The Science of Social Participation

cold fjord writes in with this story about research that breaks down Twitter conversations in 6 basic types."The Pew Research Center and the Social Media Research Foundation analyzed thousands of twitter conversations going back to 2010. They found these conversations occurred based on the structure of the individual's Twitter network. For example, the subjects and content that a person tweets about, the people they follow, the people who follow them and the way they network creates a structure of social activity. In a recently released report Pew reports that they uncovered six distinct patterns for these structures. 'These are data-driven early steps in understanding Twitter discussion structures that contribute to the emerging science of social participation,' Ben Shneiderman professor of computer science at the University of Maryland ... 'This new field is emerging right before our eyes and could eventually have a large impact on our understanding of everything from health to community safety, from business innovation to citizen science and from civic engagement to sustainable energy programs.' ... 'These maps provide insights into people's behavior in a way that complements and expands on traditional research methods ... '"

Comments

It's a Cookbook

[Bob9113]

The Pew Research Center and the Social Media Research Foundation analyzed thousands of twitter conversations going back to 2010. ... 'These maps provide insights into people's behavior in a way that complements and expands on traditional research methods ... '

It's a cookbook. Society is a fuzzy programmable machine, and we are rapidly advancing the science of computer aided psychological operations (CAPO). Widespread use of centralized insecure comm systems makes the research work really easy. Lambs to the slaughter.

Re:It's a Cookbook

[cold fjord]

Couple that with the growing understanding of the brain, how it functions, and how to read it via various imaging techniques, and the growing understanding of the genetic links to behavior and you have the foundations for the future development of either major medical breakthroughs, or terrible tools of oppression. I wonder if we have the ethics to use these many new tools for good? Humanity has a tendency for technology to outpace wisdom.

Re:It's a Cookbook

[paazin]

Couple that with the growing understanding of the brain, how it functions, and how to read it via various imaging techniques, and the growing understanding of the genetic links to behavior and you have the foundations for the future development of either major medical breakthroughs, or terrible tools of oppression. I wonder if we have the ethics to use these many new tools for good? Humanity has a tendency for technology to outpace wisdom.

Much of this rhetoric borders on needless alarmism; we've had technologies of destruction and oppression for decades and we've managed fairly well despite it. Don't forget that psychological/scientific analysis of human behavior has been influencing politics and those in power for over a century now.

Boring.

[Anonymous Coward]

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Re:Boring.

[Anonymous Coward]

According to the latest research from the Amazon Unbiased Research Foundation Center, the Cloud can provide Solutions to grow your Business!

Re:Yeesh

[Mashiki]

But "social scientists" know all, see all, eat all, and tell you where to shit at the end of the day.

Didn't Azimov call this Psychohistory?

[sandbagger]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/P...

Those who wish not to participate?

[EzInKy]

Wouldn't that be a more interesting study? What do researchers make of those who do not want their every bowell movement be globally shared make of them? Do they simply label such people as social parranahs who are trying to hide illicit activity or do they factor in sincere the sincere desires to preserve a human being's privacy?

Re:Those who wish not to participate?

[cascadingstylesheet]

Wouldn't that be a more interesting study? What do researchers make of those who do not want their every bowell movement be globally shared make of them? Do they simply label such people as social parranahs who are trying to hide illicit activity or do they factor in sincere the sincere desires to preserve a human being's privacy?

Or who maybe just aren't interested? Or who maybe (gasp) don't even use Twitter?

I'm so sad that they won't be able to analyze me.

Re:Those who wish not to participate?

[Anonymous Coward]

The self-selecting nature of social media participants has been underestimated in all forms of research and analysis. The only people who participate in social media seem to be people who have nothing better to do. The people who are doing something don't have the time and energy to bother. So you have a self-selected group of people with nothing better to do than post to social media, which gives you a population of people who have some reason to promote themselves (media figures, athletes, etc), unemployed people, busybodies, and so on. This absolutely has to skew any conclusions drawn from looking at social media posts.

Re:Those who wish not to participate?

[epiccollision]

how long before we find out/realize most of "social media" is a self aggrandizing pit of bots and social media companies. I know people who operate thousands of followers/friends each, they may not outnumber the real users but they are following/friends with one.

Re:Nazi Bootlicker

[Zontar The Mindless]

And those are his GOOD points...

Re:What?

[Anonymous Coward]

Submitter "cold fjord" is one unit of a US government sockpuppet team which uses the type of data analysed by the Pew Research Center to improve their ability to influence readers here.

Slashdot is also part of the research - he's trying to assess how much of the readership is aware of the monitoring.

Re:What?

[Anonymous Coward]

That's the purpose of Slashdot Beta, to monitor users, eeerrr I mean, audience members. The large fonts and huge empty spaces are so that they can fit the tiny surveillance cameras in between. And by making you scroll the page 50 times to read or type a 200 word post, they are getting your muscle movement patterns from your mouse to build a physical fitness profile on you.

Re:What?

[cold fjord]

Apparently some people never get over their shock and rage at encountering someone that holds a different viewpoint than their own, and is willing to defend it with evidence.

I don't work for the government, nor am I a sock puppet. There is nontrivial percentage of people in my country that hold beliefs generally similar to mine. It takes a particularly stunted view to think you will never encounter them. I hope you get over it, sometime.

Lies, lies, and statistics

[Princeofcups]

What percentage of twitter is marketing teams using each other to up their numbers? Where I work, most employees who are customer facing were told to double their twitter followers. They all followed hundreds of accounts that automatically follow you back. Check, good work says the marketing team. This is just another of the many bogus internet trends that will collapse under its own weight.