Alex Mari

Assessing the different typologies of mobile apps made available to users, it is rather intuitive to notice  4 main categories of software applications . If we go beyond the single features contained inside an app, we can observe that almost the totality of mobile applications can be conceptually included in the following categories:  education, information, entertainment, and utility . There are applications purely ‘ EDUCATIONAL ’ serving the purpose of educating people on a large variety of topics. Successful examples of educational apps are Udemy , an online learning platform that allows instructors to host courses, and TED , a global set of conferences held under the slogan ‘ideas worth spreading’. Also popular e-learning platforms for kids, such as  Dragonbox Algebra , use interactive teaching methods for educational purposes. Opposite to the educational apps, we find in the figure those focusing on ‘ INFORMATIONAL’  content. Popular information-based apps...

The large explosion of brand communities is practically attributed to the diffusion of the Internet. The advent of the Internet and more recently  social media  - where Internet users collaborate, share information, and opinions - are the critical phenomenons of the past decade in communication. Depending on the definition of the term “social media”, we can identify millions (if not billions) of users who participate in online communities as an ordinary ingredient of their social experience (see  Robert Kozinets ). In investigating this phenomenon, the literature has widely adopted the label of social media (social web or Web 2.0) to identify an online environment where people with common interests can gather together to share thoughts, ideas, and opinions on products or brands. In this context, social media markets are conceived as made by interactions and stories between people who use digital social platforms as a new form of communication media and a social envi...