Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Social entrepreneurship, stakeholder management, and the multiple fitness elements of sustainability: where cash is no longer king

Abstract Social entrepreneurs are driven to solve a particular social problem. Yet, they operate in a broad universe of stakeholders that expect the organization to at least not worsen a range of social ills. This complicates the organization’s work as various social goals can be in tension with each other. Based on Instrumental Stakeholder Theory and the concept of organizational fitness, this paper uses a revelatory case study to explore the unique stakeholder management challenges faced by social entrepreneurs. A series of nine interviews and review of archival materials reveals how Berkshares, Inc., a creator of a local currency, had to contend with competing social issues important to an array of stakeholders. The study showed that competing views of different social issues from different stakeholders in the community had a substantial impact on the management of the organization. Two primary points emerged from the data. First, the need to manage these competing dimensions greatly complicates organizational goal setting and initiative selection, potentially creating internal conflict and making decisions easily contested. Second, this challenge alters the nature of the transition from startup to maturity, such that marketing and external communication became much more critical for maintaining stakeholder support as the venture grew.
Thanos: Incentive Mechanism with Quality Awareness for Mobile Crowd Sensing

Recent years have witnessed the emergence of mobile crowd sensing (MCS) systems, which leverage the public crowd equipped with various mobile devices for large scale sensing tasks. In this paper, we study a critical problem in MCS systems, namely, incentivizing worker participation. Different from existing work, we propose an incentive framework for MCS systems, named Thanos, that incorporates a crucial metric, called workers’ quality of information (QoI). Due to various factors (e.g., sensor quality and environment noise), the quality of the sensory data contributed by individual workers varies significantly. Obtaining high quality data with little expense is always the ideal of MCS platforms. Technically, our design of Thanos is based on reverse combinatorial auctions. We investigate both the single- and multi-minded combinatorial auction models. For the former, we design a truthful, individual rational, and computationally efficient mechanism that ensures a close-to-optimal social welfare. For the latter, we design an iterative descending mechanism that satisfies individual rationality and computational efficiency, and approximately maximizes the social welfare with a guaranteed approximation ratio. Through extensive simulations, we validate our theoretical analysis on the various desirable properties guaranteed by Thanos.
Factors Limiting and Affecting the Use of Market Information Systems in Sahelian Countries

The objective of this study is to analyze the contributions of Market Information Systems (MIS) to the performance of agricultural markets in Sahelian countries, to identify and analyze the factors that limit and affect the use of these MIS for better efficiency of agricultural products markets. Indeed, the study showed that MIS can contribute to the better market performance of agricultural markets. According to the results obtained from the statistical and econometric analysis of the databases, the factors affecting the use of these MIS are: the age of the household head, his level of education, prices and the level of supply of products in the markets. The use of MIS has a positive effect on farmers’ prices and possibly on their incomes. However, there are obstacles that limit their use by market actors: the low level of literacy and organization of the actors, the difficulties of the market actors to be able to use SMS and the Internet, the low level of dissemination of information to users. And the study showed that the age, the level of education, and the level of product offerings on the markets have a negative effect on their use.
Executive Social Network and Enterprise Innovation

This paper tests the impact of executive social network on enterprise innovation, and analyzes the impact of executive social network on the innovation of target enterprises and connected enterprises. Through empirical research, we find that the executive social network significantly promotes enterprise innovation, indicating that the available resources embedded in the executive social network have played their roles. In addition, based on the organizational learning theory and Mosaic theory, this paper finds that the innovation level of enterprises with executive social network has been significantly improved. Furthermore, when the sample is divided into target companies and connected companies, the empirical results show that the innovation level of connected companies is significantly improved. Through communication and successful experience exchange, the innovation level of connected enterprises is improved.
Will Regulation Change Cryptocurrency Protocols?

Cryptocurrencies have entered the economy as alternative money, as speculation objects, and as utility tokens for innovative service-platforms. Cryptocurrencies are increasingly scrutinized by regulators, and the literature on the regulation of cryptocurrencies is emerging. In this paper, it is asked how regulatory efforts may interfere with the core of the cryptocurrencies – their protocols as enforced by the decentralized operators. It is found that regulations are likely to induce protocol changes by interfering with the operators' choices. Regulation may induce the development of regulatory-compliant cryptocurrency protocols, but also protocols specially designed to circumvent regulation.
Credit card usage behaviour among teachers in the state of Perlis, Malaysia

