The Empire Strikes Back: Microsoft buys Activision-Blizzard
Earlier this year, Activision-Blizzard, developer and publisher of games such as World of Warcraft and Call of Duty, announced that Microsoft will incorporate them for about 70 billion dollars. This acquisition has enormous implications not just for the games industry but also for the average consumer.
The United Arab Emirates: A quickly changing country
The United Arab Emirates (UAE) has a population of 9 million people, 9/10 of whom are foreigners. Overall, 200 nationalities make up the population of the UAE, with an overwhelming presence of Indian and Pakistani expatriates, followed by Asian, African, European, and American populations. The UAE is hence a multi-ethnic and multi-cultural society, governed by the typical laws and customs of the Muslim religion.
Using Social Media to Value Public Science
Since scientific knowledge doesn’t become depleted when shared, and once published in the public domain it is available to be accessed by anyone, it can be characterized as public goods. CERN, as a large-scale multinational scientific establishment, presents an ideal example to study the public value of scientific output. The study summarized below, published by researchers at the University Santiago de Compostela as part of the Science Policy Reports book series, constructs the perception of the public towards scientific activities at CERN by analyzing big data collected via Twitter posts.
