A large part of the Web, today, consists of online platforms that allow their users to generate digital content. They include online social networks, multimedia-sharing websites, blogging platforms, and online discussion boards, to name a few examples. Users of those platforms generate content in the form of digital items (e.g. documents, images, or videos), inspect content generated by others, and, finally, interact with each other (e.g. by commenting on each other's generated items). For the social process of information exchange they enable, such platforms are customarily referred to as `social media'. Activity on social media is largely spontaneous and uncoordinated, but it is not random; users choose the discussions they engage in and who they interact with, and their choices and actions reflect what they find important. In this thesis, we define and quantify notions of importance for items, users, and social connections between users, and, based on those definitions, propose efficient algorithms to detect important instances of social media activity. Our description of the algorithms is accompanied with experimental studies that showcase their performance on real datasets in terms of efficiency and effectiveness.

A large part of the Web, today, consists of online platforms that allow their users to generate digital content. They include online social networks, multimedia-sharing websites, blogging platforms, and online discussion boards, to name a few examples. Users of those platforms generate content in the form of digital items (e.g. documents, images, or videos), inspect content generated by others, and, finally, interact with each other (e.g. by commenting on each other's generated items). For the social process of information exchange they enable, such platforms are customarily referred to as `social media'. Activity on social media is largely spontaneous and uncoordinated, but it is not random; users choose the discussions they engage in and who they interact with, and their choices and actions reflect what they find important. In this thesis, we define and quantify notions of importance for items, users, and social connections between users, and, based on those definitions, propose efficient algorithms to detect important instances of social media activity. Our description of the algorithms is accompanied with experimental studies that showcase their performance on real datasets in terms of efficiency and effectiveness.

In this thesis the structure and usage of narrative within a social media platform isexplored, with Twitter as the chosen social media network. Narrative and storytellingwithin a social media sphere such as Twitter primarily focuses on bringing a certaincharacterization and voice to a user account with story and narrative generally coming insecond place. By studying and comparing real-life cases of storytelling on twitter I havecome to the conclusion that a narrative structure that combines a good character with awell-executed characterization is the ideal way of using Twitter as a platform forstorytelling.

Crowdsourcing systems - like Ushahidi (for crisis mapping), Foldit (for protein folding) and Duolingo (for foreign language learning and translation) - have shown the effectiveness of intelligently organizing large numbers of people to solve traditionally vexing problems. Unfortunately, new crowdsourcing platforms are emerging to support the coordinated dissemination of spam, misinformation, and propaganda. These “crowdturfing” systems are a sinister counterpart to the enormous positive opportunities of crowdsourcing; they combine the organizational capabilities of crowdsourcing with the ability to widely spread artificial grass root support (so called “astroturfing”). This thesis begins a study of crowdturfing that targets social media and proposes a framework for “pulling back the curtain” on crowdturfers to reveal their underlying ecosystem. Concretely, this thesis (i) analyzes the types of campaigns hosted on multiple crowdsourcing sites; (ii) links campaigns and their workers on crowdsourcing sites to social media; (iii) analyzes the relationship structure connecting these workers, their profile, activity, and linguistic characteristics, in comparison with a random sample of regular social media users; and (iv) proposes and develops statistical user models to automatically identify crowdturfers in social media. Since many crowdturfing campaigns are hidden, it is important to understand the potential of learning models from known campaigns to detect these unknown campaigns. Our experimental results show that the statistical user models built can predict crowdturfers with very high accuracy.

The purpose of this study was to understand how traditional-aged undergraduate students describe their experiences with social media. Another focus was to gain students’ perspectives to contribute to the growing body of research that currently exists. Constructivist grounded theory methodology was used. Each of the 17 students who participated in this study self-identified as a traditional-age undergraduate student who were social media users. The sample was comprised of participants ranging from the ages of 18 to 24 years of age. No other factors were considered for eligibility criteria. Themes and nested subthemes were developed, and the analysis of data ultimately led to the development of the Theory of Social Media Literacy and Identity Influence. This study is relevant to both student affairs professionals and faculty members because social media brings with it developmental factors impacting students that are not present in the current literature as it pertains to undergraduate students. / Department of Educational Studies

