<p dir="ltr">Retail prices for eggs surged during the period from early 2022 to mid-2023 in the U.S. Eggs are important to a wide range of people because of their nutritional benefits and cost relative to other protein sources. Thus, rapidly increasing egg prices can cause risks to numerous people. Using social media listening data, we analyzed the relationship between egg prices and online and social media attention and the relationship between egg prices and online and social media sentiment. Our findings suggest that egg prices are associated with the sentiment of the public as expressed in online media. However, the relationship between egg prices and online and social media attention is complex when studying the timing of increased concern with the timing of online news media coverage. Importantly, by leveraging a method of regression discontinuity in time, we show that online and social media conversations about eggs and egg prices tend to increase after the rapid rise in online news coverage. Similarly, online and social media conversations about eggs and egg prices tend to decrease after the rapid rise in online news coverage. This research also provided an example of how a total number of statements and sentiment score of social media listening data can be utilized to capture people’s attention levels, overall sentiment, and how they change over time.</p>

There is a paramount need for online university education to effectively contribute in the development of students' ability to construct and create new knowledge. Online learning should thus go beyond the production of knowledge for knowledge's sake, but should result in relevant and meaningful learning on the part of the online learner. In addition, online learning ought to result in the application of knowledge to practice. While gains made by constructivism and observational learning are well documented, research addressing online media blends that best encourage constructivist and observational learning in open and distance and e-learning (ODeL) contexts is limited. In addition, guidelines that can be used by online learning facilitators and policy makers regarding media for constructivist and observational learning were lacking when this research was conducted. The research was deemed significant in contributing to the development of an online learning framework that could be used to guide policy formulation and practice in the area of online course implementation in ODeL institutions. Using an explorative qualitative approach, this study explored online media blends for constructivist and observational learning. The study comprised three phases. The first phase was a meta-ethnography study whose objective was to synthesise previous research theses in order to gain an understanding of lecturers' and students' experiences of online media, constructivism and observational learning. The second phase consisted of a phenomenological study conducted at the University of South Africa, to explore lecturers' experiences of online media in the facilitation of constructivism and observational learning. The final phase of the research was the development of a framework based on constructivism and observational learning to guide online teaching and learning. The findings of this research study revealed that lecturers did not use media blends to a large extent in their interaction with students. The study indicated that some cognitive processes need to be exercised on the part of the facilitators when online learning is offered. It is concluded that during the curriculum planning phase, lecturers should decide on methods and media to arouse the students' attention during online courses. This also implies a more reasonable lecturer­ student ratio because large numbers of students per lecturer is not feasible in online learning. / Curriculum and Instructional Studies / D. Ed. (Curriculum Studies)

