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It used to be a big deal – but has the once mighty blog gone bust?

In the days before Facebook … there were blogs. Blogs written by corporate leaders, academics, foodies, pundits and enthusiasts of every stripe. At one point, a blogger’s opinion could greenlight a film or sink a rising star. Blogs have massive influence. But those days are gone. Where blogs were once a salon for opinion and interest – the role that survived was usually as part of a larger institution’s communications strategy. It blended internal and external engagement – and it was effective. Until now, recently even Harvard acknowledged they were getting out of the blogging realm. But as blogs fade into the sunset – will the information, data and value be preserved? Should archives be created to maintain the history of these online conversations for future generations? Or, is it simply a delete and all that information is gone? Martha Burtis is the director of the digital knowledge center at the University of Mary Washington. An expert on this topic, she recently spoke with media regarding the winding down of blogs at Harvard. She is available to speak to media regarding this topic – simply click on her icon to arrange an interview. Source:

Do Cell Phones Cause Cancer? Ask a UMW expert

UMW Associate Professor of Biology Deb O’Dell was recently featured on “Do Cell Phones Cause Cancer?” which began airing Saturday, Aug. 18, on the With Good Reason public radio show. The program, broadcast in Fredericksburg on Radio IQ 88.3 Digital at 2 p.m. Sundays, explores O’Dell’s research on the possible carcinogenic effects of one of America’s favorite gadgets. Her results – she found that a single 25-minute exposure can significantly alter the activity of genes for up to 48 hours – “surprised and alarmed” her. “You don’t use your cell phone once every two days,” O’Dell told With Good Reason host Sarah McConnell, who said she was “amazed” by the research. “What I’m afraid of [is] that these changes are not being permitted to go back to their original state … but rather, by continually activating them, we’re causing them to change persistently and that could then lead to changes in how cells reproduce themselves leading then, maybe, to tumors.” Questions surrounding the safety of cell phones and the effects of the radiation they emit have long loomed large. O’Dell has spent years – and involved several UMW students – researching this phenomenon. If you are covering this topic and need to know more – Dr. Deborah O'Dell is available to speak with media. Simply click on her icon to arrange an interview. Source:

Significance of pricing and product-line strategies

In new research, Ramnath Chellappa, associate professor of information systems & operations management, and coauthor Amit Mehra (U Texas) investigate the business practice of IT “versioning,” whereby a company creates different models of a product in order to charge varying prices for each one. Much research takes into account economies of scale and a company’s marginal costs—the price of making an additional unit of a product. However, Chellappa and Mehra note that companies also need to consider consumer usage costs when they decide to create various versions of the same IT product. But for IT products and services, the “costs” are not monetary. The pair note the “time commitment and physical effort” to use IT products or services. They use the example of mobile devices: “One cannot enjoy these information goods without them consuming resources such as memory and processing power.” They determine that “this consumption-related disutility” is critical to feature bundling and consumer segmentation. The researchers create a model to test the consumer cost impact, using a “digital goods firm with a unique production cost structure and agents—consumers who face resource constraints in consuming these goods.” Given the usage costs, they determine that individuals may not necessarily prefer products with more features to lower-quality items. The pair concludes “marginal cost and consumers’ usage costs have the same impact on versioning strategy.” Source:

Identity and the digital world

According to research from Jagdish Sheth, Charles H. Kellstadt Professor of Marketing, and Michael Solomon (UNC), the idea of identity is evolving, impacted by the growing influence of the digital world. The authors’ groundbreaking study builds on a seminal paper from Russell Belk, written in 1988, which identified the role that possessions play in an individual’s life and how external elements are critical to how people self-identify. The duo uses Belk’s findings on consumer behavior, taking it a step further by applying his concepts to current day, with the online world in mind. Sheth and Solomon found that traditional boundaries between an individual’s offline and online life are increasingly blurred, resulting in what they term the “digital extended self.” People are creating a new sense of identity, courtesy of the information posted, the persona created, and the relationships developed online. They write, “A social footprint is the mark a consumer leaves after she occupies a specific digital space (e.g., today’s Facebook posts), while her lifestream is the ongoing record of her digital life across platforms (e.g., registrations in virtual worlds, tweets, blog posts).” Not surprisingly, the notion of just what defines a consumer is changing. User-generated content and online consumer reviews have altered the nature of relationships between the producer and consumer. The authors’ findings have critical implications for marketers looking to get a better understanding of consumer behavior. Source:

Unconventional Tech Conference Brings International Audience to UMW

Join us July 30 – August 3! Educators from Canada to Cairo, the UK and across the U.S. will attend the University of Mary Washington’s Digital Pedagogy Lab. Dynamic keynote speakers like NPR’s lead education blogger, Anya Kamenetz, and Columbia University’s Jade E. Davis will ask participants to re-imagine technology’s role in higher education, finding the best ways to teach with and about it. Hosted by UMW’s trend-setting Division of Teaching and Learning Technologies (think ground-breaking initiatives like Domain of One's Own), DPL delves deep into digital pedagogy, covering everything from cultural humility to “mad genius” storytelling. We’re also on Twitter – so follow along and join in on the conversation - @DigPedLab and #digped.​​ Source:

Ban on Cryptocurrency Ads Not Good for Consumers

Starting in June, Google will no longer allow any advertising about cryptocurrency-related content. It’s a hard move, but the online giant is following in the footsteps of Facebook who initiated similar measures at the start of 2018. While a potentially lucrative and growing marketplace, there’s still a lot of hesitation and concern about potential scams. Google's director of sustainable ads, Scott Spencer recently said in an interview with CNBC: "We don't have a crystal ball to know where the future is going to go with cryptocurrencies, but we've seen enough consumer harm or potential for consumer harm that it's an area that we want to approach with extreme caution.” So, is banning ads promoting cryptocurrencies the right thing to do? "Google's ability to censor these ads is exactly why decentralization and censor-proof media and currency is so important," says David Noble, director of the Peter J. Werth Institute for Entrepreneurship and Innovation. "Do people want Google to make the decision as to what they can and can not see? Where do they draw the line," Noble asks. Noble focuses on technology entrepreneurship in the digital economy. He is often sought out by media for his perspective and insight regrading cryptocurrencies and technology. David is available to speak with media, simply click on his icon to arrange an interview. Source:

Digital Transformation: Painting the picture of the Future

There has been an enormous amount of talk and attention dedicated to Digital transformation as of late. But what does DX really mean for your company, industry and Canada? Simply explained, and according to i-Scoop - Digital transformation is the profound transformation of business and organizational activities, processes, competencies and models to fully leverage the changes and opportunities of a mix of digital technologies and their accelerating impact across society in a strategic and prioritized way, with present and future shifts in mind. To learn more, join Nigel Wallis - IDC’s VP of IoT & Industry Research - at Directions Canada 2018, where Wallis will share insightful research on the implications of Digital Transformation for Canada’s key sectors and workforce. Explore the opportunities and pitfalls of acting on the 3rd Platform technologies. Spaces remaining are limited. Click the image below to register for this year’s IDC Canada Directions conference or simply click on Nigel's icon to arrange an opportunity to chat directly with him. Source:

Prose, prayers, palindromes and 45 presidents

If there’s one thing Colin Rafferty – a University of Mary Washington associate professor of English and teacher of creative nonfiction – knows better than prose, it’s the United States’ 45 presidents. His current manuscript, a collection of essays about each of them, includes pieces that range from “The Fear” about Martin Van Buren and “Bully” about Theodore Roosevelt to “What They Said About Him” about Barack Obama and “The Imagineer Considers Tomorrow” about Trump. Written as palindromes, death songs, prayers, movie scripts and more, Rafferty’s work has appeared in such prestigious publications as Brevity, Cobalt, Juked, Parcel and Waxwing, and he was recently featured on the Virginia Public Radio’s With Good Reason for a segment on “Getting to Know the Presidents.” “Reading and writing about the presidents has let me explore both American history and the expansiveness of creative nonfiction,” said Rafferty, who read a biography of each president before penning his essays. Colin is available to speak with media about his work and about President's Day. Simply click on his icon to arrange an interview. Source:

Done in by digital? What will the sale of Time mean for the industry?

On Monday, a once mighty media juggernaut was sold off for $2.8 billion dollars. Time Inc. – the publisher of Time, Fortune, Sports Illustrated and People was now property of the Meredith Corporation. The Des Moines, Iowa-based company better known for its Better Homes and Gardens, Family Circle, Parents and Family Fun magazines. It’s a bitter and sad end for Time. The company was once the industry leader in magazines and world-respected periodicals. The magazines were’ must-reads’ for the informed. But times have changed, and Time never did catch on or catch up with the digital wave that has transformed journalism as we know it. So, what will all of this mean? Can the world of print media survive and adapt to changing times and tastes? As well, with shrinking circles of media ownership – will regulators let this sale proceed? And what will this mean for the many journalists? More job cuts and shrinking news rooms? Will they move from NYC to Iowa? Has the lustre and allure of being a New York based journalist lost its shine? There are a lot of questions that still need to be addressed and answered. That’s where the experts from Cedarville University can help. Dr. Marc Clauson is a professor of history and law at Cedarville. Marc is an expert in the fields of anti-trust regulation and the economic impact of mergers and takeovers like this. Dr. Clauson is available to speak with media – simply click on his icon to arrange an interview. Source:

What Makes Horror Movies Scary? “We do,” Says Baylor Film Expert

The best scary movies adapt to society’s current fears and turn current cultural, social and political preoccupations into elements of horror, says a Baylor University film historian and an expert on the horror film genre. “We are the monster,” said James Kendrick, Ph.D., associate professor of film and digital media in Baylor’s College of Arts & Sciences. Kendrick has authored three books: Darkness in the Bliss-Out: A Reconsideration of the Films of Steven Spielberg; Hollywood Bloodshed: Violence in the 1980s American Cinema; and Film Violence: History, Ideology, Genre. The themes of horror films have changed and developed over the years to capture the zeitgeist and adapt to societal fears, Kendrick said. However, as elements of fear transform with society, the elements of horror films remain. “Character and story, atmosphere and the monster,” Kendrick said. “That’s all you really need. Interesting, engaging characters in an effective setting pitted against some kind of monstrosity. That is the core of the genre, and anything and everything else grows from and functions to support those three elements.” The audience must be able to relate to characters and feel a sense of empathy for them, he said. The atmosphere must engage the audience and provide an effective platform for fear. Source: