The benefits of communicating and collaborating in a real-time enterprise social network

Being a combination of the conference call, talkback radio, audio podcast, and an online video chat, Clubhouse is a new social networking app that gained over 10 million users and over $100 in valuation in just 8 months. Unlike other social networks, it offers a real-time streaming audio chat that does not ask users to share any unnecessary information like exchanging text messages, conducting video calls, or sharing photos. Instead, Clubhouse users can listen to real-time conversations, contribute to these conversations and create their own conversations for the others to listen and to interact with. Often nicknamed a “Silicon Valley’s hottest start-up”, Clubhouse positions itself as an “exclusive” and “alternative” social network that attracts various celebrities and people who just want to talk to each other. Launched in March 2020, amidst the COVID-19 pandemic with its social distancing and lockdowns, Clubhouse offered its users a space for the digital group psychotherapy where people could solve their problems by talking them through with strangers. However, it is unclear what is going to happen to this new social network in the post-pandemic world after all of its hype eventually evaporates. This paper discusses the possible underlying motives for the Clubhouse creation and its real purposes. Moreover, it looks at the three possible scenarios of its further development.

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A character social network relationship map tool to facilitate digital humanities research

Library Hi Tech ◽

10.1108/lht-08-2020-0194 ◽

2020 ◽

Vol ahead-of-print (ahead-of-print) ◽

Author(s):

Chih-Ming Chen ◽

Chung Chang ◽

Yung-Ting Chen

Keyword(s):

Social Network ◽

Technology Acceptance ◽

Real Time ◽

Digital Humanities ◽

Control Group ◽

Content Type ◽

Interaction Interface ◽

Research Findings ◽

System Effectiveness ◽

Ancient Texts

PurposeDigital humanities aim to use a digital-based revolutionary new way to carry out enhanced forms of humanities research more effectively and efficiently. This study develops a character social network relationship map tool (CSNRMT) that can semi-automatically assist digital humanists through human-computer interaction to more efficiently and accurately explore the character social network relationships from Chinese ancient texts for useful research findings.Design/methodology/approachWith a counterbalanced design, semi-structured in-depth interview, and lag sequential analysis, a total of 21 research subjects participated in an experiment to examine the system effectiveness and technology acceptance of adopting the ancient book digital humanities research platform with and without the CSNRMT to interpret the characters and character social network relationships.FindingsThe experimental results reveal that the experimental group with the CSNRMT support appears higher system effectiveness on the interpretation of characters and character social network relationships than the control group without the CSNRMT, but does not achieve a statistically significant difference. Encouragingly, the experimental group with the CSNRMT support presents remarkably higher technology acceptance than the control group without the CSNRMT. Furthermore, use behaviors analyzed by lag sequential analysis reveal that the CSNRMT could assist digital humanists in the interpretation of character social network relationships. The results of the interview present positive opinions on the integration of system interface, smoothness of operation, and external search function.Research limitations/implicationsCurrently, the system effectiveness of exploring the character social network relationships from texts for useful research findings by using the CSNRMT developed in this study will be significantly affected by the accuracy of recognizing character names and character social network relationships from Chinese ancient texts. The developed CSNRMT will be more practical when the offered information about character names and character social network relationships is more accurate and broad.Practical implicationsThis study develops an ancient book digital humanities research platform with an emerging CSNRMT that provides an easy-to-use real-time interaction interface to semi-automatically support digital humanists to perform digital humanities research with the need of exploring character social network relationships.Originality/valueAt present, a real-time social network analysis tool to provide a friendly interaction interface and effectively assist digital humanists in the digital humanities research with character social networks analysis is still lacked. This study thus presents the CSNRMT that can semi-automatically identify character names from Chinese ancient texts and provide an easy-to-use real-time interaction interface for supporting digital humanities research so that digital humanists could more efficiently and accurately establish character social network relationships from the analyzed texts to explore complicated character social networks relationship and find out useful research findings.

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A Microblog Classification Algorithm for Real-Time Search

Applied Mechanics and Materials ◽

10.4028/www.scientific.net/amm.411-414.411 ◽

2013 ◽

Vol 411-414 ◽

pp. 411-414

Author(s):

Jing Bo Yuan ◽

Bai Rong Wang ◽

Ji Hao Yang ◽

Shun Li Ding

Keyword(s):

Social Network ◽

Information Sharing ◽

Real Time ◽

Search Time ◽

Classification Algorithm ◽

Test Results ◽

Question Classification ◽

Query Classification

As a social network, microblog has obtained great attention and gotten wide application. Applications of microblog need to retrieve quickly information with the support of real-time search technology in order to implement information sharing. A query classification algorithm of microblog for real-time search was put forward. Based on question classification mechanism, the algorithm divides queries into two categories: the candidate queries and the popular queries, and takes separate storage strategy. Test results show that the classification algorithm can reduce real-time search time and improve the efficiency of retrieval.

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Enterprise social network (ESN) systems and knowledge sharing: what makes it work for users?

VINE Journal of Information and Knowledge Management Systems ◽

10.1108/vjikms-04-2019-0047 ◽

2019 ◽

Vol 50 (2) ◽

pp. 305-327

Author(s):

Abhishek Kalra ◽

Rupashree Baral

Keyword(s):

Social Network ◽

Knowledge Sharing ◽

Structural Equation ◽

Least Squares Method ◽

Equation Modeling ◽

Top Management ◽

Management Support ◽

Cross Sectional ◽

Content Type ◽

Enterprise Social Network

Purpose Enterprise Social Network (ESN) systems have emerged as the technology of choice to bolster and support organizational efforts for harnessing embedded knowledge. However, a lack of understanding about it limits the optimization of its potential. Hence, this paper aims to assess the role of hedonic motivation, network externalities (NE) and top management support in conjugation with the unified theory of acceptance and use of technology theory to understand ESN’s usage for knowledge sharing. Design/methodology/approach Data were collected from 187 ESN users through a survey questionnaire and subsequently analyzed using variance-based structural equation modeling using the partial least squares method. Findings ESNs are used both for utilitarian and hedonic purposes. Furthermore, the results also bring out the importance of externalities arising from an extensive network of users and complimentary services, as well as support regarding resources and recognition from the top management toward reinforcing the benefits of using ESNs. Research limitations/implications This study advances earlier knowledge by assessing the actual usage of ESNs for knowledge sharing. It takes into consideration multiple input variables, namely, performance expectancy, effort expectancy, NE amongst others to best resonate with the key factors driving its adoption and usage by an individual. However, because of the cross-sectional research design, causality can only be inferred. Practical implications The organizations are recommended to have in place the measures for attaining optimal usage of ESNs, and in turn, witness knowledge moves around in ways unfathomable. Steps should be taken to develop tools and ecosystems to provide users affordances for both increasing productivity, as well as opportunities for gaining pleasure. Originality/value This study is one of its kind effort to synthesize the knowledge about the ESNs in an Indian context. It provides fascinating insights into the determinants of intention and usage of ESNs for knowledge sharing.

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