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Seeking online bilingual scientific information is a key aspect of bilingual scientific Web literacy – abilities to engage critically with science on the Web using two languages. This study aims to determine whether factors such as age, education major, gender and type of school attended at secondary level (monolingual, bilingual, trilingual) influence undergraduates’ ability to search online Spanish-English bilingual scientific information.

The participants in this study were 60 students (43 females and 17 males, 18–25 years old) enrolled in a university bilingual science course at a high-ranked Colombian university. They were asked to complete two tasks in which they had to seek online scientific information in Spanish and in English and post their responses on the Web application, Padlet^® (padlet.com).

Results indicate that students’ gender and age influence their academic performance in both tasks and level of originality in using information obtained via the Web, respectively. Moreover, the “scientific journal” was the top source of online information from which participants sought most information to complete both tasks.

People are becoming increasingly accustomed to seeking and sharing online scientific information to support points of view and make decisions. However, it is not known which factors influence students’ ability to seek online first language-English bilingual scientific information in countries where English is the second or foreign language.

Driven by globalization and subsequent advancements in technology, higher education has experienced exponential growth in student enrolment and increased diversity in the student population. Among the major changes are new models of learning that have supported both onsite and remote learners for quality education. In response to these major changes in education, the processes, resources and services in library and information science have been redefined to meet the information needs of all users, anytime and anywhere. Historically, libraries shifted from being curators of knowledge to creators and disseminators of knowledge. This paper aims to address the path forward for academic libraries using as example, the Main Library at The University of the West Indies, Mona Campus (UWI).

This paper explores the evolution of reference services, circulations, digitization, people engagement and how new technologies have fundamentally changed the way librarians at The UWI work. Of equal importance in this discussion of the future of academic libraries is students' ability to navigate the diverse ways in which they access resources and services. Finally, the interests, needs and the practical implications of artificial intelligence in academic libraries will be examined. This digital disruption poses both opportunities and challenges for academic libraries and students within the Caribbean in the 21st Century and beyond. A review of literature as well as a look at trends in academic libraries forms the basis of this discussion.

Library processes and services advanced from automation in the 1980s, internet and online facilities in the 1990s to web-based and consortia offerings in the 2000s rendering old models obsolete. Information products and the process of information sharing have reduced the focus on print collections and face to face interactions to fully online or hybrid offerings. What is evident is that Caribbean Libraries must continue to evolve or risk being left behind in this burgeoning technology age.

Often the Caribbean is overlooked when examining the impact and application of technology and the availability of resources to students and the wider society. This paper presents an opportunity to look at the unique status of Caribbean academic libraries, specifically The University of the West Indies Library System.

Within the last two decades, entrepreneurship education has become institutionalized in Germany. It is offered as a stand-alone program or as part of a business degree, combining academic knowledge, practical skills, and personal development to enhance the entrepreneurial success of university graduates. While entrepreneurship education has experienced similar growth worldwide, its emergence in Germany is closely tied to the country’s political and economic developments. The significance of entrepreneurship education for a thriving entrepreneurial ecosystem and contemporary economic policy has been instrumental in advancing its academic recognition. This chapter provides a historical analysis of the academization of entrepreneurship in Germany. It explores the recursive and often idiosyncratic processes involving state and financial institutions, companies, and universities that have created, respecified, and mutually reinforced a subdiscipline and field of study. Academic entrepreneurship knowledge successively not only became relevant for starting a business but also for employment within the entrepreneurial infrastructure and beyond. This chapter follows a chronological order, highlighting three key stages in the academization of entrepreneurship education. First, the academic, financial, and political roots (I) of entrepreneurship up until the 1970s. Second, it explores the transformation (II) of entrepreneurship into a viable policy alternative and the challenges faced in establishing complementary research and education in higher education institutions during the 1980s. Finally, it sketches the institutionalization (III) of entrepreneurship as a central driver of government economic policy, allowing for the late bloom of entrepreneurship education and research at universities around the turn of the millennium.

The study seeks to analyze concepts of “career grades” and “job grading,” to highlight their importance and objectives for the efficiency of administrative systems. In addition, it identifies the international standards that can be used to draw grading systems. It explores the most important types of grade structures. It also clarifies grading systems in the Egyptian administrative system. It indicates some methods that can be considered a form of career progression.

