EXPRESS: Interacting User-Generated Content Technologies: How Questions & Answers Affect Consumer Reviews

2021 ◽  
pp. 002224372110202
Author(s):  
Shrabastee Banerjee ◽  
Chris Dellarocas ◽  
Georgios Zervas
Keyword(s):  
Electronic Commerce ◽  
User Generated Content ◽  
Specific Information ◽  
Product Attributes ◽  
Online Retailer ◽  
Consumer Reviews ◽  
Question And Answer ◽  
Using Data ◽  
Product Ratings

This article studies the question and answer (Q&A) technology of electronic commerce platforms, an increasingly common form of user-generated content that allows consumers to publicly ask product-specific questions and receive responses, either from the platform or from other customers. Using data from a major online retailer, the authors show that Q&As complement consumer reviews: unlike reviews, questions are primarily asked pre-purchase and focus on clarification of product attributes rather than discussion of quality; answers convey fit-specific information in a predominantly sentiment-free way. Based on these observations, the authors hypothesize that Q&As mitigate product fit uncertainty, leading to better matches between products and consumers, and therefore improved product ratings. Indeed, when products suffering from fit mismatch start receiving Q&As, their subsequent ratings improve by approximately 0.1 to 0.5 stars and the fraction of negative reviews that discuss fit-related issues declines. The extent of the rating increase due to Q&As is proportional to the probability that purchasers will experience fit mismatch without Q&A. These findings suggest that, by resolving product fit uncertainty in an e-commerce setting, the addition of Q&As can be a viable way for retailers to improve ratings of products that have incurred low ratings due to customer-product fit mismatch.

scholarly journals The development of a mathematical concept to interpret the relation between plant composition and crop yield

1969 ◽  
Vol 37 (4) ◽  
pp. 249-264
Author(s):  
Bernardo G. Capó ◽  
George Samuels
Keyword(s):  
Puerto Rican ◽  
Crop Yield ◽  
Quantitative Relationship ◽  
Mathematical Concept ◽  
Specific Information ◽  
Mathematical Equation ◽  
Plant Composition ◽  
Nutrient Levels ◽  
Plant Yields ◽  
Using Data

Although much work has been done on the relation between the composition of a plant and its yield, very little specific information exists about the quantitative relationship between plant yields and plant composition. Using data from hegari sorghum grown at various nutrient levels on leading Puerto Rican soils, a general mathematical equation was established relating the sorghum yield to its nutrient composition.

Capturing Value in Platform Business Models That Rely on User-Generated Content

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Hemang Subramanian ◽  
Sabyasachi Mitra ◽  
Sam Ransbotham
Keyword(s):  
Network Effects ◽  
Business Models ◽  
Switching Costs ◽  
Service Level ◽  
User Generated Content ◽  
Organizational Boundaries ◽  
Considerable Uncertainty ◽  
Current Usage ◽  
Significant Interest ◽  
Using Data

Business models increasingly depend on inputs from outside traditional organizational boundaries. For example, platforms that generate revenue from advertising, subscription, or referral fees often rely on user-generated content (UGC). But there is considerable uncertainty on how UGC creates value—and who benefits from it—because voluntary user contributions cannot be mandated or contracted or its quality assured through service-level agreements. In fact, high valuations of these platform firms have generated significant interest, debate, and even euphoria among investors and entrepreneurs. Network effects underlie these high valuations; the value of participation for an individual user increases exponentially as more users actively participate. Thus, many platform strategies initially focus on generating usage with the expectation of profits later. This premise is fraught with uncertainty because high current usage may not translate into future profits when switching costs are low. We argue that the type of user-generated content affects switching costs for the user and, thus, affects the value a platform can capture. Using data about the valuation, traffic, and other parameters from several sources, empirical results indicate greater value uncertainty in platforms with user-generated content than in platforms based on firm-generated content. Platform firms are unable to capture the entire value from network effects, but firms with interaction content can better capture value from network effects through higher switching costs than firms with user-contributed content. Thus, we clarify how switching costs enable value for the platform from network effects and UGC in the absence of formal contracts.

EXPRESS: Attribute Embedding: Learning Hierarchical Representations of Product Attributes from Consumer Reviews

2021 ◽  
pp. 002224292110478
Author(s):  
Xin (Shane) Wang ◽  
Jiaxiu He ◽  
David J. Curry ◽  
Jun Hyun (Joseph) Ryoo
Keyword(s):  
Language Processing ◽  
Contextual Information ◽  
Secondary Data ◽  
Product Category ◽  
Product Attributes ◽  
Product Lines ◽  
Consumer Reviews ◽  
Attribute Hierarchy ◽  
Technical Specifications ◽  
Successive Generations