From the 1990s onwards the Australian Broadcasting Corporation (ABC) adopted a range of interactive multimedia activities: CD-ROM, web publishing, datacasting and interactive television. Drawing on extensive primary research, this thesis explores why the ABC pursued an interactive multimedia program under a neo-liberal rationality and how online publishing in particular has impacted on its role as a public service broadcaster. Drawing on neo-Foucauldian governmentality theory and Scott Lash’s critique of information, the thesis examines how the ABC operates as a technology of government in the transition to an informational society. While it considers the ABC as a localised, specific form of public service broadcasting, many of the findings have importance for analysis within the broader field of state intervention in media markets. It demonstrates that networked interactive multimedia are a communications strategy appropriate to the governance of a globally implicated market-state during a period of informationalisation – characterised by increased symbolic flows, spatial and temporal compression, decontextualised and disorderly relations of information. Public service media will transition this period, characterised by rapid social change and institutional upheaval, where they can incorporate and exploit the informational relations that threaten to diminish their utility as governmental assemblage. It finds that while ABC executives used technological change to adapt to the enterprise focus of neo-liberal government, the corporation was simultaneously transformed by disorganisational influences pursuing an ethics of internetworking. Contrary to Lash’s ideal schema of institutional decline, disorganisation – embodied in the ad hoc, program-maker led push for internet access and publishing – can become a force for organisational renewal. This is observable in the development of ABC Online, a public access web service. The conclusion drawn from ABC Online’s emergence is that the era of digitalisation exposes the ABC as a mutable object, a flexible strategy of national communications governance. It is not exclusively tied to a technical system, such as radio or television, or a practice such as broadcasting. Interactive multimedia such as ABC Online may help the ABC to readdress its contradictory political rationale – the call to represent a coherent national identity in the face of infinite lived diversity – and play a new role in connecting and engaging its users.This thesis re-examines that role in light of Lash’s observations about the nature of informational power. It explores at length the response to a new self-governing, performative subject, the user of interactive multimedia technology. The user, unlike the audience, is visible, often vocal and social. She negotiates both the space of a multimedia object and dialogic interactions within that space. Her exemplary expertise may rival that of the ABC’s program-makers. This analysis indicates that in response to informational phenomena, the ABC has reconceived its space of government, its pedagogy and its production of citizenship in order to remain an effective expression of governmentality. An online ABC may act as a mediatory, contextualising strategy that helps users negotiate the construction and function of difference. It may also be altered by user knowledge. These relations are possible, although preliminary in this research, while the ABC remains wedded to the more disciplinary relations of broadcasting. The implication is that a digitally networked ABC should not be a self-enclosed institution. It is part of an informational network: a multi-sector innovation system. It should not be divorced from its public or the market except in its ethics of exchange. It is a technology that through its technocultural relations socialises, is shaped by and melds with its sometimes unruly user/citizens. It influences, is influenced by and is part of a volatile mediascape. The ABC is organisation and disorganisation, the rigidity of the one generating the other and then being reincorporated, in a cycle of institutional and industrial change.

From the 1990s onwards the Australian Broadcasting Corporation (ABC) adopted a range of interactive multimedia activities: CD-ROM, web publishing, datacasting and interactive television. Drawing on extensive primary research, this thesis explores why the ABC pursued an interactive multimedia program under a neo-liberal rationality and how online publishing in particular has impacted on its role as a public service broadcaster. Drawing on neo-Foucauldian governmentality theory and Scott Lash’s critique of information, the thesis examines how the ABC operates as a technology of government in the transition to an informational society. While it considers the ABC as a localised, specific form of public service broadcasting, many of the findings have importance for analysis within the broader field of state intervention in media markets. It demonstrates that networked interactive multimedia are a communications strategy appropriate to the governance of a globally implicated market-state during a period of informationalisation – characterised by increased symbolic flows, spatial and temporal compression, decontextualised and disorderly relations of information. Public service media will transition this period, characterised by rapid social change and institutional upheaval, where they can incorporate and exploit the informational relations that threaten to diminish their utility as governmental assemblage. It finds that while ABC executives used technological change to adapt to the enterprise focus of neo-liberal government, the corporation was simultaneously transformed by disorganisational influences pursuing an ethics of internetworking. Contrary to Lash’s ideal schema of institutional decline, disorganisation – embodied in the ad hoc, program-maker led push for internet access and publishing – can become a force for organisational renewal. This is observable in the development of ABC Online, a public access web service. The conclusion drawn from ABC Online’s emergence is that the era of digitalisation exposes the ABC as a mutable object, a flexible strategy of national communications governance. It is not exclusively tied to a technical system, such as radio or television, or a practice such as broadcasting. Interactive multimedia such as ABC Online may help the ABC to readdress its contradictory political rationale – the call to represent a coherent national identity in the face of infinite lived diversity – and play a new role in connecting and engaging its users.This thesis re-examines that role in light of Lash’s observations about the nature of informational power. It explores at length the response to a new self-governing, performative subject, the user of interactive multimedia technology. The user, unlike the audience, is visible, often vocal and social. She negotiates both the space of a multimedia object and dialogic interactions within that space. Her exemplary expertise may rival that of the ABC’s program-makers. This analysis indicates that in response to informational phenomena, the ABC has reconceived its space of government, its pedagogy and its production of citizenship in order to remain an effective expression of governmentality. An online ABC may act as a mediatory, contextualising strategy that helps users negotiate the construction and function of difference. It may also be altered by user knowledge. These relations are possible, although preliminary in this research, while the ABC remains wedded to the more disciplinary relations of broadcasting. The implication is that a digitally networked ABC should not be a self-enclosed institution. It is part of an informational network: a multi-sector innovation system. It should not be divorced from its public or the market except in its ethics of exchange. It is a technology that through its technocultural relations socialises, is shaped by and melds with its sometimes unruly user/citizens. It influences, is influenced by and is part of a volatile mediascape. The ABC is organisation and disorganisation, the rigidity of the one generating the other and then being reincorporated, in a cycle of institutional and industrial change.

