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The purpose of this paper is to focus on the profile of DiDIYers and the antecedents of digital do it yourself (DiDIY) in Network Marketing Direct Selling Organizations (NMDSO).

A two-step research design allowed the detection of DiDIYers strictu sensu (i.e. digital makers). After collecting data about the attitudes and the actual use of digital technology (DT) by network marketers through an online survey, an open-ended interview technique made it possible to analyze the personal characteristics of DiDIYers, the motivations that drive them and the activities that mainly foster the creation of artifacts in the DT domain. Besides, it allowed to recognize the perceived benefits and the impact of DiDIY output on networkers’ downline and firms’ performance.

The results provide a preliminary profile of the DiDIYer in network marketing communities that is suitable for further comparative studies. More specifically, this exploratory study acknowledges the most important antecedents of DiDIY in digital literacy – including the awareness of being a digital literate and/or a potential appropriateur – and in organizational culture.

This is an exploratory study based on a limited sample of DiDIYers, nevertheless it offers a preliminary view of the subjective side of the DiDIY phenomenon in network marketing and represents as well a context-bound study.

Considering the ascribed benefits of DiDIY output on the traditional network marketing objectives (effectiveness, efficiency, cohesion, mutual assistance and reinforcement) network marketing communities could benefit from an increase of attention to the topic.

The study throws light on the process of DiDIY within direct sales and network marketing activities by defining a preliminary profile of digital makers and thus, underlining a phenomenon neglected so far.

Social media platforms are highly visible platforms, so politicians try to maximize their benefits from their use, especially during election campaigns. On the other side, people express their views and sentiments toward politicians and political issues on social media, thus enabling them to observe their online political behavior. Therefore, this study aims to investigate user reactions on social media during the 2016 US presidential campaign to decide which candidate invoked stronger emotions on social media.

For testing the proposed hypotheses regarding emotional reactions to social media content during the 2016 presidential campaign, regression analysis was used to analyze a data set that consists of Trump’s 996 posts and Clinton’s 1,253 posts on Facebook. The proposed regression models are based on viral (likes, shares, comments) and emotional Facebook reactions (Angry, Haha, Sad, Surprise, Wow) as well as Russell’s valence, arousal, dominance (VAD) circumplex model for valence, arousal and dominance.

The results of regression analysis indicate how Facebook users felt about both presidential candidates. For Clinton’s page, both positive and negative content are equally liked, while Trump’s followers prefer funny and positive emotions. For both candidates, positive and negative content influences the number of comments. Trump’s followers mostly share positive content and the content that makes them angry, while Clinton’s followers share any content that does not make them angry. Based on VAD analysis, less dominant content, with high arousal and more positive emotions, is more liked on Trump’s page, where valence is a significant predictor for commenting and sharing. More positive content is more liked on Clinton’s page, where both positive and negative emotions with low arousal are correlated to commenting and sharing of posts.

Building on an empirical data set from Facebook, this study shows how differently the presidential candidates communicated on social media during the 2016 election campaign. According to the findings, Trump used a hard campaign strategy, while Clinton used a soft strategy.

The purpose of this paper is to reveal the conditions that facilitate or hinder a favorable reaction of fans to the resurrection of sport club brands.

The proposed model was empirically tested by applying partial least squares-SEM to a sample of 462 fans of five Romanian football and handball clubs that were resurrected in the last five years.

The study showed that a positive relationship between the new and the old club owners, the keeping of the brand name, and the involvement of the club’s historic figures are favorable conditions for a successful resurrection. The faded brands that enjoy salient heritage and numerous loyal fans are more likely to be successfully resurrected. Moreover, when the resurrection is undertaken immediately after the old club’s bankruptcy, fans tend to alienate from the brand, as they consider the new club to be trying to counterfeit the meaning of the faded brand.

The cross-sectional nature of the study and the narrow scope of the empirical data are the major limitations of the study.

Based on the empirical findings, the authors made recommendations to sport entrepreneurs who consider reviving faded clubs, and highlighted the difficulties of the resurrection process.

To the best of the authors’ knowledge, this is the first study of brand resurrection in the sports industry.

The purpose of this paper is to answer the following research questions: Is the knowledge of a city environment a stimulus for entrepreneurship? Which knowledge profiles of cities are more propulsive in order to stimulate entrepreneurship?

