Research gap: Reputation is seen as an important asset for companies and can create competitive advantages. Within business-to-business the reputation of the company is argued to affect the relationship between buyers and suppliers and although the area is stressed to be important, it is still under-researched. Previous literature is not aligning when it comes to the importance of reputation and the duration of the relationship and it also states trust to have impact on important parts of the relationship, such as affective commitment and the willingness to invest. Purpose: The purpose of the thesis was to measure to what extent the duration of a buyer-supplier relationship affects trust, and to what extent trust affects the affective commitment and willingness to invest, when the reputation of the supplier was negative as the outcome of adverse publicity. Hypothesis: H1a; H1b: The duration of buyer-supplier relationship has a positive impact on Trust (integrity or benevolence) if the reputation of the supplier is negative H2a; H2b: Trust (integrity or benevolence) has a positive impact on affective Commitment, if the reputation of the supplier is negative H3a; H3b: Trust (integrity or benevolence) has a positive impact on willingness to invest if the reputation of the supplier is negative Method: The study had a quantitative approach and collected the data by a questionnaire sent to manufacturing business-to-business companies by email. 462 companies were contacted which resulted in 72 usable answers. Conclusion:The buyer-supplier relationship was not to a significantly extent affected by negative reputation and the duration of the relationship was not differing to a substantially extent. The different trust increased the buyers’ affective commitment and willingness to invest which demonstrates the importance of trust in the relationship due to negative reputation.

This research investigates the impact of cooperation policies on participation in, and benefits from, online learning object exchanges. First, an in-depth study of issues encountered in other online contexts (peer-to-peer systems, discussion group with lurkers, reputation systems) provided evidence that explicit cooperation policies and motivation techniques could bring benefits to online object exchanges. A case study is presented based on the comparison between two peer-to-peer systems, Mojo Nation and Gnutella, to show how cooperative policies could add value to online communities. This case study highlights several issues, such as the algorithm of pricing/exchange mechanism. Successfully solving these issues will be the key to identifying the benefits of an e-marketplace based online object exchange. An outline of an experimental exchange mechanism is presented, along with a prototype interface for users. To investigate further issues for users, an online scenario-based questionnaire was set up to measure potential users' attitudes towards cooperation policies. The detailed analysis on questionnaire results shows that cooperation policies hold promise to make the online object exchange more efficient. The results also illustrated how a transaction-based community could achieve the following benefits: increase of ROI object value discovery faster repository expansion better motivation through reputation recognition

This research investigates the impact of cooperation policies on participation in, and benefits from, online learning object exchanges. First, an in-depth study of issues encountered in other online contexts (peer-to-peer systems, discussion group with lurkers, reputation systems) provided evidence that explicit cooperation policies and motivation techniques could bring benefits to online object exchanges. A case study is presented based on the comparison between two peer-to-peer systems, Mojo Nation and Gnutella, to show how cooperative policies could add value to online communities. This case study highlights several issues, such as the algorithm of pricing/exchange mechanism. Successfully solving these issues will be the key to identifying the benefits of an e-marketplace based online object exchange. An outline of an experimental exchange mechanism is presented, along with a prototype interface for users. To investigate further issues for users, an online scenario-based questionnaire was set up to measure potential users' attitudes towards cooperation policies. The detailed analysis on questionnaire results shows that cooperation policies hold promise to make the online object exchange more efficient. The results also illustrated how a transaction-based community could achieve the following benefits: increase of ROI object value discovery faster repository expansion better motivation through reputation recognition

