• Journal of Korea Society of Industrial Information Systems
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• v.16 no.5
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• pp.173-184
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• 2011

Today smart devices such as smart phones, smart pads and tablets have become necessities of modern people in both daily life and business as they have widely proliferated. One of the most popular application areas of smart devices is a game-related area. Among these applications social network games, played with other users through social networks, are ranked top in their popularity. Though much research of PC games and online games have been performed, little research of social network games and the factors affecting acceptance of social network games are not vigorous yet. Therefore, we aim to analyze the factors and their structural influence on acceptance of social network games. We add a couple of factors such as Social interaction, Mobility, Subjective Norm, and Flow reg arding the characteristics of social network games and analyze the structural relationships among these factors using Structural Equation Modeling. Analysis results and implications are suggested with concluding remarks.

• Proceedings of the Korean Society of Computer Information Conference
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• 2018.07a
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• pp.262-264
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• 2018

Many of users play Mobil Social Network Games (M-SNG). M-SNGs are played through social network, and typically features multiplayer and asynchronous gameplay mechanics. It is most often implemented as mobile devices with mobile instant messenger app. Kakaotalk provids mobile game platform. The purpose of this study is to find significant factors that have effects on the commitment of M-SNGs. We also conduct multi-group comparison test to study the difference in factors of models between time t and time t1. Time t is October, 2012 and time t1 is April, 2016. This study is to empirically test the research model using data collected from M-SNGs' users. We survey two different groups of time t and time t1 people with the same model. We use structural equation model analysis with AMOS 18.0 and compare two models of different times. This study is to give academicians and practitioners insight about its effects and implications

• Asia pacific journal of information systems
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• v.19 no.3
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• pp.69-98
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• 2009

We investigated what factors motivate gamers to participate in a guild and why they continue to be engaged as members of the guild. We find that, based on the result of focus group interviews with MMORPG gamers, social support and self-esteem factors play important roles. Considering both prior research and the focus group interviews we have conducted, we define social support and character control as independent variables. Character identity, guild identity, and self-esteem are proposed as mediating variables while guild flow and game loyalty as dependent variables. Accordingly, we develop the research model and hypotheses, and verify them empirically. Based on our experiences of playing the WoW game, we proposed a research model and conducted focus-group interviews (FGIs). FGIs involve formulating a hypothesis and then collecting some relevant data. FGIs were conducted face-to-face with students of C University in Korea. We formulated structured interview schedules, and the questions were based on our research variables and personal experiences. The questions for the interviews encompassed the following areas: (a) the demographic characteristics of the focus group; (b) the number of years for which respondents had played online games; (c) the motive for starting a game; (d) the number of game-characters assumed by each gamer; (e) the type of game played; and (f) other issues such as the reasons for involvement in the play, the willingness to reuse the game in case new versions were released, etc. On average, it took two hours to interview each of three groups. A primary set of FGIs was conducted with three groups on the premise that there would be some differences caused by character race (Horde vs. Alliance) or by playable server (Normal vs. Combat). With respect to the manner of playing, we found that guild members shared information, felt a sense of belonging, and played computer games for quite a long time through the guild; however, they did not undergo these experiences when playing alone. Gamers who belonged to a specific guild helped other players without expecting compensation for that, freely shared information about the game, gave away items for free, and more generous with other members who made mistakes. The guild members were aware of the existence other members and experienced a sense of belonging through interactions with, and evaluations from, other players. It was clear that social support was shown within the guild and that it played an important role as a major research variable. Based on the results of the first FGIs, a second set of in-depth FGIs was carried out with a focus on the psychology of the individual within the guild and the social community of the guild. The second set of FGIs also focused on the guild's offline meetings. Gamers, over all, recognize the necessity of joining a community, not only off-line but also online world of the guild. They admit that the guild is important for them to easily and conveniently enjoy playing online computer games. The active behavior and positive attitudes of existing guild members can motivate new members of the guild to adapt themselves to the guild environment. They then adopt the same behaviors and attitudes of established guild members. In this manner, the new members of the guild strengthen the bonds with other gamers while feeling a sense of belonging, and developing social identity, thereby. It was discovered that the interaction among guild members and the social support encouraged new gamers to quickly develop a sense of social identity and increase their self-esteem. The guild seemed to play the role of socializing gamers. Sometimes, even in the real world, the guild members helped one another; therefore, the features of the guild also spilled over to the offline environment. We intend to use self-esteem, which was found through the second set of FGIs, as an important research variable. To collect data, an online survey was designed with a questionnaire to be completed by WoW gamers, who belong to a guild. The survey was registered on the best three domestic game-sites: 'WoW playforum,' 'WoW gamemeca,' and 'Wow invent.' The selected items to be measured in the questionnaire were decided based on prior research and data from FGIs. To verify the content of the questionnaire, we carried out a pilot test with the same participants to point out ambiguous questions as a way to ensure maximum accuracy of the survey result. A total of 244 responses were analyzed from the 250 completed questionnaires. The SEM analysis was used to test goodness-of-fit of the model. As a result, we found important results as follows: First, according to the statistics, social support had statistically significant impacts on character control, character identity, guild identity and self-esteem. Second, character control had significant effects on character identity, guild identity and self-esteem. Third, character identity shows its clear impact on self-esteem and game loyalty. Fourth, guild identity affected self-esteem, guild flow and game loyalty. Fifth, self-esteem had a positive influence on the guild flow. These days, the number of virtual community is rising along with its significance largely because of the nature of the online games. Accordingly, this study is designed to clarify the psychological relationship between gamers within the guild that has been generally established by gamers to play online games together. This study focuses on the relationships in which social support influences guild flow or game loyalty through character control, character identity, guild identity, and self-esteem, which are present within a guild in the MMORPG game environment. The study results are as follows. First, the effects of social support on character control, character identity, guild identity and self-esteem are proven to be statistically significant. It was found that character control improves character identity, guild identity and self-esteem. Among the seven variables, social support, which is derived from FGIs, plays an important role in this study. With the active support of other guild members, gamers can improve their ability to develop good characters and to control them. Second, character identity has a positive effect on self-esteem and game loyalty, while guild identity has a significant effect on self-esteem, guild flow and game loyalty. Self-esteem affects guild flow. It was found that the higher the character and guild identities become, the greater the self-esteem is established. Contrary to the findings of prior research, our study results indicate that the relationship between character identity and guild flow is not significant. Rather, it was found that character identity directly affects game players' loyalty. Even though the character identity had no direct effect on increasing guild flow, it has indirectly affected guild flow through self-esteem. The significant relationship between self-esteem and guild flow indicates that gamers achieve flow, i.e., a feeling of pleasure and excitement through social support. Several important implications of this study should be noted. First, both qualitative and quantitative methods were used to conduct this study. Through FGIs, it was observed that both social support and self-esteem are important variables. Second, because guilds had been rarely studied, this research is expected to play an important role in the online community. Third, according to the result, six hypotheses (H1, H5, H6, H7, H8, and H11) setup based on FGIs, were statistically significant; thus, we can suggest the corresponding relationships among the variables as a guideline for follow-up research. Our research is significant as it has following implications: first, the social support of the guild members is important when establishing character control, character identity, guildidentity and self-esteem. It is also a major variable that affects guild flow and game loyalty. Second, character control when improved by social support shows notable influence on the development of character identity, guild identity and self-esteem. Third, character identity and guild identity are major factors to help establish gamers' own self-esteem. Fourth, character identity affects guild flow through self-esteem and game loyalty. The gamers usually express themselves through characters; the higher character identity is, the more loyalty a gamer has. Fifth, guild identity, established within the guild, has clear effects on self-esteem, guild flow and game loyalty. Sixth, qualitative and quantitative methods are employed to conduct this study. Based on the results of focus group interviews and SEM analysis, we find that the social support by guild members and psychological factors are significant in strengthening the flow of guild and loyalty to the game. As such, game developers should provide some extra functions for guild community, through which gamers can play online games in collaboration with one another. Also, we suggest that positive self-esteem which is built up through social support can help gamers achieve higher level of flow and satisfaction, which will consequently contribute to minimizing the possibility for the players to develop negative attitude toward the guild they belong to.

