quantitative evaluation of facts from 500 respondents in the UAE academic zone. The outcomes have programs for companies trying to boost worker overall performance in the context of the dynamic virtual ecosystem.

Jihacktivism: the Islamic State’s model of digital resistance

ABSTRACT This study explores the main building blocks of participatory activism utilised by sympathisers of the Islamic State within their online media networks. The organisation has named this militant practice “media jihad” or militancy (munasara), which is built on the cultural patterns of traditional ground-based jihad. The practice involves transferring cultural values and war manoeuvres into the virtual ecosystem. The virtual tactics used by sympathisers are linked to the cultural norms of jihad, resulting in a combination of battlefield jihad values and digital resistance practices. The term “Jihacktivism” is introduced to describe this complex combinative Jihadist contention model promoted by the Islamic State. It is a digital resistance paradigm that decentralises the production and dissemination of the Islamic State’s propaganda and empowers sympathisers to contribute to the organisation’s communication of jihad. By doing so, sympathisers may foster a sense of solidarity and become more identified with the group’s cultural schemas and ideological beliefs.

Tehnologiile cloud și necesitatea implementării cloud-ului hibrid în mediul militar

Cloud computing has been widely adopted as the next-generation digitisation model for transforming the organisation into an entity that drives development and innovation. Nowadays, users of computing systems aim to get quick access to the virtual ecosystem and a new experience in cyberspace that seamlessly integrates with the existing services they use today. From the perspective of the military organisation/Military Enterprise, the cloud provides services for users and structures in a scalable, highly reliable and highly available manner, specifically with different security levels associated with the individual profile and functional roles in the organisation. From the end user’s perspective, the cloud provides a simple model for accessing information technology/IT services without the need for the human factor to fully understand the transport/transmission infrastructure and technology used. This article explores how modern military-classified and unclassified cloudnative infrastructures can be secured and managed in a national, military private, or mixed hybrid deployment cyber environment, along with various requirements and considerations for adapting cloud-native applications for military systems. In context, the article provides a simple but comprehensive introduction to the cloud native overview and the major technologies that developers use to build such reliable environments in cyberspace that could be the subject of a feasibility study to implement the concept of hybrid cloud in cyberspace with military use. The material is intended for IT experts, DevOps engineers, CIS (Communications and Information Technology) systems and infrastructure architects, cloud enthusiasts, cloud security experts, and any military professional involved in the development, migration, deployment, and management of current services and operations. of a cloud-native system.

Cloud Technologies and the Need for Hybrid Cloud Implementation in the Military Environment

Cloud computing has been widely adopted as the next-generation digitisation model for transforming the organisation into an entity that drives development and innovation. Nowadays, users of computing systems aim to get quick access to the virtual ecosystem and a new experience in cyberspace that seamlessly integrates with the existing services they use today. From the perspective of the military organisation/Military Enterprise, the cloud provides services for users and structures in a scalable, highly reliable and highly available manner, specifically with different security levels associated with the individual profile and functional roles in the organisation. From the end user’s perspective, the cloud provides a simple model for accessing information technology/IT services without the need for the human factor to fully understand the transport/transmission infrastructure and technology used. This article explores how modern military-classified and unclassified cloudnative infrastructures can be secured and managed in a national, military private, or mixed hybrid deployment cyber environment, along with various requirements and considerations for adapting cloud-native applications for military systems. In context, the article provides a simple but comprehensive introduction to the cloud native overview and the major technologies that developers use to build such reliable environments in cyberspace that could be the subject of a feasibility study to implement the concept of hybrid cloud in cyberspace with military use. The material is intended for IT experts, DevOps engineers, CIS (Communications and Information Technology) systems and infrastructure architects, cloud enthusiasts, cloud security experts, and any military professional involved in the development, migration, deployment, and management of current services and operations. of a cloud-native system.

