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4.74 Degrees of Separation on Facebook

Posted by samzenpus on from the closer-than-you-think dept.

First time accepted submitter perryizgr8 writes "Facebook Data Team has taken all the friends data of everyone on Facebook and analyzed it, finding out the shortest distance between every two persons. They can now confidently say that the average degree of separation between any two humans is 4.74, not six as previously claimed by various entities."

12 of 216 comments (clear)

  1. Disagree by Kazymyr · · Score: 4, Insightful

    Mine is infinity since I don't have a facebook account.

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    1. Re:Disagree by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Insightful

      You also don't know anyone with a Facebook account, and no one you know knows anyone with a Facebook account, and so on? I'm not sure you understand what they are talking about, you read "Facebook" and just wanted to tell people you don't use it.

    2. Re:Disagree by rapidreload · · Score: 5, Insightful

      Lemme guess, you don't have a TV either but want to tell the world regardless?

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    3. Re:Disagree by fisted · · Score: 5, Insightful

      yeah, so antisocial not to hand over all data to facebook.

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    4. Re:Disagree by foobsr · · Score: 4, Insightful

      is the degree 0 or 1 between two people that know each other personally

      The question might be whether the degree between you and yourself is infinity and only approaches 1 after an enormous amount of training. Just a thought.

      The implication is that any small number whithin the context given is worth ... well.

      CC.

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      TaijiQuan (Huang, 5 loosenings)
  2. Skewed Data? by Sharkyfour · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Wouldn't this be skewed by all the people who befriend random strangers to increase the size of the Mafia's or farm friends?

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    sharkyfour.com
  3. So overall, it is 6... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Insightful

    6 degrees of separation, not limited to any single medium

    Just under 5 for any two facebook'ees
    but to get to anyone not on facebook, you'd have to go one extra hop

    1. Re:So overall, it is 6... by TexVex · · Score: 4, Insightful

      I understood that six degrees was supposed to be the maximum, not the average.

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  4. no it's not by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Insightful

    it is 4.74 + 1; think about it...

    1. Re:no it's not by Tomato42 · · Score: 5, Insightful

      4.75 + 1 in my book is very close to the "old, frowned up, value" of six...

    2. Re:no it's not by jrumney · · Score: 4, Insightful

      There are whole villages across Asia, Africa and South America that do not have an internet connection. Are you sure everyone on Earth knows someone with a facebook account?

  5. Not exactly. by raehl · · Score: 4, Insightful

    The old value is that no person is more than 6 degrees of separation from ANY OTHER PERSON, period. So, randomly pick any person on the planet, and you should be able to get to that person with no more than 5 intervening people.

    An *AVERAGE* of 4.74 doesn't say anything about a 6-person maximum.

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    paintball