Credit card debt is an area of concern in Malaysia. Statistics from the Ministry of Education reports that credit card usage among teachers is disproportionately high in Malaysia when compared to other professions. To be able to further understand this situation, this study focused in the teachers in Perlis. The measures for the study were Bank Policy, Credit Card Benefits and User Attributes as the independent variables and credit card usage as the dependent variable. The outcome of the study enabled a better understanding of the reasons for the high usage of credit card by teachers. The findings indicate that credit card benefits have a significant positive relationship on Credit Card Usage. The other two variables (Bank Policy, User Attributes) did not have a significant influence on credit card usage among teachers
AN EXPLORATORY FACTOR ANALYSIS OF FIRMS ENDOGENOUS GROWTH MEASURES

Purpose: This study attempts to standardize firm endogenous growth measures by performing exploratory factor analysis on nine firm endogenous growth measures (equity book value, equity market value, working capital, stock R&D investments, stock advertisement investment, stock capital asset investment, operating expenses, sales revenue, and the number of employees). Methodology: Data was generated by pooling a panel dataset of 116 firms and13 years timespan data. Main Findings: The result of the analysis reveals three underlying firm growth factors (namely firm financials, operations, and capabilities) representing the initial nine growth measures. Implications/Applications: The results of this research can be used as the bases for further research in firm endogenous growth model analysis.
Proxy War

This book provides a more comprehensive, definitive, and rigorous treatment of proxy war. This book argues that proxy war can and should remain a useful and effective tool of foreign policy, but that such an endeavor demands better understanding and deliberation. Proxy war serves as a means of indirect intervention when conditions eclipse policies using direct or non-intervention. Indirect intervention, however, is not synonymous with proxy war. Rather, proxy war falls on the spectrum of indirect intervention and includes other options such as simply donating assistance to politically-motivated, local fighters or offering support to mercenary forces from outside the country. Building on this knowledge, policy makers and strategists can better judge how fixed and unchangeable conditions such as the presence of interstate competition, domestic politics, geography, and the characteristics of the international system influence proxy war. More importantly, this book explains the role of conditions that a state can alter or change to improve the utility and efficacy of proxy war—more or less, it provides a “how to” manual for conducting proxy war, should the policy be chosen. The ability to maintain a coherent policy (both internally and externally) and cultivate/maintain control over a proxy’s activities increase the chances that a proxy war policy contributes to the pursuit and attainment of national interests. The book provides a new look at proxy war using uncommon and unused cases to test the concepts presented.
Corporate social responsibility and business ethics: conceptualization, scale development and validation

Purpose The purpose of this paper is to theoretically develop and empirically validate separate scales that represent a consumer’s expectations of business ethics (BE) and corporate social responsibility (CSR). Design/methodology/approach A literature review and qualitative research were conducted to generate items for the scales. Initial item reduction was performed qualitatively based on a panel of experts. A follow-up quantitative assessment using an exploratory factor analysis further reduced the items. The scales were then validated using confirmatory composite analysis with partial least squares-structural equation modeling. Findings Separate scales representing consumers’ expectations of BE and CSR behaviors were developed. The scales exhibited reliability, convergent validity, discriminant validity and external validity. Practical implications The separation of these scales into two components will facilitate more precise examination of consumer perceptions of these two components of product and brand images, and how they may impact brand attitudes and brand trust. Originality/value This is the first effort to develop separate scales for consumer expectations of ethics and CSR, and assess their impact on brand outcomes.
Wireless Kinect-NAO Framework Based on Takagi-Sugeno Fuzzy Inference System

Abstract In the context of learning new skills by imitation for children with special educational needs, we propose Wireless Kinect-NAO Framework (WKNF) for robot teleoperation in real time based on Takagi-Sugeno (T-S) Fuzzy Inference System. The new solutions here are related to complex whole-body motion retargeting, standing body stabilization, view invariance and smoothness of robot motions. The raw depth Kinect data are fuzzified and processed by median filter. The joint angles estimation for motion mapping of Human to NAO movements is based on fuzzy logic and featured angles rather than direct angles are calculated by Inverse Kinematics due to differences in the human and robot kinematics. During the joint angles calculation nonlinearities are observed as a result of ambiguity of Kinect 3D joint coordinates in different offsets. NAO kinematic limitations and nonlinearities in workspace are decomposed and linearly approximated by T-S fuzzy rules of zero and first order that have local support in 2D projections. To prevent the robot to fall down, the center of mass is considered in order NAO to stay within a support and safe polygon. The feasibility of the proposed framework has been proven by real experiments.
Common Ownership and Industry Profitability: A Crossindustry View

