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This paper aims to focus on the re-presentation of the cultural phenomena hygge in Denmark and fika in Sweden in destination branding and address the inevitability of their essentialization through the branding process.

Three relevant semi-structured interviews with destination marketing organisation’s employees were conducted, as well as a content-based analysis of three social media channels (Facebook, Twitter, Instagram). A total of 465 posts in total were analysed (140 Facebook posts, 109 Twitter posts, 216 Instagram posts).

This study demonstrates how, when communicated through social media, intangible cultural assets are transformed into tangible elements. It explains why the re-presentation and place branding processes necessarily simplify and essentialize the destination.

Destination branding scholars have traditionally criticised the flattening and essentialization of culture in destination branding and have called for a more nuanced approach to presenting a destination. This paper situates destination branding as a process that necessitates the manipulation of the presentation of the destination, which inevitably essentializes the place; this is intended. Critical destination branding researchers need to rethink their criticisms and acknowledge the inherent essentialization goal of destination branding.

This paper explores the collaborative dynamics and dimensions within a virtual multi-cultural and interdisciplinary workplace. The study focusses on the use of online communication technologies to enhance social inclusion and networking within academia.

This study uses an autoethnographic approach to draw on the personal experiences of a team of four scholars, including three early-career researchers and a senior scholar. Their reflections on their academic positionality and the institutional constraints reveal both the strengths and vulnerabilities of collaborating in a virtual workplace.

The findings offer insights into the complexities of navigating social dynamics, such as delegating responsibilities, organising meetings across various time zones and encouraging continuous collaboration, inclusivity and effective communication during an extensive timeline. As a result, their experiences revealed that a virtual workplace culture with similar and different attributes to a “normal” workplace emerged.

The paper demonstrates how to create an effective and inclusive virtual workplace by exemplifying best practices in academia and providing practical guidance for individuals and institutions based on honest, co-produced autoethnographic reflections of the authors’ lived experiences.

Using an integrated theoretical model, this study aims to examine the moderating role of gamification in influencing intentions to use mobile payment applications in Bahrain.

The current examination happens to be the first approximation in the context of Bahrain wherein an extended TPB-based model integrating variables from TAM and UTAUT2 is used along with gamification and situational influence to examine the intentions to use m-payment applications.

The findings revealed that among the variates of the TPB, AT and PB significantly affect the intentions (IN) to use m-payment applications in Bahrain, but SN fails to affect intentions, similarly SI also fails to affect intentions thereby proving that the pandemic fails to drive the intention of the population under study toward using m-payment applications. However, when the application offers gamification (GM) features, SI significantly affects intentions through GM, thus experience along with situation drives intentions and this becomes the major theoretical contribution of the study.

This examination offers useful practical implications in the form of the findings revealing that GM affects intentions to use m-payment applications and that GM moderates the relationship between perceived risk (PR) and IN, as well as SI and IN, which can be used by the service providers to improve the user experience and achieve better acceptance of their application.

The novelty of the study lies in testing the integrated theoretical model in the context of a GCC nation, Bahrain.