Purpose - With the social media's emergence in recent times, the main purpose of this study is to generate knowledge about social media communication’s impact on consumer-based brand equity, in terms of firm-created and user-generated social media communication. In order to make this possible, knowledge about customer’s perception about a specific brand is required. Furthermore, we are interested in explaining issues concerning how fashion companies can efficiently use social media, and the study’s intention is also to present recommendations of how companies can use social media as a marketing communication tool. Theory and hypothesis – This chapter deals with theory about consumer-based brand equity, where the different components of the model are presented. Also theory about social media, different social media applications and a social media strategy are described. Finally, firm- created and user-generated social media communications impact on brand equity are discussed, which leads to the study’s hypotheses. Methodology – The study has a triangulation consisting of both a qualitative and a quantitative part and has essentially a deductive approach. The study interviewed one expert in the fashion industry and one expert in the area of social media. An interview with the analysed company’s marketing manager was also made. The quantitative study was made on 624 respondents, which were all members of the company’s customer club. 97 of these 624 respondents were investigated in order to observe the impact of firm-created and user- generated social media communication on brand equity. Empirical findings and results – The findings in the study indicate that firm-created social media communication positively impact brand equity, while user-generated did not show to be significant. In this study it was shown that the majority of the respondents use social media, especially Facebook, and the content that most valuable was access to discounts and promotions as well as information about the brand and its products. Conclusion - Our study confirms the importance for companies to use social media as a marketing tool and it should be in all managers’ interest to make use of this channel. Also the importance of having high brand equity is highlighted and how the customer’s perceptions about a brand can be used as guidelines in order to increase brand equity.

This paper examines how recruiters use social media during their recruitment process. The paper focuses on the staffing industry and will further examine how recruiters are handling jobseekers personal privacy when they are using social media in a recruitment process. The paper are trying to understand the meaning of what personal integrity means and how or if recruiters show consideration to this in a recruitment process when they are using social media as a recruitment tool.   Our result demonstrates that, today recruiters use social media daily to conduct background checks on job applicants. There are no clear instructions and rules on how recruiters should handle background checks through social media. Recruiters believe that job seekers are responsible for the information contained on the their social media. Recruiters do not see anything wrong with their actions when they choose to do background checks on job applicants through social media. If we look at the factors that violates an individual's privacy, can we conclude that recruits approach could be classified as a violation of jobseekers' personal integrity.

This research outlines studies about the relationship between social integration process of Japanese immigrants in Sweden and how social media assists in this process. The purpose of this research includes: To find out the reasons of migration to Sweden for six Japanese immigrants, any difficulties that they faced at the beginning of their immigration process and/or any positive qualities that they found in living in Sweden, whether they have accessed social media since they have moved in, if they do so, how the social media has been used and also, whether the social media has had a role to play in contributing to help their social integration process. In addition, it has been considered whether the participants have plans to return to Japan. In Sweden, there is relatively small Japanese migrant population. This social science research paper is the first in Sweden which explores the immigration process of Japanese migrants into Sweden. This research will help to deepen the understanding of Japanese migrants’ experiences and contributes in assisting the social services community as well as other migrants.