Our paper contributes to the common ownership debate by empirically assessing the link between common ownership and profitability as a proxy for market competition. Rather than focusing on single industries, as most related studies do, we assess the common ownership hypothesis in the aggregate, using a panel of about 3,000 U.S. firms in about 200 industries over a 21-year period. We hypothesize that if anticompetitive effects due to common ownership were present within individual industries, then the same anticompetitive outcomes should be observed when the data is expanded to cover all industries and over an extended period of time. We explore the statistical relationship between our chosen measure of common ownership and profitability across multiple model specifications, such as (1) two alternative econometric models, (2) different sets of control variables, (3) different time periods, and (4) four variations of MHHIΔ. We do not find conclusive evidence that common ownership is associated with industry-level profit margins.
Friend Recommendation Method of Weighted Networks Based on Value and Match

To improve the accuracy of the recommendation in the knowledge social network, the paper proposes a friend recommendation algorithm based on user information to measure the value and the match between the users. On the one hand, it establishes the directed graph model of the value by ‘the number of answers’ and ‘the number of likes’, to calculate the users’ value scores. And it uses the material diffusion principle to predict the value scores which are zero in the model. On the other hand, it calculates the users’ similarity through ‘topic of concern’ and ‘industry’ simulates the similarity of user pairs by using probability distribution and establishes likelihood function. After using ‘EM’ algorithm to estimate the function parameters, it gets the users' matched and mismatched probability to calculate their match scores and establish undirected graph model. Finally, it builds the comprehensive score formula between the value and the match. Combined with the directed and undirected graph model, the Top-N friend recommendation algorithm is recommended. Through the experiments, it shows that the method is better than the recommendation algorithm based on collaborative filtering in Precision, Recall and F1-measure on a large scale recommendation.
CPEC: Threat or Opportunity Protecting Local Industry through Infant Industry Theory Framework

China-Pakistan Economic Corridor is a massive investment initiative by China with a whopping amount of $62 billion. The project includes various short term and long term plans for energy, infrastructure, IT and R&D projects. The completion of short term plans by the end of 2018 and initiation of long term projects demand a comprehensive analysis as the project of CPEC presents both threat and opportunities for local producers. The threats include competition for local producers from innovative products of China and technological and managerial superiority of Chinese companies over Pakistani industry. However, the domestic producers feel more optimist as energy and infrastructure projects, and induction of new technology would benefit the business sector in Pakistan. The purpose of this study is to explore and identify the possible threats and opportunities considering “Infant Industry Theory” as an analytical framework. A qualitative and quantitative research methodology is employed and the data is gathered from 20 divergent and potential sector of SMEs through a close ended survey questionnaire. The likert scale is used to evaluate the opinions of respondents for awareness, challenges; and threats and opportunities of CPEC. The results revealed that SMEs owners are now more aware about the CPEC and its related details while the major challenges for producers were to cope with the low access to finance, unavailability of business and legal advisory services and difficulties in market access. Moreover, the majority of selected respondents consider the project of CPE as an opportunity for their businesses, industry and economy of Pakistan. It is thus concluded that business sector in Pakistan is preparing for CPEC, but with the fact that the required results are not possible till the challenges and concerns of local producers are addressed by the government in appropriate way through effective policies and efficient management. Hence, a detailed policy plan for the local industry specifying CPEC is highly recommended.
Moderating effect of organisation size in measuring the technology organisation environment and pressure (TOEP) in enterprise architecture adoption

Different names of the model have been proposed from various factors and fragmented perspectives. Besides, overall studies have put much attention on post-adoption process and EA implementation phase. Previous scholars used one or combination of different theories to identify the existing approach and perspective for formulating EA adoption model. However, not many studies were emphasized during the stage of the adoption phase. Currently, EA adoption model was also being emphasized in EA implementation. Notwithstanding these limitations, the researcher will further be investigating the possible development of EA adoption model during the adoption phase and early phase of the EA cycle. This can provide wide-ranging and rational views of business, information, and technology for the organisation. It is also found out that, the organizational adoption of EA is still missing from the technological, organizational, environmental and pressure (TOEP). Based on inferences from the previous study, there were relatively little empirical studies conducted in EA adoption studies. The existing studies tend to apply single and multiple theories from organization and management domain in one study. Therefore, this paper aims to investigate the factors that influence EA adoption at the organization level and propose a conceptual model for EA adoption from TOEP perspective. The research method of the survey using questionnaires will be employed on the multiple organizations as the selected sample size of the population . This study would be integrated with the advanced knowledge with the development of the extended and integrative TOE model with the inclusion of institutional theory and moderator variable and its relation to Enterprise Architecture adoption. This research may shed the light on the EA adoption process in organisation by proposing EA adoption model as guidelines for the decision makers in understanding factors that influence EA adoption in the MPS in the future.
Learning a Multiview Weighted Majority Vote Classifier : Using PAC-Bayesian Theory and Boosting. (Apprentissage de vote de majorité pour la classification multivue : Utilisation de la théorie PAC-Bayésienne et du boosting)

