Search

While much is known about product bundles comprised of different items, much less is known about multipacks—a product set comprised of multiple identical items (e.g. a 4-pack body washes). Using the context of multipacks, the authors propose a novel price divisibility effect, which suggests that a multipack's price that is easily divisible (vs. non-divisible) by the number of component items in the multipack will increase its purchase likelihood. For example, purchase likelihoods of a four-pack body wash multipack will be higher when its price is $16 (easily divisible by 4) versus $15.30 (non-divisible by 4). This occurs because a divisible versus non-divisible price shifts consumers' attention to the unit and creates a belief that each unit item in the multipack will be consumed quickly, which, in turn, helps justify purchasing multiple units. The authors report findings from 15 studies (including a field experiment), where they demonstrate the effect and its underlying mechanism and delineate several moderators and boundary conditions. This research contributes to several literature streams, including those on product bundling, multiple-unit pricing, product consumption, and numerical cognition. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In the rapidly evolving landscape, digitising the operations and facilities in a supply chain network is essential to make the system autonomous and develop strategies for enhancing resilience, transparency, and efficiency. The COVID-19 pandemic highlights the necessity of sustainable solutions for the hybrid mode of operations. To overcome several challenges, including price optimisation, demand forecasting under uncertainty, supply-demand gap reduction, take into account vulnerability, competitive business environment and risk, the supply chain needs to be streamlined with technology-driven infrastructures incorporating physical and information flow into overall supply chain processes. The digitisation aspect encompasses adopting cutting-edge technologies such as enterprise resource planning (ERP) for supply chain visibility, e-hailing platforms, real-time data analytics, the Internet of Things (IoT) and Internet of Behaviour (IoB), blockchain-driven technology, as well as additive manufacturing, enabling seamless connectivity and communication among diverse stakeholders. This revolution enables strategic integration of various entities and state of the art data-driven decision-making, providing real-time insights into logistics movements, demand forecasting, production planning and inventory levels. Supply chain digitisation and management emphasises collaboration with supply chain partners to identify important factors, optimise costs and enhance overall supply chain resilience. Digitisation and management are technological evolutions and strategic shifts integrating analytical tools, allowing businesses to formulate models to improve performance. The implementation of blockchain-driven technology solidifies trust and safety transactions by creating an immutable and transparent log, mitigating threats and enhancing traceability. Digitisation and management exemplify a transformative journey towards a more connected, data-driven, and agile global supply chain ecosystem. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Visibility across supply chains has been a key concern for organisations for many years, but the tools and information systems to achieve real-time visibility have not been available until recently. In response to uncertainty and complexity, advanced information and communication technologies have been explored for supply chain visibility (SCV). However, managerial perspectives are largely absent from the current literature. In response, this paper systematically documents managerial factors influencing SCV and information that should be collected and shared among supply chain partners for better visibility. A multi-stage Delphi analysis was conducted with 26 supply chain experts from various globally recognised enterprises with manufacturing units located worldwide. The results provide details on prioritised managerial perspectives and experiences within (1) factors affecting SCV (drivers, enablers, challenges and contingencies), (2) SCV content (supplier, internal and customer information) and (3) implications of SCV (capabilities and performance effects). One observation was that forecasting is not deemed as important due to severe disruptions in supply chains. Real-time visibility for better predictability emerged as the top priority. This study is among the few that empirically explores factors influencing supply chain visibility and generates new insights into why barriers can be difficult to overcome in complex supply chain settings. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The defect structure of α -phase gallium oxide thin films was investigated using transmission electron microscopy (TEM). Epitaxial Ga2O3 films were grown via halide vapor-phase epitaxy on c -plane sapphire substrates. TEM analysis revealed a high density of extended planar defects within the films, primarily located along prismatic planes of { 11 2 ¯ 0 } type. Displacement vectors were determined using the invisibility criterion for stacking faults. The study encompassed both planar and cross-sectional views of the films. It is hypothesized that these defects form due to the motion of edge partial dislocations with the 1 3 ⟨ 1 1 ¯ 00 ⟩ Burgers vector. Various mechanisms of their formation have been explored. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Enterprise social media (ESM) is changing how knowledge workers interact and share information; however, a debate persists as to whether ESM is an adequate knowledge management system. ESM provides a rich set of affordances for organizational knowledge work, such as improved organizational memory, but also constrains knowledge work performance because of digital interruptions. Extending and complementing existing scholarship, this study asks the following research question: How can organizations design ESM to realize its knowledge work benefits? Using a computational agent-based model that incorporates the design features of ESM, workers' attitudes, and resulting ESM-use affordances and constraints, this study shows how ESM-use outcomes are contingent both on the design of and users' attitudes toward ESM. Specifically, the negative effects of ESM interactivity are mitigated when employees have a low transparency preference and access ESM without posting as much. The study further unpacks asymmetric engagement as the mechanism that leads low transparency configurations to be more resilient to the negative effects of interruptions driven by ESM interactivity. Asymmetric engagement--learning from posted content without interacting often--enables the gradual creation of organizational memory while maintaining a broad user base by minimizing interruptions. These results ultimately contribute a multilevel model of ESM use and knowledge work outcomes, enhancing the theoretical understanding of previously studied mechanisms such as communication visibility and providing implications for organizations designing ESM. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Scarcity appeals in marketing have long captured the attention of scholars and practitioners, yet we know little about their effectiveness across different cultures. Drawing on cultural differences (i.e., self-concept, need for uniqueness, and susceptibility to normative influence), the authors investigate the impact of culture on the effectiveness of (demand- vs. supply-based) scarcity appeals. The authors also study the impact of product visibility while considering the moderating effect of culture on the effectiveness of scarcity appeals (demand- vs. supply-based). To do so, the authors conducted experimental research with participants from Pakistan and France. The authors find that (1) demand-based scarcity appeals were more effective than supply-based scarcity appeals in Eastern cultures, whereas the reverse was found in Western cultures; (2) such moderating role of culture was stronger for high-visibility products than for low-visibility products; and (3) the respective prevalence of interdependent (vs. independent) self-construal and its subsequent impact on susceptibility to normative influence and need for uniqueness mediated the moderating role of culture. The authors conclude by discussing the key theoretical contributions and managerial implications of these findings and suggesting future research directions. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Research impact librarianship is an area within the profession that continues to grow out of need for dedicated expertise of bibliometrics and other various assessment measures. There are numerous methods of creating or re-imagining research impact services. As is common practice within librarianship, sharing experiences and best practices for service provision, especially burgeoning services, is invaluable and informs other professionals about successes they can potentially adapt into their plans for doing similar work. The Libraries at the University of Houston is in the midst of creating a research visibility and impact program born out of an initiative to elevate the university's level of prestige and impact by developing personnel, programs, and practices to support research visibility and impact across the institution. This article discusses the University of Houston Libraries' process and progress toward formalizing research impact services. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Supply chain visibility (SCV) has been gaining recognition in recent years as a key factor for achieving analytical capabilities and improving supply chain performance. However, levels of SCV implementation lag behind current technological advances. This research was motivated by the lack of visibility in inbound logistics, which limits the possibility of managing deviation, in particular concerning changes in arrival time of incoming goods, in large industrial firms. We addressed this problem by adopting a design science approach. In particular, we followed context–intervention–mechanism–outcome (CIMO) logic to map and analyse material and information flows. The problems areas were successively translated via business and functional requirements into technological solutions. We evaluated alternative technologies using controlled experiments that mimicked real-life situations. This study provides guidance for manufacturing companies aiming to enhance deviation management and predictive capabilities by improving visibility in their inbound logistics and potentially extending visibility to other areas, such as internal and outbound flows. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Introduction: This study explores the dynamics of Linguistic Landscapes (LL) in the commercial tourist district near Labrang Monastery by analyzing the use of Tibetan, Mandarin, and English on café menus. Traditionally, LL research has focused on language visibility as an indicator of vitality, overlooking contextual complexities. We challenge this approach by considering geocultural contexts, instigators' language proficiency, and intended audience. Method: This study employed a triangulation approach, combining multiple methods of data collection and analysis. First, we conducted a preliminary observation of shop names in the region. Second, with the consent of shop owners, we comprehensively documented visual and textual artifacts both inside and outside the cafés, including signboards, menus, wall billboards, and displayed books. Third, we conducted extensive semi-structured interviews with shop owners and customers. These interviews, transcribed for analysis, provided insights into language usage preferences and decision-making processes. Results: By advocating for a holistic LL research approach, integrating qualitative insights with quantitative data, this study contributes to a deeper understanding of LL dynamics. Our findings show that geocultural contexts, instigators' language proficiency, and intended audience all play a role in shaping language representation and vitality. Discussion: The absence of a language on signage does not necessarily signify diminished vitality but can reflect strategic decisions influenced by religious, individual and commercial factors. Beyond mere visibility, languages on café menus serve as symbolic markers of ethnic identity and reflect the functions they assume within the speech community, offering insights into language vitality across different usage contexts. This research enriches scholarly discourse on LL, particularly within the Chinese context, by emphasizing the multifaceted nature of language presence and its vitality. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper takes walking-based research in early childhood education as a propositional space, one grounded in reconsidering witnessing as a practice attuned to co-emergence in waste landscapes. I draw from Ettinger’s (2001) and Boscacci’s (2018) word-concept wit(h)nessing to stake out some possibilities for walking-wit(h)nessing as an affective, relational practice for pedagogical responses to child-waste subjectivities in the ongoing global waste crisis. In doing so, I am careful to frame walking alongside waste landscapes as an invitational move towards resisting passive observation, one that refuses to extricate children, educators, and researchers from living-and-becoming with waste. I conclude by offering three propositions for walking-wit(h)nessing waste landscapes that open towards walking practices that embrace the tensions of waste and human/more-than-human enmeshment for enacting pedagogies that confront and counter status quo waste logics of invisibility, the problematics of scale, and solvability. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Improving health and social equity for persons living with a rare disease (PLWRD) is increasingly recognized as a global policy priority. However, there is currently no international alignment on how to define and describe rare diseases. A global reference is needed to establish a mutual understanding to inform a wide range of stakeholders for actions. A multi-stakeholder, global panel of rare disease experts, came together and developed an Operational Description of Rare Diseases. This reference describes which diseases are considered rare, how many persons are affected and why the rare disease population demands specific attention. The operational description of rare diseases is framed in two parts: a core definition of rare diseases, complemented by a descriptive framework of rare diseases. The core definition includes parameters that permit the identification of which diseases are considered rare, and how many persons are affected. The descriptive framework elaborates on the impact and burden of rare diseases on patients, their caregivers and families, healthcare systems, and society overall. The Operational Description of Rare Diseases establishes a common point of reference for decision-makers across the world who strive to understand and address the unmet needs of persons living with a rare disease. Adoption of this reference is essential to improving the visibility of rare conditions in health systems across the world. Greater recognition of the burden of rare diseases will motivate new actions and policies to address the unmet needs of the rare disease community. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

ABSTRACT In an era where localization is increasingly vital for daily activities, determining an individual's location and providing suggestions is crucial for successful navigation. Central to our method is the concept of visibility areas, defined as spaces from which a landmark is at least partially visible. We tessellate space into a grid and use raycasting to determine these visibility areas. Visibility areas are further subdivided into sub‐spaces, each representing a unique set of visible landmarks. To efficiently manage and query these sub‐spaces, we create a tree of options for each landmark and merge them into one compact multitree. This structure represents a hierarchical composition of sub‐spaces and enhances query efficiency while storing each sub‐space only once in the memory. The multitree is designed to support the rapid identification of sub‐spaces based on observed landmarks, resulting in efficient localization within the environment is presented to calculating the optimal localization point in a visibility area based on suggested visible landmarks. The paper concludes with a discussion of the approach targeting indoor localization but highlights also its potential for further research and some limitations. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

While the research on communication visibility has typically focused on how visibility is enacted among employees who are familiar with the networks, practices and technologies of the organization, this study focuses on the experiences of newcomers. Additionally, while technology use around newcomers has typically been approached in parallel with face-to-face communication, our study concentrates on fully remote organizational entry. Qualitative interview and survey data among 24 newcomers revealed that the dimensions of visibility – the sociomaterial context, actors’ actions and observers’ actions – play a role in uncertainty and impression management during the entry process, while simultaneously reflecting to visibility management. The findings contribute to a model theorizing the relationship between visibility, uncertainty, impression management and sociomateriality during remote organizational entry. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Diasporic Indigenous students are increasingly present in K-12 classrooms in the United States, but a failure to identify their linguistic and cultural backgrounds accurately forces their absence from critical conversations regarding academic growth. This literature review highlights the invisibility that these students endure as false assumptions are made regarding their language experiences in transnational contexts. Both historical and modern practices have contributed to the circulation of misconceptions that affect these individuals in educational environments. Many obstacles preclude their success in school, and therefore, educators must learn to recognize the unique needs of diasporic Indigenous students to serve them effectively. Essential improvements in instructional planning can occur with strategic professional development that addresses the effects of colonialism and promotes an awareness of Indigenous languages and cultures. Further research is necessary to advance the understanding of language acquisition processes for Indigenous multilingual learners and literacy development as it relates to this population, specifically. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper proposes that the dissemination of marginal archival resources can be informed by forms of socioeconomic precarity experienced by their creators and primary subjects. To account for these modes of circulation, the author proposes the notion of a precarious archive. The concept is developed with reference to the Kewpie Collection, an official though marginal archival resource containing photographs as well as recordings and transcripts of interviews with the photographs' collector, Kewpie. The Collection depicts a group of self-described gays and girls living in District Six, a multicultural, inner-city area of apartheid Cape Town, before and during the District's physical destruction by the Nationalist government. By the early 1980s, the girls were among the sixty thousand residents forcibly removed from the District because they were legally classified 'Coloured'. The circulation of materials constituting the Kewpie Collection is characterised as precarious in two senses. First, the materials have been available to diverse uses incorporating a range of identificatory claims, often in terms in which Kewpie does not describe herself. Second, Kewpie's account of the girls' experiences of precarity has been de-emphasised and her photographs celebrated as evidence of the ability of gay lives to flourish in the lost District. The author instead reads these photographs as one example of the girls' efforts to imagine new forms of social existence in the absence of sustaining infrastructure and thereby enable liveability. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Various data platforms force the individual into constant presence and visibility. However, the ways in which datafied environments relate to experienced vulnerabilities in our everyday lives remain unclear. Through diaries produced by and interviews with participants from three groups who occupy presumably vulnerable positions and who currently live in Finland, we explore the ways in which people challenge expectations and prior assumptions related to forced visibility. Using the concept of tactics developed by de Certeau, we aim to understand how individuals make everyday surveillance culture livable through what we call tactics of invisibility. Based on our analysis, we identify three kinds of tactics in this context: keeping worlds apart, cropping oneself out of the frame, and sidestepping. We interpret tactics of invisibility as ways of shaping a space for oneself illustrate fractures in what previous research has framed as digital resignation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article examines how the Rohingya diaspora employs social media platforms to reclaim their identity narratives through visibility and resistance in the context of genocide and subsequent prolonged displacement. Drawing on qualitative interviews with 15 displaced Rohingya members and activists in Brisbane, Australia, this article demonstrates how transnational digital engagements foreground the construction of the Rohingya diaspora, and subsequently how the transnational identities are negotiated and mediated online. The findings show that the social media platforms facilitated the Rohingya diaspora development and identity construction through building an 'imagined community' of resistance, transnational advocacy networks and diasporic media production. At the same time, this article explores how online activism evolved and marginal voices emerged in cyberspace longing for home(land), justice and citizenship rights. This study brings unique insights to understand voices from the margins and shows how new media allow ethnic minorities and marginalised groups to construct diasporic identity through online mediation in transnational spaces. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The two-watchman route problem is that of computing a pair of closed tours in an environment so that the two tours together see the whole environment and some length measure on the two tours is minimized. Two standard measures are: the minmax measure, where we want the tours where the longest of them has smallest length, and the minsum measure, where we want the tours for which the sum of their lengths is the smallest. It is known that computing a minmax two-watchman route is NP-hard for simple rectilinear polygons and thus also for simple polygons. Also, any c-approximation algorithm for the minmax two-watchman route is automatically a 2c-approximation algorithm for the minsum two-watchman route. We exhibit two constant factor approximation algorithms for computing minmax two-watchman routes in simple polygons with approximation factors 5.969 and 11.939, having running times O (n 8) and O (n 4) respectively, where n is the number of vertices of the polygon. We also use the same techniques to obtain a 6.922-approximation for the fixed two-watchman route problem running in O (n 2) time, i.e., when two starting points of the two tours are given as input. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Specific domains of modern life—social, ecological, legal—involve distinct issues of justice that often lead to a single-focused political-philosophical engagement with justice. Such engagements, argues Marianna Papastephanou, risk turning issues of justice that lie beyond the adopted perspective into discursive injustices (i.e. of silencing the Other's voice) and condemning them to invisibility. To address this risk, Papastephanou proposes a stereoscopic approach that better illuminates the many facets of justice and, concomitantly, the many instances of injustice that escape the dominant political-philosophical perspectives on justice. In the present article, I discuss Papastephanou's theory of a stereoscopic approach to justice along with Ernesto Laclau and Chantal Mouffe's discourse theory and notion of "nodal points." I suggest that the synergy between the two approaches enhances their efficacy: Papastephanou's theorization concretizes the implications of establishing nodal points, which, in turn, reveal how the reduction of justice to one of its facets occurs at the discursive level. Enriched by Papastephanou's theorization, discourse theory makes more visible how a stereoscopic approach to justice can unveil discursive injustices of selective and partial outlooks on (in)justice. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Parliamentarians, as political personalities, are also media personalities insofar as political news is very present in the media. The objective of this article is to question the links between the political position, media presence and digital visibility of French deputies elected in 2017. Have the patterns of mediatisation changed with the digital age? What are the relations between the 'positions' occupied by political actors in the media as well as in the political and digital spaces in our hybrid media system? Inspired by a Bourdieusian framework, results are presented. They allow us to confirm some conclusions of the current literature and, more importantly, to rethink the process of mediatisation of members of parliament in our networked age. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Purpose: This study aims to evaluate the effectiveness of the Piezosurgery® device in endoscopic-assisted correction of trigonocephaly. Trigonocephaly is a type of craniosynostosis characterized by a triangular-shaped forehead due to the premature fusion of the metopic suture. Traditional open cranial vault reconstruction, although common, is invasive and poses risks. The study explores a less invasive alternative using ultrasonic microvibrations for bone cutting, potentially reducing soft tissue damage and improving surgical outcomes. Methods: The Piezosurgery® device was employed in endoscopic trigonocephaly correction surgeries performed on patients under 4 months old at the French Referral Center for Craniosynostosis in Lyon. The technique involves making a small skin incision and performing osteotomies from the anterior fontanel to the glabella. A rigid 0° endoscope provides visibility, and the Piezosurgery® device enables precise bone cutting while preserving the dura mater. Post-surgery, patients were discharged within 3 days and required to wear a remodeling helmet for 6–8 months. Results: The use of Piezosurgery® device allowed precise osteotomies with minimal soft tissue damage. No dura mater injuries occurred in the patient series. The procedure was efficient, with an average duration of 80 min, and blood loss was minimal, reducing the need for blood transfusions. The endoscopic approach facilitated shorter surgical times and reduced postoperative infection risks. Enhanced visibility during surgery, due to cavitation effects, improved the accuracy of bone cuts. The technique demonstrated promising safety and esthetic outcomes, although it incurred higher costs compared to traditional methods. Conclusion: Piezosurgery® device provides a safe and effective method for minimally invasive endoscopic correction of trigonocephaly. The device's ability to selectively cut bone while preserving soft tissues offers significant advantages, despite longer surgical times and higher costs. This technique represents a viable alternative to traditional open surgery, promoting better clinical outcomes and reduced recovery times. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Within UK business schools, there are large numbers of female and feminized white‐collar professional service (PS) employees in disproportionately low‐paid, low‐status roles, but surprisingly, they are largely invisible within the literature on sexism and gender inequalities in academia. This paper conceptualizes PS experiences by examining how forms of gendered invisibility affect professional staff working in the hybrid "third" space between academic and administrative realms. I develop a conceptual analysis of invisibility—of invisible work and as invisible worker—arising from the performance of professional and academic work. This allows me to analyze and distinguish forms of what I call service, professional and professional‐academic housework, demonstrating how these are thoroughly imbricated in dominant patriarchal cultural ideologies of gender. In developing this schema, I draw self‐reflexively on my own experiences of "circling the divide" within a UK business school, developing a rich, multi‐perspectival account of the ways visibility and invisibility were experienced in the role of a particular third space professional and "academic‐in‐waiting." This paper therefore contributes a systematic conceptualization of gendered invisible housework performed by PS staff within a politicized third space of UK business schools. It also brings often hidden PS "academics‐in‐waiting" into the literature on feminized precarity in the academy. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Recent research advances in implicit neural representation have shown that a wide range of video data distributions are achieved by sharing model weights for Neural Representation for Videos (NeRV). While explicit methods exist for accurately embedding ownership or copyright information in video data, the nascent NeRV framework has yet to address this issue comprehensively. In response, this paper introduces MarkINeRV, a scheme designed to embed watermarking information into video frames using an invertible neural network watermarking approach to protect the copyright of NeRV, which models the embedding and extraction of watermarks as a pair of inverse processes of a reversible network and employs the same network to achieve embedding and extraction of watermarks. It is just that the information flow is in the opposite direction. Additionally, a video frame quality enhancement module is incorporated to mitigate watermarking information losses in the rendering process and the possibility of malicious attacks during transmission, ensuring the accurate extraction of watermarking information through the invertible network's inverse process. This paper evaluates the accuracy, robustness, and invisibility of MarkINeRV through multiple video datasets. The results demonstrate its efficacy in extracting watermarking information for copyright protection of NeRV. MarkINeRV represents a pioneering investigation into copyright issues surrounding NeRV. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this article, we discuss some geometric infinitely divisible (gid) random variables using the Laplace exponents which are Bernstein functions and study their properties. The distributional properties and limiting behavior of the probability densities of these gid random variables at 0 + are studied. The autoregressive (AR) models with gid marginals are introduced. Further, the first order AR process is generalized to kth order AR process. We also provide the parameter estimation method based on conditional least square and method of moments for the introduced AR(1) process. We also apply the introduced AR(1) model with geometric inverse Gaussian marginals on the household energy usage data which provide a good fit as compared to normal AR(1) data. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The recent literature on home has focused on the importance of imagination and performativity in the making of places. In this article, I bring together the imagined and the material dimensions of home-making, to show how people (re)attach themselves to multiple places and, in the process, project idealized moral orders. These arguments draw on an ethnography of a mosque in Lisbon, established in 2000 by a group of Portuguese-Bangladeshi entrepreneurs, who have been negotiating with the municipality for a space to accommodate its growing congregation. In 2012, the city hall announced the construction a new square in Lisbon, the "Moorish square," a development project that would include several multifunctional spaces, some of which will be used to relocate this mosque. This article examines these negotiations as part of making a sense of home by my interlocutors from Bangladesh and, simultaneously, reveals the anxieties over the regulation and the place of Islam and Muslims in the city. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The switch process alternates independently between 1 and $-1$ , with the first switch to 1 occurring at the origin. The expected value function of this process is defined uniquely by the distribution of switching times. The relation between the two is implicitly described through the Laplace transform, which is difficult to use for determining if a given function is the expected value function of some switch process. We derive an explicit relation under the assumption of monotonicity of the expected value function. It is shown that geometric divisible switching time distributions correspond to a non-negative decreasing expected value function. Moreover, an explicit relation between the expected value of a switch process and the autocovariance function of the switch process stationary counterpart is obtained, leading to a new interpretation of the classical Pólya criterion for positive-definiteness. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Copyright of Perífrasis. Revista de Literatura, Teoría y Crítica is the property of Universidad de los Andes and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

