Access (or Sharing) Economy Minitrack

Permanent URI for this collection

https://hdl.handle.net/10125/42272

Sharing is ingrained in the fabric of society and efficient access to goods and services constitutes a major force driving much of the economic activity today. With greater connectivity brought about by the proliferation of internetworking technologies, it has become much easier for individuals to circumvent spatial and temporal barriers during interactions, thereby giving rise to a novel access (or sharing) economy that is structured around the disintermediation of conventional channels of commerce in the exchange of both tangible and intangible resources. The access (or sharing) economy has gained notable attention within mainstream media as a new economic paradigm that leverages peer‐to‐peer technological platforms to facilitate exchange of resources among individuals who are joined via fluid relational networks. Almost overnight, numerous peer‐to‐peer platforms—in the likes of crowd‐working (e.g., Airbnb, Uber, Amazon Mechanic Turk, E‐Lance, Fiverr), co‐innovation (e.g., Mindmixer, Social Innovator), crowd‐funding (e.g., Kickstarter, Indiegogo), crowd‐searching (e.g., Crowdfynd, CrowdSearching), and crowd‐voting (e.g., California Report Card, Threadless) — have sprung up to facilitate both individuals and/or organizations to pool resources in resolving problems.

While there are many practitioners who have prophesized the access (or sharing) economyas a game‐ changer for how organizations and society function, there are also a number of detractors who questioned the uncertain and potentially disruptive future that is brought about by such peer‐to‐peer exchanges. Critics have painted a dismal picture of the access (or sharing) economy as a means for individuals and/or firms to dodge proper regulations and live beyond their means, which in turn contributes to doomsday scenarios of massive job displacements and spending habits detrimental to society. In light of the opportunities and challenges posed by the access (or sharing) economy, there is a clear urgency for a systematic and thorough scrutiny of how value creation and appropriation can take place within such economic environments while minimizing its negative impact to society.

This minitrack embraces both retrospective and progressive views of how the access (or sharing) economy has evolved and would transform with technological advances. We welcome papers that identify and address knowledge gaps in how emergent technologies are shaping the access and sharing of resources within online peer‐to‐peer communities. Papers that subscribe to inter‐disciplinary perspectives and/or adopt mixed methods are particularly welcome.

Topics of interest include but are not limited to:

Collaborative consumption and production in access access (or sharing) economy
Crowdfunding and communal investment
Crowdsourcing and open innovation
Crowd platform strategies
Data privacy and security in access access (or sharing) economy
Design and innovation of crowd platforms
Digital business models of access access (or sharing) economy
Digital labor markets and workforce management in access (or sharing) economy
Disruptive innovation in access (or sharing) economy
Market mechanics of access (or sharing) economy
Policy formulation for access (or sharing) economy
Reputation and trust in access (or sharing) economy
Social network in access (or sharing) economy
Socio‐economic and political challenges of access (or sharing) economy
Value appropriation in access (or sharing) economy

Minitrack Co-Chairs:

Bo Sophia Xiao (Primary Contact)
University of Hawai‘i at Manoa
Email: boxiao@hawaii.edu

