scholarly journals The Implications of Offering Free Versions for the Performance of Paid Mobile Apps

2017 ◽  
Vol 81 (6) ◽  
pp. 62-78 ◽  
Author(s):  
Sandeep Arora ◽  
Frenkel ter Hofstede ◽  
Vijay Mahajan

The mobile application (app) industry has grown tremendously over the past ten years, primarily fueled by small app development businesses. Lacking advertising budgets, these small and relatively unknown businesses often offer free versions of their paid apps to be noticed in the crowded app industry and to reduce customer uncertainty about app quality and fit. The authors build on the existing marketing and information systems literature on sampling and versioning to investigate the implications of offering free versions for the adoption speed of paid apps. Using a unique data set of 7.7 million observations from 12,315 paid apps, and accounting for endogeneity, the authors find that although the practice of offering free versions of paid apps is popular, it is negatively associated with paid app adoption speed. They also find that this negative association between free version presence and paid app adoption speed is stronger both for hedonic apps and in the later life stages of paid apps. The authors hope that the study's results will encourage app developers to reevaluate their current strategy of offering free versions of paid apps and prompt academics to produce more work focusing on this industry.

Author(s):  
Junda Wang ◽  
Xupin Zhang ◽  
Jiebo Luo

While the long-term effects of COVID-19 are yet to be determined, its immediate impact on crowdfunding is nonetheless significant. This study takes a computational approach to more deeply comprehend this change. Using a unique data set of all the campaigns published over the past two years on GoFundMe, we explore the factors that have led to the successful funding of a crowdfunding project. In particular, we study a corpus of crowdfunded projects, analyzing cover images and other variables commonly present on crowdfunding sites. Furthermore, we construct a classifier and a regression model to assess the significance of features based on XGBoost. In addition, we employ counterfactual analysis to investigate the causality between features and the success of crowdfunding. More importantly, sentiment analysis and the paired sample t-test are performed to examine the differences in crowdfunding campaigns before and after the COVID-19 outbreak that started in March 2020. First, we note that there is significant racial disparity in crowdfunding success. Second, we find that sad emotion expressed through the campaign's description became significant after the COVID-19 outbreak. Considering all these factors, our findings shed light on the impact of COVID-19 on crowdfunding campaigns.


2019 ◽  
Vol 34 (2) ◽  
pp. 211-233 ◽  
Author(s):  
Uday S. Murthy ◽  
Thomas J. Smith ◽  
James D. Whitworth ◽  
Yiyang Zhang

ABSTRACT This study investigates the consequences of information systems compatibility between the target and acquirer firms in the context of mergers and acquisitions (M&A). Using a unique data set of ERP implementations, we find that acquirers using the same ERP vendor as their targets exhibit shorter post-merger operating cycles and shorter post-merger audit delays relative to acquirers with different ERP vendors than their targets. In supplemental analysis, we find evidence that acquirers with the same ERP vendor as their target also exhibit more accurate management forecast guidance following the acquisition. The findings of this study should be of interest to capital market participants and managers involved in M&A activity by providing evidence about how the degree of compatibility between acquirer and target ERP systems impacts post-merger activities across different economically significant functional areas.


2004 ◽  
Vol 64 (1) ◽  
pp. 1-23 ◽  
Author(s):  
DORA L. COSTA

This article documents differences in body size between white, black, and Indian mid-nineteenth-century American men and investigates the socioeconomic and demographic determinants of frame size using a unique data set of Civil War soldiers. It finds that over time men have grown taller and heavier and have relatively less abdominal fat, implying that “modern” chronic diseases such as ischemic heart disease were common in the past. Changes in frame size explain almost half of the mortality decline among white men between 1914 and 1988 and predict even sharper declines in older age mortality between 1988 and 2022.