Trust is required in file sharing peer-to-peer (P2P) systems to achieve better cooperation among peers and reduce malicious uploads. In reputation-based P2P systems, reputation is used to build trust among peers based on their past transactions and feedbacks from other peers. In these systems, reputable peers will usually be selected to upload requested files, decreasing significantly malicious uploads in the system. This thesis surveys different reputation management systems with a focus on reputation based P2P systems. We breakdown a typical reputation system into functional components. We discuss each component and present proposed solutions from the literature. Different reputation-based systems are described and analyzed. Each proposed scheme presents a particular perspective in addressing peers’ reputation. This thesis also presents a novel trust management framework and associated schemes for partially decentralized file sharing P2P systems. We address trust according to three identified dimensions: Authentic Behavior, Credibility Behavior and Contribution Behavior. Within our trust management framework, we proposed several algorithms for reputation management. In particular, we proposed algorithms to detect malicious peers that send inauthentic files, and liar peers that send wrong feedbacks. Reputable peers need to be motivated to upload authentic files by increasing the benefits received from the system. In addition, free riders need to contribute positively to the system. These peers are consuming resources without uploading to others. To provide the right incentives for peers, we develop a novel service differentiation scheme based on peers’ contribution rather than peers’ reputation. The proposed scheme protects the system against free-riders and malicious peers and reduces the service provided to them. In this thesis, we also propose a novel recommender framework for partially decentralized file sharing P2P systems. We take advantage from the partial search process used in these systems to explore the relationships between peers. The proposed recommender system does not require any additional effort from the users since implicit rating is used. The recommender system also does not suffer from the problems that affect traditional collaborative filtering schemes like the Cold start, the Data sparseness and the Popularity effect. Over all, our unified approach to trust management and recommendations allows for better system health and increased user satisfaction.

<p>This dissertation examines whether war has reputational consequences by analyzing the conditions under which third party actors are more or less likely to challenge combatants after the war is over. I develop a theory of reputational effects that emphasizes how information generated during wartime interacts with expectations and the characteristics of third party states to determine when war outcomes influence the decision making of potential challengers. I test this theory against competing explanations using three methodological approaches. First, I analyze the effect that the outcomes of conventional wars have on the initiation of militarized disputes using cross-national time series data from 1816-2004. Second, I use process tracing to assess whether the decision making by Japan and Germany after the Winter War and the Soviet Union, Egypt, and Cuba after Vietnam is consistent with the causal logic of my theory. Finally, I combine qualitative historiography with time series intervention analysis to assess whether the Vietnam War increased or decreased the number of challenges initiated against the United States. I find that the reputational effects of revealed effectiveness are quite broad, but are most pronounced when the fighting environment is similar. Combatants that perform poorly on the battlefield are more likely to be challenged by their potential adversaries, especially when those adversaries expect to fight them in an environment that is similar to the past war. On the other hand, the reputational effects of revealed cost tolerance are much more limited. The statistical analysis found that information about the combatant's willingness to suffer costs only influenced very weak challengers, while the case studies found that it only influenced the behavior of states that were concerned about issues that were similar to those over which the past was fought. When the issues at stake were similar, weak challengers were more emboldened than strong challengers but weak challengers with different issues at stake did not alter their behavior.</p> / Dissertation

Drive-by download is a sort of network attack which uses different techniques to plant malicious codes in their computers. It makes the traditional intrusion detection systems and firewalls nonfunctional in the reason that those devices could not detect web-based threats. The Crawler-based approach has been proposed by many studies to discover drive-by download sites. However, the Crawler-based approach could not simulate the real user behavior of web browsing when drive-by download attack happens. Therefore, this study proposes a new approach to detect drive-by download by sniffing HTTP flow. This study uses reputation system to improve the efficiency of client honeypots, and adjusts client honeypots to process the raw data of HTTP flow. In the experiment conducted in real network environment, this study show the performance of a single client honeypot could reach average 560,000 HTTP success access log per day. Even in the peak traffic, this mechanism reduced the process time to 22 hours, and detected drive-by download sites that users were actually browsing. Reputation system in this study is applicable to varieties of domain names because it does not refer to online WHOIS database. It established classification model on machine learning in 12 features. The correct classification rate of the reputation system applied in this study is 90.9%. Compared with other Reputation System studies, this study not only extract features from DNS A-Type but also extract features from DNS NS-Type. The experiment results show the Error Rate of the new features from DNS NS-Type is only 19.03%.

