Romanian Distribution Committee Magazine, Volume 15, Issue 1, Year 2024 by Romanian Distribution Committee

Editorial: Perceiving with Great Lucidity the Changing Times, Staying Informed and Responsible Managing AI’s Risk While Enabling Innovation

At the opening of the January 2009 event dedicated to our Romania’s national poet Mihai Eminescu, the GeneralAssembly of members of the RomanianAcademy unanimously approved the proposal that January 15th be officially declared as our “Day of National Culture”. Mihai Eminescu (who lived from January 15, 1850 to June 15, 1889) was described byAcademician Dan Berindei as both great poet and journalist, “a man of his times, which he lived with intensity and perceived with great lucidity” (RomanianAcademy, 2009). Mihai Eminescu wrote a poem (entitled “Glossa” – from Latin) about “Time passes, time comes,” highlighting that “Everything is old and everything is new... Many things pass before us, Many things ring in our ears... The future and the past/Are two sides of the page, See the beginning at the end/ Who knows how to teach them... With a siren's song, The world-spreads glittering nets; To change the actors on stage, He lures you into whirlwinds... He asks you and calculates/What is bad and what is good; Everything is old and everything is new: Time passes, time comes.”

Recently, we found out from The Nieman Journalism Lab (Perry, 2024) that according to the prestigious Pulitzer Prize (seen as a major incentive for high-quality journalism) administrator that some of this year’s Pulitzer finalists areAI-powered (entrants being required to discloseAI usage). It would have been interesting to find out (by using GenAI) what the journalist Mihai Eminescu’s opinion with regard to the risingAI-integrated industry would be,

but as “Time passes, time comes” we leave the pleasure of performing this experiment to others, awaiting clarification concerning “What is bad and what is good”. On the other hand, it is worth remembering that on January 13, 2019 (Purcarea, 2019) we made reference to the fact that Academician Eugen Simion (as initiator and coordinator, in the “Foreword” to the first Volume of the facsimiled Eminescian manuscripts, volume launched on January 15, 2005, at the Exhibition Hall of the RomanianAcademy Library) seen Mihai Eminescu also as the one who can provide an exemplary lesson in the internet age.

Just a year ago the reputedAzeemAzhar (2023) wrote about the complications brought byAI, one of them being how “to deal with aligning artificial entities to human values”, and make “the complicated systems built aroundAI serve us well”. He brought to our attention that “such values are often abstract, conflicting and changing – and we often don’t know what they are”. This year, McKinsey experts (De Smet et al., 2024) focused on Gen AI (that in response to user prompts can generate text, images, and other content) human side, underlining that “Leaders have an opportunity to humanize that work by deciding where, when, and how their teams use gen AI so that people are freed up from routine tasks to do more creative, collaborative, and innovative thinking” (p. 4).

According to Boston Consulting Group (BCG) experts (Khodabandeh and Ransbotham, 2024), to boost revenue and find efficiency it is necessary to manageAI’s risk, harmonizingAI’s capabilities with human guidance, as well as putting into practice both services and workflows, and responsibleAI principles and guidelines, valorizing the spirit of experimentation. It is also important to redefine the economics of experience (Lellouche Tordjman et al., 2024), by concentrating GenAI in process reinvention, as well as in both customer self-assist, and employee assist, transforming the customer journey (based on the paradigm so-called MIDAS). In case of retail companies, for example, there are significant GenAI opportunities, such as: personalized offers and discounts, marketing, range and space, and customer support (Luther et al., 2024).

Two of the world’s leadingAI laboratories, Google Brain and DeepMind, were put together, giving birth in 2010 to Google DeepMind as a focused team that is creating “the next wave of research breakthroughs and transformative products”, and “help anticipate a broad spectrum ofAI-related risks, explore ways of preventing them from happening, and find ways to address them if they do”. According to its Co-Founder and CEO, Demis Hassabis: “the AI has the potential to be one of the most important and beneficial technologies ever invented”. For instance, on 19 March 2024 it was introduced (in Nature Communications) anAI system socalled TacticAI (by collaboration between the Google DeepMind team and Liverpool Football Club experts) that can provide, on the basis of predictive and GenAI, tactical insights (Wang and Veličković, 2024), opening the way to translate this advancingAI for sports into various (computer games, robotics, traffic coordination etc.).

To responsible manage AI’s risk

it is useful to take into consideration:

• The comparative analysis recently published in the European Business Review, and in which the authors Collina & Warnes (2024), two reputed consultants, examined the potential

impact of emerging AI governance laws and regulations in the EU, US, and UK on trust not only for executives and managers, but also for workers adopting AI systems, stating as follows: “Laws alone don’t build trust; company cultures matter, too. If leaders show they care about being responsible with AI, it helps staff and stakeholders gain confidence… Inside companies, leaders need to: Share an inspiring vision for using AI. Encourage ongoing learning about AI. Set a good example of values with AI. Give staff the power to question AI systems” (see the figure below).

Source: Adapted from Collina, L. & Warnes, B., 2024. Cultivating Executive Trust in the Age of AI Governance, European Business Review, March 7, 2024 (work cited)

• A significant commentary coming from the American think tank Brooking Institution regarding how “Effective AI regulation requires understanding general-purpose AI” (Caliskan and Lum, 2024), the authors, distinguished researchers, highlighting among other aspects that: “ without better information about how the (AI) models are being used, researchers, regulators, and the public are left shooting in the dark. The task of creating useful evaluations and effective regulation becomes much harder when we not only have to anticipate the attendant risks and adverse outcomes associated with a particular use case, but we also must foresee the modes of use themselves… This is where the tech companies who are building and selling access to the models come in. Undoubtedly, they have access to log data recording the various ways users are interacting with their products”.

• To make your own road map to lessen the gravity of risks while moving to capture opportunities from day one, as recently recommended by McKinsey experts (Bevan et al., 2024), and addressing, for instance, when looking to deploy high-potential use cases for generative AI,

Figure no. 1: From Regulation to AI Trust

the challenge of responsible implementation, seeing the linkage between different kinds of risk and different generative AI use cases, as shown in figure below.

Source: Bevan, O., Chui, M., Presten, B., Kristensen, I. and Yee, L., 2024. Implementing generative AI with speed and safety, representing views from McKinsey’s Risk & Resilience Practice and QuantumBlack, AI by McKinsey, March 13, 2024, p. 5 (work cited)

On 21 March 2024 the UN General Assembly adopted a resolution on regulating the field of AI, the draft resolution being introduced by the US Ambassador and Permanent Representative to the UN, Ms. Linda Thomas-Greenfield, who highlighted the international community opportunity and responsibility of the international community “to govern this technology rather than let it govern us… Let us commit to… using this technology to advance shared priorities around sustainable development” (United Nations, 2024).

Coming back to the valuable Exponential View (Mollick, 2024), it is worth quoting some recent relevant ideas expressed by Ethan Mollick, Assoc. Prof. at the Wharton School (University of Pennsylvania): “Science enables the creation of knowledge and discovery that changes how we live and see ourselves… Could AI techniques help accelerate scientific discovery by addressing the limitations of human cognition? … there is a fundamental problem: humans have a limited capacity to store knowledge, while the amount of knowledge is growing exponentially… Tools have always shaped the sharing of knowledge… AI will be able to see the hidden connections within existing knowledge… And AI isn’t just a tool for retrieving and connecting what we already know – it’s a powerful engine for creation…”

Allow us to end by remembering that six years ago (Purcarea, 2018), starting from an interesting discussion paper by McKinsey experts with regard to the impact of AI, we made reference to the fact that skilling and reskilling people to work with AI will not be a simple task for companies’ leadership, identifying some fine linkages like that with the holistic approach of

Figure no. 2: Different generative AI use cases are associated with different kinds of risk

the organizational knowledge dynamics. Next year, we signaled the pressure of new capabilities’ requirements (Romanian Distribution Committee, 2019), recalling that “It is well-known that the first foray of our scientific Association into boosting competitiveness and collaboration (including by approaching the significant issue of talent development) stems back almost 24 years when the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) highlighted the need for new indicators of human capital, training and labour requirements (underlined by the central role of learning) while focusing on indicators for the knowledge-based economy (OCDE/GD(96)102), the indicators of the knowledge distribution power and other characteristics of innovation systems being considered key (considering the importance of tacit and codified knowledge, diffusion and creation of knowledge, know-how and know-who).”

And fourteen years ago (Purcarea, 2010) we remembered some quotes about knowledge (that is in fact a public good as Johann Wolfgang von Goethe argued, the greater the knowledge, the greater the doubt; that the true knowledge, according to Henry David Thoreau, is to know that we know what we know and that we do not know what we do not know), consequently inviting at partnering in knowledge distribution

Theodor Valentin Purcărea Editor-in-Chief

References

Azhar, A., 2023. Three quick steps towards beneficial AI, Exponential View, 3 Apr. 2023. Available at: <https://www.exponentialview.co/p/three-quick-steps-towards-beneficial?> [Accessed 3 April 2023].

Bevan, O., Chui, M., Presten, B., Kristensen, I. and Yee, L., 2024. Implementing generative AI with speed and safety, representing views from McKinsey’s Risk & Resilience Practice and QuantumBlack, AI by McKinsey, March 13, 2024, pp. 1-10. Available at: <https://www.mckinsey.com/capabilities/risk-andresilience/our-insights/implementing-generative-ai-with-speed-and-safety?> [Accessed 15 March 2024].

Caliskan, A. and Lum, K., 2024. Effective AI regulation requires understanding, The Brookings Institution, Commentary, January 29, 2024, pp. 1-5. Available at:

<https://www.brookings.edu/articles/effective-ai-regulation-requires-understanding-general-purpose-ai/?> [Accessed 2 February 2024].

Collina, L. & Warnes, B., 2024. Cultivating Executive Trust in the Age of AI Governance, European Business Review, March 7, 2024. Available at: <https://www.europeanbusinessreview.com/cultivatingexecutive-trust-in-the-age-of-ai-governance-2/> [Accessed 13 March 2024].

De Smet, A., Durth, D., Hancock, B., Mugayar-Baldocchi, M. and Reich, A., 2024. The human side of generative AI: Creating a path to productivity, McKinsey Quarterly, People and Organizational Performance, March 18, 2024, pp. 1-18. Available at: <https://www.mckinsey.com/capabilities/peopleand-organizational-performance/our-insights/the-human-side-of-generative-ai-creating-a-path-toproductivity> [Accessed 13 March 2024].

Google DeepMind, n.d. Build AI responsibly to benefit humanity, About. Available at: <https://deepmind.google/about/> [Accessed 24 March 2024].

Khodabandeh, S. and Ransbotham, S., 2024. AI’s Surprises, Innovations, and Big Wins, BCG, February 28, 2024, pp. 1-5. Available at: <https://mkt-bcg-com-public-pdfs.s3.amazonaws.com/prod/ai-surprisesinnovations-big-wins.pdf> [Accessed 2 March 2024].