The study employs descriptive, analytical, as well as, legal approaches; it analyzes the information given in the study in terms of relevant legal texts.

The study identifies precise definitions of both career grades and job grading, referring to these concepts in the Egyptian administrative system. It also suggests that there is no ideal hierarchy to be applied in all administrative systems. Therefore, the study provides some criteria that help to form the appropriate grade structure for each system.

The study analyses some literature on “job grading,” its objectives, its criteria and its main types, presenting an integrated framework that can be used to develop career-structure systems. Finally, the study identifies some methods that can be considered as a means of grading.

Given the rise of sport non-fungible tokens (NFTs) and sponsorships from cryptocurrency companies in the sport industry during the coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic, this paper aims to critically frame the partnerships between cryptocurrency and sport by exploring the reception of fan tokens amongst supporters of three English Premier League clubs: Manchester City, Everton and Crystal Palace.

Drawing upon the emerging critical scholarship on cryptocurrency and the political economy of professional football, this study uses digital ethnography in an attempt to understand the major themes emanating from the online forum discussions amongst fans in response to the issuance of fan tokens by the aforementioned three clubs, among other types of partnerships with crypto companies.

The supporters’ critical deliberations revolved around the contradictions of fan tokens (as a means for supposed “fan engagement” or for financial speculation) and the utility of cryptocurrency for the public. These reactions in turn showcase a larger tension underlying the financially unstable professional football industry: the contest between the owners and the fan bases over the exchange value (for profit) and use value (for community) of the clubs.

This paper is one of the first studies to adopt a critical framework to examine the emerging partnerships between sports and cryptocurrency companies during the COVID-19 pandemic. It also provides one of the first in-depth analyses of the critical receptions of sport NFTs amongst sport fans. While contributing to the literature on fan activism/protest in the context of the commercialization and commodification of sport, the paper also raises new questions on the responsible use of cryptocurrency/NFT in sport.

Cloud computing (CC) refers to the usage of virtualization technology to share computing resources through the internet. Task scheduling (TS) is used to assign computational resources to requests that have a high volume of pending processing. CC relies on load balancing to ensure that resources like servers and virtual machines (VMs) running on real servers share the same amount of load. VMs are an important part of virtualization, where physical servers are transformed into VM and act as physical servers during the process. It is possible that a user’s request or data transmission in a cloud data centre may be the reason for the VM to be under or overloaded with data.

VMs are an important part of virtualization, where physical servers are transformed into VM and act as physical servers during the process. It is possible that a user’s request or data transmission in a cloud data centre may be the reason for the VM to be under or overloaded with data. With a large number of VM or jobs, this method has a long makespan and is very difficult. A new idea to cloud loads without decreasing implementation time or resource consumption is therefore encouraged. Equilibrium optimization is used to cluster the VM into underloaded and overloaded VMs initially in this research. Underloading VMs is used to improve load balance and resource utilization in the second stage. The hybrid algorithm of BAT and the artificial bee colony (ABC) helps with TS using a multi-objective-based system. The VM manager performs VM migration decisions to provide load balance among physical machines (PMs). When a PM is overburdened and another PM is underburdened, the decision to migrate VMs is made based on the appropriate conditions. Balanced load and reduced energy usage in PMs are achieved in the former case. Manta ray foraging (MRF) is used to migrate VMs, and its decisions are based on a variety of factors.

The proposed approach provides the best possible scheduling for both VMs and PMs. To complete the task, improved whale optimization algorithm for Cloud TS has 42 s of completion time, enhanced multi-verse optimizer has 48 s, hybrid electro search with a genetic algorithm has 50 s, adaptive benefit factor-based symbiotic organisms search has 38 s and, finally, the proposed model has 30 s, which shows better performance of the proposed model.