From the 1990s onwards the Australian Broadcasting Corporation (ABC) adopted a range of interactive multimedia activities: CD-ROM, web publishing, datacasting and interactive television. Drawing on extensive primary research, this thesis explores why the ABC pursued an interactive multimedia program under a neo-liberal rationality and how online publishing in particular has impacted on its role as a public service broadcaster. Drawing on neo-Foucauldian governmentality theory and Scott Lash’s critique of information, the thesis examines how the ABC operates as a technology of government in the transition to an informational society. While it considers the ABC as a localised, specific form of public service broadcasting, many of the findings have importance for analysis within the broader field of state intervention in media markets. It demonstrates that networked interactive multimedia are a communications strategy appropriate to the governance of a globally implicated market-state during a period of informationalisation – characterised by increased symbolic flows, spatial and temporal compression, decontextualised and disorderly relations of information. Public service media will transition this period, characterised by rapid social change and institutional upheaval, where they can incorporate and exploit the informational relations that threaten to diminish their utility as governmental assemblage. It finds that while ABC executives used technological change to adapt to the enterprise focus of neo-liberal government, the corporation was simultaneously transformed by disorganisational influences pursuing an ethics of internetworking. Contrary to Lash’s ideal schema of institutional decline, disorganisation – embodied in the ad hoc, program-maker led push for internet access and publishing – can become a force for organisational renewal. This is observable in the development of ABC Online, a public access web service. The conclusion drawn from ABC Online’s emergence is that the era of digitalisation exposes the ABC as a mutable object, a flexible strategy of national communications governance. It is not exclusively tied to a technical system, such as radio or television, or a practice such as broadcasting. Interactive multimedia such as ABC Online may help the ABC to readdress its contradictory political rationale – the call to represent a coherent national identity in the face of infinite lived diversity – and play a new role in connecting and engaging its users.This thesis re-examines that role in light of Lash’s observations about the nature of informational power. It explores at length the response to a new self-governing, performative subject, the user of interactive multimedia technology. The user, unlike the audience, is visible, often vocal and social. She negotiates both the space of a multimedia object and dialogic interactions within that space. Her exemplary expertise may rival that of the ABC’s program-makers. This analysis indicates that in response to informational phenomena, the ABC has reconceived its space of government, its pedagogy and its production of citizenship in order to remain an effective expression of governmentality. An online ABC may act as a mediatory, contextualising strategy that helps users negotiate the construction and function of difference. It may also be altered by user knowledge. These relations are possible, although preliminary in this research, while the ABC remains wedded to the more disciplinary relations of broadcasting. The implication is that a digitally networked ABC should not be a self-enclosed institution. It is part of an informational network: a multi-sector innovation system. It should not be divorced from its public or the market except in its ethics of exchange. It is a technology that through its technocultural relations socialises, is shaped by and melds with its sometimes unruly user/citizens. It influences, is influenced by and is part of a volatile mediascape. The ABC is organisation and disorganisation, the rigidity of the one generating the other and then being reincorporated, in a cycle of institutional and industrial change.