Eric Lim
University of New South Wales, Australia
Email: e.t.lim@unsw.edu.au

Chee-Wee Tan
Copenhagen Business School, Denmark
Email: cta.itm@cbs.dk

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Now showing 1 - 7 of 7

The Impact of Technology-Mediated Consumption on Identity: The case of Airbnb
(2017-01-04) Festila, Maria; Müller, Sune
The affordances introduced by digital technologies are reshaping consumption practices. Individuals are now engaging in networks rather than markets, and ownership-based consumption is giving way to the previously unattractive access-based, collaborative consumption. Such consumption practices produce different relationships between objects and personal identity, on which there is limited research. By means of an ethnographic study, we analyze the nature of consumer-object relationships in the context of Airbnb – a technology-mediated consumption model based on accessing private possessions. Our findings suggest that the consumption experience is meaningful and self-enriching if consumers identify with the accessed consumption object. However, identification is compromised when there is a perceived mismatch, diminishing the consumption experience. Nevertheless, access-based consumption is sometimes a reflexive strategy used to signal anti-consumption ideologies. We thus propose that technology-mediated, access-based consumption is challenging the normative power of ownership in the construction of identity, changing the symbolic repertoire of the contemporary consumer.
Moral Hazards and Effects of IT-enabled Monitoring Systems in Online Labor Markets
(2017-01-04) Liang, Chen; Hong, Yili; Gu, Bin
This paper investigates how IT-enabled monitoring systems mitigate moral hazard in an online labor market and their effect on market competition. We exploit a quasi-experiment at Freelancer when it introduced an IT-enabled monitoring system in 2015. We use a difference-in-differences (DID) approach to identify the treatment effect of the monitoring system on employer contractor choice, market competition, and employer surplus. We found that the IT-enabled monitoring system lowers the employers’ willingness to pay the reputation premiums. Meanwhile, comparing the trend of the control group, the IT-enabled monitoring system raised the employer surplus in hourly projects and increased the number of bids. Our result suggests that IT-enabled monitoring systems have a significant effect on alleviating moral hazards, reducing agency costs, and facilitating market competition.
Integrated Value Configurations in the Sharing Economy
(2017-01-04) Reuschl, Andreas J.; Bouncken, Ricarda B.; Laudien, Sven M.
Sharing has become a new trend in business that heavily affects the ways how firms do business. Despite this important development, research by now only provides rudimentary insights into value configuration mechanisms applied in the sharing economy. Our paper that is inspired by extant research on value creation configurations as well as recent business model research develops a model of an integrated value network for the sharing economy. We explain that focal firms in sharing economy networks ground their business model configuration in the application of web-based technology. We further point to two dimensions that determine the positioning of the business model: the degree of individualization vs. standardization of the content and the degree of completeness of property rights.
Consumer Purchase Decision in Instagram Stores:The Role of Consumer Trust
(2017-01-04) Che, Jasmine W.S.; Cheung, Christy M.K.; Thadani, Dimple R.
Instagram, a prominent social networking site, has become a popular online shopping platform among young people. In this study, we have attempted to understand what drives people to purchase in virtual stores on Instagram. Specifically, we built upon the integrative framework of trust and identified three groups of factors explaining consumer trust in Instagram stores: trustworthiness of Instagram stores (i.e., perceived benevolence, perceived integrity, and perceived competence), propensity to trust, and external environment (i.e., Key Opinion Leader (KOL) endorsement and peer customer endorsement). These factors are expected to influence consumer trust in Instagram stores, and trust in turn determines consumer intention to purchase. The model was empirically tested with 157 Instagram users. Perceived benevolence, perceived integrity, and KOL endorsement were found to be significant factors affecting consumer trust in Instagram stores, and trust was found to have a strong relationship with consumer purchase intention. The results of this study are expected to advance the trust literature in the context of social commerce and to offer practical guidelines to Instagram storeowners.
An Empirical Investigation on the Impact of Crowd Participation on the Degree of Project Success: The Perspective of Crowd Capital
(2017-01-04) Yin, Chunxiao; Mirkovski, Kristijan; Liu, Ivy Libo; Lim, Kai H.; von Briel, Frederik
Fundraisers expect to raise as much funds as possible even after they have reached initial threshold of funding goal. This study focuses on the degree of project success defined as the total amount of funds a project can obtain after it is already successful (reached the initial threshold of funding goal). Drawing upon the theory of crowd capital, this study aims to explore the effect of the crowds—represented as crowd participation—on the degree of project success. Three types of crowd participation are identified, namely funds pledge, popularity creation, and on-site communication. We postulate that funds pledge will have an inverse U-shaped relationship with the degree of project success; while the other two factors will positively influence the degree of project success. Our empirical data from a reward-based crowdfunding platform supported our predictions for funds pledge and on-site communication. Future research and implications are discussed.
An Empirical Analysis of On-demand Ride-sharing and Traffic Congestion
(2017-01-04) Li, Ziru; Hong, Yili; Zhang, Zhongju
On-demand ride-sharing, as one of the most representative sectors of sharing economy has received a lot of attention and significant debate. Limited conclusive empirical research has been done to investigate the social welfare of such service. In this research, we conduct difference-in-difference analysis to examine the impact of Uber, an on-demand app-based ride sharing service, on urban traffic congestion. We find that after Uber entry, congestion of this area has been reduced significantly. In order to check the robustness of the results, we conduct instrumental variable analysis, additional analysis using alternative measures. Findings of this research will contribute to IS community by enriching the literature of digital infrastructure platforms. Practical insights derived from this research will help inform policy makers and regulators.
Introduction to Access (or Sharing) Economy Minitrack
(2017-01-04) Xiao, Bo Sophia; Lim, Eric; Tan, Chee-Wee

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