User’s request or data transmission in a cloud data centre may cause the VMs to be under or overloaded with data. To identify the load on VM, initially EQ algorithm is used for clustering process. To figure out how well the proposed method works when the system is very busy by implementing hybrid algorithm called BAT–ABC. After the TS process, VM migration is occurred at the final stage, where optimal VM is identified by using MRF algorithm. The experimental analysis is carried out by using various metrics such as execution time, transmission time, makespan for various iterations, resource utilization and load fairness. With its system load, the metric gives load fairness. How load fairness is worked out depends on how long each task takes to do. It has been added that a cloud system may be able to achieve more load fairness if tasks take less time to finish.

The purpose of this paper is to discuss the issues in studying hard-to-reach or dispersed populations, with particular focus on methodologies used to collect data and to investigate dispersed migrant entrepreneurs, illustrating shortcomings, pitfalls and potentials of accessing and disseminating research to hard-to-reach populations of migrant entrepreneurs.

A mixed methodology is proposed to access hard-to-reach or dispersed populations, and this paper explores these using a sample of Brazilian migrants settled in different countries of the world.

This paper explores empirical challenges, illustrating shortcomings, pitfalls and potentials of accessing and disseminating research to hard-to-reach populations of migrant entrepreneurs. It provides insights by reporting research experiences developed over time by this group of researchers, reflecting a “mixing” of methods for accessing respondents, contrasting to a more rigid, a-priori, mixed methods approach.

The main contribution of this paper is to showcase experiences from, and suitability of, remote data collection, especially for projects that cannot accommodate the physical participation of researchers, either because of time or cost constraints. It reports on researching migrant entrepreneurship overseas. Remote digital tools and online data collection are highly relevant due to time- and cost-efficiency, but also represent solutions for researching dispersed populations. These approaches presented allow for overcoming several barriers to data collection and present instrumental characteristics for migrant research.

Recent studies on search-as-learning (SAL) have recognized the significance of identifying users' learning needs as they evolve for acquiring knowledge during the search process. In this study, the authors clarify the extent to which search behaviors reflect the learning outcome and foster the users' knowledge of Chinese art.

The authors conducted an exploratory-sequential mixed-methods approach using simulated work task situations to collect empirical data. The authors used two types of simulated learning tasks for topics related to painting and antique knowledge. A lot of 25 users participated in this evaluation of digital archives (DAs) at the National Palace Museum (NPM) in Taiwan. For each set of topics, a close-ended task related to lower-level learning goals and an open-ended task related to higher-level learning goals.

The learning criteria reflect changes in the users' knowledge structure, revealing the SAL process. Furthermore, users achieved better task performance on the higher-level creative-learning task, which suggests that they met more learning criteria, exhibited a greater variety of search patterns when exploring the topics via interaction with various sources. Finally, there is a close relationship between creative-learning tasks, prior knowledge, keyword search actions and learning outcomes.

The authors discuss implications with respect to the design of DAs in practice and contributions to the body of SAL knowledge in DAs of online museums. For future reference, the authors provide implications for the development of learning measures from the perspective of user search behavior with associated learning outcomes in the context of DAs.

The study provides a comprehensive understanding of the issues and illegal activities related to cryptocurrencies and their negative repercussions. This study aims to identify and classify cryptocurrency downsides using grounded theory and in-depth interviews. The study also analysed investors’ reluctance to invest in cryptocurrency. This pioneering qualitative study illuminates a deep and multifaceted criminal aspect of cryptocurrency.

The study conducted in-depth interviews with respondents who have experience and knowledge of cryptocurrency investments. The interviews were recorded and transcribed. The analysis was performed using the NVivo 14 software in the study.

The study specified two major types of cryptocurrency’s negative aspects: barriers and illegal usage. Barriers to cryptocurrency investment include technological, security, trust, market-related and regulatory reasons. Terrorist funding, money laundering, fraud and ransom payments are all examples of illegal usage. The results of the word cloud analysis are consistent with the overall findings of the survey, which highlighted illegal usage as a prominent negative element of cryptocurrencies. It is a key reason why cryptocurrency is not included in investing portfolios by investors.

The study’s findings provide useful insights for policymakers to develop better methods for successfully mitigating risks and ensuring responsible and sustainable usage of cryptocurrencies. In addition, the study could serve as a stepping stone for more cryptocurrency-related studies, contributing to the development of a more complete and nuanced comprehension of this emergent technology and its societal effects.