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Introduces the special issue on the theme “Network/multiplayer games and security”. Outlines the topics covered by the papers within, with the objective of alerting technical and systems librarians to issues which might concern them and provide them with a wider framework of experience from which they can learn and adapt to their own circumstances.

Playing games over the wireless Internet is significantly more dangerous than using traditional wired networks. Wireless networks offer new hackers new ways to attack. Since there is no physical connection for wireless networks, it is also more difficult to prevent attacks or locate the attackers. This paper will review the unique threats inherent in the wireless gaming environment and present a model aimed at solving these problems.

This paper aims to conceptualize supply market orientation (SMO) for the purchasing and supply chain management function and discusses how SMO capabilities are developed and how their application differs within and across firms. This research can thus be used as a blueprint for the development of a SMO capability that accommodates a firm’s unique contextual antecedents’ profile.

The qualitative research design comprises five in-depth case studies with 43 semi-structured interviews with large manufacturing and service firms.

SMO is defined as the capability to exploit market intelligence to assess, integrate and reconfigure the heterogeneously dispersed resources in purchasing and supply chain management in a way that best reflects the peculiarities of a firm’s supply environment. The empirical analysis shows that although SMO capabilities are configured similarly, their application varies across and within firms depending on the characteristics of a firm’s purchasing categories and tasks. Hence, reactive versus proactive SMO application is contingent upon firm-level and purchasing category–level characteristics.

The study uses the dynamic capabilities view as a theoretical background and provides empirical evidence and theoretical reasoning to elaborate and endorse SMO as a dynamic capability that firms need to have to compete in a complex and dynamic environment. The study provides guidance for supply chain managers on how to successfully develop and deploy a SMO capability.

The purpose of this paper is to investigate the interplay between configuration dimensions (network structure, network flow, relationship governance, and service architecture) of last-mile supply networks (LMSN) and the underlying mechanisms influencing omnichannel performance.

Based on mixed-method design incorporating a multiple embedded case study, mapping, survey, and archival records, this research involved undertaking in-depth within- and cross-case analyses to examine seven LMSNs, employing a configuration approach.

The existing literature in the operations management (OM) field was shown to provide limited understanding of LMSNs within the emerging omnichannel context. Case results suggest that particular configurations have intrinsic capabilities, and that these directly influence omnichannel performance. The study further proposes a taxonomy of LMSNs comprising six forms, with two hybrids, supporting the notion of equifinality in configuration theory. Propositions are developed to further explore interdependencies between configurational attributes, refining the relationship between LMSN types, and factors influencing omnichannel performance.

The findings provide retailers with a set of design parameters for the (re)configuration of LMSNs and facilitate performance evaluation using the concept of fit between configurational attributes. The developed model sheds light on the consequential effects when certain configurational attributes are altered, preempting managerial attention. Given the global trend in urbanization, improved LMSN performance would have positive societal impacts in terms of service and resource efficiency.

This is one of the first studies in the OM field to critically analyze LMSNs and their behaviors in omnichannel retailing. Additionally, the paper offers several important avenues for future research.

The purpose of this study is to clarify theory and identify factors that could explain the level of fintech continuance intentions with an expectation confirmation model that integrates self-efficacy theory.

With data collected from 753 fintech users, this study applies partial least square structural equation modeling to compare and select the research model with the most predictive power.

The results show that financial self-efficacy, technological self-efficacy and confirmation positively affect perceived usefulness. Among these factors, financial self-efficacy and technological self-efficacy have both direct and indirect effects through confirmation on perceived usefulness. Perceived usefulness and confirmation are positively related to satisfaction. Finally, perceived usefulness and satisfaction positively influence fintech continuance intentions.

To the best of our knowledge, this is one of the earliest studies that investigates the effect of domain-specific self-efficacy on fintech continuance intentions, which enriches the existing research on fintech and deepens our understanding of users' fintech continuance intentions. We distinguish between financial self-efficacy and technological self-efficacy and specify the relationship between self-efficacy and continuance intentions. Moreover, this study highlights the importance of assessing a model's predictive power using the PLSpredict technique and provides a reference for model selection.

This paper aims to find out the impact of business travelers’ behavioral belief on positive and negative e-comments, which consequently lead to intention to purchase a hotel room. To explore the relationships among attitude toward positive and negative e-comments with intention to purchase, the Theory of Reasoned Action (TRA) was used.

Business travelers in the USA who read e-comments and made a hotel choice based on those e-comments within the past six months were targeted for this study. The TRA, as well as a wide-ranging review of literature, were used to develop the survey instrument. The survey was distributed through Qualtrics, which is an online questionnaire service platform. To measure the business travelers’ behavioral beliefs toward e-comments, a number of measures were developed for this research. The theories of Fishbein and Ajzen were used to examine business travelers’ behavioral beliefs toward positive and negative e-comments. All of the questions on this survey about the intention to purchase were extracted from Liao et al. Other questions about attitude toward positive and negative comments were adopted from Chu and Choi, Sparks and Browning, Gundersen et al. and Lee and Sparks. The last section of the survey included questions about business travelers’ sociodemographic statistics, such as ethnicity, level of income, age, gender and education. The first question separated respondents to recognize those who made a reservation at a business hotel in the past six months after reading comments about the hotel. Those who responded positively were asked to participate in the study. Participants of this research presented their degree of agreement on each item by using a seven-point Likert scale, rating from (1) “Strongly disagree” to (7) “Strongly agree”. To verify the reliability of the questionnaire and to ensure it reflected the TRA, a pilot study was conducted with a small group of business travelers who had booked a hotel room in the past six months and finalized their purchases based on reading e-comments. No major changes were made to the survey as a result of the pilot study and all factors indicated an adequate level of internal consistency. The proposed model examined the effects of both positive and negative e-comments toward business travelers’ intention to purchase. This research aimed to determine the impact of behavioral belief on positive e-comments and negative e-comments, which consequently lead to intention to purchase.