Lellouche Tordjman, K., Edison, S., Jesse, E., Keating, K. and Choudhary, K., 2024. Three Ways GenAI Will Transform Customer Experience, BCG, February 21, 2024, pp. 1-9. Available at: <https://mkt-bcg-

com-public-pdfs.s3.amazonaws.com/prod/three-ways-genai-will-transform-customer-experience.pdf> [Accessed 2 March 2024].

Luther, A., De Laubier, R., De Bellefonds, N., Charanya, T., Shah, S., Ifiora, K. and Forth, P., 2024. GenAI’s Top Performers Do Differently, BCG, February 09, 2024, pp. 1-12. Available at: <https://www.bcg.com/publications/2024/what-gen-ais-top-performers-do-differently?> [Accessed 13 March 2024].

Mollick, E., 2024. AI and the future of science, Part 1, Exponential View, 28 Feb. 2024. Available at: <https://www.exponentialview.co/p/chartpack-ai-and-scientific-knowledge-1> [Accessed 29 February 2024].

Perry, A., 2024. Five of this year’s Pulitzer finalists are AI-powered, The Nieman Journalism Lab, March 11, 2024. Available at: <https://www.niemanlab.org/2024/03/five-of-this-years-pulitzer-finalists-are-aipowered/?> [Accessed 23 March 2024].

Purcarea, T., 2019. “What I wish for you, sweet Romania: May your sons live only in brotherhood”, Romanian Distribution Committee, News, January 13, 2019. Available at: <https://www.crdaida.ro/2019/01/ce-ti-doresc-eu-tie-dulce-romanie-fiii-tai-traiasca-numai-in-fratie/> [Accessed 23 March 2024].

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Romanian Academy, 2009. The need for Eminescu, Press release, Launch of the volumes XV-XX from the series of Mihai Eminescu's manuscripts, event organized by the Philology and Literature Section of the Romanian Academy, the Library of the Romanian Academy and the National Foundation for Science and Art. Available at: <https://acad.ro/com2009/pag_com09_0115.htm> [Accessed 23 March 2024].

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Improving Information and Communication Technology to Innovate the Paradigms of World Progress

Prof. Eng. Ph.D. Victor GREU

Abstract

The paper approaches the premises of evaluating “right tracks of development” and innovate the progress, in the actual dynamic World context, facing unprecedented levels of concern or danger for Earth and humankind evolution, considering that the information and communication technology (ICT) became the main driving factor of the human society by the complex consequences of its services, products and applications, when supporting the Information Society (IS) on the way towards the Knowledge Based Society (KBS) and that the average development is the result of global tendencies/innovations, including knowledge refining

We approached the ICT role in this connected World and considered Maslow pyramid as reflecting the essential needs of humankind, and this way it resulted that the energy is among the primary needs of progress and the research in this domain is perhaps the most important, but also difficult, as World is facing at least 3 combined sources of crises, including global warming (climate changes), Earth resources fading and consumption. As an average dependence, the global warming was (and is) mostly influenced by the way we generate and use the energy for the global processes, resulting that the luck of having on Earth plenty of fossil resources for World amazing industry progress, including the exponential pace given by ICT, is now the main factor (from the above 3), we have to reconsider/mitigate.

As a starting point, when analyzing the actual Earth ecosystem and its premises of development, we used some relevant examples In the case of Thorium nuclear energy, we considered the role of ICT to leverage the data extraction from uranium experience/processes and the necessary knowledge refining for thorium use. At Blockchain, one of the advanced ICT applications, as it is severely complicated/limited by energy factors, we pointed the benefits of hash-puzzle solving power metric

The basics of ICT industry, first including telecommunications and computers, should also be radically improved to meet the high requirements of carbon-aware, but, eventually, among the most important challenges for ICT context development, along with direct energy consumption (power), we could include the complex relations between performances (capacity, speed, memory and so on) and power, the extension of the 5G(6G) networks, IoT or energy costs increase. Analyzing the impact of energy on data centers [4], we observed that all the prior expertise is used to optimize the relation performance/power or memory/time, but actually it is necessary

- Part 1-

to rethink the models, for both device and network scale, including carbon-aware software engineering. The difficulty of finding solutions for the actual crises lies also on the high/apogee levels of performances and progress we are in. This way we have to agree that the old improvement solutions have already reached their maximal potential benefits and new computing paradigms are necessary, based on some holistic principles, for all the ecosystem (including education and further knowledge refining)

More than only improving ICT software, the business processes could benefit in efficiency and efficacy by improving the thinking of organization/processes strategies and data tools, still involving ICT, but with updated approaches of using resources, including humans and technology The practical consequences of such changes of paradigm will provide a higher flexibility in development and a faster updating the business to the emergent World challenges, targeting the new progress solutions. Such modern approaches of business processes could use the concept of data products, as detailed in [5]. This approach also reflects the increasing value of using data/information in the Data Deluge era, with the green ICT trend, which eventually also provides an optimal development/use of ICT instruments Our conclusion is that we have to treat data products with special attention, as a new type of product, but with features and impact on industry and beyond, as they are linked, in more and more complex ways, with the advanced ICT products, systems and services, at Earth scale As a consequence, we would propose that data products and similar new concept provided by ICT for IS toward KBS to be used like other sensible products (food, vegetables and so on), considering the appropriate environmental variable conditions, but in this case the known “time sensitivity” has to determine a more large/complex family of consequences/measures, because of the fast changes ICT and IS/KBS generate under the processes of knowledge refining we already mentioned in [11][17][13][19].

As a final conclusion, we have just observed some subtle ways the ICT could leverage the World progress by innovating its tools, but not in the same fast and sophisticated ways, as they have to find simpler and more business-oriented solutions/tools/advances. There is no doubt that these partial approaches, versus the complexity of World changes and uncertainty require further and continuously analyses to be done, at Earth scale and with appropriate knowledge refining

Keywords: Thorium nuclear energy, Blockchain, hash-puzzle solving power, carbon-aware software engineering, data products, developer, knowledge refining

JEL Classification: L63; L86; M15; O31; O33

1. Searching energy challenges of World progress

When life problems seem to overwhelm us, sometimes we used to rediscover the hope and the ways to go on, against all odds and eventually changing some paradigms of what we long time considered normality.

Beyondthephilosophical relativityoftheabovethinking,itissurethattheactualWorld crises and challenges represent unprecedented levels of concern for most people and incumbents, just considering the consequences of global warming (climate changes), Earth resources fading, social unbalances or geopolitical/security crises, consumption or changes in human behaviour/values [7][8][10][21][11][19].

Under such negative premises, the expectations for World progress are naturally an important but very complicate issue, which must be deeply analyzed in order to eventually foresee the ways of improvements [12][18][20][17].

In fact, for a more precise evaluation of the premises and actual World’s context, we should consider with more care even the used terms, as “concern for most people and incumbents” includes at least 3 sources of uncertainty/approximation, as “concern” is not an objective measure of reality, which then could be affected by the diversity/statistics which the level of democracy generates among “people and incumbents”.

Such general and non-technical consideration could seem inappropriate for evaluating “right tracks of development” , but we have to recall that we livein a highly connected World, where the democracy is prevailing (at least till now!) and average development is the result of global tendencies/innovations, including knowledge refining.

With other words, the democracy and the market economy generate, either good and bads, development tendencies, as reflecting “most people and incumbents” options and eventually …their knowledge - which should be refined in the actual dynamic World context

On the other hand, actually, a basic premise for any progress should consider the information andcommunicationtechnology (ICT) crucial role, as ICT becamethemain driving factor of the human society by the complex consequences of its products, applications and services, when supporting the Information Society (IS) on the way towards the Knowledge Based Society (KBS), as we already approached in [15][13].

It is sure that the real World context, processes and evolutions are much more complex and complicated than the above suggested generic model, but this is the reason to consider it as astarting point,when analyzing the actualEarth ecosystem and its premises ofdevelopment, using some relevant examples [1][2][4][5][14][23][24].

Starting from ICT role in this connected World and considering Maslow pyramid as reflecting the essential needs of humankind, which must be a base for reducing uncertainty/approximation in the above mentioned “options”, we expect to find some reasons/ways which could lead to the “right tracks of development” when facing the mentioned unprecedented levels of concern or danger for Earth and humankind evolution.

This way it is natural to consider the energy among primary needs of progress and the research in this domain is perhaps the most important, but also difficult, as World is facing at least 3 combined sources of crises, considering global warming (climate changes), Earth resources fading and consumption

In fact, as an average dependence, the global warming was (and is) mostly influenced by the way we generate and use the energy for the global processes, resulting that the luck of having on Earth plenty of fossil resources for World amazing industry progress, including the exponential pace given by ICT, is now the main factor (from the above 3), we have to reconsider/mitigate.

Eventhenuclearenergytechnology, byits already spreaduse andpotential,is thetarget of many research centres, one being presented by the next example in [1]:

“ …China announced the completion of its first experimental thorium-based nuclear reactor. Built in the middle of the Gobi Desert in the country’s north, the reactor over the next few years will undergo testing. If the experiment proves successful, Beijing plans to construct another reactor potentially capable of generating electricity for more than 100 000 homes. China is not alone in its intentions to reap thorium's unique properties. In the past, India, Japan, the United Kingdom, the United States of America and other countries have demonstrated enthusiasm for research into the possible application of thorium in nuclear power. The appeal of this metal is its potential to be a more abundant and efficient substitute for uranium, the dominant nuclear fuel.”

The nuclear research made by different countries is still monetarized by the specialized international agency (IAEA) specialists, who have a balanced opinion on the sustainability of Thorium:

<<“Many countries consider thorium as both a viable and very attractive option for generating power and meeting their growing energy needs,” said Kailash Agarwal, a Nuclear Fuel Cycle Facilities Specialist at the IAEA and one of the authors of the report. “Our research project helped share valuable knowledge and experience among national laboratories and research institutions in the use of thorium, culminating in this publication.”

Thorium is a silvery, slightly radioactive metal commonly found in igneous rocks and heavy mineral sands. It was named after Thor, the god of thunder in Norse mythology. It is three to

four times more abundant in nature than uranium but historically has found little use in industry or power generation. This is partly because thorium in itself is not a nuclear fuel, but it can be used to create one. Thorium-232, the only naturally occurring isotope of thorium, is a fissionable material but not a fissile one, meaning that it needs high-energy neutrons to undergo fission the splitting of atomic nuclei which releases energy that is used for electricity generation. However, when irradiated, thorium-232 undergoes a series of nuclear reactions, eventually forming uranium-233, a fissile material that can be burned up as fuel in nuclear reactors >>

Although is an “abundant and efficient substitute for uranium”, Thorium has also some technical challenges to be considered and eventually solved before becoming a practical solution for the energy of future:

<<However, there are several economic and technical obstacles making the deployment of thorium challenging. Despite its abundance, the metal is currently expensive to extract. “The mineral monazite, which is a major source of rare earth elements, is also a primary source of thorium,” said Mark Mihalasky, a Uranium Resources Specialist at the IAEA. “Without the current demand for rare earth elements, monazite would not be mined for its thorium content alone. Thorium is a by-product, and extraction of thorium requires methods that are costlier than for uranium. So, as it stands, the amount of thorium that can be pulled out of the ground in a cost-effective manner is not as great as for uranium. This, however, could change if there was a higher demand for thorium and its application in nuclear power.”

