Thesis (Ph. D.)--Washington State University, May 2010. / Title from PDF title page (viewed on July 16, 2010). "Department of English." Includes bibliographical references (p. 117-122).

Thesis (M.A.)--Northern Kentucky University, 2006. / Made available through ProQuest. Publication number: AAT 1434826. ProQuest document ID: 1163268411. Includes bibliographical references (p. 91-96)

Adopting a mixed methods approach consisting of interviews, focus group discussions and surveys, this thesis investigates the state of digital publishing in Ghana within the context of Rogers’ diffusion of innovation theory. With a focus on children’s ebooks, it examines publishers’, authors’ and readers’ levels of adoption of ebooks, and their motivations for, perceptions of, and challenges or barriers to, going digital or otherwise. It also assesses the state of digital infrastructure and human resource capacity in Ghana to support the growing ebook sector, and identifies the knowledge and skills deficit in the industry in order to inform the development of courses that will be incorporated into the BA Publishing Studies programme at Kwame Nkrumah University of Science and Technology (KNUST). This thesis reveals that the level of adoption of ebook publishing among publishers and authors was relatively low given the interest demonstrated by young readers. The latter were very interested in ebooks and read mainly foreign content because it was freely available and accessible online. Publishers’ and authors’ motivations for publishing ebooks include visibility, the opportunity to reach a much wider audience, and the novelty of publishing digitally to keep abreast of current trends so as to transform the local industry. Some barriers to adoption identified were the cost associated with acquiring infrastructure, the security of online content, inadequate information about ebooks, non-use of ebooks, and infrastructural challenges such as inconsistent electricity supply and poor Internet penetration. The thesis also identified an awareness disconnect between publishers and their local readers: publishers perceive ebooks to be for the international market and, as such, do not focus on promoting them in the local market; thus, local readers are not aware of the existence of ebooks. Expanding on Rogers’ adoption categories, two new categories were created, incidental adopters and perceptual late adopters, to accommodate individuals who do not fall within Rogers’ established adopter categories. To increase the spread of digital publishing and the uptake of ebooks in the Ghanaian book market, the thesis recommends the elimination of the barriers to adoption and, most importantly, advocates training and skills development to reduce the knowledge and skills deficit gap among publishers and authors.

No description available.

The aim of this study was to investigate factors affecting the adoption of open access in research activities within Tanzanian public universities in order to device mechanisms of enhancing the use of this mode of scholarly communication. The study adopted the UTAUT model to formulate an open access research model comprising of six constructs and five moderators for guidance of this investigation. A triangulation approach for data gathering was adopted. In the first instance, a semi-structured questionnaire was used to collect data from 398 respondents selected using the stratified random sampling from a population of 1088 university researchers from six public universities in Tanzania. The interview involving 63 policy makers and structured records review were also conducted to complement the questionnaire survey. The descriptive and binary logistic regression statistics of the Statistical Package for Social Sciences (SPSS) were used for data analysis. The study established that majority of the policy makers (90.5%) and researchers (72.1%) were aware of open access. Attitude, awareness, effort expectancy, and performance expectancy were established as the key determinants for researchers’ behavioural intention of open access usage while age, awareness, behavioural intention, facilitating conditions and social influence were found to significantly affect researchers’ actual usage of open access. It was concluded that researchers’ and policy makers’ general perceptions about open access were very positive signifying the acceptance of this mode of scholarly communication in the study area. Current poor research conditions and researchers’ low Internet self-efficacy such as inadequate information search and online publishing skills were cited as the main hindrances for researchers to use open access in scholarly communication. The study recommends institutionalisation of open access publishing in Tanzanian public universities and other similar research institutions so as to improve the dissemination of research output emanating from such institutions. Six areas for further research to establish more insights regarding the feasibility for open access development in the country are also recommended. / Information Science / D. Litt. Phil. (Information Science)

