Office of the Provost and Senior Vice President for Academic Affairs

Message Archive

Thursday, May 5, 2016

 

This email is being sent to all members of the Baruch College faculty.

For an archive of announcements sent from the Associate Provost beginning June 2011, click here.

 

The Baruch Faculty Research Seminar Series on Business Analytics

 

Dr. Wael Jabr is Assistant Professor at Georgia State University’s Robinson College of Business. Dr. Jabr’s research focuses on the value creation from IT artifacts. Specifically, he studies how crowd-sourcing has been changing the markets for information (in settings such as review forums and technical support forums). He also studies how IT-intensive firms maintain their competitiveness in highly dynamic markets. His research has resulted in two best-paper awards at two major IS conferences. He published his work at MIS Quarterly, as well as major IS conferences (ICIS, WISE, CIST and WITS). He was also successful in receiving highly competitive federal grants to fund his ongoing work.

The Fallacy of Spam Reviews - The Case of Amazon

Monday, May 9, 12:30PM to 2:00PM

14-266 NVC

Abstract: Online reviews remain the de-facto reliable source for customers when making purchase decisions. Paradoxically, so much ink has been spilled to demonstrate the pervasiveness of spam reviews in online markets. In this paper, I provide preliminary evidence that what has been claimed as a systematic flaw in online review systems is nothing but a fallacy. Using a falsification analysis, I provide the first proofs that widely accepted spam detection algorithms fail in delivering what they have been designed for and that infomediaries do exercise good control over their review environment. I then proceed to show econometrically that contrary to common beliefs, reviews that might be diluted by spam are ineffective at influencing sales, the only exception being niche products. This study contributes to the burgeoning literature on the extent and impact of spam in online settings. In doing so, I offer a way to validate spam detection algorithms as well as identify spam’s economic impact. 

Registration:

To register, please complete the registration form: https://goo.gl/l2IQdu

For more information, please contact: Nanda Kumar (nanda.kumar@baruch.cuny.edu) or Radhika Jain (radhika.jain@baruch.cuny.edu) or Kannan Mohan (Kannan.mohan@baruch.cuny.edu), Dept. of SCIS.

This program is supported by the Office of the Provost’s Faculty Research Seminars

 

Members of the Faculty Research Seminar Series on Business Analytics

·         Radhika Jain, Nanda Kumar, Kannan Mohan, and Isak Taksa - CIS 

·         Kamiar Rahnama Rad/Junyi Zhang - Statistics 

·         Mahima Hada, David Luna, Karthik Sridhar, Cliff Wymbs - Marketing

·         David Anderson, Shan Li, Will Millhiser - Management 

____________________________________
Kannan Mohan
Director (interim), Center for Teaching and Learning

Professor of CIS
Baruch College, The City University of New York

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