Social computing has transformed the content industry. Content providers have changed from providing merely content to offering social content experiences that allow users not only to passively consume content but also to actively participate. As the latest development, social live streaming services (SLSS) have emerged that enable so-called co-interactive behaviour, i.e., the live interplay between users while co-experiencing content. Yet, it remains unclear how co-interactive behaviour affects the monetisation of social live content. Based on a data set of 868,940 users from 59 gaming channels of the freemium-based SLSS Twitch, we empirically show that co-interactive behaviour has a stronger effect on users’ willingness to subscribe (WTS) than passive and active behaviour. Since we find that a user’s reciprocated interactions also directly increase other users’ WTS, our results call for dismantling the current dichotomy of user participation and social influences in IS research. We suggest a social-experiential perspective that integrates social influences as an inherent part of users’ participation experiences. This novel interactive second-person perspective contributes to research on user engagement and value capture on social content platforms, and it allows SLSS providers to obtain a more precise picture of user value to better develop or adapt their monetisation strategies.

Digital transformation is here to stay. With the emergence of new digital innovations and diverse and rich data sources, only those organisations that can adapt faster and make better, quicker decisions will become more competitive. Yet, being a first mover is only the start of the transformation process. Organisations need to address and implement digital strategies to manage and sustain a digital transformation in order to stay with, or ahead of, their competition. In this article, we outline some of the key challenges associated with researching digital transformations within the information systems (IS) field and stress the importance of shifting the focus on how digital transformations are managed and sustained. To explore this further, we launched a Special Issue on “Managing and Sustaining Digital Transformations” and received a large volume of submissions. After a series of reviews and revisions, we were delighted to unearth four excellent articles on this important topic. Our hope with this Special Issue is to improve researchers’ abilities to identify the importance of managing and sustaining digital transformations and to encourage them to build on these contributions to better unpack the digital transformation process for the future.

This paper examines the recognition of real persons, mirrored persons and other objects using thermal infrared (TIR) images and radar micro-Doppler (μ-D). Mirrored persons lead to confusion of firefighters, when only a TIR camera is used. However, mirrored persons exhibit the μ-D of the mirroring objects, hence radar can resolve this ambiguity. In this paper, multiple sensor fusion architectures are investigated for this classification task. The first approach uses an attention stage, where bounding boxes of candidates for real/mirrored persons are determined in TIR images. These bounding boxes are associated to the radar targets and subsequently classified. A joint classification of the radar μ-D and TIR image at measurement level is compared to a separate classification with subsequent combination (object level). Furthermore, a classification of the complete scene is proposed, omitting the TIR attention stage and data association. Experiments with real measurements are used for an evaluation of the presented approaches.

The introduction of smartphones and the accompanying profusion of mobile data services have had a profound effect on individuals’ lives. One of the most influential service categories is location-based services (LBS). Based on insights from behavioural decision-making, a conceptual framework is developed to analyse individuals’ decisions to use LBS, focusing on the cognitive processes involved in the decision-making. Our research is based on two studies. First, we investigate the use of LBS through semi-structured interviews of smartphone users. Second, we explore daily LBS use through a study based on diaries. The findings highlight that the decision to use LBS can be described by either a comparative mode based on the value of LBS in relation to other available options, or an intuitive mode in which past experiences trigger the use of heuristics. These modes in turn have positive influences on the continuance of LBS use and indicate changes in individuals’ information retrieval behaviours in everyday life. In particular, the distinct value dimension of LBS in specific contexts of use changes individuals’ behaviours towards accessing location-related information.

Information Systems Research (“Wirtschaftsinformatik”) basically follows two research approaches: the behavioristic approach and the design-oriented approach. In this memorandum, 10 authors propose principles of design-oriented information systems research. Moreover, the memorandum is supported by 111 full professors from the German-speaking scientific community, who with their signature advocate the principles specified therein.