La generation massive de donnees, nous avons de plus en plus de donnees issues de differentes sources d’informations ayant des proprietes heterogenes. Il est donc important de prendre en compte ces representations ou vues des donnees. Ce probleme d'apprentissage automatique est appele apprentissage multivue. Il est utile dans de nombreux domaines d’applications, par exemple en imagerie medicale, nous pouvons representer le cerveau humains via des IRM, t-fMRI, EEG, etc. Dans cette cette these, nous nous concentrons sur l’apprentissage multivue supervise, ou l’apprentissage multivue est une combinaison de differents modeles de classifications ou de vues. Par consequent, selon notre point de vue, il est interessant d’aborder la question de l’apprentissage a vues multiples dans le cadre PAC-Bayesien. C’est un outil issu de la theorie de l’apprentissage statistique etudiant les modeles s’exprimant comme des votes de majorite. Un des avantages est qu’elle permet de prendre en consideration le compromis entre precision et diversite des votants, au cœur des problematiques liees a l’apprentissage multivue. La premiere contribution de cette these etend la theorie PAC-Bayesienne classique (avec une seule vue) a l’apprentissage multivue (avec au moins deux vues). Pour ce faire, nous definissons une hierarchie de votants a deux niveaux: les classifieurs specifiques a la vue et les vues elles-memes. Sur la base de cette strategie, nous avons derive des bornes en generalisation PAC-Bayesiennes (probabilistes et non-probabilistes) pour l’apprentissage multivue. D'un point de vue pratique, nous avons concu deux algorithmes d'apprentissage multivues bases sur notre strategie PAC-Bayesienne a deux niveaux. Le premier algorithme appele PB-MVBoost est un algorithme iteratif qui apprend les poids sur les vues en controlant le compromis entre la precision et la diversite des vues. Le second est une approche de fusion tardive ou les predictions des classifieurs specifiques aux vues sont combinees via l’algorithme PAC-Bayesien CqBoost propose par Roy et al. Enfin, nous montrons que la minimisation des erreurs pour le vote de majorite multivue est equivalente a la minimisation de divergences de Bregman. De ce constat, nous proposons un algorithme appele MωMvC2 pour apprendre un vote de majorite multivue.
Towards Closing the Service Delivery Gaps in the Hospitality Industry for National Development in Nigeria

Successive governments in Nigeria have attempted to move the country away from being an oil mono-economic nation, by looking into how other sectors could be developed. One of the sectors of our economy yet to be fully harnessed is the hospitality industry,this sector has the potential of contributing to national development. The United Nations World Tourism organization (UNWTO) confirms that between 70% and 75% of international tourists‟ expenditure goes to hospitality services on annual basis (UNWTO, 2006). The hospitality industry is a major sector in the economy and is one of the most rapidly expanding fields in the service industry. In recent times, it has brought tremendous growth to the global economy by providing services such as accommodations to the tourism industry (Oyibo, 2013). The term hospitality conveys the image that reflects the traditions of service and the ways service providers in the industry would like their businesses to be perceived. This forms the basis of this study to assess how service delivery in the hospitality industry can impact on national development.
Convergence of Social Media and E-commerce in today’s online world

Social media marketing is the use of social media platforms to market products and services to the intended consumers. It involves the process of tailoring the marketing content to the needs and preferences of the target consumers. With most social media platforms having in-built data analytics tools, it enables businesses to build marketing content according to the users’ preferences and track and monitor the marketing campaigns to gauge the popularity, user engagement and the success rate. This also helps businesses plan future marketing campaigns based on past consumer preference data. With the rise of social media as a highly viable platform for introducing and marketing products and services to consumers across product lines, demographics and geographies, this paper aims to analyze how different factors such as industry and firm size affect the rationale behind various social media strategies that are being devised and implemented by businesses. This paper studies the existing literature in this area of research and examines the impact of social media in business marketing strategies and in turn the impact on the firm’s equity value.