Project Flanders

Facebook vs Twitter

An interesting observation that we made while talking with people how they use social media, is that people either use and like Twitter a lot but not Facebook, and vice versa.

We are not sure why this is the case. One possible  explanation is that using regularly both Twitter and Facebook just takes too much time, and people tend to focus on one application.

Another explanation could be Twitter and Facebook are very different applications and appeal to very specific personalities, i.e. there people either have a "Twitter personality" or a "Facebook" personality. However, we weren't are not what these personalities are. This is one question we want to explore further.

Another interesting question is whether Twitter and Facebook cover all "online social networking personalities", or whether there is room for another social networking application that appeals to people who are neither on Twitter nor on Facebook.

 

A great Talk!

We had Nicholas Christakis from Harvard University, that author of the book "Connected",  give a talk on "Social Networks Offline" in the Distinguished Lecture Series of our department. It was very inspirational talk and very worth seeing.

Here is a link to  his TED talk - highly recommended - enjoy!

http://www.ted.com/talk/nicholas_christakis_the_hidden_influence_of_social_networks.html

 

 

Which Twitter User Archetype Are You?

Who uses Twitter and why?

We are trying to understand better the Twitter users. Can we organize Twitter users into Twitter Archetypes, users who resemble each other in how they use Twitter?

This is a first attempt at this.

We believe that one can identify three Twitter user archetypes:

• Writers who want to be heard:
  Writers are interested in sharing information with other users. Writers can be experts in a particular field, celebrities, or companies wanting to inform their customers.
• Readers who want to be informed:
  Readers are interested in getting interesting content from Twitter. Typically, readers are interested in particular topics for which they want to get the "latest news/updates" from Twitter
• Social People who want to be connected:
  Social people use Twitter as a communication tool to connect and stay in contact with other users.

Social people can be further thought of as

• Conversationalist who want to stay in touch with people they already know in real life. Conversationalist typically belong to a clique of users who follow each other and use Twitter as a way to communicate/chat.
• Networkers who want to connect with new people. Networkers are using Twitter to create new contacts with other users who share a similar interest or they would like to connect with for professional or other reasons.

Do these archetypes resonate with you?

Which archetype are you?

 

 

Twitter - a Highly Personalized Service

One fascinating aspect of Twitter is that different users experience and use the service very differently.

Some ways of how Twitter is used that we observed are the following:

Broadcasting: Twitter is extremely useful for broadcasting information to a large audience (followers). For example, universities use Twitter in this way to update students and faculties on events on campus.

Chat room: Twitter can serve as a chat room where friends keep each other updated on what they are up to. 

Feeling the Pulse: Twitter also users to get a feeling of the pulse of what the world is currently talking about or thinking about a particular topic. The service  can feel as participating in  a "big party" where people mingle and exchange the latest news and rumors.

These are just a few example and we believe that Twitter is used in many other ways that we are not aware of. This is one of the mysterious of Twitter that we would like to uncover and understand better.

How do you use Twitter?

Who we are and what we do.....

We are a research group in the Computer Science Department at the University of Toronto.

We are interested in online social networking applications such as Twitter. In particular, we are interested in understanding

• how people use social networking applications and
• how current services can be improved

Ultimately, we would like to create a new online social networking application that makes it easy and fun for people to connect and share content.

This blog is for us to share our throughts on online social networks, and get feedback and inspiration for our research.