The results of the proposed model revealed that behavioral belief positively affects both positive and negative e-comments. This means that business travelers want to be informed about both complaints and compliments in e-comments. However, this does not mean they intend to purchase a hotel room based on both opinions; rather business travelers would be inclined to purchase a hotel room based on positive e-comments. Using gender as a moderating effect indicated that females neither believe of the helpfulness of negative e-comments nor intend to purchase based on these e-comments. However, males tend to find both positive and negative e-comments helpful.

The findings of this research will help hoteliers, as well as online website review operators, to obtain a clearer understanding of guests’ or users’ needs and wants in order to offer a more desirable service. Since business travelers are considered an important target market in the hotel industry, hoteliers need to put more emphasize on these factors to attract more business travelers. By recognizing business travelers’ requirements and their expectations, hoteliers should prioritize their responsibilities for meeting these guests’ expectations; therefore, they can assign their resources accordingly. In other words, once a guest’s needs are understood clearly, hoteliers will be in safe position to provide the desired service.

The difficulty of attributing subject to editorial cartoons for indexing purposes exists both for traditional paper-based cartoon formats and for digitized or born-digital cartoons. This paper presents a selective review of literature on indexing editorial cartoons and the associated challenges.

A gap exists in published research on indexing collections of editorial cartoons for online search and retrieval. This paper presents a review of selected works that specifically address the topic of editorial cartoon indexing within a wider context of research that addresses image indexing, subject analysis and indexing challenges more generally. Works that address the interpretation of cartoons by readers and how readers respond to information communicated by editorial cartoons are also considered.

Cartoon controversies in transnational and multicultural contexts, experienced through the international news media since 2000, have dramatically increased research attention and publications in this area. Profound changes in media publication since the advent of the Internet have had an impact on editorial cartoonists and cartoon publishing. Subject indexing of editorial cartoons remains a challenge.

The potential for large indexed cartoon collections to be data-mined for topic modeling for research in the social sciences points to the need for indexers of cartoon collections to improve metadata standards and structures to allow improved access to cartoon metadata for computational analysis.

This paper places discussion of the technical challenges facing indexers of editorial cartoons within a broader context of discussions about the nature and future of editorial cartooning in rapidly changing media and publishing environments.

This study investigates the impact of insider-ownership of publicly traded firms on their performance, cost of debt (COD) and cost of equity. We use a sample of 104 non-finance listed companies of Pakistan for the period from 2006 to 2016. Our study is conducted in Pakistan as a developing country in which insider-ownership is dominant, and a weak external corporate governance mechanism increases the payoffs from insider-ownership. We use feasible generalized least square (FGLS) regression methods to examine these hypotheses. Based on agency theory, we find that insider-ownership enhances firm performance. Furthermore, our results show that insider-ownership reduced the COD and equity. Higher ownership decreases the opportunistic behavior of insiders. It also reduces the creditor’s perception of the likelihood of default on loan payments and reduces agency issues among shareholders. The insider will invest in positive NPV projects which will help maximize shareholders’ wealth and minimize the COD. Similarly, the relationship between insider-ownership and cost of equity is significant but negative. Supporting the convergence of interest increase in ownership helps in aligning the goals of managers and stakeholders whereby the insider will focus on value creation by minimizing equity cost.

The purpose of this paper is to examine gender differences in occupational status among South Korean workers in 1988 and 1998. In 1988, the South Korean National Assembly enacted an Equal Employment Opportunity Act. The goal is to better understand how occupational status differs by gender between these time periods.

Using the “88 and 98 Occupational Wage Bargaining Survey on the Actual Condition (OWS),” the paper examines occupational differences by gender and log wage using OLS.

Occupational segregation by gender was more extreme in 1988 than 1998. In 1988, 83.3 percent of all female workers were employed in three broad occupational categories. Few women (5.4 percent) worked as professional, technical or administrative workers. By 1998, 11.5 percent of female workers were employed as professionals. The highest paid occupational categories, in South Korea, have the lowest percentage of female workers. Women benefit from additional educational experience, though less so than holds for men, and from being in a union (in 1988). Women are penalized, in terms of occupational status prestige, when working in large firms and when married.

If South Korea aims to make full use of the human capital of all workers, measures need to address how women might enjoy returns on their educational investment that approach those realized by men. Further, efforts to integrate women into professional occupations categories might be examined.

Little has been explored with regard to occupational gender differences in South Korea. This work provides a better understanding of occupational status differences by gender and how they vary across time.