Propuesta de un sistema de indicadores para la medición de la confianza y el engagement en internet. Aplicación y análisis en la compañía Disney España

The purpose of this paper is to study trust and engagement in virtual ecosystems. The specific case of Disney Spain is reviewed, on the website of the online store shopDisney.es, and on the @DisneySpain profiles on Instagram and Twitter. For this purpose, a measurement system is proposed based on the design of two instruments with registration and scope indicators. Direct observation and the subsequent content analysis determine that the company adequately manages strategies to generate trust and engagement. The diagnosis, carried out through the indicators, made it possible to identify the presence of mechanisms that pursue reliability in content, brand image and social interaction, in addition to certain shortcomings or needs for improvement in issues related to the web usability and communication with users.

Değiştirilmiş tek bölen fonksiyonları ve bölen yaprak modeli

In this research, modelling of the leaves with the help of divisor functions are worked on. Given a positive integer k (1 ≤ k ≤ 100), we investigate solutions of the equation σ(n) = σ(n + 2k) with odd square-free integer n. Further, for a positive integer l and odd prime q, there are no results of the equation σ2i(n) = σ2i(q). As an application, we pose the basic structure of the leaves model for real-time virtual ecosystem construction derived from the equation of shifted odd divisor functions. Also, the elliptic, flabellate and five-lobes leaves’s area and the growth process of the leaves were made modelling with the help of divisor functions.

Designing Immersive Virtual Reality Simulation for Environmental Science Education

Recently, severe environmental changes, such as global warming, climate change and environmental pollution, have become expected, and thus environmental education is becoming essential. The purpose of environmental education is to instill awareness in students to recognize and solve environmental problems. Virtual reality provides students with a spatial and temporal experience similar to reality, and it can increase their understanding of knowledge through immersion and interaction compared to traditional learning. In previous studies, virtual reality for education has mainly focused on experience, but it is difficult to find examples for environmental education. Hence, this research proposed an immersive virtual reality simulation for environmental education based on the virtual ecosystem model. It also presented two applications developed based on this simulation. This research aims at encouraging students’ active participation and motivation to solve the environmental problems while experiencing the results of interaction related to environmental factors in a virtual environment.

Social Sensing and Individual Brands in Sports: Lessons Learned from English-Language Reactions on Twitter to Pau Gasol's Retirement Announcement.

Pau Gasol announced his retirement on 5 October 2021. Subsequently, a number of users virtually reacted. Twitter is one of the most popular social media platforms, with more than 368 million active users, generating large-scale social data. This study used data from Twitter for analyzing social sensing related to an individual brand, Pau Gasol's retirement announcement, from a quantitative and qualitative content analysis perspective. Pau Gasol's farewell can be considered a unique event to which many people are emotionally attached, providing a great opportunity for understanding sports virtual ecosystems. A total of 2089 tweets in the English language were recovered from Tuesday 5 October 2021 at 3:00 to Thursday 7 October 2021 at 23:59, Greenwich Mean Time +00:00 time zone. During this time, posts were observed to be mainly influential during and right after Pau Gasol's ceremony. The tweets that created more impact were published by news sources or by sports reporters. Lastly, the themes that emerged showed that the Los Angeles Lakers and the NBA were the two most important milestones in Pau Gasol's career. The data can be used to detect potential areas of controversy or other issues to be addressed in order to preserve the athlete's public image. These results are considered of interest for reaching better knowledge of sport virtual environments through social sensing, supporting the idea of users acting as sensors.

Facing the challenges of metaverse: a systematic literature review from Social Sciences and Marketing and Communication

