Epitomizing an emerging category: Effects of entrepreneurial firms and influential stakeholders on the entrepreneurial firms’ status attainment
研究了创业企业如何通过修辞策略（对比与独特性主张）以及应对既有品类中有影响力利益相关者的负面回应，来塑造新兴品类的符号边界，从而影响自身地位获取。基于韩国在线报纸数据，发现对比主张提升地位，而独特性主张在无负面回应时反而降低地位。
This article explores the status-attainment process of entrepreneurial firms in emerging categories. Previous literature emphasizes that in emerging categories, being perceived as the exemplars is important to attain status. We emphasize that clear symbolic boundaries around emerging categories can increase the possibility of exemplar perception and argue that entrepreneurial firms and influential stakeholders of existing categories can affect the status-attainment process by changing such perception. Specifically, contrast and distinctiveness rhetorical claims employed by entrepreneurial firms and negative responses from influential stakeholders differently affect status by delineating symbolic boundaries around the emerging category to varying degrees. We find support for our arguments in Korean online newspapers. The utilization of contrast claims compared with print media or receiving conciliations from print media’s influential stakeholders increased the status of online newspapers, measured by news-source citations. However, distinctiveness claims compared with other online newspapers negatively affect status, albeit mitigated by negative responses from influential stakeholders.