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The purpose of this paper is to examine the interaction effects of spokes-character dynamism (high vs low) and brand personality (sincere vs competent) on consumers’ evaluation and the mediating role of processing fluency.

Two experiments were conducted to test the hypotheses. Study 1 establishes the interaction effect between evoked spokes-character dynamism and brand personality on brand trust and examines the mediating role of processing fluency. By introducing a control group and using purchase intention as the dependent variable, Study 2 further extends the results of Study 1.

The results of Studies 1 and 2 show that for sincere brands, spokes-characters with high dynamic imagery contribute to significantly higher consumer evaluation than the control group and the group of spokes-characters with low dynamic imagery. However, for competent brands, spokes-characters with low dynamic imagery contribute to significantly higher consumer evaluation than the control group and the group of spokes-characters with high dynamic imagery. In addition, processing fluency mediates the interaction effect between evoked spokes-character dynamism and brand personality on consumers’ evaluation.

The studies considered only one method, “frozen motion,” to evoke perceived movement. Further studies using other methods are needed to allow for generalization.

The discerning use of dynamic imagery in spokes-character design involving advertisements may aid marketers in maximizing spokes-characters’ effect on consumers’ evaluation.

The perceived movement of spokes-characters is integrated into the cognition of brand personality. Marketers should take into account how the match between spokes-character dynamism and brand personality may influence consumers’ evaluation of the brand.

Digital stickers are being used frequently due to a rapid increase in the usage of mobile messenger services. Moreover, characters featured on digital stickers are being used as spokes-characters for brand marketing and advertisements. These characters create positive consumer attitude toward the brand and the brand's product or service.

Based on 307 surveys collected in Korea, this paper examines the relationship between the dimensions of the characters and the usage intention of an Internet-only banking service.

Results indicate that unlike conventional spokes-characters, the expertise of sticker characters does not have an influence on usage intention. However, all three dimensions of characters are effective in forming a positive brand equity, and this has a mediating role in enhancing usage intention.

Current research has brought academic attention to characters featured on digital stickers and have verified their significant role. Moreover, in an Internet-only banking context, branding strategy is an effective way to encourage customers to use services. Theoretical implications are addressed, as are implications for managers who are looking for a character that will execute effective marketing campaigns.

Digital humanities aim to use a digital-based revolutionary new way to carry out enhanced forms of humanities research more effectively and efficiently. This study develops a character social network relationship map tool (CSNRMT) that can semi-automatically assist digital humanists through human-computer interaction to more efficiently and accurately explore the character social network relationships from Chinese ancient texts for useful research findings.

With a counterbalanced design, semi-structured in-depth interview, and lag sequential analysis, a total of 21 research subjects participated in an experiment to examine the system effectiveness and technology acceptance of adopting the ancient book digital humanities research platform with and without the CSNRMT to interpret the characters and character social network relationships.

The experimental results reveal that the experimental group with the CSNRMT support appears higher system effectiveness on the interpretation of characters and character social network relationships than the control group without the CSNRMT, but does not achieve a statistically significant difference. Encouragingly, the experimental group with the CSNRMT support presents remarkably higher technology acceptance than the control group without the CSNRMT. Furthermore, use behaviors analyzed by lag sequential analysis reveal that the CSNRMT could assist digital humanists in the interpretation of character social network relationships. The results of the interview present positive opinions on the integration of system interface, smoothness of operation, and external search function.

Currently, the system effectiveness of exploring the character social network relationships from texts for useful research findings by using the CSNRMT developed in this study will be significantly affected by the accuracy of recognizing character names and character social network relationships from Chinese ancient texts. The developed CSNRMT will be more practical when the offered information about character names and character social network relationships is more accurate and broad.

This study develops an ancient book digital humanities research platform with an emerging CSNRMT that provides an easy-to-use real-time interaction interface to semi-automatically support digital humanists to perform digital humanities research with the need of exploring character social network relationships.

At present, a real-time social network analysis tool to provide a friendly interaction interface and effectively assist digital humanists in the digital humanities research with character social networks analysis is still lacked. This study thus presents the CSNRMT that can semi-automatically identify character names from Chinese ancient texts and provide an easy-to-use real-time interaction interface for supporting digital humanities research so that digital humanists could more efficiently and accurately establish character social network relationships from the analyzed texts to explore complicated character social networks relationship and find out useful research findings.

The purpose of this paper is to present a novel image sensor technology for raised characters based on line structured‐light. It can convert raised character's three‐dimensional (3D) features into image's grayscale levels.

The measurement principle and mathematical model are described. An experimental device is established and system parameters are calibrated. A grayscale conversion algorithm is proposed to convert the distortion of laser stripe to the grayscale intensity of image. The article also introduces a four‐factor method to assess the image quality of characters.