2021 ◽  
Vol 9 (1) ◽  
pp. 1-5
Author(s):  
Dawood Zahi Khutar

Distance learning is something really familiar nowadays. In the past few years, our world has witnessed a massive revolu-tion in the world of information technology and provided simple ways to obtain information at reasonable prices. Today, sharing information is an integral part of every person's life. Devices such as phones, tablets, and smartphones have be-come the main focus of digital life. With technological progress, electronic devices go through stages of software develop-ment that allow them to perform additional, more complex tasks, and process a larger flow of information. Almost every-one between the ages of 10 and 60 owns a mobile device. So mobile apps are always up to date. Therefore, it is quite logi-cal to use the mobile application as an auxiliary element in the educational system, especially as it provides many services such as accessing the Internet, browsing the web, sending e-mails, exchanging multimedia messages and files and provid-ing instant messaging applications with audio and video. Focusing on employing technology in education and its curricula, regardless of its level, is considered very important. This work diagnoses what users prefer when using the e-learning appli-cation through a questionnaire distributed to a group of university students to collect data on their preferences regarding mobile applications for e-learning.


2017 ◽  
Vol 45 (4) ◽  
pp. 1660-1688 ◽  
Author(s):  
Violetta Bacon-Gerasymenko ◽  
J. P. Eggers

This study investigates what leads managers to allocate constrained cognitive effort toward new versus familiar aspects of a business. Specifically, we explore advice giving by venture capital firms (VCs) to their portfolio companies, distinguishing between business topics on which a VC has advised other ventures in the past and topics new to the VC that may be outside its areas of expertise. We use both demand-side (venture-driven) and supply-side (VC-driven) perspectives to offer a novel theory about the antecedents of cognitive effort underlying advice giving. Empirical tests in a unique data set of French VCs show that both perspectives explain important aspects of advice-giving dynamics for VCs. VCs facing dynamic environments and capacity constraints strongly respond to stimuli from ventures, but VCs also adjust their behavior as they accumulate experience in ways that reflect both expanding confidence in their ability to add value and concerns about overextension of their efforts, depending on the valence of VC experience. Our findings provide important insights to the antecedents of cognitive effort and to research on the VC–venture relationship by exploring the dynamics of how advice-giving relationships evolve over time as VCs gain experience.


Author(s):  
Norazean Sulaiman ◽  
Nurul Nadiah Dewi Faizul Ganapathy ◽  
Wan Faizatul Azirah Ismayatim

Listening skills should be given more attention as listening takes precedence over anything else when it comes to acquiring a language (Putriani, Sukirlan & Supriyadi, 2013). Even with the booming of various technology to facilitate teaching and learning of listening skills in class, the assessment conducted to identify students’ level of understanding of certain topic is still not up-to-date and not parallel with the advancement of technology. The current studies show that the use of mobile apps for listening purpose is proven to be effective in reducing students’ anxiety (Rahimi & Soleymani, 2015), sustaining students’ motivation (Read & Kukulska-Hulme, 2015), and improving students’ linguistic competencies (Ramos & Valderruten, 2017). This study is aimed to test the effectiveness of mobile application in assessing students’ listening skills. Diploma students from various faculties in UiTM Shah Alam were randomly chosen to answer listening comprehension questions via the prototype developed, named Pocket E-Li. The results demonstrate that the majority of the students provided positive response towards the implementation of mobile application for listening assessment. Almost all respondents agreed that listening assessment should be conducted via mobile application in the future. It can be concluded that listening assessment via mobile application is beneficial to students since it meets the students’ demands and needs which is equivalent with the use of current technology.


2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Karen Davies ◽  
Bie Nio Ong ◽  
Sudeh Cheraghi-Sohi ◽  
Katherine Perryman ◽  
Caroline Sanders

