As public entities enter the metaverse, their efforts to meet public service obligations and uphold ethical values lead to governance challenges that directly affect immersive design. Metaverse characteristics of anonymity, interoperability, borderlessness and immersivity create tensions that need to be addressed. Drawing on interviews and document analysis across three metaverse initiatives, this study identifies key governance concerns around jurisdictional boundaries, regulatory alignment, and identity management. These insights inform an emerging framework for ethically aligned and compliant public sector engagement in the metaverse.

The metaverse promises to extend our physical world using AR and VR technologies. Virtual environments and immersive spaces have been described as antecedents of the metaverse and offer some insight into the potential socio-economic impact of a fully functional, persistent cross platform metaverse. Considering the renewed interest by big tech companies in metaverses and the investment in relevant technologies, it is important to reflect on the current state of play and assess the socio-economic impact that such transformative technologies could have. The empirical evidence provided by papers responding to the Special Issue call shed light on the impact metaverses have, offering valuable theoretical and practical insights into business and social opportunities and challenges.

Metaverses enhance and intensify online interactions by seamlessly merging with physical experiences, unlocking a wide spectrum of opportunities and challenges. With the wider adoption of metaverses, diverse and dynamic platform ecosystems are expected to emerge. While these ecosystems hold significant potential for innovation and economic growth, they also raise ethical and societal challenges, thus highlighting the need for responsible governance. This paper addresses this need at the regional level. It focuses on the case of the European Union (EU) and its efforts to shape a vision for metaverse ecosystem governance. Drawing on stakeholder contributions from the EU’s open consultation and grounded in the Platform Assessment Framework (PAF), the study analyzes how responsibility is understood and managed in metaverse ecosystems. The findings show that responsibility in metaverse ecosystems must consider not only the needs of metaverse users, as emphasized by existing literature, but also those of other key actors, including platform owners and complementors. The paper proposes a framework for fostering responsible metaverse ecosystems through governance mechanisms, continuous monitoring, and design principles. It highlights that digital responsibility should consider both the development and diffusion phases of metaverse platforms. Moreover, it argues that ensuring responsibility in metaverse ecosystems should go beyond addressing societal implications and also aim at promoting market fairness.

This paper focuses on COVID-19 pandemic and how this new normal has affected employees in Greece. In particular it explores the benefits and challenges, the engagement and productivity, working conditions and management of remote workers. Most of the existing literature has focused on the employees' well-being and productivity in remote working settings. However, little have researchers investigated remote working in the Greek business context, including the IT tools used to perform remote work, their contribution in the efficiency and effectiveness of the communication and collaboration of the remote workers and the perceived proximity of the workers in remote working settings. This research aims to address this gap by exploring the effectiveness of the communication and collaboration of remote workers as well as the level of contribution of the technological tools used in building relationships with their colleagues. In addition, it analyzes the perceived benefits and challenges by remote workers concerning this remote working culture and the digital teamwork. Inspired by the evolving landscape of remote work and recognizing gaps in existing research, the study aims to tackle two central research inquiries. The first delves into the IT tools used for effective communication and collaboration in Greek remote working settings. The second query delves into how these tools bridge the gap between the geographical distance and the perceived proximity of the remote workers. To respond to these questions, the author undertakes a literature review across diverse fields including information systems, organizational studies, economics, human resources, sociology, and psychology. Then the author draws on empirical research through the use of qualitative methods and more specifically, semi-structured interviews. The findings show that younger individuals and those with more remote work experience hold more positive views on this working style compared to older generations and people with much experience. Participants in larger cities or different locations from their workplace also express positivity due to time-saving benefits and increased job opportunities. Effective communication and diverse technological tools contribute to overall satisfaction and efficiency in remote work. The research suggests implementing a hybrid work model in Greek organizations to offer flexibility and enhance work-life balance. Other recommendations include increasing face-to-face meetings, providing newcomer support, conducting regular morning team meetings.

Mixed methods enable a more integrated and insightful understanding of the phenomena we study, but are complex to plan, execute, and document. This applies to concurrent and fully integrated mixed methods research designs in particular, which remain underrepresented in information systems research. In this paper, we extend the prevailing templates for this type of research and propose a new conceptualization. We argue that different research strands (e.g., qualitative, quantitative, computationally intensive, or other) that unfold at the same time need not be independent. Rather, as they run concurrently, they can interact and inform each other through ongoing cross-fertilization. This offers the opportunity for enhanced validation and deeper research insights. We conceptualize how the interaction between the research strands may unfold and we propose a DNA helix analogy to enable and enhance the conceptualization of such interdependent mixed methods research. We further explain the mechanism through which the different research strands interact in an ongoing cross-fertilization, and how interim meta-inferences may be continuously and incrementally drawn, (re)shaping how each research strand evolves. The research process within this conceptualization is depicted in a flow diagram that can serve as a possible roadmap for this type of research. We also show how this process can be documented, contributing to more transparent accounts of how mixed methods research actually evolves. We refer to our research on cloud adoption as an example and further validate our proposed research design with interviews with junior and experienced researchers engaged in mixed methods research. We conclude with a set of principles to guide interdependent mixed methods research and present their practical implications.