Last but not theleast, the research costs for thorium industrial use are also considerable, because of the novelty of such industry processes, which need, again, innovations.

Wealsosupposethat,inthisnewcontext,theroleofICT,toleveragethedataextraction from uranium experience/processes and the necessary knowledge refining for thorium use, could be benefic and significant:

<<Equally expensive are research, development and testing of thorium-powered nuclear installations due to a lack of significant experience with thorium and uranium's historical pre-eminence in nuclear power. “Another hurdle for thorium is that it can be difficult to handle,” said Anzhelika Khaperskaia, Technical Lead on Fuel Engineering and Fuel Cycle Facilities at the IAEA. Being a fertile and not fissile material, it needs a driver, such as uranium or plutonium, to trigger and maintain a chain reaction. >>

Still, the prevailing conclusion is that thorium is an important/potential resource for the future energy industry, while the research of this field will continue in a sustainable way:

“To meet growing energy demand and achieve global climate objectives, the world is looking for alternative sustainable and reliable energy technologies. Thorium may become one of those,” concluded Clément Hill, Section Head at the IAEA. “We will continue our research to deliver credible and science-based results for those interested in working with thorium.”

Looking for the relevant links of ICT development with World general progress versus actual challenges, including the energy crises, we have to recall the huge energy consumption of ICT planetary products and services [19][11]

On the other side, it is known that the race of ICT towards new performances (capacity, speed, memory, miniaturization etc.) has been more and more linked and even limited by the energy/power consumption, where Cloud, AI or Blockchain are relevant cases

The next example reveals how Blockchain, one of the advanced ICT applications, are severely complicated/limited by energy factors to be considered [2]:

“Clearly, Bitcoin’s challenge is to create an ecosystem of mostly honest pseudonymous miners. More specifically, the challenge is to 1) incentivize as many computer owners as possible to participate in this distributed process as nodes, thereby motivating a large plurality of unrelated nodes and 2) discourage nodes from creating crony nodes that might affect the

outcome of the distributed agreement. After all, the more nodes that decline an invalid mined block, that is, a block with modifications (of transactions or entire blocks), double spending, or omissions, the lower the chance that the whole network will accept it in their blockchain view. ”

Because blockchain is a concept and a technology which include very complex processes, in order to address the above challenges, at least their short description should be approach:

“A node is chosen at random from all working nodes within the ecosystem. This random node selection is not done by a governing authority; rather, it is done by having all nodes try to solve a hash puzzle. As hash puzzles are randomized, the only way a node can solve the problem is by repeatedly tossing a coin and trying a new candidate solution. Being energy costly with almost no reward (rejected blocks are not rewarded even though a miner solved the hash puzzle), this process addresses the aforementioned challenge number 2). In contrast, the lucky nodes that solve the hash puzzle receive an incentive [thereby addressing the aforementioned challenge number 1)] in the form of 0.625 bitcoins (in 2021), delivered as a special Bitcoin transaction; miners will continue mining as long as this incentive off sets their expenses. ”

In simpler words, one of the main mechanisms of blockchain, which provide essential features of randomization and integrity, is in the same time a big consumer of energy, as large as it takes the process of mining (solve hash puzzle).

Further, an essential leveraging way to evaluate the system efficiency is to introduce and use an associated metric (hash rate) for hash-puzzle solving power:

“Note that most, if not all, fully operational nodes in the Bitcoin ecosystem participate in the mining proof-of-work operation, namely, they all try to solve the hash puzzle. Hashpuzzle solving power is measured using a metric called hash rate, which measures hashes computed per second (H/s). A personal laptop has a hash rate of a few millions of hashes per second; because the hash-puzzle target Ta has become so small over the years, the probability of solving it within 10 min on a personal laptop has become negligible. Therefore, serious miners must invest in expensive hardware to perform mining and hardware capable of computing a large amount of hash candidates, albeit with a high energy cost; specialized hardware can achieve close to 100 trillion hashes computed per second (TH/s) ”

It is important to notice that the network development requires not only energy but also performant hardware able to compete in hash-puzzle generation.

On the other hand, even for a such complex and complicate ICT application/system, the above metric and the corresponding figures could be used to improve the energy consumption, while studying the system operation general cost:

“The hardware’s fixed cost is several thousand U.S. dollars. Miners most often use racks consisting of a plurality of such hardware devices, thereby increasing energy consumption even more. As energy hungry as each mining operation is, multiply that by the number of mining nodes in the network (estimated to be more than one million nodes) to understand how the total electrical power consumption reached 135 TW/h in 2021. According to Digiconomist, a single Bitcoin transaction has an average carbon footprint of approximately 500 kg CO2, the equivalent of roughly 90,000 h of watching YouTube.”

Still, the final estimations/results show huge energy consumption, versus other global ICT applications, putting in a realistic picture the challenges ICT has to face at Earth scale, especially for complex products, applications and services where energy is a main ingredient for providing high performances, needing further timely analyses and even new approaching models in order to optimize the development and provide sustainable progress

2. Innovate while using efficient ICT and refining the knowledge everywhere

Thecomplexand complicatepremises ofapproaching theinnovation ofWorldprogress are much beyond from only considering the generation and consumption of energy, especially in the context of optimally developing the huge domain of ICT as global impact at Earth scale. From energy basic factors, to the improved right tracks of progress, there is a long and winding road for ICTto lead theWorld toward mitigating theconsequences ofemergent crises.

In fact, even the basics of ICT industry, first including telecommunications and computers, should be radically improved to meet the high requirements of carbon-aware, as we already pointed [3][19].

Among the most important challenges for ICT context development, along with direct energy consumption (power), eventually, we could include the complex relations between performances (capacity, speed, memory and so on) and power, the extension of the 5G(6G) networks, IoT or …energy costs increase [23][24].

A prominent importance has the impact of energy on data centers, as they became, in the Cloud applications proliferation context, the highest power consumers. Their needs for power are difficult to be reduced while their capacity/performances would increase, although more and more research is continuously done, on all implied factors.

The research directions for improving the development of green or carbon-aware ICT include extensions of earlier phases of battery savings type, but it is clear that the new crises era, we entered in, requires radical steps forward, for both hardware and software of the equipments and systems, as it is also detailed presented by [4]:

“From the dawn of computing through the mid-1980s, machines were severely limited in memory capacity and computation speed. The early devices were physically large in comparison to today and required substantial energy, so much so that cooling for data centers received significant research attention. In the latter part of the early computing era, embedded systems, with limited memory capability (for example, the Space Shuttle Inertial measurement computer program resided in 64 K of random-access memory), relied on a time-space tradeoff principle. This informal principle held that, to use less memory you had to increase computation time and vice versa. In those days, all kinds of tricks were used to save time (like loop unrolling, which removed the overhead of counting the loop iterations) but at the expense of additional storage requirements. Many other approaches used in compiler optimization were employed, although these methods were specifically oriented toward real-time, embedded systems ”

Here we can observe that all the prior expertise is used to optimize the relation performance/power or memory/time, but actually it is necessary to rethink the models, for both device and network scale:

“In the early days of portable computing, researchers focused on battery-saving strategies. Various power conservation techniques were proposed that have now become commonplace, such as turning off the computer’s screen during disuse, optimizing hard drive input–output, and slowing down the CPU with clocking schemes. Process migration over networks from high power consumption to more efficient computational devices can also be used. Although most of these early hardware energy principles are still with us today, perhaps we need a new set of power-saving and “power-aware” principles for current computing paradigms” .

Far from being simpler, the software optimization problem, although more flexible and having the benefit of easy updating, at the actual critical requirements of carbon-aware software engineering is also dependent of the impact of the new hardware solutions/versions on environment:

“Carbon-aware software engineering involves the design and development of software with a focus on reducing the carbon footprint. Related practices include reducing energy consumption of the software during development as well as its runtime energy consumption. It also includes considering the environmental impact of the hardware used to run the software. The techniques used in carbon-aware software engineering include energy profiling, power management, and use of renewable energy sources. (A small example here is the pixel colors on a smartphone screen; not all pixel colors drain the same amount of the phone’s battery.)”

As we observed earlier [11], the difficulty of finding solutions for the actual crises lies also on the high/apogee levels of performances and progress we are in and this way we have to agreethattheoldimprovementsolutionshavealreadyreachedtheirmaximal potentialbenefits:

“Carbon-aware software engineering takes us back to the old days of embedded computing with 64 K executable memory stores, self-modifying code, and space/time tradeoffs. Through the 1980s, software engineers had to be aware of the underlying hardware and target devices, components even to the transistor level, which is anathema to the concept of hardwareagnostic software engineering, computer architecture (hat tip to the late, great Fred Brooks). But the new computing paradigm requires software engineers to rethink these principles ”

The realistic approach became, naturally, the necessity of new computing paradigms, aspartofthelargerpicturewehavementionedfromthebeginning(changingsomeparadigms of what we long time considered normality):

“Fonseca et al.[3] proposed the following nine principles for energy-aware software engineering:

1. Public awareness is key for widespread adoption.

2. Incentives for software stakeholders.

3. Energy-aware software engineering should be a priority for every stakeholder.

4. Education and professional training should cover energy-aware software by default.

5. Broad adoption requires attention to usability.

6. Energy awareness should be engineered throughout the lifecycle.

7. Software quality should not come at the expense of energy awareness.

8. Energy awareness demands dynamic adaptability.

9. We value measures over beliefs (and reliable trends over precision).

These principles appear simple and useful, but we consider that their prominent quality is to provide for all the ecosystem, (nota bene: including education and further knowledge refining) a holistic approach/solution to follow in a very complicate ICT context:

“All of these are self-explanatory and important. Incidentally, any of these principles could be adopted for cybersecurity. To promote awareness, perhaps software engineers should adopt some sort of carbon-aware labelling system: green, yellow, orange, and red for energy usage for typical usage or exceptional profiles. Such a system could lead to carbon-aware compilers. Input to a “carbon-aware compiler” would include a description of the hardware configuration, a set to operational profiles and their probabilities, and the output would be (in addition to the usual outputs) a power consumption profile. Of course, this approach would necessitate an accurate description of the underlying hardware configuration and power requirements under an operational profile, accurate descriptions of these operational profiles and software trace executions, and accurate knowledge of the likelihood of these profiles” .

Although these proposals could seem too general, they have remarkable practical benefits, as they respond to the complex and dynamic context of World crises, where ICT has to “heal first its own wounds”, while leveraging the expected solutions for the whole Earth ecosystem by their obvious quality to be easy applied in larger environments or domains.

