An Exploratory Study about Microblogging Acceptance at Work

Microblogging is the new Web 2.0 hype in the media. Techies, politicians, family members and many more use Twitter to keep in touch with their interest groups, their voters or their friends and relatives. We wanted to know whether Twitter can also keep us aware about our team colleagues, how this improves teamwork and finally why Twitter is accepted and used in teams. Based on an action research study about Twitter usage in a team of seven researchers and the findings of prior literature, we attempt to extend the unified theory of technology acceptance (Venkatesh 2003) and adapt it to the specific context of microblogging in teams. Extending the performance expectancy construct, we propose two groups of factors inherent to social software that should be integrated into the UTAUT: the task characteristics of other users and the individual motivations for using social software

Demo Abstract: Disseminating WMSN Data by Using Social Network and Web

For smart cities applications, a key requirement is to disseminate data collected from both scalar and multimedia wireless sensor networks to thousands of end-users. Furthermore, the information must be delivered to non-specialist users in a simple, intuitive and transparent manner. In this context, we present Sensor4Cities, a user-friendly tool that enables data dissemination to large audiences, by using using social networks, or/and web pages. The user can request and receive monitored information by using social networks, e.g., Twitter and Facebook, due to their popularity, user-friendly interfaces and easy dissemination. Additionally, the user can collect or share information from smart cities services, by using web pages, which also include a mobile version for smartphones. Finally, the tool could be configured to periodically monitor the environmental conditions, specific behaviors or abnormal events, and notify users in an asynchronous manner. Sensor4Cities improves the data delivery for individuals or groups of users of smart cities applications and encourages the development of new user-friendly services.

Multimodal viral communication: a social semiotic analysis of the popular Spanish "Ola ke ase" meme

Multimodality – the interdependence of semiotic resources in text – is an existential element of today’s media. The term multimodality attends systematically to the social interpretation of a wide range of communicational forms used in meaning making. A primary focus of social- semiotic multimodal analysis is on mapping how modal resources are used by people in a given social context. In November 2012 the “Ola ke ase” catchphrase, which is a play on “Hola ¿qué hace?”, appeared for the first time in Spain and immediately has been adopted as a Twitter hashtag and an image macro series. Its viral spread on social networks has been tremendous, being a trending topic in various Spanish-speaking countries. The objective of analysis is how language and image work together in the “Ola ke ase” meme. The interplay between text and image in one of the original memes and some of its variations is quantitatively analysed applying a social-semiotic approach. Results demonstrate how the “Ola ke ase” meme functions through its multimodal character and the non-standard orthography. The spread of uncountable variations of the meme shows the social process that goes on in the meaning making of the semiotic elements.

La representación multimedial de la transición de ‘Malaguistán’ a ‘Málaga Soho subversivo

Lagunillas es un barrio céntrico de Málaga, a espaldas de algunas atracciones turísticas y culturales como la Plaza de la Merced, la Casa Natal de Picasso y el Teatro Cervantes. Durante muchos años este barrio se ha catalogado como área de riesgo social y de índices altos de pobreza y marginación, aunque recientemente varias asociaciones de vecinos se han esforzado por mejorar la situación de la barriada. Los colectivos activos en Lagunillas procuran documentar y denunciar el abandono de la zona por parte del Ayuntamiento y hacer visible las iniciativas tomadas por el vecindario en los medios sociales (Facebook, Twitter, Youtube) y en periódicos de oposición. Por tanto, esta contribución se centra en la representación multimodal del barrio Lagunillas en dichos medios. El estudio se basa en un enfoque de la semiótica social multimodal y recurre a métodos cualitativos con la ayuda del programa TAMS Analyzer. Los objetivos de análisis son cómo los activistas emplean diferentes recursos semióticos multimodales para mostrar el estado del barrio y de qué manera los recursos semióticos interactúan. La multimodalidad subraya de este modo la acción situada, es decir, acentúa la importancia del contexto social y de la elección de los recursos disponibles para crear significado. En el caso de Lagunillas la relación intersemiótica, y en especial, el modo visual, se convierten en recursos sumamente impactantes para representar la transición de “Malaguistán” a “Málaga Soho subversivo”.