Massive Open Online Courses (MOOCs) have the potential to democratize education by improving access. Although retention and completion rates for non-paying users have not been promising, these statistics are much brighter for users who pay to receive a certificate upon completing the course. We...

We measure the effects of pre- and post-release blog volume, blog valence and advertising on the performance of 75 movies in 208 geographic markets of the U.S. We attribute the variation in blog effects across markets to differences in demographic characteristics of markets combined with...

Our objective in this paper is to measure the impact of national online user reviews (valence, volume and variance) on Designated Market Area (DMA) level local geographic box-office performance of movies. We account for three complications with analyses that use national level aggregate...

While diversity, equity, and inclusion issues are a focus of brand activism and many firms’ corporate social responsibility initiatives, the challenge is that these topics either 1) impact a relatively small group of individuals (i.e., limited in scope) or 2) are emotionally charged or...

We investigate the effects of online word of mouth on the demand for new products using Twitter data. Twitter can both generate buzz & awareness as well as provide information on product quality that can readily diffuse through the population. Leveraging comprehensive data from the US movie...