Public libraries and Nigerian cultural development

This paper has identified the ingredients of culture, especially as found in an African society such as Nigeria. It has shown the cultural missions of public libraries as enunciated in the 1995 UNESCO Public Library Manifesto. It shows the role culture in the development of a society. It has discussed some of the ways the cultures of different Nigerian ethnic groups have been negatively influenced; and the problems hindering public libraries in the country from performing their cultural functions creditably. It emphasizes that this category of libraries should be adequately supported for them to uphold, and project the good image of Nigerians through their cherished cultural activities.     

Individual motivations and demographic differences in social virtual world uses: An exploratory investigation in Second Life

Emerging social virtual worlds (SVWs) are attracting attention from researchers and practitioners for the potential benefits they offer to many real-life domains such as business and education. The values of SVWs cannot be realized without a sufficient number of users; however, little research has been conducted to investigate the factors attracting people to use SVWs. The purpose of this paper is to explore individual motivations and differences in SVW uses based on the uses and gratifications paradigm and on the literature of Internet uses. Content analysis is adopted to code and categorize the responses from 188 users in Second Life (SL), one of the most popular SVWs. Results show that people use SL because of three types of motivations: functional, experiential, and social. Comparative analysis by gender, age, education, and experience using Chi-square tests suggests that (1) female users are more inclined to shopping, researching, and exploring within SL, whereas male users are more concerned with using SL for making money; (2) younger users are more likely to use SL for entertainment, while older users are more likely to use SL for creating and education; (3) users with higher education exert significantly more effort with in-world research and education than those who with lower levels of education; and (4) relative to their counterparts, experienced users are more aware of the values of SL for creating, education, and commerce. No significant inter-group difference of any experiential motivation has been found regarding education and experience. In addition, no significant individual difference has been found regarding social motivations.     

Interruptions in the workplace: A case study to reduce their effects

Collaboration is an important aspect for virtually all workplace environments. Workplaces often encourage and foster collaboration in a variety of ways with the purpose to collectively focus the group's attention on a specific problem and solve it as quickly and as efficiently as possible. While collaboration is generally viewed as a positive aspect of the workplace, the negative aspect—interruption—cannot be ignored. Interruptions are an important research area of human-computer interaction and with the growth of pervasive or ubiquitous computing on the rise, the number of interruptions we experience on a daily basis is also growing. It is for these reasons that interruption is and will continue to be a key issue in workplaces.This report presents the findings of a qualitative research project which explored interruptions in a mid-size software development company based in Ontario, Canada. The purpose of this research was to identify the types of interruptions (both on- and off-task) that occur during typical office software related activities, explore the contextual characteristics surrounding these interruptions, and identify methodologies that could be used to reduce the cost of interruptions and increase employee effectiveness and satisfaction.     

The cognitive selection framework for knowledge acquisition strategies in virtual communities

As a significant source of knowledge, virtual communities have stimulated interest in knowledge management research. Nonetheless, very few studies to date have examined the demand-side knowledge perspective such as knowledge acquisition in virtual communities. In order to explore the knowledge acquisition process within virtual communities, this study proposes the cognitive selection framework of knowledge acquisition strategy in virtual communities. The proposed framework takes a cognitive perspective, to identify how knowledge recipients select their strategy for acquiring specialized knowledge, emphasizing their cognitive goals (e.g., cognitive replication and innovation) and cognitive motivators (e.g., virtual community self-efficacy, heightened enjoyment, and time resources). Our results suggest that knowledge recipients’ cognitive motivators differentially influence their cognitive goals (cognitive replication and innovation), which, in turn, are related to their selection of knowledge acquisition strategy (static and dynamic acquisition strategy), respectively.     

Examination of how social aspects moderate the relationship between task characteristics and usage of social communication technologies (SCTs) in organizations

Because of the increasing significance of social communication technologies within an organization, they have become a new form of information processing, resulting in business process transitions and increased benefits. By applying media richness theory and social theories, this study investigated how social communication technologies (SCTs) can be used by an employee to fit his/her task characteristics. Additionally, it also examined how the employee's social relationships moderated media usage in the current job environment and how this usage influenced the task performance. Five media were selected in this study (telephone, video conferencing, email, instant messaging, and blog). Using a hierarchical regression approach, we found that task characteristics were related to media usage, whereas social factors (social influence and social affinity) moderated the degree of the relationships. A few particular media and technologies seemed to perform well, however these are influenced by the social aspects. Moreover, the usage of social technologies results in positive task performance. The performance of a few specific technologies demonstrated binding effects (email performance was associated with instant messenger performance). In summary, we found that the usage of SCTs is instrumentally determined by the interaction between the task and social relationships.     

