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A multiperiod, theoretical model characterizes the relationship between a publication that ranks universities and prospective students who might use this ranking to decide which university to attend. The published ranking offers information about the universities' objective quality but also affects their prestige, which may increase student utility. This prestige effect gives the commercial publication incentive to act contrary to the best interest of the students. If a ranking created with the commonly used attribute-and-aggregate methodology creates prestige, then to maximize profit the publication needs to (1) choose attribute score weights that do not match student preferences and (2) alter those attribute score weights over time, even in the absence of changes to student preferences and/or education technology. Without a prestige effect, the publication should choose attribute score weights that match student preferences. This model also defines a student-optimal ranking methodology that maximizes the sum of the students' utilities. The results offer insights for prospective students who use existing rankings to choose a university, as well as which ranking designs would better align with students' preferences. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper aims to explore the determinants of social sustainability in the supply chain (SSSC) of the company and examine the role of strategic information systems development as moderating variables in the relationship of SSSC and firm performance. The research setting used a sample of 106 SMEs of natural color batik of "Batik Tulis" in Bantul Regency. Testing the hypothesis in this study using hierarchical regression analysis techniques. The results of the study proved that determinant variables such as environmental uncertainty, regulation of environmentally friendly proved to have a significant effect on SSSC, while interdependency determinant variables consisting of three dimensions namely interdependency task, interdependency goal and interdependency reward identified that the three dimensions had no significant effect on SSSC. While the influence of SSSC on firm performance proved to have a significant effect, also the ability of the strategic information system development variable to prove significant was able to strengthen SSSC's influence on firm performance. The results of the study provide empirical evidence about the concept of social sustainability in supply chain (SSSC) in order to develop a new theory of Sustainability Supply Chain Management.

In many authoritarian countries, the Internet is an oasis of freedom of speech and the free transfer of knowledge - thus, if not completely free, then at least a more free space for transferring content than traditional information providers. Nevertheless, the total freedom of this medium has passed irretrievably. Use of social media and other websites to post material that cannot be posted on traditional media, and even online newspapers tend to be affected by less stringent censorship laws. However, this does not change the fact that contemporary authoritarian regimes are going so far as to interfere with social media, either by blocking access to content or by promoting false information. The conducted analysis is to show the mechanisms of top-down information management in order to lead to widespread disinformation and distortion of reality. In this respect, it is worth bringing up the actions of the Russian authorities in the context of the conflict in Ukraine and the possible opposition of the Russian society to the ongoing military operations. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The aim of this study is to empirically investigate how transformational leadership (TL) practices encourage innovation for competitive advantage within the specific context of Saudi large firms and SMEs. Despite a profusion of studies noting that innovation strongly contributes to a firm's performance, there is a dearth of studies about how TL practically encourages organizational innovativeness. Moreover, because many leadership studies are limited in their location to Western nations, further research in a range of different cultural contexts is warranted. This study will address these issues and suggest a conceptual framework that empirically tests the path-dependent influences of TL, structural capital, relational capital, tacit knowledge sharing, and training on innovation outcomes. This study will employ a mixed methods approach to examine the hypothesized relationships between factors. The findings of this research may emphasize the importance of utilising TL style as a process rather than through the study of leadership alone in facilitating innovation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The 'main structure and performances' of any physical system may be (nearly) maintained for a given time interval only if this system is kept inside a kind of 'shell' that protects it and only if the necessary (desired) exchange of energy-mass with its environment is realized through some transducers. The subsystem constituted by the shell and transducers constitutes a kind of 'barrier' between this physical system and its environment. Then, humans can exchange energy, mass, and information with their environment only though their available transducers. The paper presents sections about Plank energy, about inertia in rotation, translation, about waves and space dimensions, all based on classical physics and mathematics. These sections present in a different manner some very well-known physical phenomena. Associated with a new and convenient technology, all these models may be considered as innovation strategy importance. Applications may be found in interplanetary telecommunications and treks but also for everyday Earth vehicles and life. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The alignment of information technology (IT) and business strategy is a perennial challenge for corporate executives. While earlier studies confirm the value of alignment, there is still some question as to how alignment creates value and the level at which value is created. In this research, we use a series of theoretical arguments based on the interconnected structure of the value chain to consider the extended effects of alignment at the process level. Since processes are often linked to create a complex chain of activities, the absence or presence of alignment in any process could have implications for business performance elsewhere in the value chain. Minimally aligned processes can not only disrupt performance within the focal process, but their effects may also be felt further downstream in the form of bottlenecks and a diminution in the business value of IT. Using a simplified form of the value chain and data from matched surveys of business and IT executives at 317 U.S. and EU firms, we examine how the effects of alignment on a given process spill over into processes further downstream, creating higher IT business value in those downstream processes. We also show that these spillover effects continue along the length of the value chain and do not diminish based on distance from the focal process. Our results reinforce the call for firms to improve the fit between business and IT strategy by showing how efforts to improve alignment in a given process can deliver a stream of benefits along the value chain. This research provides a fresh perspective on the value of alignment, facilitating a deeper understanding and appreciation of the link between strategic IT alignment and firm performance. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this paper, we develop a framework that captures the effects of information management and risk-sharing contracts in supply chain networks. In particular, we analyse the impact of strategic information acquisition and sharing on supply chain disruption risks and costs and we evaluate the supply chain performance of risk-sharing contracts. Risk-sharing contracts specify who needs to incur the costs when supply chain disruptions occur. We develop a model that consists of three tiers of multi-criteria decision-makers, manufacturers, retailers, and demand markets. We describe the behaviour or each decision-maker, derive the finite-dimensional variational inequality formulation of the equilibrium conditions of the supply chain and present numerical examples. The numerical examples highlight that it is not a priori clear which participant in the supply chain network will benefit from increased information-sharing activities. Our models indicate that the beneficiary of reduced information-sharing costs is in some cases dependent on the negotiation power of participants and that it is also dependent on the type of risk-sharing contract used. Furthermore, the numerical examples show that, in some cases, information-sharing and risk-sharing contracts are complements while in other cases they are substitutes. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article presents information on the usefulness of merging or joining datasets as a method for evidence-based management. The process of creating such a dataset is described as merging, indexing, concatenating and lagging company-wide information. In this way, comparisons can be drawn from month to month, and the effectiveness of changes can be measured. The use of such datasets by companies like Walt Disney, Panda Restaurant Group, and Holiday Inn are described. The use of evidence-based management techniques which rely on this type of data for strategic business planning decisions is broadly recommended, with some caveats noted. INSET: A Primer on Quasi-Experimental Analysis.

Almost all attempts to date to monetize Internet applications targeted at individuals have focused on natural extensions of traditional media or traditional retailing. Most are either some form of consumer-focused advertising or of consumer-focused e-commerce. And yet the Net is far more powerful than traditional media on one hand, and far more liberating and thus inappropriate as an alternative to traditional media on the other. There are numerous potential online business models that are not based on advertising. This paper explores several such areas and divides them into two basic categories, those that sell some product, experience, content, or service and earn revenues from the sale, and those that provide access to consumers and charge for access. It further divides each of these major categories into subcategories, and for each subcategory reviews current experience, places it in the context of the relevant literature in competitive strategy, and uses that theory to make predictions. The paper concludes with strategic recommendations for corporations as well as with suggestions for further research. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Although user satisfaction is widely used by researchers and practitioners to evaluate information system success, important issues related to its meaning and measurement across population subgroups have not been adequately resolved. To be most useful in decision-making, instruments like end-user computing satisfaction (EUCS), which are designed to evaluate system success, should be robust. That is, they should enable comparisons by providing equivalent measurement across diverse samples that represent the variety of conditions or population subgroups present in organizations. Using a sample of 1,166 responses, the EUCS instrument is tested for measurement invariance across four dimensions--respondent positions, types of application, hardware platforms, and modes of development. While the results suggest that the meaning of user satisfaction is context sensitive and differs across population subgroups, the 12 measurement items are invariant across all four dimensions. The 12-item summed scale enables researchers or practitioners to compare EUCS scores across the instrument's originally intended universe of applicability. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

A combination of big data and predictive analytics orchestrated through the Internet of Things (IoT) offers many opportunities for researchers in Information Systems, Operations Management and Strategy to look at old problems in new ways, and to identify completely new research areas. While there is much hype, little research has been conducted that informs companies about how to profitably integrate the IoT with strategic or operational processes. This paper views the IoT through the lens of predictive maintenance -- the use of real-time data and predictive analytics algorithms to dynamically manage preventive maintenance policies. These are being used by numerous manufacturing organizations to transition from product-oriented to service-oriented business models. In particular, we analyze optimal preventive maintenance policies in an environment where equipment is subject to a deterioration, which shifts it from its initial, fully-productive state, having a specified, age-dependent failure rate to a less-productive or deteriorated state, having a different, presumably higher, age-dependent failure rate. The deterioration, itself, is a random process. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this paper, we study the effects of subjective biases on strategic information transmission (SIT) within a Stackelberg game setting, where a human transmitter (leader) communicates an encoded source message to a human receiver (follower) so that the receiver decodes back a desired version of the original source signal. We model human decisions using Rieger–Wang’s prospect theory, which is an extension of traditional prospect theory to continuous decision spaces. Having found a closed-form expression for the receiver’s best response strategy under any general setting, we consider two settings: Gaussian SIT games and exponential SIT games. While the Gaussian SIT games result in strategies that are independent of subjective biases of both the transmitter and the receiver, we show that the equilibrium strategies in exponential SIT games depend on the subjective biases of both the transmitter and the receiver. Numerical results are presented to illustrate results in both Gaussian and exponential settings. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Investment in strategic information systems (SIS) is advocated by numerous authors as an important way for firms to seek competitive advantage. Yet there is still little empirical evidence that implementation of SIS results in long-term competitive advantages. This is primarily due to the difficulty of isolating economic benefits attributable to SIS implementation. In this research, thirty-five sample firms identified in the media for successful employment of SIS are analyzed for evidence of long-term financial success. This analysis is conducted over a thirteen-year period, centered around the year in which firms were identified for employment of SIS to either support growth, control costs, form alliances, differentiate products, or provide innovation of products/processes. Results show that the stock market reacted favorably to announcements that firms were using SIS, and in subsequent years those firms tended to be more productive and more profitable than their industries and than firms in their respective industries. The greatest profitability differences occurred in the years after SIS firms were initially recognized as successfully employing SIS or investing in SIS. Further, a subsample analysis revealed that the positive results were primarily driven by those firms employing SIS to support growth. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Research suggests the practice of self-management can be beneficial to service operations. However, the self-management concept has received relatively little use in the service industry. This article discusses the concept of self-management in the service environment, identifies some of the critical information requirements unique to this environment, and proposes a conceptual model of an information system that supports the developmental functions and business activities of the self-managed, working in the service industry. The proposed self-management information system (SMIS) promotes self-managed behavior by facilitating: scanning and analyzing the environment, setting and contracting goals, monitoring and evaluating work, rewarding or punishing performance, learning new skills, and system maintenance. The SMIS also mitigates some of the bathers to self-management by providing executive management with a control system and by helping to improve the decision-making process of line workers. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Strategic information systems planning is the process of creating a long-range plan of computer-based applications to enable an organization to achieve its goals. Previous research has shown that many problems can potentially impede information systems planners as they carry out the process. The current study uses a survey of eighty information systems planners to investigate a causal relationship among the problems. It reveals a causal model describing (1) the influence of organization problems on hardware, cost, and database problems, and (2) the influence of organization, hardware, cost, and database problems on implementation problems. Cost problems had the largest direct effect on implementation problems. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Many organizations are moving forward with the development of an executive information system (EIS). Based on the experiences of other organizations, there are guidelines that can be followed when creating an EIS. The strategic business objectives methodology corresponds with these guidelines and involves a six-step process: (1) the organization's strategic business objectives are identified; (2) the business processes that are critical to the strategic business objectives are identified; (3) priorities are assigned to the strategic business objectives, and as a consequence, to the critical business processes; (4) information needed to support the critical business processes is defined; (5) information linkages among business processes are identified; and (6) a plan for a modular EIS development, implementation, and evolution is developed. Fisher-Price used a similar methodology when developing its EIS, and this has helped Fisher-Price become more market oriented. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The usefulness of strategic decision support systems (SDSSs) has been a highly discussed, yet under-investigated issue. This paper attempts to help fill the gap between available subjective/argumentative theory and the necessary empirical evidence to evaluate and implement existing claims and design methodologies. An empirical study is described that explicitly focused on the usefulness of information in a strategic decision-making context. Factor analysis was employed in the derivation of five orthogonal dimensions of the usefulness of strategic information. The results suggest that strategic systems planning [20] may be preferable to historical, traditional approaches to providing useful information to strategic decision makers in a SDSS context. A research agenda is discussed that suggests avenues for studying strategic systems planning in the context of various planning processes contributing to SDSS development, of knowledge-based SDSSs, and of strategic expert systems. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