We show that proximity is significant during cloud computing's adoption. This is counter to the prevailing assumptions of cloud adoption as being more impersonal and distant, with less interaction between provider and purchaser than on-premise technologies. We do this through an interpretive study of cloud computing adopters across Europe. We develop a conceptual framework of cloud proximity which draws attention to its locational, relational and temporal proximal dimensions. Our proximal analysis leads us to identify three aspects of cloud adoption where proximity plays a key role: mercantile aspect (e.g., cloud sales support), counsel aspect (e.g., access to internal and external expertise) and organi-technical aspect (e.g., the understanding of cloud technology and services alongside their organizational adoption context). By challenging assumptions of distant and remote adoption, we contribute to the cloud computing adoption research and raise questions for IT adoption in general.

PurposeThe authors study how cloud adoption decision making unfolds in organizations and present the dynamic process leading to a decision to adopt or reject cloud computing. The authors thus complement earlier literature on factors that influence cloud adoption.Design/methodology/approachThe authors adopt an interpretive epistemology to understand the process of cloud adoption decision making. Following an empirical investigation drawing on interviews with senior managers who led the cloud adoption decision making in organizations from across Europe. The authors outline a framework that shows how cloud adoptions follow multiple cycles in three broad phases.FindingsThe study findings demonstrate that cloud adoption decision making is a recursive process of learning about cloud through three broad phases: building perception about cloud possibilities, contextualizing cloud possibilities in terms of current computing resources and exposing the cloud proposition to others involved in making the decision. Building on these findings, the authors construct a framework of this process which can inform practitioners in making decisions on cloud adoption.Originality/valueThis work contributes to authors understanding of how cloud adoption decisions unfold and provides a framework for cloud adoption decisions that has theoretical and practical value. The study further demonstrates the role of the decision-leader, typically the CIO, in this process and identifies how other internal and external stakeholders are involved. It sheds light on the relevance of the phases of the cloud adoption decision-making process to different cloud adoption factors identified in the extant literature.

Of all emerging technologies, Artificial Intelligence (AI) is perhaps the most debated topic in contemporary society because it promises to redefine and disrupt several sectors. At the same time, AI poses challenges for policymakers and decision-makers, particularly regarding formulating strategies and regulations to address their stakeholders’ needs and perceptions. This paper explores stakeholder perceptions as expressed through their participation in the formulation of Europe’s AI strategy and sheds light on the challenges of AI in Europe and the expectations for the future. Our analysis reveals six dimensions towards an AI strategy; ecosystems, education, liability, data availability sufficiency & protection, governance and autonomy. It draws on these dimensions to construct a desires-realities framework for AI strategy in Europe and provide a research agenda for addressing existing realities. Our findings contribute to understanding stakeholder desires on AI and hold important implications for research, practice and policymaking.

The integration of cloud computing and Internet of Things (IoT) technologies has brought significant advancements in the agriculture domain. However, the implementation of such systems often requires significant time and resources, making it challenging for smart agriculture providers to offer optimized yet affordable services for small and medium-sized farmers at scale. Low-code development platforms can be a viable solution to address these challenges, enabling non-experts to adapt or enhance existing applications with minimal coding. This paper presents a low-code approach to enhance smart agriculture scenarios with pattern-oriented functionality blocks for cloud/edge collaboration. It highlights the usage of a pattern collection for redesigning the implementation of smart agriculture applications that can enhance the data collection process as well as real-time decision-making and efficient resource management in the continuum. The effectiveness of the presented approach is demonstrated through the implementation of a case study in smart agriculture greenhouses. Evaluation results show that this approach can significantly reduce the time and effort required to deploy smart agriculture applications and provide data resilience.

Metaverses refer to immersive virtual worlds in which people, places, and things of the physical world are represented by their digital representations. The wide adoption of metaverses is expected to widely disrupt the way we interact in the virtual world by elevating our online interactive experiences and bringing a plethora of implications for businesses. Following a structured literature review of related research published in the last decade, we shed light on our current understanding of metaverses and reflect on the potentially transformative value of metaverses for businesses in the near future. We draw on an established research framework to organize the insights of existing literature across different levels of analysis and activities' purpose. Through this analysis, we reveal eight propositions on the changes brought by the use of metaverses and identify a number of open questions which could serve as future research avenues.

