Ram D. Gopal

Warwick Business School, The University of Warwick

Title: Echoes of Authenticity: Reclaiming Human Sentiment in the LLM Era

Abstract: We explore the unintended consequences of employing large language models (LLMs) like ChatGPT for editing user-generated content, particularly focusing on alterations in sentiment. Through a detailed analysis of a climate change tweet dataset, we uncover that LLM-rephrased tweets tend to display a more neutral sentiment than their original counterparts. By replicating an established study on public opinions regarding climate change, we illustrate how such sentiment alterations can potentially skew the results of research relying on user-generated content. To counteract the biases introduced by LLMs, our research outlines two effective strategies. First, we employ predictive models capable of retroactively identifying the true human sentiment underlying the original communications, utilizing the altered sentiment expressed in LLM-rephrased tweets as a basis. While useful, this approach faces limitations when the origin of the text—whether directly crafted by a human or modified by an LLM—remains uncertain. To address such scenarios where the text’s provenance is ambiguous, we develop a second approach based on the fine-tuning of LLMs. This fine-tuning process not only helps in aligning the sentiment of LLM-generated texts more closely with human sentiment but also offers a robust solution to the challenges posed by the indeterminate origins of digital content. This research highlights the impact of LLMs on the linguistic characteristics and sentiment of user-generated content, and more importantly, offers practical solutions to mitigate these biases, thereby ensuring the continued reliability of sentiment analysis in research and policy.

Ram D. Gopal is the Information Systems Society’s Distinguished Fellow and Alan Turing Institute’s Turing Fellow, and a Professor of Information Systems Management and Analytics at the Warwick Business School. He also serves as the Academic Director of the Gillmore Centre for Financial Technology at the Warwick Business School. He previously served as the Por-Dean for Research at the Warwick Business School (2020-2023) and as Head of the Department of Operations and Information Management in the School of Business, University of Connecticut (2008-2018. He has a diverse and a rich portfolio of research that spans analytics, health informatics, financial technologies, information security, privacy and valuation, intellectual property rights, online market design and business impacts of technology. He has served on the editorial boards of top journals including Information Systems Research and has served as the President of the Workshop on Information Technologies and Systems organization from 2016 to 2018. At the Warwick Business School, he teaches ‘Digital Transformation’ on the Full-time MBA and Executive MBA (London), as well as ‘Digital Finance, Blockchain & Cryptocurrencies’ on the MSc in Management of Information Systems and Digital Innovation, and ‘Text Analytics’ on the MSc in Business Analytics.


Youngjin Yoo

Weatherhead School of Management,Case Western Reserve University

Title: Architecture Matters: The role of Layered Modular Architecture on Externality of Digital Platforms and Its Remedy

Abstract: Digital platforms harness the benefits of a loosely coupled structure of a layered modular architecture (LMA) and the generativity of open innovation. However, negative externalities emerge as these platforms continue to expand in both size and scope. In this essay, I elucidate the impact of the architecture of digital assets that underpin these platforms on the negative externalities they create. Specifically, I demonstrate how cloud-based digital assets and their property control rights shape how values are created and allocated in these platforms. Crucially, the architecture of digital shapes who can exercise property control rights over those digital assets. Based on the analysis, I propose a decentralized layered modular architecture as a crucial remedy to mitigate the negative externalities of LMA-based platforms. This emerging architecture should incorporate additional decentralized layers of digital identity, personal data, and models. Crucially, the proposed architecture should facilitate delineating property rights for digital assets to enable efficient, effective, and equitable governance of these platforms. Finally, I discuss the theoretical, methodological, social, and policy implications of the emergence of decentralized LMA.

Youngjin Yoo is the Elizabeth M. and William C. Treuhaft Professor in Entrepreneurship and Professor of Information Systems at the Department of Design & Innovation at the Weatherhead School of Management, Case Western Reserve University, where he also serves as the associate dean of research. An Association of Information Systems Fellow, he is also WBS Distinguished Research Environment Professor at Warwick Business School, UK. He is a faculty co-director of xLab at Case Western Reserve University. He has worked as the Innovation Architect at the University Hospitals in Cleveland, overseeing the digital transformation efforts at one of the largest teaching hospital systems in the country. He studies digital innovation and has published at leading academic journals such as MIS Quarterly, Information Systems Research, Organization Science, the Journal of AIS, Information & Organization, the Communications of the ACM, and the Academy of Management Journal.

Categories: Keynotes Speeches