More than only improving ICT software, the business processes could benefit in efficiency and efficacy by improving the thinking of organization/processes strategies and data

tools, still involving ICT, but with updated approaches of using resources, including humans and technology [6][9][22].

The practical consequences of such changes of paradigm will provide a higher flexibility in development and a faster updating of the business to the emergent World challenges, targeting the new progress solutions.

Such modern approaches of business processes could use the concept of data products, as detailed in [5], but we think that these also reflect the increasing value of using data/information in the Data Deluge era, with the green ICT trend, which eventually provides an optimal development/use of ICT instruments:

“Some companies that used to release new functionality every six months are now able to build and deploy new data outcomes in weeks Data product owners are responsible for the overall data products value chain and to ensure its success throughout its entire lifecycle. This lifecycle is from the creation of data products to their eventual retirement. In the previous ‘project-led’ approach, there was no accountability and data assets created for the duration of the project were never purged once their utility was over. ”

In a concrete expression, we have to treat data products with special attention, as a new type of product, but with features and impact on industry and beyond, as they are linked, in more and more complex ways, with the advanced ICT products, systems and services, at Earth scale.

As a consequence, we would propose that data products and similar new concept provided by ICT for IS toward KBS to be treated like other sensible products (food, vegetables and so on), considering the appropriate environmental variable conditions, but in this case the known “time sensitivity” has to determine a more large/complex family of consequences/measures, because of the fast changes ICT and IS/KBS generate under the processes of knowledge refining we repeatedly mentioned [11][17][13][19].

Some examples of such approaches and measures could be similarly observed in the further analysis of data products consequences, first considering their developers:

“There is a higher emphasis on doing higher value-add tasks that support business imperatives, in contrast to the past when a lot of effort was spent in performing overhead tasks. Many of those tasks are now handled by the cloud provider, or are automated. The ability to focus on the business needs is enabled by an automated low-code developer platform that handles underlying infrastructure enablement tasks. ”

As we have mentioned above, some complicated conditions/requirements of the business ecosystem must be changed for a new/improved progress launch, as even some definitions/paradigms should be considered:

“In the modern approach, it is imperative to increase the definition of a developer. Some developers may be SQL experts, but other ‘citizen developers’ need a visual drag-and drop platform to explore data assets. The latter want ‘self-service’ capabilities without depending upon an overburdened data engineer to deliver their requests ”

We have to notice the subtle/complicate ways ICT is involved in these apparently human resources processes, as initially it is about decreasing the engineers role, not always being necessary experts for structured query language (SQL) to manipulate data, but later we see that, in fact, it is about changing their tools, for a better efficiency:

“To speed up the delivery of data products, one of the biggest impacts is via using tools that offer business users a visual interface with no-code or low-code tooling, while automatically generating code that savvy developers can customize. This low-code platform enables citizen data engineers and citizen analysts who are not well versed in coding techniques but need to prepare data for their own initiatives to use visual drag and drop and intuitive user interfaces and quickly build pipelines, reuse existing artifacts and start analyzing

data. As organizations enhance their maturity in enabling data products, they add the ability to measure benefits, like the frequency of new releases, and the usage of data products.”

Here we have just observed some subtle ways the ICT could leverage the World progress by innovating its tools, but not in the same fast and sophisticated ways, as they have to find simpler and more business-oriented solutions/tools/advances.

There is no doubt that these partial approaches, versus the complexity of World changes and uncertainty require further and continuously analyses to be done, at Earth scale and with appropriate knowledge refining

3. Conclusions

We considerthat searchingnew paradigms for World progress could startby evaluating “right tracks of development”, in a highly connected World, where the democracy is prevailing (at least till now!) and average development is the result of global tendencies/innovations, including knowledge refining. The democracy and the market economy generate, either good and bads, development tendencies, as reflecting “most people and incumbents”optionsandeventually theirknowledge -whichshouldberefinedin theactual dynamic World context.

A basic premise for any progress should consider the ICT crucial role, as it became the main driving factor of the human society by the complex consequences of its products, applications and services, when supporting the IS on the way towards the KBS, as we already approached in [15][13].

It is sure that the real World’s context, processes and evolutions are much more complex andcomplicated thanthesuggestedgenericmodel ofdemocracy,but this is thereason to consider it as a starting point, when analyzing the actual Earth ecosystem and its premises of development, using some relevant examples

Approaching the ICT role in this connected World and considering Maslow pyramid as reflecting the essential needs of humankind, which must be a base for reducing uncertainty/approximation in the above mentioned “options”, we expect to find some reasons/ways which could lead to the “right tracks of development” when facing the mentioned unprecedented levels of concern or danger for Earth and humankind evolution. This way it resulted that the energy is among the primary needs of progress and the research in this domain is perhaps the most important, but also difficult, as World is facing at least 3 combined sources of crises, considering global warming (climate changes), Earth resources fading and consumption.

In concrete/practical approaches, we could recall the research for alternative (non fossils) sources of energy, revolutionary battery technology (pointing the future electrical cars and even aircrafts) and so on, but even the nuclear energy technology, by its already spread use and potential, is the target of many research centres, one being analysed by the example of Thorium nuclear energy [1]. We also concluded that, in this new context, the role of ICT, to leverage the data extraction from uranium experience/processes and the necessary knowledge refining for thorium use, could be benefic and significant

ICT towards new performances (capacity, speed, memory, miniaturization etc.) has been more and more linked and even limited by the energy/power consumption, where Cloud, AI or Blockchain are relevant cases.

We have analyzed an example that reveals how Blockchain, one of the advanced ICT applications, are severely complicated/limited by energy factors to be considered [2]. It is important to notice that the network development requires not only energy but also performant hardware able to compete in hash-puzzle generation. For a such complex and complicate ICT application/system, the hash-puzzle solving power metric and the corresponding figures could be used to improve the energy consumption, while studying the system operation general cost. The final estimations/results showed a huge energy consumption, versus other global ICT applications, putting in a realistic picture the challenges ICT has to face at Earth scale, especially for complex products, applications and services where energy is a main ingredient for providing high performances, needing further timely analyses and even new approaching models in order to optimize the development and provide sustainable progress.

The complex and complicate premises of approaching the innovation of World progress are much beyond from only considering the generation and consumption of energy, especially in the contextofoptimallydevelopingthehugedomain ofICT as global impact at Earth scale. Counting the energy basic factors, to the improved right tracks of progress, there is a long and winding road for ICT to lead the World toward mitigating the consequences of emergent crises.

As even the basics of ICT industry, first including telecommunications and computers, should be radically improved to meet the high requirements of carbon-aware, among themost importantchallengesforICTcontextdevelopment,alongwithdirectenergyconsumption (power), eventually, we could include the complex relations between performances (capacity, speed, memory and so on) and power, the extension of the 5G(6G) networks, IoT or energy costs increase.

This way, we have analyzed the impact of energy on data centers [4], as they became, in the Cloud applications proliferation context, the highest power consumers. Their needs for power are difficult to be reduced while their capacity/performances would increase, although more and more research is continuously done, on all implied factors, including both hardware and software of the equipments and systems. Here we observed that all the prior expertise is used to optimize the relation performance/power or memory/time, but actually it is necessary to rethink the models, for both device and network scale, including carbon-aware software engineering.

As we observed earlier [11], the difficulty of finding solutions for the actual crises lies also on the high/apogee levels of performances and progress we are in. This way we have to agree that the old improvement solutions have already reached their maximal potential benefits. Consequently, the necessity of new computing paradigms [4], as part of the larger picture we have mentioned from the beginning (changing some paradigms of what we long time considered normality), resulted, based on some holistic principles, for all the ecosystem (nota bene: including education and further knowledge refining), to follow in a very complicate ICT context. We consider that these principles respond to the complex and dynamic context of World crises, where ICT has to “heal first its own wounds”, while leveraging the expected solutions for the whole Earth ecosystem by their obvious quality to be easy applied in larger environments or domains

paradigm will provide a higher flexibility in development and a faster updating the business to the emergent World challenges, targeting the new progress solutions. Such modern approaches of business processes could use the concept of data products, as detailed in [5], but we think that these also reflect the increasing value of using data/information in the Data Deluge era, with the green ICT trend, which eventually provides an optimal development/use of ICT instruments.

Our conclusion is that we have to treat data products with special attention, as a new type of product, but with features and impact on industry and beyond, as they are linked, in more and more complex ways, with the advanced ICT products, systems and services, at Earth scale. As a consequence, we would propose that data products and similar new concept provided by ICT for IS toward KBS to be used like other sensible products (food, vegetables and so on), considering the appropriate environmental variable conditions, but in this case the known “time sensitivity” has to determine a more large/complex family of consequences/measures, because of the fast changes ICT and IS/KBS generate under the processes of knowledge refining we repeatedly mentioned [11][17][13][19].

Asafinalconclusion,wehavejustobservedsomesubtlewaystheICTcouldleverage the World progress by innovating its tools, but not in the same fast and sophisticated ways, as they have to find simpler and more business-oriented solutions/tools/advances There is no doubt that these partial approaches, versus the complexity of World changes and uncertainty require further and continuously analyses to be done, at Earth scale and with appropriate knowledge refining.

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Abstract

The Integration of EmotionalIntelligence into AI Marketing:Connecting Brands with Consumers

by Cosmin TĂNASE

An Honorary Member of the Romanian Distribution Committee

Emotional intelligence (EI) has emerged as a key concept in various domains, including psychology, leadership and education. In recent years, it has found its way into the realm of marketing as an essential factor in building strong and lasting connections with consumers. At its core, emotional intelligence refers to the ability to perceive, understand, manage, and influence emotions, both in oneself and others. In the context of marketing, EI is the capacity of brands and marketers to recognize and respond to consumers’ emotional states to create impactful and authentic experiences. However, while EI has gained popularity as a marketing buzzword, it warrants a critical examination to understand its true implications and potential pitfalls. Defining Emotional Intelligence in the Context of Marketing Emotional intelligence in marketing refers to the strategic understanding and application of emotions to build deeper connections with consumers. It involves perceiving, interpreting, and responding to consumer emotions in a way that enhances brand-consumer relationships.

Keywords: CX, AI, Social Media, Online Marketing, Generated Content, Data Structures

JEL Classification: C88; D83; M31; M37; O33

Advocates of emotional intelligence inmarketing argue that understandingconsumeremotions can lead to more effective advertising, personalized messaging, and increased brand loyalty. Emotional responses can significantly influence purchase decisions, and tailoring marketing strategies to evoke specific emotions seems promising. However, critics argue that relying solely on EI to drive marketing decisions may oversimplify consumer behavior. Emotions are multifacetedandcanvarysignificantlybetweenindividualsandcultures,makingitchallenging tocreateaone-size-fits-allapproach.Oneofthemostcontentiousissuessurroundingemotional intelligence in marketing is the fine line between establishing authentic emotional connections and emotional manipulation. While connecting with consumers on an emotional level can lead to genuine relationships, some marketers might exploit emotions to push products or services aggressively. Ethical concerns arise when emotional triggers are used to sway consumers without considering their best interests. Marketers must be mindful of the ethical implications of leveraging emotions for commercial gain. Quantifying emotional responses presents a significantchallengeformarketers.Emotionalexperiencesareoftenintangibleandchallenging to quantify accurately. Traditional marketing metrics like click-through rates and conversion rates might not fully capture the emotional impact of a campaign. Developing reliable methods for measuring emotional engagement remains a pressing issue in the integration of emotional intelligence into marketing strategies.

