The Impact of Social Networking on ResNet Users

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The Impact of Social Networking on ResNet Users

• Kevin Guidry
• IT Fellow at Sewanee The University of the South
• Member, ResNet Applied Research Group

All original content in this work is licensed
under a Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike
3.0 License
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Introductions

• Who am I?
• Who are you?

3
Disclaimers

• I dont know it all
• No one knows it all
• Were going to play loose and fast with some of
  the language

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Outline

1. Foundation and generalities
2. Facebook
3. Practical implications and practices

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Part 1 Foundation and generalities
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First, the Web 2.0 hype...
The Machine is Us/ing Us video from Kansas State
Universitys Digital Ethnography
Project Available at http//mediatedcultures.net/
ksudigg/?p84
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Staggering StatisticsLevy (2007)

• MySpace
• More than 66 million users visit each month
• 12 percent of all time on Internet spent there
• Facebook
• 23 million users visit each month
• More than 2 million users joined in April
  (150,000 a day)
• Compare with countries of the world

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What is a Social Networking Service (SNS)?
Group Activity

• Are these SNSs?
• Blackboard
• Digg
• Facebook
• MySpace
• Second Life
• Slashdot
• Wikipedia
• World of Warcraft

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What is a Social Networking Service (SNS)?
Group Activity
1 2 3 4 5 6 7
Blackboard
Digg
Facebook
MySpace
Second Life
Slashdot
Wikipedia
World of Warcraft
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How some researchers define SNS

• UNC Social Software Symposium
• December 8-9, 2006, Chapel Hill NC
• 37 attendees
• Their definitions of SNS

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How some researchers define SNS

• danah boyd (2007)
• These three features - profiles, Friends lists,
  and comments - comprise the primary structure of
  all social network sites, although individual
  sites provide additional features for further
  engagement. While SNSes allow visitors to wander
  from Friend to Friend and communicate with anyone
  who has a visible profile, the primary use
  pattern is driven by pre-existing friend groups.
  People join the sites with their friends and use
  the different messaging tools to hang out, share
  cultural artifacts and ideas, and communicate
  with one another.
• - emphasis added

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Key properties of SNS(boyd, in press)

• Persistence Unlike the ephemeral quality of
  speech in unmediated publics, networked
  communications are recorded for posterity. This
  enables asynchronous communication but it also
  extends the period of existence of any speech
  act.
• Searchability Because expressions are recorded
  and identity is established through text, search
  and discovery tools help people find like minds.
  While people cannot currently acquire the
  geographical coordinates of any person in
  unmediated spaces, finding ones digital body
  online is just a matter of keystrokes.
• Replicability Hearsay can be deflected as
  misinterpretation, but networked public
  expressions can be copied from one place to
  another verbatim such that there is no way to
  distinguish the original from the copy.
• Invisible audiences While we can visually detect
  most people who can overhear our speech in
  unmediated spaces, it is virtually impossible to
  ascertain all those who might run across our
  expressions in networked publics. This is further
  complicated by the other three properties, since
  our expression may be heard at a different time
  and place from when and where we originally
  spoke.

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Key properties of SNS

1. Persistence
2. Searchability
3. Replicability
4. Invisible audiences

Brief excerpt from video of danah boyds talk at
the University of North Carolina on September 14,
2006 Available at http//www.ibiblio.org/speakers
/index.cgi/2006/09/14boyd06
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Why Youths use SNS

• To create a
• digital publics
• Socialization
• Identity development

Brief excerpt from video of danah boyds talk at
the University of North Carolina on September 14,
2006 Available at http//www.ibiblio.org/speakers
/index.cgi/2006/09/14boyd06
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Internet DisinhibitionSuler (2004)

• Dissociative anonymity
• Invisibility
• Asynchronicity
• Solipsistic introjection
• Dissociative imagination
• Minimization of authority

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Its a dog-eat-dog world

• http//dogster.com/
• http//www.uniteddogs.com/
• http//vivapets.com/myhome.php
• http//www.petzzy.com/
• http//www.doggysnaps.com/
• http//www.sniflabs.com/

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Part 2 Facebook
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Caveats

• I am not an expert in this application/tool
• Research takes time
• Significant gaps in the research
• Facebook continues to change

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Recent Facebook Changes

• February 2006 High school users allowed
• September 2006 All users allowed
• May 2007 API expanded/changed
• More than 40,000 developers have requested to be
  part of the project, around 1,500 applications
  have been produced so far, and some of the most
  popular went from zero to 850,000 users in three
  days.