Les médias et les réseaux sociaux constituent une source importante de diffusion et de communication des résultats de la recherche clinique. Le terme « spin » est utilisé lorsque la présentation et l’interprétation des résultats d’une étude sont déformées par les auteurs que ce soit intentionnellement ou involontairement. Les spins exagèrent les effets bénéfiques des interventions et sous-estiment les effets indésirables. Les principaux objectifs de ce travail étaient :1) d’évaluer la prévalence des « spins » dans les articles de presse, d’identifier les différentes stratégies de spin et de développer une classification de spin ; 2) d’identifier les facteurs associés à une diffusion des résultats via les réseaux sociaux et 3) d’étudier comment les articles scientifiques rapportés avec des spins diffusent via les réseaux sociaux, à partir de l’exemple de l’essai DAPT 2014. Dans un premier temps, nous avons réalisé une revue systématique des articles de presse décrivant les résultats d’études évaluant une intervention et indexés dans la rubrique santé de Google. Nous avons développé une classification des stratégies de spin pour les articles de presse et montré que la prévalence des spins est élevée. Dans un deuxième temps, nous avons réalisé une étude de cohorte d’articles évaluant les traitements contre le cancer pour identifier les facteurs associés à une attention médiatique élevée. Le critère de jugement principal était l’attention portée par les médias et les réseaux sociaux mesuré par le « score Altmetric ». Nos résultats ont montré l’importance de l’accès libre et des communiqués de presse. Enfin, nous avons effectué une analyse systématique de l’attention portée par les médias et les réseaux sociaux autour de l'étude DAPT qui était rapporté avec des spins sous estimant les effets indésirable de l’intervention. Nous avons montré que l’interprétation des résultats par les auteurs sont rarement contredits. Ces travaux ont permis de mettre en évidence l’importance des spins dans les médias et de développer des outils (classification de spin) pour améliorer la diffusion des résultats de la recherche. / Mass media and social networks are important sources of disseminating and communicating clinical research. The term “spin” is used when the presentation and interpretation of the results of a study is distorted by the authors intentionally or unintentionally. Spins exaggerate the beneficial effects of interventions and underestimate adverse effects. The main objectives of this PhD were (I) to assess the prevalence of spin in health news, as well as identify and classify different strategies of spin; (II) to identify factors associated with dissemination of research results through online media, and (III) to explore how results of a trial reported with spin were disseminated to the scientific community and online media, using the 2014 DAPT trial as a case study. For the first aim, we performed a cross-sectional study of health news and described the distortion of research results of studies evaluating an intervention in Google health news. We developed a classification of spin for health news and showed a high prevalence of spin. For the second aim, we performed a cohort study of articles evaluating cancer treatments and identify factors associated with high online media attention. The primary outcome was the attention received by media and social networks measured by Altmetric score. Our results highlighted the importance of open access and press releases. Finally, we performed a systematic review of attention received by media and social networks surrounding the DAPT study which were reported with spin and undermine the adverse effects of the treatment. We showed that the interpretation of results by authors was rarely criticized. These results highlighted the importance of spin in mass media and provided a tool (classification of spin) to improve the dissemination of research results.