The Impact of Technologyand AI Advancementsin technology andartificial intelligence have enabled marketers to harness vast amounts of data, including emotional data from social media and other sources. While AI can help identify emotional patterns and sentiments, it is not a substitute for genuine human understanding. The danger lies in relying solely on AI-driven emotional analytics, potentially overlooking the nuances that only human empathy and intuition can grasp. Emotional intelligence is not universally understood or expressed in the same way across cultures and regions. Emotional cues that resonate with one demographic might fall flat with another. Marketers must be sensitive to cultural differences and adapt their emotional appeals accordingly. A lack of cultural awareness could lead to unintended consequences, damaging brand reputation and relationships with consumers.

THE SIGNIFICANCE OF EMOTIONAL CONNECTIONS BETWEEN BRANDS ANDCONSUMERS

In the competitive landscape of modern marketing, emotional connections between brands and consumers have gained increasing attention as a potent tool for fostering loyalty, advocacy, and lasting relationships. By tapping into consumers’ emotions, brands aim to create memorable experiences that transcend transactional interactions. While emotional connections can undoubtedly yield substantial benefits, a critical examination is necessary to understand the genuine significance and potential drawbacks of relying on emotions in brand-consumer relationships.Emotionalconnectionshave the powertotransform passive consumersintoloyal brandadvocates. Whenconsumers feel a strongemotional attachment toa brand, they are more likely to remain loyal over time, even in the face of competing offers. This loyalty can extend

beyond individual transactions, leading to increased customer lifetime value. Loyal customers are also more inclined to recommend the brand to friends and family, acting as organic brand ambassadors. However, critics argue that loyalty built solely on emotions might be fickle, susceptible to shifting sentiments or the appeal of competitors.

In markets flooded with similar products and services, forging emotional connections can be a way for brands to differentiate themselves. Emotional experiences that resonate with consumers can create a unique brand identity, setting the brand apart from competitors solely focused on functional attributes. Emotional connections become part of the brand’s narrative andareoftenmorememorablethanfeaturesorbenefits.However,relyingheavilyonemotional appeals might overshadow the actual value proposition and may not be sufficient to sustain long-termsuccess.Duringtimesofcrisisoreconomicturbulence,brandswithstrongemotional connections are often better equipped to weather the storm. Consumers who feel emotionally connected are more forgiving of occasional missteps, giving the brand the benefit of the doubt. These connections can serve as a buffer against negative publicity and public relations challenges. Nevertheless, critics caution against overestimating emotional connections as a panacea for all adversities, as the effectiveness of emotional appeals may vary depending on the nature and severity of the crisis.

IMPACT ON CONSUMER DECISION-MAKING

- Emotional connections can significantly influence consumer decision-making processes. Emotions can lead to impulse purchases, particularly when aligned with the consumer’s self-identity or aspirations. Marketers’ adept at tapping into emotions can create a sense of urgency or exclusivity, triggering quick decisions. However, critics argue that emotional appeals may not be sufficient when complex rational considerations are involved, such as major financial decisions, where logic and practicality play a more significant role. While emotional connections can captivate consumers, it is essential not to overshadow product or service quality. A strong emotional bond may initially attract consumers, but the product’s performance and value will determine long-term satisfaction. Some brands may focus excessively on emotional marketing without investing in the underlying quality, leading to disillusioned customers and eroding brand trust over time. Emotional intelligence (EI) has become a focal point in the study of consumer behavior, as marketers seek to understand and influence consumers’ emotional responses to their brand messages and products. EI’s influence on consumer decision-making has been touted as a key driver of successful marketing strategies. However, a critical examination of this relationship reveals both its potential benefits and inherent complexities. Emotional intelligence inmarketing involves identifying emotional triggers that resonate with consumers, evoking positive feelings such as joy, nostalgia, or a sense of belonging.

Marketers use emotional cues to craft compelling stories and experiences that connect with consumers on a deeper level. While emotional triggers can be effective in capturing attention and generating initial interest, critics argue that solely relying on emotions may distract consumersfromassessingtheproduct’sfunctionalattributesandlong-termbenefits.Emotional intelligence plays a pivotal role in shaping consumers’ perceptions of brands. Brands that display high emotional intelligence can foster a sense of trust, authenticity, and empathy,

leading to increased brand loyalty. Consumers may perceive such brands as being genuinely invested in their well-being, resulting in a stronger emotional attachment. However, some marketersmayexploitemotionalintelligencetocreateartificialemotional associations,leading to a shallow and fleeting connection that ultimately fails to build lasting loyalty. EI’s impact on consumer behavior often manifests in emotional decision-making. Consumers make many purchase decisions based on emotions rather than rational evaluations of product features or price points. Emotional appeals can sway consumers’ choices, leading to impulse purchases or preference for familiar brands associated with positive emotions. However, critics argue that heavy reliance on emotional decision-making might lead to buyers’ remorse or dissatisfaction when emotions subside, potentially affecting brand credibility in the long run. Emotional intelligence continues to play a role in post-purchase behavior and customer retention. Brands that maintain emotional connections beyond the initial purchase are more likely to encourage repeat purchases and foster brand advocates.

Emotional intelligence facilitates personalized customer interactions, such as personalized thank-you messages or tailored offers, which can enhance customer satisfaction and loyalty. However, striking the right balance between emotional engagement and privacy concerns remains a challenge. As emotional engagement emerges as a central focus in modern marketing, the integration of artificial intelligence (AI) has become a game-changer in cultivating deeper and more meaningful connections with consumers. AI’s ability to process vast amounts of data, analyze emotions, and deliver personalized experiences has transformed the way brands approach emotional engagement.

AI-poweredpersonalizationhasredefinedemotionalengagement byenablingbrandstodeliver tailored content, products, and experiences to individual consumers. By analyzing consumer preferences and behavior, AI can craft emotionally resonant messages that cater to each person’s unique emotional triggers. Personalization fosters a sense ofintimacyand connection, elevating emotional engagement to new heights. Nonetheless, there are concerns about privacy and data security, as personalization requires access to substantial amounts of consumer data. The emergence of AI-driven chatbots has revolutionized customer interactions, especially in customer support and service. By employing AI and natural language understanding, chatbots can simulate empathetic conversations and respond to emotional cues from consumers. Emotional chatbots aim to create a more human-like experience, showing understanding and empathyduringinteractions.However,criticshighlight that while AIchatbotscanhandle basic emotional interactions, they lack true emotional intelligence and may fall short in addressing complex emotional needs. AI-generated content, such as emotionally driven advertisements, social media posts, and product descriptions, has become increasingly prevalent. AI algorithms can analyze successful emotional content and create new, emotionally appealing material. This approach saves time and resources while allowing brands to engage with consumers on an emotional level. Nevertheless, critics argue that AI-generated content may lack genuine emotional authenticity, potentially leading to consumer skepticism or even backlash if it appears insincere or manipulative. AI’s involvement in emotional engagement raises ethical concerns, particularly regarding data privacy, emotional manipulation, and transparency. Collecting and analyzing emotional data requires careful consideration of consumers’ consent

and their right to data protection. Ensuring that emotional engagement is used ethically and responsibly is essential to avoid crossing ethical boundaries or exploiting consumers’ vulnerabilities.

UNDERSTANDING CONSUMER EMOTIONS

WITH AI - As consumer behavior increasingly becomes driven by emotions, understanding and deciphering these complex human responses have become crucial for marketers seeking to forge meaningful connections with their target audience. The advent of artificial intelligence (AI) has provided a novel approach to unraveling the intricacies of consumer emotions. However, a critical examination of the role of AI in this domain is essential to grasp both its potential and limitations. AI has revolutionized emotional analysis by allowing marketers to process massive amounts of unstructured data, including text, images, and videos, to gain insights into consumers’ emotional states. Through sentiment analysis and natural language processing, AI algorithms can identify emotional triggers and patterns in customer feedback, social media interactions, and product reviews. This data-driven approach offers marketers a wealth of information to craft emotionally resonant campaigns. Nonetheless, critics caution against relying solely on data-driven insights, as AI might overlook the complexities and subtleties of human emotions. While AI can detect and categorize basic emotions like happiness, sadness, or anger, understanding the deeper context and nuances of these emotions remains a challenge. Human emotions are often multilayered and influenced by a myriad of factors, including cultural background, personal experiences, and social context. AI’s reliance on data may not fully capture the depth and intricacy of emotional responses, leading to potential misinterpretations and oversimplifications. Brands must strike a balance between leveraging AI insights and incorporating human empathy to comprehend complex emotional experiences. Emotionally intelligent AI chatbots are designed to respond empathetically to consumers, providing a more personalized and human-like interaction. These chatbots are programmed to recognize and address emotions, such as frustration or satisfaction, to enhance the customer experience. However, critics argue that AI’s understanding of emotions might be superficial, lacking true empathy and genuine emotional connection. AI’s responses, no matter how sophisticated, may feel artificial and insincere, potentially leaving consumers dissatisfied. To harness the true potential of AI in understanding consumer emotions, marketers must complement data-driven insights with genuine human empathy. AI can provide valuable data points, but it is human understanding and emotional intelligence that can bridge the gap between data and authentic emotional connections. Combining the strengths of AI with the emotional intelligence of marketers can lead to more impactful emotional engagement strategies.

UTILIZING AITO GATHER AND ANALYZE EMOTIONAL DATA FROM VARIOUSSOURCES

In the quest to unlock deeper insights into consumer emotions, the integration of artificial intelligence (AI) has emerged as a powerful tool for gathering and analyzing emotional data from a myriad of sources. AI’s ability to process vast amounts of unstructured data, coupled with sophisticated sentiment analysis algorithms, has promised to revolutionize emotional engagementinmarketing.Socialmedia platforms,customerfeedback,online reviews,andchat

interactions serve as troves of emotional data that can provide a comprehensive view of consumer sentiments and preferences. This data-rich approach empowers marketers to create emotionally resonant campaigns tailored to specific audiences. However, the deluge of data raises concerns about data quality, accuracy, and the risk of misinterpretation. AI can simulate emotionally intelligent responses, providing consumers with empathetic interactions. While emotionally intelligent AI chatbots may impress consumers with their understanding of emotions, they lack genuine emotional comprehension. Human emotional intelligence and empathy cannot be replicated entirely by AI, and the risk of consumers feeling emotionally manipulated by AI-driven interactions remains a concern.