Experimental results show that the method can get high‐contrast images of raised characters that are conventionally low‐contrast with the background. Besides, the method does not need complicated calibration and mass computation, which makes the system structure simple and increases the speed of image acquisition.

The paper presents a novel image acquisition method for raised characters.

WordPerfect offers several facilities to handle foreign languages and multi‐lingual documents. This paper discusses two aspects of language handling in WP: the language code, which is a WP formatting code that gives access to language modules and the keyboard editor, which facilitates entering foreign characters. The paper discusses the possibilities offered in the 5.1 version of the program. The last section discusses improvements in WP 6.0.

Character coding systems such as ASCII and EBCDIC are unable to deal with the worldwide range of characters and so possible solutions, such as ISO 10646 and Unicode, involving 16‐bit codes have been suggested. The paper examines how libraries deal with multi‐lingual character sets and describes work being undertaken on the definition of a basic European character set as part of the National Bibliographies on CD‐ROM project being funded as part of the Commission of the European Communities Action Plan for Libraries.

Examines the history of branded characters in children’s marketing; these go back to the Michelin Man in 1898, and include the Robinson Golly and the Jolly Green Giant. Shows how reliance on these characters diminished with television advertising, which allowed animated stories to carry the brand, rather than mere static poster and press characters; some of the characters have now been pensioned off. Outlines three stages of child development related to brand characters, followed by the different form of commercial character usage: licensed product (the character is the brand), brand spokespeople like Tony the Tiger, characters associated with the brand over time (like the Dulux dog), borrowed equity using entertainment characters, and pack design with character visuals. Warns that increased sophistication of children with respect to brands and advertising means that character brands can alienate older children if they are perceived as too childlike.

The purpose of this research is to examine the effects of congruence between the ideal self-image of a game player and the game character on identification and interaction with the game character, perceived game power and performance, character attachment and willingness to spend money on the game character.

A total of 347 online game players participated in an online survey posted via the nationwide crowdsourcing web service Mechanical Turk in the US. A structural equation modelling was conducted using a maximum-likelihood estimation procedure to test the relationships among the variables.

The results revealed a significant positive impact of congruence between a game character and the ideal self-image of a game player on identification and interaction with the game character, perceived game power, game performance, attachment to the game character and willingness to spend money on the game character.

Although significant research has been conducted in the area of online gaming, limited attention has been given to the strategic game content that stimulates a player's intention to purchase game items. Due to the challenges in sales growth in the game industry caused by business model shifts from a subscription-based model to a free-to-play one, it is important for marketing practitioners to motivate game players to continue playing the game and purchase game items. The results of this study provide valuable strategic insights to overcome the limitations of existing marketing strategies in the online game business.

Professional storytelling and interpretive techniques can be successfully adapted for the classroom. For educators, character interpretation is an especially effective teaching tool. The author uses her extensive experience as an actress, storyteller, and educator to explain why character interpretation works so effectively to engage students and capture their attention. More than traditional methods of instruction, these established techniques put a “face” on history: They place people and events in a relatable, humanizing context that supports the teaching of controversial topics such as human rights and revolution. Using real-world examples, Tucker explains how character interpretation attracts people at all levels of ability and interest. Such presentations enable students to not only connect with historical figures' perspectives and motivations but also compare their own contemporary worldviews. Further, teachers can connect STEM education with history through their choice of people to portray, drawing from contemporary as well as historical figures to illustrate key learning concepts. This chapter outlines the educational value of framing a presentation within a socio/political/scientific context; doing so helps students to relate the presentation content to their own perceptions and to frame appropriate questions for the character if a Q&A takes place. The chapter further deconstructs the complexities of character interpretation into a series of manageable steps, explaining the sequence of storytelling from character conception to performance. Guiding questions at the end provide useful suggestions for dramatic presentations by teachers and students.

The Archers is a much-loved soap opera which relies entirely on audio outputs: on actors speaking and listeners listening. Despite this, many silent characters populate the drama. In fact, from Rosaline in Shakespeare’s Romeo and Juliet to Godot in Beckett’s Waiting for Godot, and not forgetting Tracey the barmaid in Eastenders, silent characters have long played a crucial role in dramatic productions, an influence all the more acutely felt if they are unseen as well as unheard. Therefore, using key examples of silent characters, and with reference to Freda Fry in particular, I discuss the expanding role and influence of the silent characters in The Archers. In addition, by invoking philosophies of language and silence, I will suggest they have an influence and potency in the storylines that speaking actors should envy, and that Freda Fry reigns supreme over all others.