• Korean Management Science Review
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• v.32 no.1
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• pp.83-100
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• 2015

We analyze a duopoly competition when two firms face input cost increases. The objective of this study is to determine the firms' optimal strategy between a price increase and downsizing under conditions of a spatially differentiated market and consumers' diminishing utility on the product size. We develop a theoretical model of two competing firms offering homogenous products using the standard Hotelling model to determine how firms' optimal strategies change when facing input cost increases. In this paper, there are two types of duopoly competitions: symmetric and asymmetric. In the symmetric case, the two firms have the same marginal cost and are producing and selling identical products. In the asymmetric case, the two firms have different marginal costs. The results show that the optimal strategy decision depends on the size of the input cost increase and the cost differences between the two firms. We find that when two firms are asymmetric (i.e., they have different marginal costs), the two firms might choose asymmetric pairs of strategies in equilibrium under certain conditions. When the cost differences between the two firms are sufficiently large and the cost increase is sufficiently small, the cost leader chooses price increase, and the cost-disadvantaged firm chooses downsizing in equilibrium. This asymmetric strategy reduces price competition between two firms, and consumers are better off. When the cost differences between the two firms are sufficiently large, downsizing is the dominant strategy for the cost-disadvantaged firm. The cost-disadvantaged firm finds it more profitable to reduce the product size than to increase its price to reduce price competition, because consumers prefer downsizing to price increases. This paper might be a good starting point for further analytical research in this area.

• The Journal of Society for e-Business Studies
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• v.10 no.4
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• pp.83-100
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• 2005

In this paper, we investigate the concept of cyber identity built in cyberspace and analyze the effects of general perception toward cyber identity on loyalty and purchase intent. Cyber identity is classified into two types: personal and social cyber identity, and has five components. Avatars and online gaming capability make up personal cyber identity while online communities and instant messenger count as social cyber identity. We regard blog personalities as having both personal and social characteristics. In our survey, we conclude that internet users want to purchase cyber items such as avatars, online game items, and wallpaper pictures to enhance their cyber identities. Based on the survey results , we derive five factors comprising personal cyber identity and social cyber identity using factor analysis and analyze overall effects of cyber identity on loyalty and purchase intention using Structural Equation Model.

• Asia-Pacific Journal of Business
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• v.1 no.1
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• pp.73-95
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• 2010

European integration is characterized by the development of a transnational European identity, which is considered an integral part of the process. Northeast Asia has no similar projects to address the common identity issue, although cooperation is highly valued there as well. Identity and cooperation both require interdisciplinary approaches combining social psychology, international relations theory and international economics. This article considers the problems of applying existing studies on cooperation and identity as well as the European experience (with the Baltic Sea example) to the case of Northeast Asia. Transnational identities promote cooperation beyond the limits of rationalistic game theory, if countries of the region can define their identities and interests, commit to common goals, create shared discourses and reach a balance between nationalism and internationalism. In view of proposed negotiations on the free trade area between China, Korea and Japan and ongoing discussions about a possibility of introducing a common currency (ACU) it can be crucial to consider the importance of identity building as early as possible, before regional integration meets a stumbling block of egoistic rationality that is a problem in any model of cooperation.

• Journal of Digital Convergence
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• v.20 no.5
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• pp.525-535
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• 2022

The purpose of this study is to identify the factors influencing the user's continuous usage intention of computer games. A research model was developed which shows that the independent variables of value, expectation confirmation, perceived enjoyment affect user satisfaction and continuous usage intention. To test the six hypotheses, survey data were collected from 104 respondents, and hypotheses tests as well as a confirmatory factor analysis were conducted using a partial least square analysis tool. The statistical analysis result showed that expectation confirmation had a significant positive effect on satisfaction, and satisfaction also had a strong positive effect on the game user's continuous usage intention. Perceived enjoyment showed a highly strong positive effect on satisfaction. In addition, satisfaction was found to have full mediation effects in the relationship between expectation confirmation and continuous usage intention, and perceived enjoyment and continuous usage intention respectively. This result provides an important implication that continuous usage intention occurs through user satisfaction, and also indicates the contribution of this study for the game industry. Another contribution of this study is to introduce critical independent variables from the marketing and information technology domains in order to explain continuous usage intention of computer games.

• Journal of Communications and Networks
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• v.18 no.6
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• pp.975-988
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• 2016

Large access providers (ISPs) are seeking for new types of business agreements and pricing models to manage network costs and monetize better the provision of last-mile services. A typical paradigm of such new pricing norms is the proliferation of paid peering deals between ISPs and content providers (CPs), while on top of this, some ISPs are already experimenting with usage-based tariffs, usually through data-plans, instead of the typical fixed-based charging. In this work we define as common platform, the infrastructure in which a single ISP transacts with several CPs through peering agreements. In this context, we examine whether, and under which market conditions, the profitability of the involved stakeholders improves when the establishment of this platform is accompanied by a monetary compensation from the CPs to the ISP (paid peering), v.s. a scenario where their deal is a typical settlement-free one. In both cases, we assume that the ISP implements a usage-based access pricing scheme, implying that end-users will pay more for higher transaction rates with the CPs. Our framework captures some of the most important details of the current market, such as the various business models adopted by the CPs, the end-users' evaluation towards the ISP's and CPs' level of investments and the traffic rates per transaction for the offered services. By analysing the equilibrium derived by a leader-follower game, it turns out (among other practical takeaways) that whether or not the profitability of a CP improves, it highly depends on whether its business model is to sell content, or if it obtains its revenue from advertisements. Finally, we extract that consumer surplus is considerably higher under paid peering, which in turn implies improved levels of social welfare.