Web 2.0 and folksonomies in a library context

Libraries have a societal purpose and this role has become increasingly important as new technologies enable organizations to support, enable and enhance the participation of users in assuming an active role in the creation and communication of information. Folksonomies, a Web 2.0 technology, represent such an example. Folksonomies result from individuals freely tagging resources available to them on a computer network. In a library environment folksonomies have the potential of overcoming certain limitations of traditional classification systems such as the Library of Congress Subject Headings (LCSH). Typical limitations of this type of classification systems include, for example, the rigidity of the underlying taxonomical structures and the difficulty of introducing change in the categories. Folksonomies represent a supporting technology to existing classification systems helping to describe library resources more flexibly, dynamically and openly. As a review of the current literature shows, the adoption of folksonomies in libraries is novel and limited research has been carried out in the area. This paper presents research into the adoption of folksonomies for a University library. A Web 2.0 system was developed, based on the requirements collected from library stakeholders, and integrated with the existing library computer system. An evaluation of the work was carried out in the form of a survey in order to understand the possible reactions of users to folksonomies as well as the effects on their behavior. The broad conclusion of this work is that folksonomies seem to have a beneficial effect on users’ involvement as active library participants as well as encourage users to browse the catalogue in more depth.     

Examining the antecedents of knowledge sharing in facilitating team innovativeness from a multilevel perspective

This paper examines how transformational leadership (TFL) climate influences employees’ team identity and their intentions to share knowledge and how team knowledge sharing intention subsequently influences team innovativeness. Data was collected from 301 employees comprising 52 R&D teams. Hypotheses were tested with both hierarchical linear modeling (HLM) and regression analyses. Results indicated that TFL climate was related to employees’ intention to share knowledge through team identity. At the group level, results supported the relationships between team knowledge sharing intention and team innovativeness. The results also indicated that team knowledge sharing intention mediated the relationship between TFL climate and team innovativeness.     

Role of knowledge conversion and social networks in team performance

This study aims to find out how different processes of knowledge management and patterns of social networking affect team performance. Our data on teams originate from a sample of different organizations from a variety of both public and private industries in Finland (76 teams; 499 employees). One of the main deficiencies in the current literature on knowledge and networks is that they tend to concentrate on specific types of teams in a single organization context. Our aim was to put the team phenomenon into an everyday context by analysing the interplay of knowledge creation and social networks in teams which function on a permanent basis in a variety of industry contexts. Both knowledge creation and social networking contributed to performance, but the results showed that whereas team members see the knowledge conversion processes as central to performance, top management emphasize the importance of social networks in value creation. In our examination, lively interaction between team members, combined with team leaders’ intra-organizational networks, contributed to team performance.     

e-Government legislation: Implementation issues for programs for low-income people

This paper introduces a research agenda to explore the intersection of e-government implementation and the key federal programs – Medicaid, the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP, a.k.a. food stamps), (SSI), and Temporary Assistance to Needy Families (TANF, a.k.a. welfare) – that provide assistance to low-income citizens in the United States. To lay the groundwork for on-going research, this paper focuses on the implementing statutes that require different levels of automation for delivering these programs to the public. It discusses the programs in terms of their breadth, impacts to recipients, and the effects of automation as implemented for each. It identifies some of the consequences of automation, such as potentially faster service delivery, different approaches to information access, and issues of privacy. It then suggests some points to consider for policymakers and for future research to more deeply understand this unique and little-studied aspect of e-government implementation. By understanding the impacts of implementing statutes on the poor, policymakers can develop a deliberately inclusive strategy that leverages technology to support access to assistance in measurable models that can be implemented at the federal, state, and county levels. This can further democratize the government-to-citizen relationship and support greater accountability to taxpayers.