The metaverse has the potential to extend the physical world using augmented and virtual reality technologies allowing users to seamlessly interact within real and simulated environments using avatars and holograms. Virtual environments and immersive games (such as, Second Life, Fortnite, Roblox and VRChat) have been described as antecedents of the metaverse and offer some insight to the potential socio-economic impact of a fully functional persistent cross platform metaverse. Separating the hype and “meta…” rebranding from current reality is difficult, as “big tech” paints a picture of the transformative nature of the metaverse and how it will positively impact people in their work, leisure, and social interaction. The potential impact on the way we conduct business, interact with brands and others, and develop shared experiences is likely to be transformational as the distinct lines between physical and digital are likely to be somewhat blurred from current perceptions. However, although the technology and infrastructure does not yet exist to allow the development of new immersive virtual worlds at scale - one that our avatars could transcend across platforms, researchers are increasingly examining the transformative impact of the metaverse. Impacted sectors include marketing, education, healthcare as well as societal effects relating to social interaction factors from widespread adoption, and issues relating to trust, privacy, bias, disinformation, application of law as well as psychological aspects linked to addiction and impact on vulnerable people. This study examines these topics in detail by combining the informed narrative and multi-perspective approach from experts with varied disciplinary backgrounds on many aspects of the metaverse and its transformational impact. The paper concludes by proposing a future research agenda that is valuable for researchers, professionals and policy makers alike.

: Artificial Intelligence is possibly the most talked about topic among all emerging and disruptive technologies. Being under continuous development for the last 60 years or more, AI promises to provide benefits within a number of domains, including healthcare, finance security and energy, to name only a few. In this paper, we explore stakeholder perceptions with regards to the forthcoming European AI Strategy, as expressed during the European Commission’s formal consultation process. We follow a qualitative inquiry to analyse our data and identify emerging themes. Our findings reveal six dimensions that are considered crucial for a responsible and ethical AI strategy: ecosystems; education; liability & accountability; data availability, data sufficiency & protection; and governance. We elaborate on these dimensions and develop a desires-realities framework. Our work contributes to a better understanding of stakeholder expectations from the AI strategy and holds important implications for research on addressing grey areas and overcoming the realities in the AI domain.

Metaverses refer to virtual worlds which enable the interaction between users and simulate people, places and things of the physical world. The wider use of metaverses can disrupt how we interact and bring a plethora of implications for businesses and society. While the term metaverse received increased attention recently due to the interest of tech giants, researchers have been exploring virtual world interactions for over a decade. In light of new exciting metaverse implementations, it is necessary to consolidate information via existing research on how the use of metaverses can transform businesses. As a first step, this paper outlines the methodology to be followed by future researchers aiming to shed light on metaverse and business transformation. It proposes a framework to assist authors in organizing existing literature on metaverses and guide them in identifying future research avenues.

Towards enabling the automated and optimized FaaS deployment of applications in a hybrid-cloud setting, the application requirements should be met by comparing them to the capabilities of the available resources of available clusters. To this end, semantic matching between the application characteristics and the individual descriptions of available compute clusters (e.g. from public or private cloud or edge facilities available) is required. In this work, such a system is proposed, namely the Reasoning Framework, which performs semantic matching between application and resource (meta)data and facilitates information sharing among the FaaS platform components leveraging Knowledge Graphs, ontology technologies, and semantic reasoning. The proposed system harvests information from the application function workflow, provided as a graph by the function editor specification (based on Node-RED), including developer-inserted annotations during the design process, and maps them to the dynamic information retrieved from the available clusters. The Reasoning Framework interprets these data as graphs and automatically applies several semantic rules that enable filtering of the available resources and efficient information retrieval through a RESTfull interface. The paper also discusses experimental results to further showcase the advantages of the proposed approach.

Contemporary information systems in combination with high-speed internet, liberate individuals as they set them free from time, place and device restrictions of their everyday life. As a result, they blur the boundaries between work, social and personal life contexts. In this paper we introduce the concept of digital emancipation to refer to the notion of freedom experienced by individuals due the wide use of contemporary information systems. We argue that digital emancipation may have both a positive and a negative impact in each context as the individual may be at the same time be digitally emancipated, but also bound to the technology and its capabilities or limitations. We draw on existing literature to provide indications that digital emancipation is associated to both positive and negative experiences within each context and highlight that tensions between these mixed experiences exists. Building on this analysis, we then set the ground and motivates the need for an integrated theoretical framework for understanding the balancing effort of the digitally emancipated individual.

Blockchain technology was initially employed as the public transaction ledger for cryptocurrencies. However, beyond cryptocurrencies, blockchain technology has been recently considered for a plethora of other applications as it encapsulates unique properties including decentralization, security, transparency and anti-tampering. Such properties are particularly advantageous for variety of prominent issues experienced in the financial sector. As a result, blockchain technology holds the potential to revolutionize the financial industry by altering the way in which different services are conducted in the financial industry. In this paper, we outline five different financial industry use cases that are expected to be radically transformed by the use of blockchain technology.