Sentiment analysis, also known as opinion mining, has become a prominent tool in understanding consumer sentiment, attitudes, and emotions. This AI-powered technique involves analyzing textual data, such as customer reviews, social media posts, and online discussions, to determine whether the expressed sentiments are positive, negative, or neutral. Sentiment analysis offers marketers an automated and scalable approach to process large volumes of textual data, providing insights into consumers’ feelings and opinions. This speed and efficiencyallow marketers to respond swiftlytocustomer feedback, track brand sentiment, and assess the impact of marketing campaigns. However, an overreliance on automated insights may risk overlooking the nuances and context that influence consumer sentiment, leading to incomplete or inaccurate interpretations.

THE RISK OF EMOTIONAL MANIPULATION - Empathetic AI-driven

chatbots may inadvertently manipulate emotions to keep users engaged or achieve specific business outcomes. While providing empathetic responses can enhance user experiences, using emotional responses solely to influence consumer behavior raises ethical concerns about emotionalmanipulation.AImodelsaretrainedonvastdatasetsthatmaycontainbiases,leading to biased empathetic responses. Bias in chatbot interactions can reinforce stereotypes, alienate certain user groups, or unintentionally discriminate. Brands must diligently address biases in chatbot training data to ensure fair and unbiased responses. While empathy is essential for customer interactions, chatbots must also prioritize accuracy and effectiveness in addressing user queries. Striking the right balance between empathetic responses and providing accurate information is critical to maintain trust and credibility with consumers. To avoid potential backlash, brands must be transparent about chatbots’ AI nature and limitations. Users should be informed that they are interacting with an AI-driven chatbot and understand its capabilities. Setting appropriate user expectations ensures that consumers do not feel deceived or disappointed by the chatbot’s responses.

EMOTIONAL STORYTELLING THROUGH AI-GENERATED CONTENT -

Emotional storytelling has long been a powerful tool for brands to connect with audiences, evoke emotions, and foster meaningful relationships. AI-generated content holds the promise of creating emotionally resonant narratives at scale. By analyzing vast amounts of data, AI algorithms can identify patterns in emotional responses and storytelling structures, potentially delivering content that aligns with audience preferences and emotional triggers. Emotional storytelling relies on authentic human experiences and perspectives. AI-generated content may struggle to capture the subtleties andcomplexities ofhumanemotions and experiences, leading

to narratives that feel generic or manufactured. AI-generated emotional storytelling raises concerns about potential emotional manipulation. Crafting content solely to evoke specific emotions for marketing or persuasive purposes may be perceived as disingenuous and undermines consumer trust. While AI can generate content based on patterns and data, human creativityremainsessentialforcraftingemotionallyauthenticandunique narratives.Emotional storytellingofteninvolvesvulnerability,empathy,and an understandingof human psychology, aspects that AI may lack. AI-generated emotional storytelling often relies on personal data to tailor content to individual preferences and emotions. Striking the right balance between personalization and data privacy is critical to ensure ethical data handling and consumer trust. Brands must consider the ethical implications of using AI-generated emotional content. Transparency, informed consent, and adherence to data protection regulations are essential to safeguard consumer privacy and ensure responsible use of emotional data. Brands must be cautious about outsourcing their emotional storytelling entirely to AI. Maintaining brand authenticityandhumanconnectioniscrucialinbuildinggenuine relationshipswithconsumers.

INTEGRATING EMOTIONAL METRICS WITH TRADITIONAL PERFORMANCE INDICATORS

The integration of emotional metrics with traditional performance indicators represents a transformative approach in assessing the holistic impact of marketing campaigns. By combining emotional insights with conventional measurements, brands can gain a comprehensive understanding of the emotional resonance of their strategies and their influence on tangible outcomes. This section critically examines the process of integrating emotional metrics with traditional performance indicators, highlighting its benefits, challenges, and ethical considerations. Traditional performance indicators such as sales, conversion rates, and click- through rates provide quantitative insights into campaign effectiveness. Integrating emotionalmetrics,suchassentimentanalysis,emotionalengagementscores,andbrandaffinity measures, enriches the evaluation process by revealing the emotional impact on consumer behavior. Linking emotional metrics with traditional indicators bridges the gap between emotional engagement and tangible outcomes. Brands can uncover how emotional resonance directly influences consumer actions, shedding light on the underlying drivers of conversions and loyalty. The integration allows brands to pivot from transactional approaches to consumercentric strategies. By understanding howemotions shape consumer decisions, brands cantailor their messaging and experiences to create deeper emotional connections.

THEETHICALIMPLICATIONSOF USINGAIFOR EMOTIONALENGAGEMENT

- The use of artificial intelligence (AI) for emotional engagement in marketing introduces a range of ethical considerations that demand careful examination. While AI offers exciting opportunities to enhance emotional connections between brands and consumers, it also raises concerns about privacy, manipulation, consent, and the potential impact on human relationships. This section critically explores the ethical implications of employing AI for emotional engagement, shedding light on the complexities that marketers and brands must navigate. The ethical implications of using AI for emotional engagement underscore the need for a critical and responsible approach to leveraging technology for emotional connections.

While AI offers the potential to enhance brand-consumer relationships, the considerations of informed consent, emotional manipulation, cultural sensitivity, and algorithmic biases demand vigilantethicaloversight.Brandsmust prioritizeauthenticity,consumerwell-being,andethical AI development to navigate the complexities of emotional engagement in an ethically sound manner. By critically examining the ethical dimensions and ensuring responsible practices, brands can harness the transformative potential of AI while upholding ethical standards and fostering meaningful, genuine, and ethical emotional connections with their consumers.

CONCLUSIONS

In the pursuit of deeper, more resonant connections between brands and consumers, the integration of emotional intelligence (EI) and artificial intelligence (AI) stands as a transformative force. The profound impact of AI-driven emotional marketing is shedding light on its potential to forge authentic, enduring relationships with consumers. Emotional intelligence empowers brands to tailor their approaches, ensuring they resonate on a profound, emotionallevel.AI,withitsdata-driveninsightsanddynamicadaptability,amplifiesemotional intelligence to an unprecedented scale. The integration of AI not only decodes complex emotional patterns but also delivers personalized experiences, redefining the way brands connect with people. Yet, amidst this technological revolution, a crucial thread emerged: the imperative to balance technology with genuine human connection. The fine art of emotionally resonant marketing lies not in replacing human interactions, but in enhancing them. AI serves as an invaluable tool, guiding strategies and optimizing experiences, but it is the authenticity of human emotions that remains the bedrock of enduring relationships., It is obvious that the future of emotional marketing lies at the intersection of technology and human emotion. The brands that thrive will be those that master this delicate dance, leveraging the power of AI to augment, not replace, the profound connections that form the heart of human experiences. Through this critical examination there can be seen a path forward – one that combines innovation with ethics, and technology with empathy, to unlock emotional intelligence in ways that resonate, inspire, and endure.

References

[1] Alvarez, C., & Fournier, S. (2016). “Consumers’ Relationships with Brands.” Current Opinion in Psychology, 10, 129–135.

[2] Feldman, R. (2013). “Techniques and Applications for Sentiment Analysis.” Communications of the ACM, 56(4), 82–89.

[3] Hwang, J., & Kandampully, J. (2012). “The Role of Emotional Aspects in Younger Consumer-Brand Relationships.” Journal of Product & Brand Management, 21(2), 98–108.

[4] Jorfi, H., Fauzy Bin Yacco, H., & Md Shah, I. (2012). “Role of Gender in Emotional Intelligence: Relationship Among Emotional Intelligence, Communication Effectiveness and Job Satisfaction.” International Journal of Management, 29(4).

[5] Kidwell, B., Hardesty, D. M., Murtha, B. R., & Sheng, S. (2011). “Emotional Intelligence in Marketing Exchanges.” Journal of Marketing, 75(1), 78–95.

[6] Munoko, I., Brown-Liburd, H. L., & Vasarhelyi, M. (2020). “The Ethical Implications of Using Artificial Intelligence in Auditing.” Journal of Business Ethics, 167(2), 209–234.

[7] Peter, P. C. (2010). “Emotional intelligence.” In Wiley International Encyclopedia of Marketing. John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.

[8] Vredeveld, A. J. (2018). “Emotional Intelligence, External Emotional Connections and Brand Attachment.” Journal of Product & Brand Management, 27(5), 545–556.

[9] Willman-Iivarinen,H.(2017). “TheFutureofConsumer DecisionMaking.”EuropeanJournalofFuturesResearch, 5(1), 14.

[10] Zaidi N., M. Maurya, S. Grima, P. Tyagi (2024). “Building AI Driven Marketing Capabilities - Understand Customer Needs and Deliver Value Through AI”. Apress Berkeley.

[11] Zhang, L., Wang, S., & Liu, B. (2018). “Deep Learning for Sentiment Analysis: A Survey.” WIREs Data Mining and Knowledge Discovery, 8(4).

A Shift in Retail Perspective Considering Customers’ Three-Dimensionality

Dr. Ioan Matei PURCĂREA

Abstract

Retailers’ competition in generating phygital trips in the current inflationary economy is fiercer than ever. There is an increase in winning the more price-conscious consumers by creating a coherent connection between physical and digital stores. The role of the new AI strategies and AI-enabled marketing teams is more and more important. Retail disruption and the future of retail is gaining increasing attention. And to be prepared for retail’s next chapter it is worth better adapting to continuous change, growing by reflection.

Keywords: Phigital retail; E-Commerce; Retail disruption; AI strategies; AI-enabled marketing teams; Customers’ three-dimensionality

JEL Classification: D83; L21; L81; M21; M31; M37; O31; O33

Retailers’ competition in generating phygital trips in the current inflationary economy

In our last RDCM issue (Purcarea, 2023) we underlined the need of better understanding the multidirectional impact of e-commerce and the role of having a successful e-commerce interaction, also making reference, among other aspects, to the continuously changing consumer satisfaction as a situation changes, what makes us think dynamically about patterns of behavior. According to a 2023 e-commerce marketplace report commissioned by Ware2Go (a UPS

company), when shopping (E2E CX across them being essential) on these marketplaces (Amazon, Walmart, Target, Macy’s, Wayfair etc.) consumers’ expectations (considering their lack of loyalty, after product discovery their final purchase could be made on a different channel) regarding delivery standards are moving closer towards free shipping over a price threshold, 2day option on all orders, free shipping for all orders, and multiple shipping options (Ware2Go, 2023). For instance, the top considerations of US consumers when contrasting different marketplaces are as follows: Price, 81% ; Product quality, 69%; Product selection 64%; Shipping cost, 61%; Shipping speed, 50%.

A traditional RetailWire discussion (Ryan, 2024) focused on analyzing the launch of the first Target’s first paid membership program under the Target Circle umbrella making the most of valorizing the same-day delivery (by combining Target’s RedCard credit card and Shipt membership programs) revealed interesting points of view, such as: how challenging is to generate e-commerce or store trips in the current inflationary economy taking into account the generally higher priced Target’s offerings, Target also needing to be aware of the fact that both the same-day delivery demand, and frequent repeat purchases are driven by the grocery baskets (John Hennessy); done at the right time it’s a winning game for price shoppers to make comparisons, considering membership costs’ objectivity (Christopher P. Ramey); there is an obvious competitive advantage for retailers offering same-day shipping that is super convenient for customers (Shep Hyken).