There is a paramount need for online university education to effectively contribute in the development of students' ability to construct and create new knowledge. Online learning should thus go beyond the production of knowledge for knowledge's sake, but should result in relevant and meaningful learning on the part of the online learner. In addition, online learning ought to result in the application of knowledge to practice. While gains made by constructivism and observational learning are well documented, research addressing online media blends that best encourage constructivist and observational learning in open and distance and e-learning (ODeL) contexts is limited. In addition, guidelines that can be used by online learning facilitators and policy makers regarding media for constructivist and observational learning were lacking when this research was conducted. The research was deemed significant in contributing to the development of an online learning framework that could be used to guide policy formulation and practice in the area of online course implementation in ODeL institutions. Using an explorative qualitative approach, this study explored online media blends for constructivist and observational learning. The study comprised three phases. The first phase was a meta-ethnography study whose objective was to synthesise previous research theses in order to gain an understanding of lecturers' and students' experiences of online media, constructivism and observational learning. The second phase consisted of a phenomenological study conducted at the University of South Africa, to explore lecturers' experiences of online media in the facilitation of constructivism and observational learning. The final phase of the research was the development of a framework based on constructivism and observational learning to guide online teaching and learning. The findings of this research study revealed that lecturers did not use media blends to a large extent in their interaction with students. The study indicated that some cognitive processes need to be exercised on the part of the facilitators when online learning is offered. It is concluded that during the curriculum planning phase, lecturers should decide on methods and media to arouse the students' attention during online courses. This also implies a more reasonable lecturer­ student ratio because large numbers of students per lecturer is not feasible in online learning. / Curriculum and Instructional Studies / D. Ed. (Curriculum Studies)

This diploma thesis which is titled Communication of selected companies in online and offline environment (illustrated on enterprises České dráhy, RegioJet and Leo Express) aims to map the communication activities of the mentioned carriers on online and offline media platforms in the Czech environment. In the theoretical part is defined the basic terminology of analyzed issues, above all from the area of communication, media, marketing and partially also from the perspective of linguistics. The practical part besides the methodology includes a presentation of the analyzed companies, České dráhy, RegioJet and Leo Express, and also a descriptive analysis of their presentation or more precisely communication activities on various media types and platforms - for each of the mentioned companies separately. Furthermore, in the practical part there is a comparison of analyzed companies, based on the results of descriptive analysis and there is also a description of an additional quantitative analysis - a questionnaire survey, which was answered by a total of 808 respondents of all ages from all over the country - so in this case from the customer's point of view. At the end of the practical part, the results are summarized and evaluated, and besides, there are also from them following recommendations -...

North Korea is one of the most isolated countries in the world. The media therefore play an important role in shaping the image of this country abroad. The aim of this diploma thesis was to find out how Czech online media represented the DPRK between 2010 and 2012, when the power was transferred from Kim Jong-il to Kim Jong-un. In the first part of the thesis, I qualitatively analysed 48 articles from five Czech online media: lidovky.cz, novinky.cz, iHNed.cz, respekt.cz and reflex.cz. I chose grounded theory as a research technique. However, the aim of the research was not to build the theory itself, but to conceptualize and describe the relations among the individual media representations of the DPRK. The analysis revealed that the online media reported on the DPRK mainly in connection with country's poor economic situation and with related deep inequalities between the ruling class and people. The transfer of power in North Korea was reported by Czech media in connection with Kim Jong-il's poor health. After his death, the media focused on uncertainty about the country's future. At the end of the period the media represented Kim Jong-un as the new North Korean leader, who was seeking for his own ruling style, which was based on the cult of personality.

Die Globalisierung und digitale Transformation stellen wesentliche Treiber organisationaler Veränderungsprozesse von Unternehmen dar. Neue Möglichkeiten der Zusammenarbeit und Arbeitsgestaltung für geografisch unabhängige Arbeit innerhalb eines Unternehmens entstehen (Kock, 2008). Die COVID-19-Pandemie wirkt hierbei als Katalysator und beschleunigt die Veränderung der Art der Zusammenarbeit innerhalb von Unternehmen (Kniffin et al., 2021). Damit Unternehmen neue Arbeitsweisen, wie die kollaborative Arbeit über online Medien, erfolgreich umsetzen können, bedarf es geeigneter Instrumente zur Erfolgsbewertung und Steuerung (Möller et al., 2020). Ein geeignetes Instrument stellen Reifegradmodelle (RM) dar (Reeb et al., 2021), wobei bereits unterschiedliche Modelle zur Steuerung von online, kollaborativer Arbeit existieren (Alonso et al., 2010; Boughzala & Vreede, 2012; Su et al., 2017). ... [Aus: Einleitung]