In 2020, the Affane Mohamed Foundation initiated the restoration of the Yves Saint Laurent house in Oran, Algeria, led by architect Youcef Fernane. The project aimed not only to restore the artist's birthplace but also to showcase his first private theatre, sketches, drawing table, study, and personal bedroom. The house, built in 1925 in the Plateau Saint-Michel district (now Hai Sidi El Bachir), exemplifies neoclassical architecture with Art Deco influences. This project stands out as a unique initiative in Oran, where the preservation of public figures' homes is rare, making it an exception in Algeria. The restoration, completed in 2022, has attracted significant attention, drawing visitors locally and internationally, particularly through social media, highlighting the cultural and historical value of the site. The research addresses visitor feedback, hypothesising variability in their testimonials, which serve as constructive criticism of this initial tourism initiative in Oran. The dual objectives are to illuminate the significance of the Yves Saint Laurent residence and to analyse visitor perceptions and attitudes towards this memorial site. Methodologically, the study is based on documentary research, including recent surveys and photographs from the Youcef Fernane design office and qualitative data from online questionnaires and visitor books. The results highlight the house's importance as a cultural landmark but also reveal a lack of publicity, affecting its visibility. Conclusions suggest that the museum significantly enhances Oran's cultural landscape, offering emotional and educational experiences. However, there is a need for better promotional efforts to increase its visibility and appeal to a broader audience, emphasising the importance of strategic marketing and visitor experience improvements for future projects. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background: Situational awareness is an essential component of wildland firefighter safety. In the US, crew lookouts provide situational awareness by proxy from ground-level locations with visibility of both fire and crew members. Aims: To use machine learning to predict potential lookout locations based on incident data, mapped visibility, topography, vegetation, and roads. Methods: Lidar-derived topographic and fuel structural variables were used to generate maps of visibility across 30 study areas that possessed lookout location data. Visibility at multiple viewing distances, distance to roads, topographic position index, canopy height, and canopy cover served as predictors in presence-only maximum entropy modelling to predict lookout suitability based on 66 known lookout locations from recent fires. Key results and conclusions: The model yielded a receiver-operating characteristic area under the curve of 0.929 with 67% of lookouts correctly identified by the model using a 0.5 probability threshold. Spatially explicit model prediction resulted in a map of the probability a location would be suitable for a lookout; when combined with a map of dominant view direction these tools could provide meaningful support to fire crews. Implications: This approach could be applied to produce maps summarising potential lookout suitability and dominant view direction across wildland environments for use in pre-fire planning. We use machine learning to predict the probability an area is suitable for a wildland firefighter lookout based on incident data, roads, and lidar-derived visibility, terrain, and vegetation information. This approach may aid pre-fire planning and enhance situational awareness by providing maps of potential lookout locations. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The study aims to unveil how translators deal with confrontational responses through their visibility in translating the diplomatic discourse of China’s diplomatic press conferences. Distinct from past theoretical frameworks, this study is grounded in the impoliteness strategies model (Bousfield, 2008) and the concept of translator’s visibility. The corpus focuses on the English-translated responses using the “challenge” strategy, delivered by the spokesperson Hua Chunying throughout 2020. Findings show that the translator’s visibility is mainly presented at the syntactical and lexical levels, and the discursive level is hardly found. The translation strategy of modulation is used most in syntax and reduction most in lexicon. Additionally, the translator’s visibility by using translation strategies can mediate the degree of confrontation. In maintaining the confrontational tone, the main strategies involve modulation in syntax and reduction in lexicon. Linguistic compression and reduction are employed more commonly in weakening the confrontational implication in lexicon, and reduction in syntax. Linguistic amplification is observed more frequently in the lexicon and modulation is more often used in syntax in strengthening the confrontation. This research sheds light on the dynamic interplay between impoliteness strategies and the translator’s visibility, contributing to a deeper understanding of the translator’s engagement in institutional discourse. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The online phenomenon of social commerce (i.e., s‐commerce) platforms has emerged as a combination of online social networking and e‐commerce. On s‐commerce platforms, consumers can observe others' behavioural decisions and can distinguish those made by their friends from those made by their followees (i.e., the people a focal consumer follows but who do not follow that consumer back). Given this distinction, our study examines how consumers' behavioural decisions—regarding, for example, purchases, ratings, or "likes"—are made on s‐commerce platforms, with a focus on how they are influenced by prior decisions of friends and followees. Combining panel data from a large s‐commerce platform and two controlled experiments, we identify a strong normative social influence pattern in which consumers tend to follow others' prior decisions to gain social approval. Because the occurrence of normative social influence depends on both consumer behaviours with high public visibility and strong consumer needs to establish social ties, the unique information concerning behaviour visibility and consumers' social needs in the panel data allows us to identify normative social influence and to distinguish it from informational confounding mechanisms. Our panel data results show that on a friend network, where consumers' behavioural decisions are visible, females exhibit a greater tendency to follow others' prior decisions than males. We attribute this result to the stronger social needs of females. However, on a followee network, where behavioural decisions are invisible, these differences become less evident. Moreover, the two experiments demonstrate that making decision contexts private or activating social needs via a priming procedure can thwart (or even turn off) normative social influence. Our findings challenge prior research that identifies informational social influence as the predominant driver of conformity behaviours and thus have important implications for practice related to normative social influence, such as the development of techniques for satisfying consumers' different social needs depending on their gender or any other situational factors on s‐commerce platforms. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

We draw on (Merton, The Journal of Finance 42:483-510, 1987) to develop predictions for the benefits of voluntary disclosures by firms pursuing an initial public offering (IPO) prior to when they begin providing regulated financial information via their IPO prospectus. We find that voluntarily issuing press releases and attending investor and industry conferences are common disclosure activities prior to filing the IPO prospectus. Consistent with these disclosures enhancing investor awareness, we find positive associations with subsequent information acquisition by prospective investors and the financial press during the IPO filing period. These relations remain significant in tests exploiting the passage of the 2005 Securities Offering Reform as a source of variation in issuers' ability to provide disclosures designed to attract attention from prospective investors. Consistent with pre-prospectus disclosures enhancing the visibility of the firm, we find that, while direct associations between pre-prospectus voluntary disclosures and IPO pricing are limited, there are significant indirect effects operating through filing-period information acquisition by prospective investors and media coverage. We find no evidence that issuers' disclosure activities serve as hype, as the IPO price impact does not reverse post-offering. Overall our evidence is consistent with pre-prospectus voluntary disclosures benefiting issuers by enhancing awareness, which leads to improvements in firm valuations. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Image steganography is the art of hiding information in a cover image in such a way that a third party does not notice the hidden information. This paper presents a novel technique for image steganography in the spatial domain. The new method hides and recovers hidden information of substantial length within digital imagery while maintaining the size and quality of the original image. The image gradient is used to generate a saliency image, which represents the energy of each pixel in the image. Pixels with higher energy are more salient and they are valuable for hiding data since their visual impairment is low. From the saliency image, a cumulative maximum energy matrix is created; this matrix is used to generate horizontal seams that pass over the maximum energy path. By embedding the secret bits of information along the seams, a stego-image is created which contains the hidden message. In the stego-image, we ensure that the hidden data is invisible, with very small perceived image quality degradation. The same algorithms are used to reconstruct the hidden message from the stego-image. Experiments have been conducted using two types of images and two types of hidden data to evaluate the proposed technique. The experimental results show that the proposed algorithm has a high capacity and good invisibility, with a Peak Signal-to-Noise Ratio (PSNR) of about 70, and a Structural SIMilarity index (SSIM) of about 1. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Texture and color enhancement imaging (TXI) may improve the visibility of gastric tumors and allow their early detection. However, few reports have examined the utility of TXI. Between June 2021 and October 2022, 56 gastric tumors in 51 patients undergoing endoscopic submucosal dissection at Fukuchiyama City Hospital were evaluated preoperatively using conventional white light imaging (WLI), narrow-band imaging (NBI), and TXI modes 1 and 2. The color differences of the tumors and surrounding mucosae were evaluated using the CIE 1976 L*a*b color space, Additionally, the visibility scores were scaled. Of the 56 gastric tumors, 45 were early gastric cancers, and 11 were adenomas. Overall, the color difference in TXI mode 1 was considerably higher compared to WLI (16.36 ± 7.05 vs. 10.84 ± 4.05; p < 0.01). Moreover, the color difference in early gastric cancers was considerably higher in TXI mode 1 compared to WLI, whereas no significant difference was found in adenomas. The visibility score in TXI mode 1 was the highest, and it was significantly higher compared to WLI. Regarding adenomas, the visibility score in TXI mode 1 was also significantly higher compared to that in WLI. TXI may provide improved gastric tumor visibility. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

With the introduction of the metaverse, augmented reality (AR) is expected to become the next interface between people and computers. Research is conducted to improve the usability of AR applications and devices. Color transparency and background effect are the two critical factors to consider while developing AR applications. Ten user interface conditions (5 color transparency levels × 2 background conditions) were evaluated in an AR environment. The task completion time and mean error were noted along with the subjective scores of button visibility, background visibility, and motion sickness. The results revealed a significant difference in task completion time, button visibility, and background visibility between transparency conditions, but not in the number of errors and total motion sickness. The transparency level of T0.5 and T0.75 is recommended for the interface of AR applications. This study could be helpful when creating augmented reality applications for the metaverse and other platforms. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Nowadays, man-in-the-middle (MITM) attacks have become a large problem due to the advancement of computational power and interactive mobile technologies. Message security is a crucial concern that ought to be managed in order to help protect vital data from unauthorized people, such as MITM. Steganography is the technique of hiding secret data within an ordinary, non-secret file or message in order to avoid detection when communicating through an unsecured network. Steganography applications play a vital role in various fields that involve classified data transfer, such as healthcare, multimedia, and the military. Hence, the application of steganography in those fields attracts MITM attacks. Thus, in an attempt to address the challenge. This study proposes a hybrid approach that integrates an image steganography technique, the Advanced Encryption Standard (AES) for message encryption, and EdDSA (Edward-Curve Digital Signature Algorithm) for signature verification to enhance steganography against MITM attacks. The proposed hybrid approach was tested and measured using image metrics (MSE, PSNR, and SSIM) and histogram visualization and verified through experimentation. The results have proven that the proposed hybrid approach is an enhanced security approach with low execution time, more payload size for hiding messages, and a high invisibility embedded message to MITM compared with other existing approaches. This study has potential limitations. It does not explore tamper resistance or algorithm robustness, and it was not tested on a public image dataset. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Copyright of Cuadernos del Centro de Estudios de Diseño y Comunicación is the property of Cuadernos del Centro de Estudios de Diseno y Comunicacion and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

Many manufacturing industries today are adopting sustainable production methods in response to environmental regulations and efforts. One of the typical criteria they consider is the United Nations has set global objectives (Sustainable Development Goals: SDGs) designed to address various social, economic, and environmental challenges. "Ensuring sustainable consumption and production patterns" (Goal 12) is one of these goals. As a result, not only are manufacturers interested in sustainable products, but consumers are also showing increased interest. Consequently, the market size for sustainable products is also on the rise. This study aims to examine the mechanisms of how to improve customer loyalty of South Korean consumers who have experience purchasing sustainable apparel to vitalize the sustainable product market in Korea. Specifically, this study reveals the impact of perceived value (PV) on loyalty (LY), focusing on the mediating effects of satisfaction (SAT) and trust (TR). The analysis finds that functional value (FV), emotional value (EMV), and green value (GV) have significant direct effects on LY. Additionally, SAT and TR have significant mediating effects between PV and LY, and there is no difference in the strength of the indirect effects of SAT and TR in the relationship between FV, EMV, GV, and LY. This study extends the theoretical background of the mechanisms enhancing loyalty to sustainable apparel through the verification of parallel mediating effects. Furthermore, it is expected that these insights will serve as a direction for the operational strategies of sustainable apparel manufacturing companies. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper presents a comprehensive approach to harmonizing lunar calendars across different global regions, addressing the long-standing challenge of variations in new crescent Moon sightings that mark the beginning of lunar months. We propose a machine learning (ML)-based framework to predict the visibility of the new crescent Moon, representing a significant advancement toward a globally unified lunar calendar. Our study utilized a dataset covering various countries globally, making it the first to analyze all 12 lunar months over a span of 13 years. We applied a wide array of ML algorithms and techniques. These techniques included feature selection, hyperparameter tuning, ensemble learning, and region-based clustering, all aimed at maximizing the model's performance. The overall results reveal that the gradient boosting (GB) model surpasses all other models, achieving the highest F1 score of 0.882469 and an area under the curve (AUC) of 0.901009. However, with selected features identified through the ANOVA F-test and optimized parameters, the Extra Trees model exhibited the best performance with an F1 score of 0.887872, and an AUC of 0.906242. We expanded our analysis to explore ensemble models, aiming to understand how a combination of models might boost predictive accuracy. The Ensemble Model exhibited a slight improvement, with an F1 score of 0.888058 and an AUC of 0.907482. Additionally, the geographical segmentation of the dataset enhanced predictive performance in certain areas, such as Africa and Asia. In conclusion, ML techniques can provide efficient and reliable tool for predicting the new crescent Moon visibility that would support the decisions of marking the beginning of new lunar months. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this article I follow the mystery of millions of tons of materials washed out to sea by the March 2011 Japan tsunami: a massive wave of lost materials expected to reach North American shores that never seems to officially arrive. I bring Gordon's conceptualization of haunting together with STS conversations about absence and invisibility to build on feminist approaches that do not take as given what is missing or what should be done. I begin by situating efforts to respectfully distinguish materials survivors call 'floating things' amidst a sea of concern for ocean plastic pollution. These efforts are then contrasted with what I initially perceived as the institutional erasure of floating things at sea, re-counting how some practices work to ensure materials can be ignored, cleaned-up, or used for other kinds of ocean science research. Yet, floating things refuse to disappear completely, as potential traces wash up on beaches, trajectories are modeled back into existence, and individual practices exceed institutional obligations. I argue that attending to hauntings by listening to ghosts and drifting with them is necessary for justice-oriented forms of care for absences. In the case of floating things, this means honoring survivor relations while resisting the perpetuation of Pacific narratives of danger from the outside. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In a series of papers in the 1980s Alexander Holevo proved a classification theorem for continuous quantum measurement processes, or, as they would today be called, stationary quantum trajectories in continuous time. His main tools were functional analytic in character: starting from a Bochner-type inequality he employed dilation techniques for positive definite kernels. Here, we give an alternative, more probabilistic proof: we use weak convergence of measures and employ Lévy's Continuity Theorem. We clarify the boundedness conditions in Holevo's theorem, and supply a simple example from quantum optics. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper formalizes problems 41, 92, 121–123, 172, 182, 183, 191, 192 and 192a from "250 Problems in Elementary Number Theory" by Wacław Sierpiński [8]. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Sometimes, a form of discrimination is hard to register, understand, and articulate. A rich precedent demonstrates how victim testimonies have been key in uncovering such "hidden" forms of discrimination, from sexual harassment to microaggressions. I reflect on how this plausibly goes too for "attentional discrimination", referring to cases where the more meaningful attributes of one social group are made salient in attention in contrast to the less meaningful attributes of another. Victim testimonies understandably dominate the "context-of-discovery" stage of research into these initially opaque forms of discrimination; a victim's encounter with the gap between their experience and dominant conceptual frameworks for understanding it is what provides an initial foothold for analysis to begin. Some object, however, to this methodology continuing to dominate the later "context-of-justification" stage, where the hypothesis is rigorously challenged. I argue that this objection underestimates not just how other methodologies are more likely to inherit the various mechanisms of invisibility hiding the discrimination in question, but also how victim testimonies are distinctively well-suited to recognize and challenge those mechanisms. Victim testimonies, then, ought to continue playing a dominant role into these later stages of research regarding hidden forms of discrimination. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]