The metaverse is the conjunction and optimization of the possibilities of the Internet and technology at their best. It is a consequence of the development and evolution of digital society. Technological innovation, fundamentally oriented toward virtual reality, augmented reality, and mixed realities, contributes significantly to the creation of a solid foundation on which to build an entire universe of virtual worlds. This is a universe that, in turn, requires the creation of backbone content for narratives that attract and retain users by capturing their attention to promote a specific ecosystem that transfers the activities of the real world to a virtual one, either projected or recreated. This research is based on a systematic review of 402 articles and a qualitative analysis of 125 publications. It examines the trends in technology, application, and methodology pertaining to the metaverse in the social sciences field, namely marketing and communication and neuroscience, areas that contribute to the understanding of the social dimension of the metaverse phenomenon. Although there is abundant academic literature on the metaverse in computer science, this is not the case in the aforementioned disciplines. Given that the metaverse is destined to become the next Internet revolution, there is a race among countries and brands to position themselves within it, which is expected to intensify in the coming years. The metaverse can contribute to a wide variety of applications of a social nature, which is why it is a highly competitive tool for nations, companies, and academia, as well as the public and private media. The results indicate a technological transformation proposing a future that includes neuro-technologies based on brain–computer interfaces and the metaverse as the setting. This will occur alongside the solidification of the virtual ecosystem thanks to the emergence of digital natives and Gen Z, as well as the convergence of many different technologies and immersive and participatory content, in which the consumer is the provider, owner, and beneficiary.

The cultural construction of sympathiser social identities in the Islamic state’s virtual ecosystem: an analysis of the politics of naming

ABSTRACT This study explores the politics of naming in the Islamic state (IS) media networks, looking into how sympathisers’ (munāsir-s) virtual identities are socially constructed online. Naming is a discursive practice which is purely ideological in that when sympathisers name themselves online, they re-imagine their roles and the boundaries of their national belonging alongside cultural representations of the organisation. By naming, they reify IS cultural heritage which is recontextualised from the historical legacy of the Prophet and Islamic Conquest. By naming, they also amplify IS hegemonic cultural frames and master narratives. In this sense, naming oneself in the IS virtual ecosystem is a significant rhetorical strategy that may fulfil at least one of the three main cultural functions. Names may (1) imitate historical role models, (2) reconstruct the sense of belonging to homophilic communities (brothers of the same faith) beyond ethno-racial geographies, and/or (3) convey a politically religionist bias in constructing the self vs. the other. The politics of naming is an online social learning process in which collective intelligence instructs sympathisers on how to create accounts with innovative iconic/connotative identifying aliases. In IS social ecology, naming may stand for a ritual call to adventure, the destination of which is already recognised. Sympathisers are interpellated as jihadi subjects to cross the threshold of their ordinary world and embark on a virtual journey to media jihad – hence, their recognition of their new subject positions in support groups and the potential manufacturing of their loyalty and disavowal (al-walā’ wa l-barā’).

New Digital Culture Metaverse Preparation Digital Society for Virtual Ecosystem

The advancement of digital culture in human life presents a new life that can be lived virtually. The phenomenon of metaverse becomes a new concept to combine the physical and digital worlds in society. The development of this metaverse will present many new opportunities in the future, especially in virtual work. The characteristics of this metaverse result in automation, telework, and also management algorithms, this can have the effect of replacing the work done by humans. It will also appear new job in the metaverse world certainly requires new skills in society, this requires the preparation of an integrated and digital-based educational role. This research is descriptive of skill development and education in the virtual metaverse world, with a qualitative method based on an analysis of the six pillars of the virtual ecosystem (avatar, content creation, virtual economy, social acceptability, security and privacy, trust and accountability). The result of this research is a future job in virtual ecosystem sustainability scheme, by linking the sustainability design dimension – virtual ecosystem – future job and skills need for society. Indonesian people need to adapt to advances in digital technology with academic development that is ready with digital technology

Prospects of developing business ecosystems: competition, cooperation, specialization