BACKGROUND Background: There is a growing interest in using mobile applications in supporting health and wellbeing. Evidence directly from people with dementia regarding the acceptability, usability and usefulness of mobile apps is limited. It builds on ‘My Health Guide’ which was co-designed with people with cognitive disabilities. . OBJECTIVE Objective This paper describes the protocol of a study evaluating an app designed for supporting wellbeing with people living with dementia, specifically focusing on enhanced safety through improved communication METHODS Method: The study will employ design research, using participatory qualitative research methods over three cycles of evaluation with service users, their families and practitioners. The study will be developed in partnership with a specialist home care service in England. A purposive case selection will be used to ensure that the cases exemplify differences in experiences. The app will be evaluated in a ‘walkthrough’ workshop by people living with early stage dementia and then trialled at home by up to 12 families in a ‘try-out’ cycle. An amended version will be evaluated in a final ‘walkthrough’ workshop in cycle 3. Data will be collected from at least four data sources during the try-out phase and analysed thematically (people with dementia, carers, practitioners and app usage). An explanatory, multiple-case study design will be used to synthesise and present the evidence from the three cycles drawing on Normalisation Process Theory to support interpretation of the findings. RESULTS Results: The study is ready to be implemented but has been paused to protect vulnerable individuals during the Coronavirus in 2020. The findings will be particularly relevant for understanding how to support vulnerable people living in the community during social distancing and the period following the pandemic, as well as providing insight into the challenges of social isolation arising from living with dementia CONCLUSIONS Discussion: Evaluating a mobile application for enhancing communication, safety and wellbeing for people living with dementia contributes to key ambitions enshrined in policy and practice, championing the use of digital technology and supporting people with dementia to live safely in their own homes. The study uses a co-design method to enable the voice of users with dementia to highlight the benefits and challenges of technology and shape future development of apps that potentially enhances safety through improved communication.


2020 ◽  
Vol 0 (0) ◽  
Author(s):  
Claudia Berg ◽  
M. Shahe Emran

AbstractThis paper uses a unique data set on 143,000 poor households from Northern Bangladesh to analyze the effects of microfinance membership on a household’s ability to cope with seasonal famine known as Monga. We develop an identification and estimation strategy that exploits a jump and a kink at the 10-decimal land ownership-threshold driven by the Microfinance Institution screening process to ensure repayment by excluding the ultra-poor. Evidence shows that microfinance membership improves food security during Monga, especially for the poorest households who survive at the margin of one and two meals a day. The positive effects on food security are, however, not driven by higher income, as microcredit does not improve the ability to migrate for work, nor does it reduce dependence on distress sale of labor. The evidence is consistent with consumption smoothing being the primary mechanism behind the gains in food security of MFI households during the season of starvation.


2020 ◽  
Vol 20 (3) ◽  
Author(s):  
Claudia Berg ◽  
M. Shahe Emran

AbstractThis paper uses a unique data set on 143,000 poor households from Northern Bangladesh to analyze the effects of microfinance membership on a household's ability to cope with seasonal famine known as Monga. We develop an identification and estimation strategy that exploits a jump and a kink at the 10 decimal land ownership-threshold driven by the Microfinance Institution (MFI) screening process to ensure repayment by excluding the ultra-poor. Evidence shows that microfinance membership improves food security during Monga, especially for the poorest households who survive at the margin of one and two meals a day. The positive effects on food security are, however, not driven by higher income, as microcredit does not improve the ability to migrate for work, nor does it reduce dependence on distress sale of labor. The evidence is consistent with consumption smoothing being the primary mechanism behind the gains in food security of MFI households during the season of starvation.


2021 ◽  
Vol 164 (3-4) ◽  
Author(s):  
Xiaoying Xue ◽  
Guoyu Ren ◽  
Xiubao Sun ◽  
Panfeng Zhang ◽  
Yuyu Ren ◽  
...  

AbstractThe understanding of centennial trends of extreme temperature has been impeded due to the lack of early-year observations. In this paper, we collect and digitize the daily temperature data set of Northeast China Yingkou meteorological station since 1904. After quality control and homogenization, we analyze the changes of mean and extreme temperature in the past 114 years. The results show that mean temperature (Tmean), maximum temperature (Tmax), and minimum temperature (Tmin) all have increasing trends during 1904–2017. The increase of Tmin is the most obvious with the rate of 0.34 °C/decade. The most significant warming occurs in spring and winter with the rate of Tmean reaching 0.32 °C/decade and 0.31 °C/decade, respectively. Most of the extreme temperature indices as defined using absolute and relative thresholds of Tmax and Tmin also show significant changes, with cold events witnessing a more significant downward trend. The change is similar to that reported for global land and China for the past six decades. It is also found that the extreme highest temperature (1958) and lowest temperature (1920) records all occurred in the first half of the whole period, and the change of extreme temperature indices before 1950 is different from that of the recent decades, in particular for diurnal temperature range (DTR), which shows an opposite trend in the two time periods.


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