This is a short movie made by students in our CGT department. I loved it so much, had to share it here:
Buying eyeballs
I was just about to rant (OK, comment) on the practice of buying eyeballs. It goes like this: Leave a comment on my blog post and something good will happen (we’ll donate to a cause, enter you in a drawing for a prize, etc.). From a marketing perspective, is this how you want to get eyeballs? Is this a valid assessment trick for counting how many eyeballs you get?
Then, I realized that I was offering a small prize for comments on my teaching blog – these are important class instructions and I wanted confirmation that students saw them. Good educational practice?!
So then, I will no longer complain about Iams buying eyeballs. Come on, give them your pair of eyeballs and they will donate 25 meals to animals in shelters! (oh, and enjoy Pawcurious, it’s become one of my favorite blogs)
Research article: Online influencers
There are many attempts in the industry (and many apps) to identify online influencers. My main concern with them is that they operate with a seat-of-the-pants operational definition of the concept of “influencer.” What are, exactly, the behaviors that characterize an influencer? And how do you know that the behaviors a certain app is measuring (e.g. number of followers and number of retweets on Twitter) are actually measuring social influence and not something else? We have seen that, according to such measures, Sockington the cat is more influential than Chris Brogan.
This is where academic research can help. I’m browsing the latest issue of Human Communication Research and came across this article:
Huffaker, D. (2010). Dimensions of leadership and social influence in online communities. Human Communication Research, 36(4), 593-617
[note: David Huffaker completed his Ph.D. at Northwestern and now he is a researcher at Google, according to his website. This paper was part of his dissertation work.]
The article set out to identify the communication traits of online leaders (aka influencers, but influencer is not a word, so it can’t be used in an academic publication). These communication traits are of two types: (1) linguistic characteristics; and (2) social interaction patterns.
To identify influencers’ communication traits, Huffaker used both automated textual analysis and social network analysis.
Drawing on previous literature on leaders in the offline world and opinion leaders, Huffaker proposes the following abilities that define online leaders: The ability to:
- trigger feedback
- spark conversations within the community
- shape the way other members of a group discuss a topic
in other words, they…
- set agendas for discussion by causing or facilitating dialog on a particular topic
- frame discussion by shaping the way a topic is talked about
The study was designed to examine the relationship between 3 characteristics of online leaders and online leadership itself. If there is a strong relationship, this means that the 3 characteristics are good indicators of online leadership. So, the 3 characteristics were the independent variables, and online leadership was the dependent variable:
Independent variables:
- communication activity (measured as: number of posts a person has contributed to a group; number of replies a person contributes to messages initiated by other group members; length of participation in the community, as an indication of credibility)
- social networks (measured as: expansiveness – the number of times a person replies to different group members; reciprocity – frequency of a person’s participation in a back-and-forth dialog with another person; brokering – being the link between two otherwise unrelated groups)
- language use (measured as: talkativeness – the average length of messages contributed by a person; linguistic diversity – the number of unique words found in a message; assertiveness – frequency of certain words indicating assertiveness, such as “always” and “never;” affect – frequency of words that represent emotional language, such as “nice,” “ugly,” “happy,” etc.
Dependent variable: online leadership, operationalized (measured) as:
- reply trigger – the ability to inspire responses
- conversation creation – the ability to spark a long dialog between users
- language diffusion – measured as the number of words used by the author of a message that were repeated by other users in subsequent replies (so, if A triggers a discussion using the word “inappropriate,” if the same word is used frequently in other posts on the topic, this indicates high language diffusion, and therefore, social influence
The author used linguistic analysis(LIWC) and social network analysis (UCINET) software and performed the analyses on a random sample of 16 Google Groups on various topics. The sample included 33,540 users and 632,622 messages written between June 21, 2003-January 31, 2005.
The measures of the independent and dependent variables were analyzed using correlations, regression analysis, and hierarchical linear modeling analysis (I wish I could explain these to you, but I can’t – especially not the last one) to test a series of hypotheses that are neatly summarized by the author in this one sentence:
“Users who generate the most message replies, comments, or conversations, or spread the most word choices [aka online leaders, the dependent variable – MV’s note] were expected to exhibit more communication activity and tenure in the community, more network centrality and brokering behaviors, and language that exhibits talkativeness, affect, assertiveness, and linguistic diversity [measures of the independent variables, MV’s note].”
