Lifestyle & Consumption

It is now a fairly uncontested fact that racism and intolerance characterise a significant portion of the content shared on major social media platforms like Facebook, Twitter or YouTube. From the United States to Europe, the spread of hate speech has been witnessed by ordinary users as well as journalists, politicians, celebrities and activists.

In management circles and beyond, companies are rushing to integrate, adapt and exploit big data in their organisations.

Some researchers have recently questioned the realities of doctoral life in management science research. Certain senior colleagues highlight the moroseness and apprehension of today’s doctoral students, while the same doctoral students, on the other hand, affirm their curiosity and collective spirit.

The ongoing Facebook and Cambridge Analytica scandal has revealed just how vulnerable our social-media data are to exploitation. Marketers, political groups and shadowy third parties can now harvest our information, divide us into homogenous groups and send targeted messages in ways that are far beyond anything imagined even a decade ago.

The Finnish start-up aiming to crack the “intelligent supermarket”

Today’s hyperconnected customers no longer distinguish between online and offline experiences. They want to be able to choose, as the mood takes them, from the numerous channels offered by a particular brand.

In 2017 alone, 1.3 trillion photos (1012) are expected to be taken, compared to around 90 billion in 2000 and 350 billion in 2010. Every day, 350 million photos are shared on Facebook and 80 million on Instagram. Every minute, 300 hours of videos are uploaded to YouTube… These figures illustrate the dizzying pace at which images are created in our society.

While self-portraiture is nearly as old as art itself, the photographic selfie emerged as a globally recognized phenomenon only recently, as a result of the rising “attention economy” and its growing appetite for likes, followers, retweets and fame.

What makes a simple wine, grown in a rather mediocre wine-growing region, one of the most famous and magical icons of today? How did champagne establish such a unique position, against all the odds, and become the global symbol of celebration?

The question of ‘timeflow’, or the pace of the customer experience, has long impacted consumers’ perceptions of products and has been capitalised on by companies and researchers to improve their services. […]

“Everyone is afraid of being uberised”. The words of Maurice Levy in the Financial Times in December 2014 first brought the term uberisation to public attention.