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The knowledge flow is a key success factor for organizations and institutions. Lack of proper knowledge flow in an organization and among different individuals, organizations, and businesses will cause gaps in information and information access. One such gap is the gap in the innovation system. Mediators, as one of the innovation system variables, can play a role in filling these gaps. One of the mediators is knowledge brokers. On the other hand, every business needs a specific business model for implementation depending on its nature. The present study proposed an ecommerce business model canvas for knowledge brokers to improve knowledge flow. In the present study, meta-synthesis and Delphi methods were used, respectively. The sampling methods used in the Delphi part were homogenous and snowball, based on which the experts were 10. The results showed that 7 variables (out of 48) and 22 indicators (out of 156) were removed. Finally, 134 indicators and 41 variables were classified based on Osterwalder's business model canvas variables and presented within the model. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The present study was conducted to provide a suitable model for book distribution in Iran. This research is applied in terms of purpose, and the research method is mixed (qualitative: grounded theory; and quantitative: analytical survey). The data were collected through a series of semi-structured interviews at the qualitative stage. The population of the qualitative section consisted of 10 book distribution experts who were selected by using the snowball method; for the second population, 118 book distributors were purposefully selected, and the research questionnaire was distributed among them. The MAXQDA software was used to determine the qualitative section's concepts, categories, and subcategories. Then the paradigm of book distribution in Iran was identified. The model was determined using PLS software in the form of descriptive statistics and structural equation modeling in the quantitative section. In the qualitative section, the five cultural, economic, legal and political, substructural, and professional factors were identified; the results of the quantitative section showed that the cultural dimension had a weak relationship with distribution factors, and the relationship was vital for other dimensions. It can be said that the cultural dimension has the lowest intensity of the relationship, and the substructural dimension, economic dimension, professional dimension, and legal and political dimension have the highest intensity correlation with distribution factors, respectively. The most influential factors influencing book distribution were the lack of reading culture, inadequate distribution, unprofitability, weak rules, and unprincipled publishing support. The most effective way to improve the distribution was to strengthen the professional distributors. Distribution channels of goods and cultural services in Iran are mainly traditional. Moreover, the traditional distribution network, lack of use of new technologies, the long flow path of goods, the minimal share of bookstores in the distribution system, weakness of distribution substructures, lack of manpower skills in the distribution sector, and lack of capable public and private distribution networks cause inefficiency of the book distribution network and result in consumer dissatisfaction. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The main purpose of this study is to analyze the strategic role of public libraries in Iran's Geopolitics of Information. This is applied research adopting a mixed-method (qualitative-quantitative) approach. A semi-structured interview was used to collect qualitative information. In the quantitative part, a researcher-made questionnaire was designed based on the results of the qualitative part. The statistical population of the research in the qualitative section included 13 experts and university professors who were selected purposefully based on a set of criteria. The qualitative data were analyzed using the qualitative content analysis method. The findings of the quantitative part were analyzed using factor analysis. The population of the quantitative part included the general managers and deputies of the general administrations of Iran's public libraries (70 people) and the librarians of the provinces that had the central public libraries from five clusters of north, south, east, west, and center of Iran, including 10 provinces and 160 librarians. Some 201 completed questionnaires were received. The findings showed that libraries had an implicit role in strengthening cultural identity and increasing public awareness, especially in strengthening Iranian-Islamic identity, as one of the three main components of geopolitics. However, this role is neither deliberated for a specific mission nor clearly explained in the upstream documents. Moreover, based on the findings, the acquisition of the centralized resources by the Iran Public Libraries Foundation for all public libraries is managed in an integrated manner such that there is not any clear role of user needs in the selection process. This is inconsistent with the Free-Flow of Information approach. The findings also suggested that national policymakers should pay attention to the role of public libraries as a public discourse space in transmitting culture and information and a base for strengthening the power of soft defense, training and explaining the specific role for librarians, developing technological infrastructure of libraries, providing resources based on local needs and the audience needs, continuous and purposeful monitoring of activities, and increasing the number of service recipients from public libraries. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Risk management is a preventive activity that identifies project risks and technical and non-technical problems for key managers and stakeholders by identifying project risks. The introduction of new digital forms of information not only has created rich and extraordinary opportunities for libraries to expand community access to information and create a positive relationship between libraries and users but poses some degree of risk. The present study employs a qualitative research approach with The Fuzzy Delphi Method (FDM). For data collection, a researcher-made questionnaire was used to identify the risks of content production in digital libraries. The FDM was employed for complete analysis using 20 IT experts on a 5-point Likert scale. The study identified 61 sub-components under nine main content production risk components: human, environmental, infrastructure, conservation and maintenance, technical, copyright, integration, evaluations of resource content, and information security risks. The present study addresses the content production risk components so that authorities can assist in planning and decision-making to prevent and resolve content production issues in digital libraries. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The present research aims to represent the terms and concepts of civil engineering and thus design its domain structure in the form of ontology. This is an applied research and the qualitative content analysis method with summative approach is used. The research population is 12309 published articles in the scientific journals (1983 to 2016), indexed in the full-text Persian articles database at Regional Information Center for Science and Technology (RICeST). Data collection was done via SQL queries from the RICeST database. The content analysis was used to create a conceptual model of the civil engineering domain and to explain the relationships and instances. To create the conceptual model, there were consulted with 10 Subject experts in civil engineering area. The process of ontology creation has been done through METHONTOLOGY methodology and protégé ontology management software (Beta 5 edition). The made-artifact of this research has 283 concepts, along with 62 object properties, 79 data type properties, 10 annotative properties, and 976 instances. In total, in the present research, 151 semantic properties were identified between the concepts. The results of this research can serve as a guide for the RICeST experts in order to identify the users' needs and facilitate the users' interaction with RICeST databases. This can also provide the users with access to more relevant resources. This ontology can also be served as a layer of semantic web in these databases. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The synergies for the Iranian regional and national innovation systems among the geographical, technological and organizational distributions of firms were measured. Among the data of 87934 active industrial firms (December 2015), merely 46150 firms could be classified using NACE codes into high-tech, mediumtech and knowledge intensive sectors which in turn geographically divided into five regions. Accordingly, both the T0 and ΔTGTO of Iran at the national level had negative signs (-480.6 and -5.14 mbits, respectively), however all the ΔTGTOs in each separate region was highly positive denoting that national agglomeration significantly adds to the synergy in the system and a highly integrated national innovation system was proposed in Iran. Regions 1 (including Tehran as the capital) as well as region 4 (including Khuzestan which contains enormous oil and gas resources and industries) caused less disturbance to the national synergy compared with the other three regions (ΔTGTOs= +18.1 and +22.2 mbits, respectively). The decomposition of sectorial technologies showed that in contrast to many other countries, especially for west European countries, high-tech manufacturing and knowledge intensive services were the main drives of knowledge-based configuration in the regional economy of Iran, while mediumtech manufacturing tend to uncouple the economy from the regional configuration. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]