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Basic stats (as of May 2007)Cashmore (2007)

• General Growth More than 24 million active
  users More than 100,000 new registrations per
  day since Jan. 2007 An average of 3 percent
  weekly growth since Jan. 2007 Active users have
  doubled since Facebook expanded registration in
  Sept. 2006User Demographics Over 47,000
  regional, work-related, collegiate, and high
  school networks More than half of Facebook
  users are outside of college The fastest
  growing demographic is those 25 years old and
  older Maintain 85 percent market share of
  4-year U.S. universities
• User Engagement Sixth-most trafficked site in
  the United States More than 40 billion page
  views per month in May 2007 More than half of
  active users return daily People spend an
  average of 20 minutes on the site daily
• Applications No. 1 photo sharing application on
  the web Photo application draws more than
  twice as much traffic as the next three sites
  combined More than 1.8 billion photos on the
  site More than 6 million active user groups on
  the site
• International Growth Canada has the most users
  outside of the United States, with more than 2.5
  million active users The U.K. is the third
  largest country with more than 1.4 million active
  users Remaining Top 10 countries in order of
  active users (outside of the U.S., Canada and
  UK) Norway,Australia, South Africa, Lebanon,
  Egypt, Sweden and India
• Source comScore Media Metrix

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How many students use Facebook?

• ECAR (2006) More than 70 percent use social
  networking sites such as MySpace and Facebook,
  and of those 65.9 percent do so several times a
  week or more.
• Ellison, Steinfield, Lampe (2006) 94 of MSU
  freshmen
• Stutzman (2006) In week 1, 85 of UNC freshmen
  by week 16, 94
• Vanden Boogart (2006) 94.4 of participants at 4
  different institutions

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Frequency of Facebook Daily UseVanden Boogart
(2006)

• N Percent
• 0 - 30 minutes 1539 53.9
• 30 minutes - 1 hour 837 29.3
• 1 hour - 2 hours 362 12.7
• 2 hours - 3 hours 89 3.1
• more than 3 hours 30 1.1
• Total 2857 100.0

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Is anyone not using Facebook?

• Ellison, Steinfield, Lampe (2006) Neither
  gender, ethnicity, nor income appeared to relate
  to propensity to join Facebook. Older students,
  and those who have been at school longer are
  significantly less likely to be on Facebook,
  probably reflecting an effect of the recency
  which with the MSU Facebook community began.

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How many friends do they have?

• Ellison, Steinfield, Lampe (2006) Students
  reportbetween 150 and 200 friends on the
  system.
• Vanden Boogart (2006) The average respondent
  had 145 friends at their institution and 127
  friends at other institutions.
• Golder, Wilkinson, Huberman (2006) Of the 4.2
  million users in our dataset, we found a median
  of 144 friends and mean of 179.53 friends per
  user.

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Dunbar's number 150

• Dunbar (2002) The cognitive limit to the number
  of individuals with whom any one person can
  maintain stable relationships.

Image courtesy Wikimedia Commons http//commons.wi
kimedia.org/wiki/ImagePongo_pygmaeus_28orangutan
g29.jpg
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What are they doing on Facebook?
Group Activity
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What are they doing on Facebook?

• Vanden Boogart (2006) The highest area for use
  on Facebook is staying connected to high school
  friends. One would expect more people using
  Facebook to connect to college peers however a
  very small percentage (21.1) are using it for
  this purpose.

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Why do they use Facebook?

• Bumgarner (2006)
• Gossip
• Directory
• Diversion
• Voyeurism and exhibitionism

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Privacy expectations awareness

• Acquisti Gross (2006) Most of privacy
  concerned undergraduates still join the network
• Govani Pashley (2005) Facebook users
  generally feel comfortable sharing their personal
  information in a campus environment. Survey
  participants said that they had nothing to hide
  and they dont really care if other people see
  their information.
• Jones Soltren (2005) Women definitely
  self-censor their Facebook data more than men do.

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Prolific bad photos?

• Watson, Smith, Driver (2006) The recent media
  reports indicating student users of Facebook
  routinely post questionable photos on their
  sitesappear to be largely unfounded based on the
  evidence elicited from this research study.
• Results closely replicated by Saunders, Jamieson,
  Hale (2007)

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Part 3 Practical implications and practices
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When are students in front of their computers?
View pages 8 and 9 from Rhythms of Social
Interaction paper Available at
http//www.hpl.hp.com/research/idl/papers/facebook
/facebook.pdf
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How do we get started?
Brief excerpt from North Carolina State
Universitys The Facebook Phenomenon video
(specifically, 1927 2130) Available at
http//ncsu.edu/facebook/
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Digital Divide

• Leichtman Research Group, Inc. (2007)
• 53 of all US households have high-speed Internet
  access.
• High-speed services now account for about 72 of
  all home Internet subscriptions compared to 60
  last year.
• While broadband subscriptions continued to
  increase across the country in the past year,
  broadband penetration remains strongly correlated
  with household income.
• 68 of all households with annual incomes over
  50,000 subscribe to high-speed access
• 39 of all households with annual incomes under
  50,000 subscribe to high-speed access
• 81 of all US households have at least one
  computer but only 56 of those with annual
  household incomes under 30,000 have a computer
  at home
• 45 of households with annual incomes below
  30,000 subscribe to an Internet service at home
  compared to 92 of households with annual
  incomes above 75,000
• 7 of all Internet subscribers say that
  high-speed access is not available in their area

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Participatory Divide

• Boyd (in press) Those who only access their
  MySpace accounts in schools use it primarily as
  an asynchronous communication tool, while those
  with continuous nighttime access at home spend
  more time surfing the network, modifying their
  profile, collecting friends, and talking to
  strangers. When it comes to social network sites,
  there appears to be a far greater participatory
  divide than an access divide.