• Journal of the Korea Academia-Industrial cooperation Society
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• v.13 no.2
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• pp.866-871
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• 2012

Most of the computer to implement a Augmented reality 3-D, or a graphic or visual means through the virtual space. The participants in the Augmented reality immersive virtual reality and virtual reality, the process proceeds to change the world. In particular, the field of children's games and Augmented reality fits well with the technical characteristics of the children that may lead to more interesting and creative sector is pointing to. In this study, children's games in order to maximize learning effectiveness of board games and Augmented reality technology, take a look at the characteristics of the children's educational program is to propose a new model proposal.

• Journal of Intelligence and Information Systems
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• v.22 no.4
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• pp.157-176
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• 2016

For a long time, mobile phone had a sole function of communication. Recently however, abrupt innovations in technology allowed extension of the sphere in mobile phone activities. Development of technology enabled realization of almost computer-like environment even on a very small device. Such advancement yielded several forms of new high-tech devices such as smartphone and tablet PC, which quickly proliferated. Simultaneously with the diffusion of the mobile devices, mobile applications for those devices also prospered and soon became deeply penetrated in consumers' daily lives. Numerous mobile applications have been released in app stores yielding trillions of cumulative downloads. However, a big majority of the applications are disregarded from consumers. Even after the applications are purchased, they do not survive long in consumers' mobile devices and are soon abandoned. Nevertheless, it is imperative for both app developers and app-store operators to understand consumer behaviors and to develop marketing strategies aiming to make sustainable business by first increasing sales of mobile applications and by also designing surviving strategy for applications. Therefore, this research analyzes consumers' mobile application usage behavior in a frame of substitution/supplementary of application categories and several explanatory variables. Considering that consumers of mobile devices use multiple apps simultaneously, this research adopts multivariate probit models to explain mobile application usage behavior and to derive correlation between categories of applications for observing substitution/supplementary of application use. The research adopts several explanatory variables including sociodemographic data, user experiences of purchased applications that reflect future purchasing behavior of paid applications as well as consumer attitudes toward marketing efforts, variables representing consumer attitudes toward rating of the app and those representing consumer attitudes toward app-store promotion efforts (i.e., top developer badge and editor's choice badge). Results of this study can be explained in hedonic and utilitarian framework. Consumers who use hedonic applications, such as those of game and entertainment-related, are of young age with low education level. However, consumers who are old and have received higher education level prefer utilitarian application category such as life, information etc. There are disputable arguments over whether the users of SNS are hedonic or utilitarian. In our results, consumers who are younger and those with higher education level prefer using SNS category applications, which is in a middle of utilitarian and hedonic results. Also, applications that are directly related to tangible assets, such as banking, stock and mobile shopping, are only negatively related to experience of purchasing of paid app, meaning that consumers who put weights on tangible assets do not prefer buying paid application. Regarding categories, most correlations among categories are significantly positive. This is because someone who spend more time on mobile devices tends to use more applications. Game and entertainment category shows significant and positive correlation; however, there exists significantly negative correlation between game and information, as well as game and e-commerce categories of applications. Meanwhile, categories of game and SNS as well as game and finance have shown no significant correlations. This result clearly shows that mobile application usage behavior is quite clearly distinguishable - that the purpose of using mobile devices are polarized into utilitarian and hedonic purpose. This research proves several arguments that can only be explained by second-hand real data, not by survey data, and offers behavioral explanations of mobile application usage in consumers' perspectives. This research also shows substitution/supplementary patterns of consumer application usage, which then explain consumers' mobile application usage behaviors. However, this research has limitations in some points. Classification of categories itself is disputable, for classification is diverged among several studies. Therefore, there is a possibility of change in results depending on the classification. Lastly, although the data are collected in an individual application level, we reduce its observation into an individual level. Further research will be done to resolve these limitations.