There has been considerable attention paid to competitive and strategic information systems. Few cases, however, have been studied and presented in detail. McKesson's order entry and distribution system, Economost, is one of the most widely cited strategic information systems, with wide acceptance; nearly 100% of McKesson's orders are entered electronically by customers. Impact on customers, and on McKesson's costs, has been favorable and dramatic. Similar systems are now widely available from major competitors; the effect of such systems on the industry, and on industry consolidation, has also been significant. But differential competitive impact on McKesson is more difficult to establish. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Concepts of uncertainty and information processing are used to integrate the diverse organization design/structure literatures. This approach more fully explicates the concept of congruence which lies at the heart of contingency ideas. The review suggests a contingency approach to design which develops a feasible set of structural alternatives from which the organization can choose. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

There has been a dramatic increase in the use of strategic planning tools in the past decade. Since the quality of strategic planning will be greatly impacted by the quality of the information inputs, increasing attention should be paid to the systematic development of strategic intelligence systems. Examples are drawn from a field research project on these systems. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The author provides insights into the need for marketing information systems and discusses their benefits, organizational needs, structural requirements, and general limitations. Illustrations of current marketing information systems are provided. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The aim of this article is to study the impact of strategic information system on quality of public healthcare services in Iraq. After a brief literature review, an empirical study was conducted among 206 physicians of Baghdad hospitals. To this end, a model has been developed to be tested by structural equation modeling. The results of this study showed that strategic information system directly affected the quality of public healthcare services. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Highlights • A dramatic case of decision making failure in Formula 1 demonstrates the need for broader analysis from a practice-based perspective. • An inductive study of the Ferrari case in Abu Dhabi in 2010 reveals more complex and nuanced reasons for failure than those reported in the media that led to key strategists being ousted. • Three topics stand out for strategic IS research: (1) The situated nature and affordances of decision making; (2) The distributed nature of cognition in decision making; and (3) The performativity of the decision support system. Abstract Decision support systems (DSS) are sophisticated tools that increasingly take advantage of big data and are used to design and implement individual- and organization-level strategic decisions. Yet, when organizations excessively rely on their potential the outcome may be decision-making failure, particularly when such tools are applied under high pressure and turbulent conditions. Partial understanding and unidimensional interpretation can prevent learning from failure. Building on a practice perspective, we study an iconic case of strategic failure in Formula 1 racing. Our approach, which integrates the decision maker as well as the organizational and material context, identifies three interrelated sources of strategic failure that are worth investigation for decision-makers using DSS and big data: (1) the situated nature and affordances of decision-making; (2) the distributed nature of cognition in decision-making; and (3) the performativity of the DSS. We outline specific research questions and their implications for firm performance and competitive advantage. Finally, we advance an agenda that can help close timely gaps in strategic IS research. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Large scale exhibition is a complex crowd system, providing quality service for many tourists is an important issue that managers must pay attention to. Intelligent information management system should adopt scientific and reasonable resource scheduling sche-me to improve the efficiency of the crowd management. Through the domestic and foreign literature research, this paper points out the deficiencies in the previous research, and analyzes the process of crowd service in large-scale exhibition activities. In order to carry out the management of tourist service resources in the large scale exhibition, the concept model of mobile resource scheduling is put forward, and the detailed introduction of each dimension is presented. Multi-resource scheduling model based on Dijkstra and multi-ant colony optimization algorithms are established respectively. The advantages and disadvantages of the two algorithms are compared through the numerical examples. Dijkstra algorithm is superior to multi-ant colony optimization algorithm in the cost control, but in the running time of the algorithm, multi-ant colony optimization algorithm is better than Dijkstra algorithm. The research has practical significance for the development of scientific and effective population service operation plan and service management plan for large scale exhibition activities. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Summary: Nowadays, organizations need to be able to adjust more rapidly to the circumstances of their environment, at a strategic, tactical, and operational level. However, most software tools are designed to support the tactical and operational levels, while at a strategic level there are not many options available. In this paper, we propose a software tool which supports modelling of strategic information, covering several well‐known strategy techniques, and also facilitates the design of highly customizable management dashboards. To validate our proposed software tools, we perform two case studies, with two inherently different organizations, namely a public university and an investment fund. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper presents a model in which a central and a local supervisor contribute their efforts to obtain information on the solvency of a local bank, which is then used by the central supervisor to decide on its early liquidation. This hierarchical model is contrasted with the alternatives of decentralized and centralized supervision, where only the local or the central supervisor collects information and decides on liquidation. The local supervisor has a higher bias against liquidation (supervisory capture) and a lower cost of getting local information (proximity). Hierarchical supervision is the optimal institutional design when the bias of the local supervisor is high but not too high and the costs of getting local information from the center are low but not too low. With low (high) bias and high (low) cost it is better to concentrate all responsibilities in the local (central) supervisor. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This work presents a study developed in a medium port system composed of 50 public and private actors interacting with their macro-environment, which can generate strategic synergistic relationships. In order to determine these synergistic links between their components, the strategic phrases contained in their missions are analysed and classified according to the multi-criteria that are part of the macro-environment of each port actor: political, economic, social, technological, environmental, risk and learning. Likewise, new characterizations and classifications are proposed for groups and sub-groups of port actors. From absolute frequencies, Contingency Tables and the Chi-square test, quantitative results are obtained, which show the potential cases of strategic synergistic relations in the port system and the behavior of each group and sub-group of actors, as well as dependence / independence between every pair of criteria. Finally, it is verified that it is possible to use quantitative methods to analyze the strategic synergistic relationships between the actors of the port system. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Logics of joint strategic ability have recently received attention, with arguably the most influential being those in a family that includes Coalition Logic (CL) and Alternating-time Temporal Logic (ATL). Notably, both CL and ATL bypass the epistemic issues that underpin Schelling-type coordination problems, by apparently relying on the meta-level assumption of (perfectly reliable) communication between cooperating rational agents. Yet such epistemic issues arise naturally in settings relevant to ATL and CL: these logics are standardly interpreted on structures where agents move simultaneously, opening the possibility that an agent cannot foresee the concurrent choices of other agents. In this paper we introduce a variant of CL we call Two-Player Strategic Coordination Logic (SCL2). The key novelty of this framework is an operator for capturing coalitional ability when the cooperating agents cannot share strategic information. We identify significant differences in the expressive power and validities of SCL2 and CL2, and present a sound and complete axiomatization for SCL2. We briefly address conceptual challenges when shifting attention to games with more than two players and stronger notions of rationality. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

If the proposition of Williamson that 'highly standardized transactions are not apt to require a specialized governance structure' (1979, p. 248) is to be accepted, then a discrete transaction market between small business owners and their suppliers can be easily organized in the market. This view essentially nullifies the possibility of there being a relational transaction. In this backdrop, this research attempts to explore the small buyer-supplier relationship in the context of a small city. Keeping embeddedness (Granovetter, Am. J. Sociol., 1985; 91: 481-510) as a theoretical foundation, we explore the social content in an apparently pure economic exchange. Although, earlier attempts (Khoja and Kauffman, J. Small Bus. Manag., 2012; 50: 20-40; Uzzi, Am. Socio. Rev., 1996; 61: 674-698) conformed to embeddedness in transactions between a buyer and a supplier among businesses of various sizes, they largely ignored very small-size buyers and suppliers owing to the miniscule size of business transactions and less frequent interactions between buyers and suppliers. Based on the grounded theory approach (Strauss and Corbin, Basics of Qualitative Research-Grounded Theory Procedures and Techniques, 1990), in this study, we conducted in-depth interviews with 57 very small business owners to develop detailed narratives. These narratives were organized under four themes: Contractual relationship, Strategic information sharing, Caste as a proxy, and Trust Factor. The findings clearly indicate that small business owners foster continued relationships with their suppliers, owing to social conditioning factors. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

One of the most important quantities of the exact Markovian SIS epidemic process is the time-dependent prevalence, which is the average fraction of infected nodes. Unfortunately, the Markovian SIS epidemic model features an exponentially increasing computational complexity with growing network size N . In this paper, we evaluate a recently proposed analytic approximate prevalence function introduced in Van Mieghem (2016). We compare the approximate function with the N -Intertwined Mean-Field Approximation (NIMFA) and with simulation of the Markovian SIS epidemic process. The results show that the new analytic prevalence function is comparable with other approximate methods. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper is to investigate the dynamics of a stochastic SIS epidemic model with saturated incidence rate and double epidemic diseases which make the research more complex. The environment variability in this study is characterized by white noise and jump noise. Sufficient conditions for the extinction and persistence in the mean of two epidemic diseases are obtained. It is shown that the two diseases can coexist under appropriate conditions. Finally, numerical simulations are introduced to illustrate the results developed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Areas which require physical protection systems are usually those in which very valuable material, potentially dangerous material, or strategic information is stored. The primary purpose of the physical protection systems for such areas is to prevent theft or sabotage of the protected items. Intrusion detection is one of the essential elements of a physical protection system. It is essential that any new or to-be-improved intrusion detection system be carefully planned and analyzed to ensure that it will reliably perform its intended function in the specified environment and that the system's strengths and weaknesses be identified and understood. Details about particular types of sensors and how they operate are given in the references listed and are not repeated here. The performance of intrusion detection sensors is influenced by a complex interrelationship of a large number of factors. Some of these factors for exterior and interior sensors to be used in intrusion detection systems are identified and discussed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Purposes: The main goal of the paper is to determine the significance of selected sources of strategic information, used by Polish farmers in decision making. In addition, an attempt was made to determine the factors impacting the evaluation of those sources among the traits of the farmer and his farm. Methodology: Data was gathered using the questionnaire method and analysed with standard tools of descriptive statistics. Findings: The farmers deemed personalised sources of strategic information the most important, especially agricultural advisers, input suppliers and buyers of agricultural products. From among institutional (non-personalised) sources, local government and the chamber of agriculture were significant. Business information agencies and survey companies are the least important sources for farmers. The characteristics of the surroundings of the farm - specifically, its geographic location and the size of settlement where it is located proved to have the widest impact on the evaluation of the sources included in the study. From among the organisational factors, only farm size has a significant impact. Research limitations/implications: The study was confined to a representative group of farmers in Poland. A closed list of sources of strategic information was used. Originality/value: The study results contribute to the knowledge on the functioning of Polish agriculture and may also be used in comparative studies, characterising this sector's diversity within Europe. They can in turn contribute to properly focusing on supporting the policy of balanced agriculture development in the EU. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this paper, we consider epidemic spreading on a weighted adaptive network in which the network topology varies according to the global and local infective information of individuals. We focus on the relationship between network topology and epidemic spreading. Interacting strength is defined to evaluate the level of how individuals’ infective information taking effects on their connections. The model is analyzed by discrete-time Monte-Carlo simulations with an initial BA scale-free network. It is found that greater interacting strength leads to higher epidemic threshold, lower average disease density of steady-state and shorter epidemic prevalent decay time. Besides, the interaction tends to change the initial BA scale-free network to a fat-tail network while the scaling exponent almost keeps unchanged. In addition, individual who reacts with local infective information will significantly restrain the outbreak of disease comparing to the one with global infective information, and this phenomenon becomes more notable if the interacting strength becomes greater. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article is devoted to the construction of a strategic information system of implementing multilevel feedback in higher educational institution. The characteristic of personal criterion for knowledge evaluation was showed. The key principles of feedback construction were outlined. In this article authors provide the analysis of KSU Feedback service using experience in Kherson State University as an example of considered type of a strategic information system.

The article focuses on the system of information security in the U.S. The author suggests that for the country to achieve long-range strength in scientific and technical productivity, the flow of information must go two ways, both into and out of government agencies. He notes that classification of information should be well-examined, if it is still inclined to the security measures set by the country or if it needs reorganization in relation to the importance of new ideas and new concepts. The need for maximum utilization of brain power specifically abroad and a system which promotes originality and invention is the key to unveiling a more sound information security. Moreover, progress in science depends on the number and quality of trained minds, and on free flow of information.

Marketing decision makers are increasingly faced with too much information. The development of marketing information systems [1, 8, 9] is a logical response to this information overload. Many advantages foreseen for these systems have been lost in implementation [2], however, often because new system developments are not integrated with the information system that already exists in a company. Amstutz identified four characteristics of a successful marketing information system [1, p. 74]: 1. The system is founded on management's conception of the decision environment 2. The user-manager understands the system structure 3. The system is based on disaggregated data rites 4. System development has proceeded to increasing levels of sophistication through a process of gradual evolution. The first item requires identifying and describing executives' information needs and decision processes, while the second implies substantial communication and education. The last two characteristics describe technical features of an information system. The first two requirements might be approached through study of a company's existing information system. This method produces descriptions of the information-processing and decision-making systems in an organization. Such descriptions emphasize organizational relationships, capture informal elements of decision making, and concisely display a great deal of information. Accurate descriptions of the existing information system offer a basis for recommending improvements [4]--e.g., whether the firm continues to use a "manual" system or decides to develop a computerized system. Whether such a procedure develops toward modeling the individual executive [7] or toward systems simulation, this approach to systems design offers the advantage of using management's conception of the decision environment [1]. Further, the flowcharts, which constitute a natural language for systems analysts, are easily understood by managers, and they are usef... [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]