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Purpose - This paper aims to explore the factors affecting consumers' loyalty toward online games based on the uses and gratifications theory and the flow theory. \ud \ud Design/methodology/approach - The research employed two approaches to collect data: personal interview and online survey. Each data collection approach consists of two phases to overcome method bias. This study adopted structural equation modeling to analyze the data. \ud \ud Findings - The results focusing on popular massively multiplayer online role-playing games reveal that players' sense of control, perceived entertainment, and challenge affect their loyalty toward an online game. Conversely, sociality and interactivity produce negligible effects on loyalty. \ud \ud Practical implications - First, game designers may strengthen gamers' sense of control and challenge by adding more status information, gaming options, or through the designed system of goals and achievements. Second, the entertaining nature of online gaming suggests greater demand for content design, and points to the direction of mobile gaming. Third, considering the recent growth of online social network services, consumers regard online games as lower priority when prompted by socially related motives. Additionally, people mostly reckon online relationships as virtual and not gratifying real-world social needs. \ud \ud Originality/value - In view of the prevalence of computer and Internet usage, online gaming research should shift more focus toward the non-technological aspects of gaming. This paper is one of the few studies that examine online game loyalty from the non-technological aspects while adopting a multi-disciplinary approach based on theoretical parsimony

The authors report measurements of the electrical resistivity, Seebeck coefficient, and thermal conductivity for a series of misfit-layered oxides Ca3Co4−xFexO9+δ (x=0, 0.05, 0.1, 0.15, 0.2) prepared by solid state reaction. Structural parameters are refined with superspace group of X2∕m(0b0)s0 using powder x-ray diffraction data. With partial substitution of Fe+2 for Co+3, the resistivity decreases, while the thermopower increases simultaneously. The x=0.05 sample exhibits a higher figure of merit (Z=3.01×10−4K−1) than that of Ca3Co4O9+δ (0.33×10−4K−1) at 300K, indicating much improvement of thermoelectric characteristics via partial substitution of Fe for Co.

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Primarily antiviral resistance related mutant strains do exist in treatment naïve patients. Without antiviral pressure, HBV strains evolved at a normal speed. In depth sequence analysis implied that viral replication might be correlated with its variability, which needs to be further investigated.