Objective: based on the analysis of modern ecosystems, to determine the promising forms of their dissemination.Methods: abstract-logical research method, methods of information analysis and synthesis were used in the study.Results: in the recent years, ecosystems have been actively developed in management practice. Despite the constant growth of their number, the phenomenon itself has been studied rather poorly, without a clear legal and organizational structure. This article analyzes the theoretical and practical aspects of the implementation of various scenarios for the formation and functioning of ecosystems; their promising options are identified. Based on the analysis of scientific literature, the main approaches to the study of ecosystems are identified: technological, product, and as a set of companies. The Russian practice of ecosystem organization was analyzed, on which basis the key features of ecosystems were identified, distinguishing them from traditional business models. A comprehensive review of the relationships between the constituent elements of the ecosystem was carried out, regarding its partners, stages of formation and specific management methods, and interactions with competitors. The main approaches to the organization of interaction within ecosystems – totalitarian, authoritarian and democratic – were studied. The peculiarities of the organization of competition and partnership of ecosystems with other market participants were also considered. Based on the practice of merging ecosystems, the prospects for the development of mega-ecosystems were determined.Scientific novelty: as a result, a number of approaches to the development of ecosystems in an extensive and intensive aspect were identified. Standard expansion options based on mergers and acquisitions of other enterprises typical of classical companies can be supplemented by interactions of several ecosystems within the framework of common projects and their joint formation. It is determined that the formation of highly specialized ecosystems is a more rational way of their development than the processes of merging and absorption of ecosystems. The scientific novelty also lies in the application of the analysis of internal and external forms of interaction in ecosystems to identify promising forms of development in new sectors of the economy.Practical significance: it consists in offering an original approach to the formation of ecosystem companies, as well as the possibility of creating a combination of a number of services based on a virtual ecosystem.

Value Innovation Creation in a Creative Industries Platform

Studying modern organisational management models shows an increasing researchers’ interest in innovation and business transaction development in various industries based on platforms (Lew et al., 2019). Rapid establishment of platforms (hereinafter – platformisation) is defined as a process where economic, governmental and digital infrastructures are expanded into virtual ecosystems (Nieborg and Poell, 2018). However, it is important to emphasise that from the cognitive point of view, platforms can be established on the basis of an organisational structure as well; this is based on collective activities, dynamics and interconnection. The concept of the platform is interpreted as a new organisational paradigm due to changed expectations of those interested in order to increase the efficiency of an organisation (Kim, 2016). The aspect of new value generation is often compared with innovation and application of a platform strategy in organisations. In the academic discourse, value innovation has been studied for over two decades; however, researchers have found out that when competitiveness of organisations increases in various sectors, there has been a need to ensure as much as possible a position in the current market, employing less methods that require economic input that would allow to develop the quality of services or products when offering innovation. Innovation development processes used in creative industries are seen as a critical source of a long term competitive advantage (Holmquist et al., 2019). Evaluating the ability of CIs organisations to use existing resources in the market effectively, new ways and methods that give basis to general value generation through creative activities are created. Regarding both the practical and the academic need to study value innovation creation in a creative industries (CIs) platform, evaluating the context of the changing environment, the following research problem has been formulated: how is value innovation created in a creative industries platform?The work presents the analysis of academic discourse: abstract and systematic theoretical material of value innovation creation in a creative industries platform.The aim of the article is to analyse the creation of value innovation in a creative industries platform.

Virtual Reality as a Surgical Care Package for Patients Undergoing Weight Loss Surgery: A Narrative Review of the Impact of an Emerging Technology.

While bariatric surgery is regarded as the most effective treatment for people with severe and morbid obesity, its pathway is regarded as a complex one due to the multidisciplinary approaches required from pre-surgery education until long-term management. This is essential to maintain weight loss and improve the quality of life after bariatric surgery. Although these approaches are broadened, patient education, pre-operative preparation, behavioural therapy, rehabilitation, and dietary changes are regarded as the main domains in such complex care. With the increase in technological adaptation in medical services, virtual reality (VR) has shown many benefits that can be utilized in the care of bariatric patients undergoing surgery. However, VR has not been innovated to be a multidomain care package in which bariatric patients could benefit throughout their journey from the pre-operative optimization, recovery, and long-term follow-up. This review aims to give a brief description of some of the applications of VR technology and question whether it has the potential to be considered as a virtual ecosystem to improve the bariatric patients’ experience and pathway throughout surgery and follow-up.