Coming back to Ware2Go approach, it is worth remembering that also recently they highlighted how the delivery experience represents the first physical experience with a product of e-commerce shoppers, the key factors in creating an excellent CX in the digital-first retail environment being fulfillment and delivery (Ware2Go, 2024).

Winning the more price-conscious consumers by creating a coherent connection between physical and digital stores. The role of the new AI strategies and AI-enabled marketing teams

Placer.ai (Margalit, L., 2024) brought to our attention an interesting comparison regarding brands’ visits between U.S. leading eyewear brands being on a course of enlargement, the online-only retailer, launched in 2010, Warby Parker (that opened three years later its first physical store and having now already 250) and America's Best Contacts & Eyeglasses (a discount eyewear chain, having now more than 900 stores). It was underlined within this framework suggestive aspects, such as: the for many consumers’ viable option represented by the digital try-on and easy returns; the difference between the two retailers represented by the fact that the last one is serving a lower Herfindahl-Hirschman Index (HHI) demographic and have as a goal to win the more price-conscious consumers.

According to the reputed Dr. Wided Batat (2024), to create a coherent connection between physical and digital settings it is essential to establish a continuum in consumer value. Focused on better valorizing metaverse and the immersive phygital CX in it, he demonstrated

that it has no sense to replicate all sensory dimensions (positive effects have been confirmed only from sight and touch) in the metaverse (by combining physical and digital worlds’ features) based on integrating ER technologies. And in order to capture the evolving consumers’ perceptions of these dimensions, as well as consumers’ real-time reactions to ER technologies it is needed to use a mix of quantitative and qualitative methods in future research. Allow us to remember that Batat (2021) explained the difference between phygital (as a holistic approach, and as ecosystem describing the combination of a digital experience and a physical one, providing not only functional values, but also humanizing CX by intensifying individuals’ emotions) and omnichannel (that is using digital with the purchase and e-commerce logic to connect touchpoint). He shown, for instance, how in designing CX, to intensify consumers engagement, it is necessary to also use in the digital space both the five senses, and sensory maximization, a holistic and customer-centric approach being essential in ensuring phygital transformation (delivering coherent and consistent value in both directions).

On the other hand, a report published by Retail Economics (2024) in association with Auctane gave special importance to omnichannel approach (presenting omnichannel behaviour flow across online and in-store channels) and the critical role of delivery and logistics. The report presented retail evolution (Single channel, pre 1992; Multichannel, 1993-2006; Omnichannel, 2007-2022; Unified commerce, 2023+) over the last 30+ years, and revealed significant aspects such as: the powerful competitive attention economy created by the increasing mobile device use, social media, and proliferation of ecommerce platforms; how essential is customer engagement with relevant personalised content encouraging conversion; the rising importance for research and discovery of online marketplaces, as well of social media for product discovery and purchase inspiration; the increased preference of international shoppers for ‘home delivery’ as ‘go-to’ option, as well as more quickly development of lockers, click-and-collect, and other pick-up points.

A recent report by RETHINK Retail (2024) in partnership with Lily AI (a retail technology platform using a mix of GenAI, computer vision, NLP, ML, and deep learning), focused on closing the retail-consumer expectation gap with the help of the new AI strategies, revealed the domination of three e-commerce technologies (‘on-site search’ – 71% of respondents; ‘product reviews’ – 52% of respondents; ‘social media shopping’ – 42% of respondents) preferred by North American shoppers (in significant sectors like fashion, home, and beauty). This report confirmed the importance of a more holistically enhancement of consumer product discovery (customer journey being empowered with the most recent AI tools and ML algorithms), as well as of consumers’ inspiration by high-quality contextual content

It is worth mentioning here that Gartner’ s experts (2024)1 highlighted that to manage disruption CMOs need to focus on building AI-enabled marketing teams (as a continuous cycle:

1 Gartner, 2024. Leadership Vision for Disruptive Moments, The Chief Marketing Officer 1Q24, pp. 5-6, 10-13. Available at: <https://emt.gartnerweb.com/ngw/globalassets/en/marketing/documents/q1-2024-cmojournal.pdf?> [Accessed 21 March 2024].

identifying priorities, building capabilities, aligning to model, and evaluating impact) and remodel marketing’s value (making a map of the course to catalytic value as the basis for a new customer engagement strategy), as well as on both scaling marketing’s commercial impact and driving profitability by orchestrating customer-led growth plans (reducing collaboration drag). Going on this path marketing teams will be enabled to valorize the new technologies, contributing to the success of essential digital growth initiatives.

Shoptalk 2024: Retail disruption and the future of retail

The annual retail conference Shoptalk 2024 (U.S., Las Vegas, Nevada, March 17 – 20, 2024) is a special occasion to show consideration for the future of retail, the first day marking the start of the “Shark Reef” Startup Pitch competition in which retail solutions based on innovative technologies were presented by 12 recently started to develop B2B retail-technology businesses, master of ceremonies and lead judge being the reputed CEO and Founder of Coresight Research (a research partner of Shoptalk 2024), Deborah Weinswig (Doijad, 2024). One of the four areas of retail disruption in which the above-mentioned innovative retail-technology startups were categorized by Coresight Research was e-commerce operations and fulfillment (together with AI/AI-based content, shoppable media and experiential commerce, and post-purchase CX and loyalty). For example, one of the innovative competitors was Portless (founded in 2023 and having headquarters in Toronto, Ontario, Canada), that is offering direct shipping solutions for ecommerce brands, streamlining supply chain processes, and making possible to achieve greater cost efficiency and a quickly reaction to changing market demands.

Keynote speakers talked about very interesting topics. There were significant insights revealed by Coresight Research all along the Shoptalk 2024 event (Harmon a, 2024; Harmon b, 2024; Harmon c, 2024; Harmon d, 2024), for instant: the importance of business transformation by employing AI, good data being the key to AI success (also being considered vital to have employee feedback when putting into action new technologies); there are lessons to learn for brands and retailers from Amazon’s knowledge and experience to build and precisely adjust its retail media network or in using AI in product imagery; the need of better knowing customers and implement personalization strategies driving long-term engagement, as well as of benefitting from with supply chain participants’ data sharing; Walmart’s management critical and thoughtful approach toward AI implementation; the ways (identified by the CEO and Founder of Coresight Research) needed for retail companies to win on Chinese complex and competitive market; retailers’ and brands’ challenges to valorize AI and GenAI; the value of shoppable video in encouraging the development of customer engagement was underlined by the representatives from Fanatics, TikTok and Walmart; the importance of ensuring a frictionless and personalized shopping experience within the phygital journey; an increased focus on authenticity as the key to driving shoppable video’s future; lessons to learn from Walmart’s Luminate unique approach to monetizing its data, and Zalando’s unique data and fulfillment network across Europe

We appreciate Coresight Research insights, a result of a traditional rigorous analysis, and we recommend it for in-depth study. It is worth mentioning that Coresight Research (Kumar, 2024), as an official research partner, presented already in February 2024 the key sessions’ essential guide (across the following retail themes: employing AI to transform your business, harnessing brand power and building brand trust, building loyalty via seamless customer journeys, creating unified retail experiences, and navigating changing industry relationships).

Instead of conclusions: Adapting to continuous change, growing by reflection

In the last three years we wrote, for instance, about the disrupted retail and the innovative technology, connecting data (Purcarea, 2021), e-commerce personalization wanted by the next generation of shoppers, livestreaming e-commerce, q-commerce, social commerce, and the metaverse (Purcarea, 2022), and the paradigm shift in e-commerce within the context of the new AI space race (Purcarea, 2023). We recall that some years ago our attention has been drawn to report entitled “RETAIL 5.0: CHECK-OUT THE FUTURE” (Kowalkiewicz, Rosemann and Dootson, 2017) and prepared by the PwC Chair in Digital Economy based at Queensland University of Technology (QUT), Brisbane, Queensland,Australia. This report made reference to the five stages of retail industry evolution (1.0 Production; 2.0 Industrialisation; 3.0Automation; 4.0 Digitisation; 5.0 Individualisation), stating as follows: “Retail 5.0 means the retailer comes to you… Ultimately, 5.0 means that the shift from a push-based to a pull-based value chain that we have witnessed in the retailer–manufacturer relationship since the 1980s now also hits the retailer–consumer relationship…” (p. 11).

More recently, our attention has been drawn to a recent edition of McKinseyAuthor Talks starting from a book published at the beginning of this year (Wiley, January 2024) and entitled “Redefining Retail: 10 Guiding Principles for a Post-Digital World”,Authors being the reputed Philip Kotler and Giuseppe Stigliano.As we are witnessing “a perfect storm going on in retailing” (Kotler), and “an exponential transformation, rather than an evolution” (Stigliano), while moving from multichannel (focus on quantity) and omnichannel (focus on seamless integration of all available channels) to optichanneling (optimization of the available channels). The discussion (Kotler, Stigliano and Mondalek, 2024) ended with the following statement by Stigliano: “Now we’re talking about future interactions with digital and physical touchpoints of a consumer, a perspective consumer, or client, who starts the relationship with the brand in a virtual world. This is something completely new. That’s why we define this customer journey as three dimensional. We call it a three-dimensional customer. ”

And to be prepared for retail’s next chapter it is worth better adapting to continuous change, growing by reflection

References

Batat, W., 2024. Phygital customer experience in the metaverse: A study of consumer sensory perception of sight, touch, sound, scent, and taste, Journal of Retailing and Consumer Services, Volume 78, May 2024. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jretconser.2024.103786.

Batat, W., 2021. How Phygital Is Humanizing the Customer Experience, Inc.com, Jun 2, 2021. Available at: <https://www.inc.com/wided-batat/how-phygital-is-humanizing-customerexperience.html> [Accessed 22 March 2024].

Doijad, V., 2024. Shoptalk 2024 “Shark Reef” Startup Pitch Competition: Preview 12 Innovators, Four Areas of Retail Disruption, Coresight Research, March 11, 2024. Available at:

<https://coresight.com/research/shoptalk-2024-shark-reef-startup-pitch-competition-preview-12innovators-four-areas-of-retail-disruption/?> [Accessed 16 March 2024].

Gartner, 2024. Leadership Vision for Disruptive Moments, The Chief Marketing Officer 1Q24, pp. 5-6, 10-13. Available at:

<https://emt.gartnerweb.com/ngw/globalassets/en/marketing/documents/q1-2024-cmojournal.pdf?> [Accessed 21 March 2024].

Harmon, J., 2024. Shoptalk 2024 Day One: Game-Changing AI, Multi-Benefit Associate Apps and the Keys to Success for Retail Media (Not for the Faint-Hearted), Coresight Research, March 18, 2024. Available at: <https://coresight.com/research/shoptalk-2024-day-one/> [Accessed 21 March 2024].

Harmon, J., 2024. Shoptalk 2024 Day Two: A Triad of Trends Personalization, Innovation and Collaboration, Coresight Research, March 19, 2024. Available at: <https://coresight.com/research/shoptalk-2024-day-two/> [Accessed 21 March 2024].

Harmon, J., 2024. Shoptalk 2024 Day Three: A Thoughtful Approach to GenAI; Retail Innovation in China, Coresight Research, March 20, 2024. Available at: <https://coresight.com/research/shoptalk-2024-day-three/?> [Accessed 21 March 2024].

Harmon, J., 2024. Shoptalk 2024 Day Four: Innovation for Innovation’s Sake?, Coresight Research, March 20, 2024. Available at: <https://coresight.com/research/shoptalk-2024-dayfour/?> [Accessed 22 March 2024].

Kotler, P., Stigliano, G., Mondalek, A., 2024. Author Talks: Philip Kotler and Giuseppe Stigliano on retail’s next chapter, McKinsey Global Publishing, Interview, March 19, 2024. Available at: <https://www.mckinsey.com/featured-insights/mckinsey-on-books/author-talksphilip-kotler-and-giuseppe-stigliano-on-retails-next-chapter?> [Accessed 22 March 2024].

Kowalkiewicz, M., Rosemann, M. and Dootson, P., 2017. RETAIL 5.0: CHECK-OUT THE FUTURE, PwC Chair in Digital Economy, Queensland University of Technology (QUT), Brisbane, Queensland, Australia, pp. 1-24. Available at: <https://chairdigitaleconomy.com.au/wp-content/uploads/2018/04/Retail-5.0-Check-out-theFuture.pdf> [Accessed 22 March 2024].

Kumar, A., 2024. Essential Guide to Shoptalk 2024: Strategies and Opportunities Across Five Retail Themes, Coresight Research, February 21, 2024. Available at: <https://coresight.com/research/shoptalk-2024-day-four/?> [Accessed 21 February 2024].

Margalit, L., 2024. Diving Into Brick-and-Mortar Eyewear, Placer.ai, February 27, 2024. Available at: <https://www.placer.ai/blog/diving-into-brick-and-mortar-eyewear [Accessed 4 March 2024].

Purcarea, I.M., 2021. The Disrupted Retail and the Innovative Technology: Connecting Data, Romanian Distribution Committee Magazine, vol. 11(4), pp. 32-42, January.

Purcarea, I.M., 2022. E-Commerce Personalization Wanted by the Next Generation of Shoppers. Livestreaming E-Commerce, Q-commerce, Social Commerce, and the Metaverse, Romanian Distribution Committee Magazine, vol. 13(4), pp. 40-55, December.

Purcarea, I.M., 2023. Successful E-Commerce Interaction, and the Multidirectional Impact of ECommerce, Romanian Distribution Committee Magazine, vol. 14(4), pp. 42-50, December.

Purcarea, I.M., 2023. The Paradigm Shift in E-Commerce Within the Context of the New AI Space Race, Romanian Distribution Committee Magazine, vol. 14(3), pp. 33-39, August.

RETAIL ECONOMICS, 2024. Ecommerce Delivery Benchmark Report 2024, RETAIL ECONOMICS in association with AUCTANE, February 2024. Available at: <https://www.retaileconomics.co.uk/retail-insights/thought-leadership-reports/ecommercedelivery-benchmark-report-2024> [Accessed 21 March 2024].

RETHINK Retail, 2024. How New AI Strategies Are Helping Bridge the Consumer Expectation Gap, RETHINK Retail in partnership with Lily AI, pp. 2, 5, 7, 9, 20. Available at: <https://issuu.com/rethink-retail/docs/how_ai_helps_bridge_the_consumer_expectation_gap> [Accessed 21 March 2024].

Ryan, T., 2024. Target Leans Into Same-Day Delivery in Paid Membership Launch, RetailWire, March 6, 2024. Available at: <https://retailwire.com/discussion/target-leans-into-same-daydelivery-in-paid-membership-launch/?> [Accessed 9 March 2024].

Ware2Go, 2023. 2023 eCommerce Marketplace Report, Market Research, May 12, 2023, pp. 19. Available at: <https://explore.ware2go.co/ecommerce-marketplace-report-2023> [Accessed 13 March 2024].

Ware2Go, 2024. How to Increase Customer Lifetime Value with Fulfillment, Demand & Inventory Planning, February 26, 2024. Available at: <https://ware2go.co/articles/how-toincrease-customer-lifetime-value/?> [Accessed 13 March 2024].

● The 33rdAnniversary Celebration of Romanian-American University, “AMiracle of Romania”

OnApril 1, 2007 an interesting newspaper article – entitled “AMiracle of Romania, and following the line of visionary thoughts” – appeared on the website of the Romanian Distribution Committee, the article starting from the statement of His Excellency Mr. Moscardo de Souza, formerAmbassador of Brazil to Romania (and laterAmbassador of Brazil to Belgium), with regard to the Romanian-American University as "Amiracle of Romania". Mr. Moscardo de Souza is the one who argued (as Ambassador of Brazil to Belgium) in the Diplomatique Gazette, Brussels, that a "cultural mutation" would be necessary to transfer the target point of the economic to the meta economic and of the material scenarios to the human person. In a comment regarding this stance, the Founder of the Romanian-American University, Professor Ion Smedescu, expressed his pleasure to follow the line of visionary thoughts about the organization of the planetary society in the context of radical changes and extraordinary effects that necessarily impose a new task, specific to a deep and tenacious philosophy, reconciling the conceptions to be able to put the economy at the service of society, against the background of the development of a more participatory citizen attitude. The volume of “Expuneri, Alocuţiuni, Mesaje (1991-2006)”, published in 2007 at the Pro Universitaria Publishing House, Bucharest, and signed by Ion Smedescu, offered the opportunity to understand the tenacious constructive

approach of the one who sheds a tear of the soul with each passing year added to the history of this “Miracle of Romania”, the Romanian-American University (RAU), as if confirming Brancusi’s words: “Time perfects the human spirit, and the spirit itself demands this”

(https://www.crd-aida.ro/2007/04/o-%e2%80%9cminune-a-romaniei%e2%80%9d-si-urmarireafirului-gandurilor-vizionare/).

It is suggestive to remember here the congratulatory remarks made by the 2007 RAU Management-Marketing School Valedictorian, Cosmin Tănase-Gheorghiu, on the occasion of the celebrating of RAU 25th anniversary: “Celebrating the 25th anniversary of the RomanianAmerican University elicits a storehouse of wonderful memories, heightens my appreciation for the work of professors, students and the entire academic community, evoking many thoughts about the past, the present and the future. My experience at the Romanian-American University is bound up inextricably with the intellectual pursuits that I have followed. There are important, but more elusive, qualities of this University – a unique place – that are more difficult to put into words. I believe that the character of its special academic prestige was distinctively shaped by the expectation that each and every one of us will bring our full share of curiosity, analysis, passion, and intellectual brilliance to bear on our lifelong search for new insights and interpretations. To me, it is the fulfilling notion that the Romanian-American University could achieve at once, namely teach students to explore new intellectual horizons, and at the same time, create class after class of devoted alumni who see positive action in the real world as their highest achievement. It has been a great honor and privilege for me to participate with my professors and colleagues in the never-ending task of building an academic community of distinction. Through our efforts, generation by generation, a 25-year enterprise has not only endured but flourished and I am glad to be a part of this achievement. For all these reasons, the Romanian-American University will always have a special place in my heart and memory” (https://holisticmarketingmanagement.ro/congratulatory-remarks-celebrating-the-25thanniversary-of-rau/).

Coming back to Brussels, it is worth mentioning that just two years before (onApril 18, 2014) another interesting newspaper article – entitled “More than a happy coincidence: a new reference to the Romanian-American University in ‘Distribution d’aujourd’hui’, Brussels” –appeared on the website of the “Holistic Marketing Management” journal of RAU ManagementMarketing School: “…in Brussels the prestigious journal “Distribution d’aujourd’hui” (55ème année, Janvier – Février – Mars 2014; published in French and Dutch) made a new reference to RAU through the expert voice of Professor Léon F. WEGNEZ. On the occasion of this anniversary of 23 years of excellence in bringing the education and career of the RomanianAmerican University Students forward, while keeping pace with the times that come and go, and reinforcing the strengths of this wonderful educational citadel by testifying the importance of teamwork governed by values and principles, our whole academic family is continuing to honor the memory of the great man that was Professor ION SMEDESCU, Founding-President and Rector of the Romanian-American University between 1991 and 2008”

(https://holisticmarketingmanagement.ro/more-than-a-happy-coincidence-a-new-reference-tothe-romanian-american-university-in-distribution-daujourdhui-brussels/).

Drawing an arc over time it is important to refer to the impressive RAU Opening Ceremony of the 2023-2024 academic year, which took place on Friday, September 29, 2023. A significant newspaper article – entitled “Academic excellence, learning, innovation and international collaboration” – appeared on the website of the “Holistic Marketing Management” journal of RAU Management-Marketing School: “The participants of the opening ceremony were warmly greeted by the Rector of the Romanian-American University Costel Negricea, who conveyed a significant message regarding academic excellence, learning, innovation and international collaboration. Next, Professor Costel Negricea invited Her Excellency Mrs. Kathleen Kavalec, the Ambassador of the United States of America to Romania, to take the floor. Her Excellency’s rigorously organized, pertinent and elegant speech captured the attention of the audience, stimulating both reflection on the highlighted relevant aspects and the quality of the speeches delivered by the following distinguished speakers. A special merit also went to the video messages sent by several traditional partners of the Romanian-American University, such as the President of the James Madison University in the USA, Jonathan R. Alger, an acclaimed specialist in higher education policy.”

It is again an honor to recall the words of the RAU Founder, Professor Ion Smedescu:

“For me, the Romanian-American University is everything: my home, my profession and my spare time. This establishment of education and science is a mirror of me and of my work for tens of years, my eternal soul, and my idea for the renewal of the concept of work.”Allow us to remember that Professor Ion Smedescu chose the same day as Rev. Prof. Dr. Dumitru Stăniloae, the 5th of October (1993, namely 2008), to step on the path of eternity. Former student of the „Christian love Theologian” – Father Stăniloae, Professor Ion Smedescu often mentioned Father Stăniloae, speaking of the mysterious beauty of a wonderful landscape and the necessity of the conscious sense of the ordinance, of the beauty, in order to perform a task the right way, in joyful communion. Professor ION SMEDESCU always knew how to guide RAU academic family, giving shared ambition and purpose, determining a real commitment to the necessary cultural transformation to keep RAU dream alive and well, never forgetting what makes RAU unique. He

always linked explicitly expectations to goals, designed the proper roles for future needs, cultivated leaders through apprenticeship, and involved stakeholders in building desire for change in accordance with his fundamental sense of noble mission and urgency.