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The blog is a typical content production platform after BBS and QQ. Despite the launches of the Micro-blog, WeChat, and other emerging social media applications, blogs possess the basic features and mode of operation of social media in general. To study the environment of the blog, the relationship between bloggers, followers, online media and the changes in blogging practices have important theoretical and practical significance. These reveal the influential factors of contemporary online content production; reflect the logic of practices of content producers, the relationships between content producers and consumers, and development trends; and have theoretical and practical significance. Scholars have mainly focused on typical problems in the blogosphere, such as blogging behaviour and the influential factors impacting this. It is important to position the blog into a social context and comprehensively analyse it. Except political and economic field mentioned in this Bourdieu's field theory, this research added media ecology as an additional macro environment factor. Meanwhile, motivations theory and Uses and Gratifications theory were used to support micro-level analysis. This research holistically and systematically investigated the social environment, blogging practices and key relationships within the blogosphere by employing interviews and content analysis of blog posts. It reflected on the features and patterns of content production, dissemination and consumption. Moreover, it provided a new paradigm in studying content production in the social media era. This study found that as key content producers, bloggers' practices are not only influenced by political and economic factors but also constrained by the Internet and media technology. The features of the relationships between bloggers and the political field centre on dialogue and compromise, the relationships between bloggers and economic field involve support and integration, and the relationships between bloggers and media ecology are essentially interdependence and symbiosis. This study pointed out that the field is constantly changing and full of choices and the change of the field itself determines changes in blogging practices. It is a dynamic relationship. The motivations for blogging impact on blogging strategies. Extrinsic stimulation, intrinsic motivations and emotional reasons all influence blogging practices and strategies. The changes of blogging practices are influenced by the macro environment and the agency of bloggers. The basic blogging strategy is to assess the gain and loss. The research sorted out the relationships between the three main groups in the blogosphere, i.e. bloggers, followers, and online media. Blogger-to-blogger relationships are moving from competition towards cooperative relationships. Blogger-to-follower relationships have developed from a "writer-reader" relationship to "producer-customer" relationship. Blogger-to-online-media is transiting from dependence to the diversification of content operations. The primary contributions of this work are as follows. First, it has extended the application of field theory. When analysing the field of cultural production, Bourdieu only discusses political and economic influences. However, this study considers media ecology as the most important and direct factor. Second, it has revealed the paradigm of text-based content production by analysing blogging practices. The blogosphere is dynamic. Bloggers exert their agencies in response to the environment. The common features of the blogosphere and even the field of content production itself are changing from simple to complex and from simplification to diversification. Third, it has perfected the application of the concept of "cultural capital". Bourdieu noted that cultural capital is basically represented by educational qualification. This study found that in contemporary online content production, prior experience of working in media should be regarded as a vital indicator of cultural capital and assessing content production as it directly influences bloggers' content production. Fourth, it has emphasised the relationship between content producers and consumers. Field theory only focuses on the relationship among cultural producers and between cultural producers and brokers (publishers). However, the relationship between content producers and consumers is an essential interdependent and contradictory relationship. Therefore, by adding this relationship, this study holistically elucidated relational paradigms within the blogosphere. Key words: blogging practices, motivations, social milieu, dynamic relationships, capital. 博客是继BBS、QQ之后出现的具有社交功能的内容生产平台。虽然微博、微信等社交媒体应用相继出现，但博客已具备了社交媒体的基本特征和运作模式，在社群中有一定的影响力。本论文主要研究博客生存、发展环境，博主与博主、博主与粉丝、博主与平台之间的关系及互动，以及博主行为变化的规律，并对当下内容生产的影响因素、生产者的行为逻辑、生产者及受众间的相互关系及其发展趋势进行分析，具有重要的理论价值和现实意义。学界围绕博客使用的行为特征及其影响因素等问题，进行了有价值的探讨，其中多是针对博客的某一具体议题进行分析。而将博客作为内容生产媒介，并放在社会大背景下，进行全方位、多角度分析的研究，并不多见。本研究以布尔迪厄的场域理论为基础，除了本理论强调的政治场域和经济场域以外，还加上媒介生态作为宏观环境的因素，加上动机理论及使用与满足等相关理论作为微观理论。通过深度访谈法及内容分析法，访谈博主、分析博文、检阅文献，对博客所处的宏观社会环境、博客的写作行为、场域内的主要关系进行了较为全面、系统及深入地研究，分析内容生产、传播、消费的特征和规律，进而为社交媒体下的内容生产研究提供新的范式。本研究发现，博主作为内容生产的主体，其写作内容不仅受到社会政治、经济场域的影响，同时还受互联网和媒体技术场域的制约。主要关系特征表现为：与政治场域的对话与妥协，与经济场域的支撑与融合，以及与媒介生态的依存与共生。本研究指出，场域是一个不断变化且充满不定项选择的空间。场域的发展变化，决定博主写作行为的演化，是一个动态关系。博主的不同动机决定相应的行为策略。从场域刺激到情感内化是博主选择写作主题和决策的过程，这一过程既受客观环境的影响，又受主观能动性的制约，权衡得失是基本策略。研究也发现，在博客场域的三大主体,即博主、粉丝与平台的关系方面，博客主之间的关系由单纯的竞争关系向竞争与合作关系发展；博客主与粉丝的关系由单纯的"作者--读者"关系向"生产者--客户"关系转化；博客主与在线媒体的关系由单纯的依赖关系向多元化运作过渡。本文主要贡献有以下几点：一、拓展了场域理论。传统的场域理论在研究文化产业场域时，仅考虑到政治和经济两大因素，而本文将媒介生态作为一个重要的直接的因素来考量。二、通过分析博客场域，揭示了基于文字的内容生产的发展范式。博客场域具有动态变化的特征，博客的写作行为具有能动性。由简单到复杂，由单一到多元，是博客乃至所有内容生产场域的共同特征。三、完善了布迪厄"文化资本"概念的内涵。布尔迪厄强调文化资本主要是以教育资质为形式的制度化资本。而本研究发现，在当下的网络内容生产中，不仅要考虑到学历，媒介工作的经历，也是评估内容生产、文化资本的一个重要指标，直接影响博主的内容生产与传播。四、强调了内容的生产者与消费者的主体关系。场域理论仅关注了文化生产者之间、文化生产者与中间商（出版社）的关系。而内容的生产者与消费者是内容生产场域或传播领域最基本的依存及矛盾关系。因此，本文增加了这一主体关系，使得场域内各主体关系的分析更加全面。关键词：博客行为，动机，社会环境，动态关系，资本