Introduction to Social Media and E-Business Transformation Minitrack

Social media are online platforms that facilitate global collaboration and sharing amongst users. New social media applications in e-business and e-commerce appear on a daily basis and result in enormous shocks to the ecosystem of individuals and businesses. This minitrack provides a forum for the exchange of research ideas and best practices related to social media in e-business environments. It also aims to raise awareness in terms of the latest developments in social media, and address the challenges of using social media. This year, eight papers were selected for inclusion in the proceedings. The first paper, "Social Media at Socio Systems Inc.: A Socio-technical Systems Analysis of Strategic Action" by Don Heath, Rahul Singh and Jai Ganesh proposes an analytic framework to explain organizational strategies for directed action in social media. The next paper by Eric T.K. Lim, Dianne Cyr, and Chee-Wee Tan, "Understanding Members\´ Attachment to Social Networking Sites: An Empirical Investigation of Three Theories", constructs a theoretical model of members\´ communal attachments within SNSs. The model is then empirically validated via an online survey of 787 active members of SNSs. Drawing from the push-pull-mooring model and uses and gratification theory, Fei Liu and Bo Xiao proposed and empirically tested a theoretical model explaining SNS users\´ switching behavior in their paper, "Do I Switch? Understanding Users\´ Intention to Switch between Social Network Sites". The fourth paper by Alexander Richte, David Wagner and Andrea Back, "Leadership 2.0: Engaging and Supporting Leaders in the Transition Towards a Networked Organization", illustrates the concept of Leadership 2.0 through a series of interviews with the persons who are responsible for the implementation of social software at publicly listed, multinational organizations in Germany. The next paper, "Understanding Information Adopt- on in Online Review Communities: The Role of Herd Factors" by Xiao-Liang Shen, Kem Z.K. Zhang, and Sesia J. Zhao, extends prior research on information adoption by incorporating the perspective of herd behavior to explain the influence of massive online reviews in online communities. The research model was empirically tested with 376 users of a Chinese online review community. "Impact of Online Firm Generated Content (FGC) on Supply Chain Performance: An Exploratory Empirical Analysis", by Ajaya Swain and Qing Cao uses an advanced sentiment analysis approach to examine the impact of FGC effect on supply chain performance. Information sharing and collaboration are identified as two key FGC elements affecting supply chain performance. Based on an experimental investigation of the judgment ability of 478 subjects, Christian Wagner and Ayoung Suh found that collective size and expertise transfer effects are moderated by task difficulty and are strongest for tasks in a medium difficulty range in their paper, "The Wisdom of Crowds: Impact of Collective Size and Expertise Transfer on Collective Performance". The final paper, "Assessing the Effects of Navigation Support and Group Structure on Collaborative Online Consumers\´ Consensus and Mutual Understanding" by Yanzhen Yue and Zhenhui (Jack) Jiang, explores an emerging phenomenon of collaborative online shopping by investigating the effects of navigation support and group structure on collaborative online consumers\´ consensus and mutual understanding. We thank the authors for submitting their work to make this another engaging minitrack. We hope you enjoy the papers and their presentation at the conference.