Sales, product design, and engineering teams benefit immensely from better understanding customer perspectives. How do customers combine a product’s technical specifications (i.e., engineered attributes) to form abstract product benefits (i.e., meta-attributes)? To address this question, the authors use machine learning and natural language processing to develop a methodological framework that extracts a hierarchy of product attributes based on contextual information of how attributes are expressed in consumer reviews. The attribute hierarchy reveals linkages between engineered attributes and meta-attributes within a product category, enabling flexible sentiment analysis that can identify how meta-attributes are received by consumers, and which engineered attributes are main drivers. The framework can guide managers to monitor only portions of review content that are relevant to specific attributes. Moreover, managers can compare products within and between brands, where different names and attribute combinations are often associated with similar benefits. The authors apply the framework to the tablet computer category to generate dashboards and perceptual maps, and provide validations of the attribute hierarchy using both primary and secondary data. Resultant insights allow the exploration of substantive questions, such as how successive generations of iPads were improved by Apple, and why HP and Toshiba discontinued their tablet product lines.

Constraints on clade ages from fossil outgroups

Paleobiology ◽  
2010 ◽  
Vol 36 (1) ◽  
pp. 16-31 ◽  
Author(s):  
Matthew M. Hedman
Keyword(s):  
Common Ancestor ◽  
Simulated Data ◽  
Specific Information ◽  
Data Sets ◽  
Last Common Ancestor ◽  
Using Data ◽  
Fossil Preservation ◽  
Fossil Data ◽  
Age Constraints ◽  
Simulated Data Sets

This paper presents a method for constraining the age of a clade with the ages of the earliest fossil specimens in that clade's outgroups. Given a sufficiently deep, robust, well-resolved, and stratigraphically consistent cladogram, this method can yield useful age constraints even in the absence of specific information about the fossil preservation and recovery rates of individual taxa. The algorithm is applied to simulated data sets to demonstrate that this method can yield robust constraints of clade ages if there are sufficient fossil outgroups available and if there is a finite chance that additional outgroups may be discovered in the future. Finally, the technique is applied to actual fossil data to explore the origin of modern placental mammals. Using data from recently published cladograms, this method indicates that if all Mesozoic eutherians are regarded as outgroups of Placentalia, then the last common ancestor of modern placental mammals and their Cenozoic allies lived between 65 and 88–98 million years ago, depending on the assumed cladogram and the number of outgroups included in the analysis.

scholarly journals Dementia-Related Products on an e-Commerce Platform

10.2196/17514 ◽  
2020 ◽  
Vol 5 (1) ◽  
pp. e17514 ◽  
Author(s):  
Benjamin K P Woo
Keyword(s):  
Older Adults ◽  
Electronic Commerce ◽  
Online Shopping ◽  
Medical Product ◽  
Neurocognitive Disorder ◽  
Consumer Reviews ◽  
Current Trends ◽  
Biomedical Technologies ◽  
Health Related ◽  
Aging And Health

Dementia is a neurocognitive disorder, which affects older adults. There are currently no medication treatments available to cure dementia, but a number of biomedical technologies could be useful in assisting patients with dementia. With the continued growth of electronic commerce (e-commerce), online shopping for aging and health-related products will only continue to increase. Using the Tmall marketplace as an example, the purpose of this viewpoint is to describe the current trends of dementia-related products and devices available on an e-commerce platform. Feedback and critiques in the form of consumer reviews should be used to improve the design of dementia-related products. Online medical product consumers, however, must be vigilant about the effectiveness and risks of these biomedical devices.

scholarly journals Effects of Narcissism, Leisure Boredom, and Gratifications Sought on User-Generated Content Among Net-Generation Users

2013 ◽  
pp. 49-63 ◽  
Author(s):  
Damon Chi Him Poon ◽  
Louis Leung
Keyword(s):  
Social Networking ◽  
Social Networking Sites ◽  
Large Degree ◽  
User Generated Content ◽  
Net Generation ◽  
The Internet ◽  
Online Forums ◽  
Consumer Reviews ◽  
Negative Feelings ◽  
Leisure Boredom

This research identifies the gratifications sought by the Net-generation when producing user-generated content (UGC) on the internet. Members of the Net-generation want to vent negative feelings, show affection to their friends and relatives, be involved in others’ lives, and fulfill their need to be recognized. These gratifications, to a large degree, were found to be significantly associated with the users’ various levels of participation in UGC (e.g., Facebook, blogs, online forums, etc.). What’s more, narcissism was predictive of content generation in social networking sites, blogs, and personal webpages, while leisure boredom was significantly linked to expressing views in forums, updating personal websites, and participating in consumer reviews. In particular, the results showed that Net-geners who encountered leisure boredom had a higher tendency to seek interaction with friends online. Implications of findings are discussed.

scholarly journals Computers can’t give credit: How automatic attribution falls short in an online remixing community