by Leung Hung Cheong, Leung Wai Kwan, Sabrina. / Thesis (M.B.A.)--Chinese University of Hong Kong, 1999. / Includes bibliographical references (leaves 62-63). / ABSTRACT --- p.i / TABLE OF CONTENTS --- p.iii / ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS --- p.v / Chapter / Chapter I --- INTRODUCTION --- p.3 / Chapter II --- BACKGROUND - ABOUT THE CYBERSPACE --- p.5 / What is the Internet? --- p.5 / A Brief History of the Internet --- p.6 / The Global Influence of the Internet --- p.7 / Chapter III. --- LITERATURE REVIEW --- p.9 / Facts in the U.S. Newspapers Industry --- p.9 / Evolution of Online Newspapers --- p.12 / Research for German Dailies on WWW --- p.15 / Chapter IV. --- PRACTICAL ISSUES OF ONLINE NEWPAPERS --- p.20 / Elements of an Electronic Newspaper --- p.20 / Free Access versus Subscription --- p.23 / Operation of an Online Newspaper --- p.25 / Chapter V. --- INVESTIGATING ONLINE NEWSPAPERS IN H. K. --- p.28 / The Newspaper Industry in Hong Kong --- p.28 / Objectives of Study --- p.31 / Research Methodology --- p.32 / Chapter VI. --- RESEARCH FINDINGS --- p.35 / Result for the Exploratory Study: Two Online / Newspaper Publishers in Hong Kong --- p.35 / "Result for the Quantitative Study," / Part I - Overall Survey Responses --- p.40 / "Result for the Quantitative Study," / Part II - T-Tests Between / Categories of Respondents --- p.46 / Chapter VII. --- INTERPRETATION OF RESULTS --- p.51 / "For Result of the Quantitative Study," / Part I - Overall Survey Responses --- p.51 / "For Result of the Quantitative Study," / Part II - T-Tests Between / Categories of Respondents --- p.53 / Chapter VIII. --- RECOMMENDATIONS --- p.56 / Chapter IX. --- CONCLUSIONS --- p.59 / Chapter X. --- LIMITATION OF STUDY --- p.61 / Chapter XI. --- APPENDICES --- p.64 / Appendix A - Electronic Newspaper Publishers' Questionnaire / Appendix B - Electronic Newspaper Readers' Survey / Appendix C - Summary for Customer Survey Result / Appendix D - Reference Table for T-Tests Results / Appendix E - Graphical Illustration of Survey Results

Thesis (M. Bus.)--University of Technology, Sydney, 2003. / Title from PDF title page (viewed on July 25, 2005). Includes bibliographical references (p. 50-56).

Technologists predict that electronic information dissemination will create a paperless work environment. In spite of such predictions, paper-based internal communication will remain the primary medium for disseminating information in organizations for decades to come. However, electronic technology will have an impact on paper information production that may be more profound than changes following word processing's introduction. Previously unavailable for everyday production to enhance word meaning, certain graphic techniques now can be used to access readers' preconditioned symbol meanings to increase comprehension of routine correspondence and information internalization. This quasi-experimental field study examines interactions among laser-printer graphic treatment and communication variables as contributors to explaining variance in comprehension. Set Multiple Regression/Correlation analysis identifies significant variance explained by conditional relationships between near-typeset quality text and readers' self-interest and between near-typeset quality text and text's readability. The conditional relationship of near-typeset quality and self-interest shows increase in reader comprehension at a greater rate than the comprehension increase rate attributed to the reader's self-interest increase alone. This suggests that conditional relationships may be accessing an internal judgment process interpreting greater self-interest in near-typeset printed text. The conditional relationship between near-typeset quality and readability reveals that at more difficult reading levels comprehension is greater for near-typeset text. The significance of this relationship indicates that an internal judgment process is involved rather than the difference being attributed to legibility treatment. The strength of these conditional relationships suggests that planning for communication policies and practices should be a part of organizational strategic planning in the same ways as are financial analysis, operations planning, or human resource management.

Cette dissertation présente un problème réel et sujet à contreverse. C'est une compilation et une discussion bien étayée des principales analyses concernant la crise des journaux, surtout en ce qui concerne l'édition électronique, aussi bien que des initiatives d'accès ouvert, d'auto-archivage et des serveurs de prétirage. Ses sources sont les contributions des différents acteurs sur le marché pour l'information savante électronique comme les éditeurs commerciaux ou non, les sociétés savantes, les bibliothèques, etc...

This thesis describes and analyzes implications of going from hypertext news to hypermedia news through a process of design, involving users and producers. As in any product development, it is difficult to conceive design of a novel news format that does not relate to earlier genres, and thus to antecedent designs. The hypothesis is that this problem can be addressed by explicitly taking a genre perspective to guide interaction design. This thesis draws on genre theory, which has previously been used in rhetoric, literature, and information systems. It is also informed by theories from humancomputer interaction. The methodological approach is a case study of the ELIN project, in which new tools for online hypermedia newspaper production were developed and integrated. The study follows the project from concept design to interaction design and implementation of user interfaces, over three years. The thesis makes three contributions. Firstly, a genre perspective on interaction design is described, revealing broadly in what respects genre affects design. Secondly, the online newspaper genre is described. Based on a content analysis of online newspaper front-pages, and interviews with users and producers, genre specific design recommendations regarding hypertext news front-page design are given. A content analysis of Swedish online newspapers provides a basis for a design rationale of the context stream element, which is an important part of the news context on article pages. Regarding hypervideo news, design rationale is given for the presentation of hypervideo links, in the context of a hypermedia news site. The impact on news production in terms of dynamics of convergence is also discussed. Thirdly, the design processes in cooperative scenario building workshops are evaluated, regarding how the users and producers were able to contribute. It provides implications and lessons learned for the workshop phase model. A discourse analysis also reveals important facilitator skills and how participants relied on genre in the design process.