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How should these tools be used in hiring
(students or staff)?
Group Activity
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NYU New Student Orientation

• Undergraduate Orientation Leader application
  statement
• I understand that, as a UOL, I will be expected
  to serve as a role model and be conscious of how
  I present myself in all forums, including
  electronic ones, such as Facebook and Myspace
  sic.Furthermore, though any information I have
  available in an on-line community will not be
  formally researched as a part of the staff
  selection process, I understand that members of
  the selection staff may have accounts and
  unintentionally come across my on-line personal
  profile.

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NYU New Student Orientation

• Facebook-related exercises during group
  interviews
• Statement on Orientation Leader Contract
• I will be conscious of how I represent myself
  in all forums, including electronic ones, such as
  Facebook or Myspace sic.

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Institutional monitoring?

• Steinbeck Deavers (2007)
• Is the college monitoring its students online
  activities regularly?
• If the institution monitors this activity, why
  has it chosen to do so?
• Has the college informed its students of its
  policy toward monitoring?

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Facebook Platform

• Official website http//developers.facebook.com/
• Example application UIUC Library Search

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Its a little cheesy but...
The Internet has a Face video from Kansas State
Universitys Digital Ethnography
Project Available at http//mediatedcultures.net/
ksudigg/?p102
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References

• Acquisti, A., Gross, R. (2006). Imagined
  communities Awareness, information sharing, and
  privacy on the facebook. Cambridge, England 6th
  Workshop on Privacy Enhancing Technologies.
• boyd, d. (2007). Social network sites public,
  private, or what? The Knowledge Tree(13).
  Retreived June 11, 2007, from http//kt.flexiblele
  arning.net.au/tkt2007/?page_id28
• boyd, d. (in press). Why youth (heart) social
  network sites the role of networked publics in
  teenage social life. In D. Buckingham (Ed.),
  Identity Volume New York McGraw-Hill. Retrieved
  June 11, 2007, from http//www.danah.org/papers/Wh
  yYouthHeart.pdf
• Cashmore, P.. (2007, May 24). Facebook F8 Live.
  Mashable. Retrieved June 19, 2007, from
  http//mashable.com/2007/05/24/facebook-f8-live/
• Dunbar, R.I.M. (1992) Neocortex size as a
  constraint on group size in primates. Journal of
  Human Evolution 22 469-493.
• Golder, S., Wilkinson, D., Huberman, B. (2006).
  Rhythms of social interaction messaging within a
  massive online network. Retrieved January 23,
  2007, from http//www.hpl.hp.com/research/idl/pape
  rs/facebook/facebook.pdf
• Govani, T., Pashley, H. (2005). Student
  awareness of the privacy implications when using
  facebook. Pittsburgh, PA Carnegie Mellon
  University. Student Poster.
• Hersh, S. Hinkle, S. (2007). Shaping the
  Facebook of higher education Teaching online
  street-smarts during new student orientation.
  Orlando, Florida 2007 ACPA/NASPA Joint Meeting.
• Jones, H., Soltren, J. H. (2005). Facebook
  threats to privacy. Cambridge, MA Massachusetts
  Institute of Technology. Unpublished student
  paper.

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References

• Leichtman Research Group, Inc. (2007). Over half
  of U.S. households subscribe to broadband
  internet. Durham, NC Leichtman Research Group,
  Inc. Press release. Retrieved June 11, 2007,
  from http//www.leichtmanresearch.com/press/060707
  release.html
• Levy, S. (2007, May 28). Is Facebook catching up
  with MySpace? Newsweek. Retrieved June 11, 2007,
  from http//www.msnbc.msn.com/id/18754283/site/new
  sweek/
• McCarthy, Caroline (2007, June 18). FaceBook
  platform attracts 1,000 developers a day. CNET
  News.com. Retrieved June 20, 2007, from
  http//www.zdnet.com.au/news/software/soa/FaceBook
  -platform-attracts-1-000-developers-a-day/0,130061
  733,339278661,00.htm
• Steinbeck, S. E. Deavers, L. M. (2007, April
  3). The Brave New World of MySpace and Facebook.
  Inside Higher Ed. Retrieved June 13, 2007, from
  http//www.insidehighered.com/views/2007/04/03/ste
  inbach
• Suler, J. (2004). The online disinhibition
  effect. CyberPsychology Behavior, 7(3).
• Vanden Boogart, M. R. (2006). Uncovering the
  social impacts of facebook on a college campus.
  Unpublished Master of Science Thesis, Kansas
  State University, Manhattan, Kansas.
• Watson, S. W., Smith, Z., Driver, J. (2006).
  Alcohol, sex and illegal activities an analysis
  of selected facebook central photos in fifty
  states. ERIC Document ED493049.