2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
Andrés Monroy-Hernández ◽  
Jazmin Gonzalez-Rivero ◽  
danah boyd ◽  
Benjamin Mako Hill
Keyword(s):  
Social Media ◽  
Online Community ◽  
User Generated Content ◽  
Technological Systems ◽  
Structured Interviews ◽  
Social Media Platforms ◽  
Media Platform ◽  
The Subject ◽  
Using Data ◽  
Content Reuse

In this paper, we explore the role that attribution plays in shaping user reactions to content reuse, or remixing, in a large user-generated content community. We present two studies using data from the Scratch online community – a social media platform where hundreds of thousands of young people share and remix animations and video games. First, we present a quantitative analysis that examines the ef- fects of a technological design intervention introducing au- tomated attribution of remixes on users’ reactions to being remixed. We compare this analysis to a parallel examination of “manual” credit-giving. Second, we present a qualita- tive analysis of twelve in-depth, semi-structured, interviews with Scratch participants on the subject of remixing and at- tribution. Results from both studies suggest that automatic attribution done by technological systems (i.e., the listing of names of contributors) plays a role that is distinct from, and less valuable than, credit which may superficially involve identical information but takes on new meaning when it is given by a human remixer. We discuss the implications of these findings for the designers of online communities and social media platforms.

Application of Data Mining in e-Commerce

2014 ◽  
Vol 7 (4) ◽  
pp. 79-91 ◽  
Author(s):  
Mohamed Chajri ◽  
Mohamed Fakir
Keyword(s):  
Data Mining ◽  
Electronic Commerce ◽  
Market Share ◽  
Data Mining Techniques ◽  
Commercial Area ◽  
Using Data ◽  
Definition Of ◽  
Source Of Information ◽  
The Web

The web in recent years has been a big trend, which helped make it a source of information and essential in the various fields of research, in particular, the commercial area that represents the e-commerce (electronic commerce). However, the competition in the e-commerce sites is very tight. This has pushed companies to conserve and retain customers rather than seeking to expand its market share by conquering politically. These requirements have introduced the extraction of knowledge from data in e-commerce sites, using data mining techniques. This article will be an introduction to the concept of data mining, a definition of economic concepts related to e-commerce, and the authors' approach to the application of data mining techniques in e-commerce.

An Experimental Determination of the Effect of Increasing the Minimum Age (or Size) of Fish at Capture upon the Yield per Recruit

1984 ◽  
Vol 41 (5) ◽  
pp. 736-743
Author(s):  
Jacek Majkowski ◽  
William S. Hearn ◽  
Ronald L. Sandland
Keyword(s):  
Experimental Approach ◽  
Fish Growth ◽  
Specific Information ◽  
Trial And Error ◽  
The Past ◽  
Minimum Age ◽  
Southern Bluefin Tuna ◽  
Using Data ◽  
Yield Per Recruit

The aim of this paper is to describe a tag release–recapture experiment designed to determine the quantitative effect of increasing the minimum age (or size) of fish at capture upon the yield per recruit for the current intensity of fishing, if the minimum age corresponding to the maximum catch weight per recruit for this fishing intensity is greater than the minimum age that currently applies in the fishery, this optimal minimum age can be determined from a single tag release–recapture experiment. The main advantage of the described tag release–recapture experiment over the experimental approach recommended in the past, but not yet applied, is a reduction in the use of trial and error procedures. Unlike the classical Beverton and Holt yield per recruit analysis, this approach does not require specific information on fish growth and natural and fishing mortalities. Consequently, it can be implemented for many complex fisheries systems. However, as with the classical approach, it does not enable useful predictions to be made when a change in the minimum age significantly alters the number of recruits to the fishable stock. The method of data analysis is developed and illustrated using data on southern bluefin tuna (Thunnus maccoyii).

Students' Formal and Informal Information Sources

2019 ◽  
pp. 209-232
Author(s):  
Corinna Petra Raith
Keyword(s):  
Information Sources ◽  
Interview Study ◽  
User Generated Content ◽  
Academic Learning ◽  
Usage Behavior ◽  
Question And Answer ◽  
Informal Information ◽  
Preparation Work

Based on an explorative interview study, this chapter reports on students' usage behavior concerning formal and informal information sources for academic (learning) purposes. In this regard, a variety of information sources was reported, ranging from scholarly materials to applications based on user-generated content like Wikipedia, Facebook, YouTube, blogs, forums, and question-and-answer sites. The findings showed that students' acceptance of information sources varied with an increase in the academic age: the more experienced students were, the more focused their choice of information sources was. Bachelor students utilized diverse sources, while doctoral and PhD students mainly concentrated on scholarly materials and news articles, but used Wikipedia, YouTube, and blogs as well. Regarding such informal sources, bachelor students mainly consulted these for learning purposes, while doctoral/PhD students primarily utilized them for checking up/acquiring information and their preparation work. The results are preliminary in their nature and are to be validated in further research.

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