In order to answer the aforementioned research questions, two multidimensional indexes have been created: Knowledge-Based City Developing Entrepreneurship and Entrepreneurship (ENT). The sample includes all capital cities in the EU28. The presence of cities from EU28 countries is important to foster the entrepreneurial attitude in each European Country. The authors have also included 32 non-capital cities in the EU that are important hubs, contributing to a sample formed of 60 cities.

The empirical results show that the social and cultural environment may significantly improve the entrepreneurship in EU cities, more than others factors that are usually connected to economic development.

The work tries to contribute to the debate on urban economic development and entrepreneurship, providing implication for academics and urban policy makers.

The issue investigated in this work is relative to the features of the information sub‐systems supporting specific university administrative processes (accountancy, personnel management, student services). This paper attempt: to develop a benchmarking model; and apply the suggested model to a group of Italian universities.

While the literature analysis has been useful to achieve the first goal, the empirical methodology of case studies has been employed for both the objectives. It means that there has been a full commitment of the involved universities also in the theoretical phase of the work.

Two types of specific results are expected through the application of the suggested benchmarking model. The first is the pertinent position of each university in respect with some observed features of the information sub‐systems. The second is the identification of possible trends that are widespread within the selected universities.

Generalization of the benchmarking trends is not possible, because trends arise from a limited group of universities.

The universities involved in the project have discovered the importance of benchmarking as a means of improving their processes and systems.

This paper represents a first attempt at developing a model to compare the condition of the administrative information systems in a selected group of Italian universities.

The long-term development of a mobile gaming application (app) depends on its continued use by its users. The expectation–confirmation model of IS continuance was used as the basic framework, to which bi-dimensional consumption emotions were added to help better explain satisfaction judgment and continuance intention in the context of mobile gaming app use. The paper aims to discuss this issue.

The data were analyzed using structural equation models. The effects of positive consumption emotions and negative consumption emotions were examined, respectively, in Models 1 and 2. Competing models (Models 3 and 4) were also examined in order to compare the proposed model.

Both PE and NE have an effect on the satisfaction of mobile gaming app users and their continued usage intention, a finding that represents an important contribution to the extension of technology continuance theory. Comparison with the IS continuance model shows that the new model can explain significantly more variance in continuance intention.

Mobile gaming firms should pay attention to users’ consumption emotions, especially negative emotions. Some specific emotions involved in mobile gaming app use were identified, which could guide firms’ understanding of users’ emotions.

This study offers insight into the role of consumption emotions in forming continuance intentions toward mobile gaming app use in China, a topic that has not previously been investigated.

The purpose of this paper is to provide a contribution to advancing knowledge on the more recent phenomenon of social brand community.

The paper is based on an extensive interdisciplinary literature review in areas such as sociology, management, and marketing. Three interrelated and consecutively developed conceptualizations resulting from a co‐operation of the researchers over the last three years are presented to explain the influence of the evolution of current social trends on the relationship between consumers and brands in different contexts (socio‐demographic aspects and culture). The conceptualizations have been applied to a qualitative case study on Cypriot consumers, which conducted in‐depth expert interviews and focus groups. The research project has been designed in three stages: the first stage elicited thenature of relationships between consumer, brands and social groups; the second stage was concerned with differentiating consumer behaviour and segmentation patterns in the various stages; finally, the last one conceptualized the influence of culture on the brand‐consumer relationship and benefited from a progressive knowledge of the researchers in the field of embedded learning and human branding.

The first conceptualization (Siano and Basile) explains the various stages of the evolution of the relationship between the consumer and the brand. The second conceptualization proposes a new segmentation and categorization pattern of brand consumers and their respective behaviors derived from the different stages of the consumer‐brand relationship development (Siano and Basile; Siano, Kaufmann and Basile). The third conceptualization has been developed from the findings of an exploratory study on Cypriot brand related consumer behavior (Kitsios and Kaufmann), which had expanded the previous two conceptualizations by integrating cultural aspects. Beyond that, the third conceptualization integrates the influence of embedded learning and stimulant experience on the consumer‐brand relationship.

The paper provides innovative knowledge on a new quality, even new paradigm, of consumer‐brand‐social group relations leading to newly arising segmentation patterns and socially responsible marketing.