After testing relationships between these variables, the following emerged as characteristics of online leaders:
Online leaders:
- post a lot of messages and a lot of replies (high communication volume)
- have been part of the group for a long time (online tenure)
- engage with several different members of the group
- engage in back-and-forth dialog with members of the group
- tend to write longer messages than other group members
- use a richer vocabulary that other community members. Tthis is linked in the research literature to cognitive complexity – i.e. how smart one is – and therefore, to credibility. Or, it is possible that the richer, more colorful language draws readers in.
- are assertive
- express affect and emotion (attitudes) – which, along with assertiveness, may be an indicator of leaders’ passion for the topic
- are able, through behaviors 3 and 4 above, to create supportive, loyal relationships with other community members and between them. Leaders are important to the success of the group as a whole because they are instrumental in creating and maintaining relationships within the community.
The only characteristics that was not associated with leadership was brokerage.
Of course, these findings are valid for discussion groups. We don’t know yet if they apply to other types of online communities.
So, what do you think? Do these sound to you as reasonable characteristics of online leaders? Will this study change the way you identify online influencers?
McAfee Global Report: Web 2.0 in Business
Photo credit: McAfee
My Facebook & Twitter pals might have seen my mentions of a big mystery project I was working on at the end of the summer. Well, the big mystery project has been released, and now I can tell you about it: It was preparing a global report for McAfee Co. I worked with my Purdue and CERIAS colleague, Dr. Lorraine Kisselburgh to analyze data from a global survey McAfee conducted, enrich it with expert interviews, and weave it into a story which became the report – Web 2.0: A Complex Balancing Act.
You can download the report at the link above, and you can read highlights in the news release.
So, you want an assistantship?
I’ve written before my advice on how to be a successful graduate student. But to even get to be a graduate student in the first place, you may need a graduate teaching or research assistantship – especially if you’re an international student not eligible for loans in the U.S.
I get it, I understand how important an assistantship is to you (the ticket to graduate education in the U.S.!) and how much you need it. I’ve been an international graduate student myself. Granted, I didn’t have to ask for assistantships – I always got them, maybe because I was lucky, maybe because my file spoke for itself.
But here you are, you got admitted to Purdue (congratulations!) yet you don’t have funding. What do you do??
The first thing NOT to do is to type (or copy from some website) a letter along the lines of the one below and send it to ALL professors in several departments:
“Dear Professor,
I’ve been admitted to Purdue… I’ve read about your research and I’m very interested… I am highly qualified in… (areas usually not related to the professor’s research). My resume is attached… Will you please consider me for a research assistantship?”
You know what happens to these emails? DELETE. Most of us don’t even bother to answer. Hey, you didn’t bother to look up my research interests – or even spell my name in the opening of the email.
Whoever advised you that you get ahead in life by sending template letters to lots of people was WRONG.
If you want to get my attention and have a chance at being considered for funding, here’s how to go about it:
- Write a clear, specific subject line that refers to something I do or I’ve worked on (I=me, the professor, not you). This will get my attention and will tell me the email is relevant to me personally.
- Use my name in the opening of the email. Copy and paste it from my website, to make sure you spell it correctly.
- DO actually read about my research interests, peruse my list of publications, read one or more of them – or at least spend a few minutes reading my blog.
- Convince me you are ACTUALLY interested in the research I do. Be specific about what you’re interested in and why. Show me you’ve done the work to learn about my research. A strong interest in my research is the #1 qualification I look for in students. I can teach you the rest.
- Argue how your skills will actually be applicable to the research I’m doing. Give me some ideas about what you would like to work on.
Yes, this type of letter is more work. You won’t be able to write 500 of them. But the 10 you will be able to write are more likely to get you an assistantship than the other 500.
You should know a few more things about how this process works. If you are admitted as a graduate student in my department, chances are I saw your file. I might have even voted on your admission. If I wanted to offer you an assistantship, I would have done so by now. If you are in another department on campus, I have not seen your file. Although I am more motivated to fund students in my own department, I will consider you if you are a very good fit.
If you’ve applied for admission in my department, don’t send me the form letter above the week before classes start – or ever. If you were REALLY interested in my research, you would have mentioned that on your application to graduate school, and you would have been in touch with me a LONG time ago.
And here’s the last part. Not all my faculty colleagues will work this way, but it may work with me: If you’re just applying to graduate school and you’re VERY interested in working with me, contact me as early as possible – even before you send in your file. Be prepared to explain what about my research you’re interested in and why.
Research is the most valuable skill you need (and will learn) as a graduate student. Show you have potential for it by DOING YOUR RESEARCH before approaching professors and asking them to invest in you.
[Photo credit: http://academicregaliaforpurchase.com]
MV 