In the age of knowledge-based economy, company need to hire talented people who possess leading knowledge and skill to keep its competitive advantages. Taiwan located in crucial position of Asian market, but lost competitive advantages in attracting talented people when comparing the policies and environmental conditions with neighboring countries like South Korea, Singapore and the raising China This study chooses case company which is successful in attracting global talent in Taiwanese electronic technology industry. To investigate the factors that make firm attractive to talented people. The finding show that company should build up international recruitment network and good reputation, thus job applicant will have positive perception to company. Providing long-term development opportunity to talented people to satisfy their need. Besides, company should provide social support actively, to help talented people get used to unfamiliar environment, thus talented people will contribute to company more effectively.

This collective qualitative case study explores the ways American urban school districts engage in image management and reputation building activities to sustain their on-going organizational improvement efforts and maintain public support. The study catalogues the internal and external communication and media relations strategies utilized by three urban districts to manage their public image, identity, and reputation. District officers were found to be generally aware of their district's image in the community, their own role in projecting and improving that image, and the positive or negative identity of the employees in relation to the district's image. The concepts of organizational adaptive instability and mutability were found to be most important to urban district leaders as they all described their response to organizational challenges by sharing information with internal and external stakeholders and focusing on long-term improvement efforts. Accountability for effectiveness and efficiency was found to be the most dominant theme related to reputation. This study suggests that urban districts need to manage their public image through a well developed communications plan that focuses on projecting a district image of continuous improvement, clearly defines roles in district communication, and utilizes professional communications expertise.

Under the wave of globalization and liberalization, all enterprises face vigorous competition. The enterprises must adjust their resources and strategy to survive. Human resource is the most valuable and prominent property to a company.The recruit is the foundation of all the Human ResourceManagement. Quality Human Resource can increase the total benefits of the enterprise. And corporate reputation is recognized as a critical factor of competitive advantage for firms in the labor market.The recruiting effective in the process is very important. The purpose of this study was to examine the possible impact of the corporate reputation¡Brecruiting channel¡Brecruiting effective and view on organizational attractiveness. Therefore, this research bases on the survey of the High Tech Company in Taiwan.By statistic analysis method get some findings as follows: 1.Corporate reputation, Recruit channel are significant affect to Recruit effectiveness. 2.Corporate reputation, Recruit channel are significant affect to Organizational attractiveness. 3.Corporate reputation, Recruit channel, Recruit effectiveness, Organizational attractiveness are significant affect to different character of Corporate.

Three independent models are built based on information asymmetric to analysis discipline effects brought by banks` issuance of subordinated debts. The research results offer the theory of subordinated debts discipline effects. First, an adverse selection model is built to examine banks¡¦ policies when issuing subordinated debts based on the banks¡¦ credit risks. The result shows that banks with lower credit risks are more likely to issue subordinated debts, since after the issuance, the yields of these debts are lower. When depositors observe the lower yields of the subordinated debts, they would presume that these banks have lower credit risks. As a result, banks with lower credit risks can decrease their operational costs by issuing subordinated debts. This model has demonstrated that the market can discipline banks indirectly through the issuance of subordinated debts. Second, a moral hazard model to show that issuing of subordinated debts by banks can bring direct market discipline and indirect market discipline to make their loans less risky. The direct market discipline means that the risk level of bank will be evaluated by professional investors. The investors will require that the yields accord to the banks risk. For lowering the cost of issuing subordinated debts, banks will make their loans less risky. The indirect market discipline means that the depositors would take the yields of these debts as a significant signal indicating banks risk levels. The depositors will decide to withdraw their savings when the bank signals a higher risk, and keep their saving when the bank signals a lower risk. I prove that issuing of subordinated debts by banks can bring about these two kinds of market discipline. The model has also demonstrated that if the bank supervisor can utilize the information of issuing subordinated debts effectively, they will achieve higher supervisory goal. Third, a reputation model is built to show that for reputation concerns, a bank would change its monitoring decisions if it issues subordinated debts. Reputation effect in banks is different in different scenarios. When the good banks probability of success is very high, reputation effect would induce the bad bank to start monitor it`s borrowers, and the efforts of bad banks monitoring would be increased by time. When the bad banks probability of success is very low, reputation effect would induce the good bank start monitoring its borrowers. and the efforts of bad banks monitoring would be decreases by time.