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Call for Papers: Social Media Network Analysis

Here is an interesting call for papers on social media network analysis. The session will be held at the International Conference on Social Science Methodology in Sydney, Australia, from July 9 to 13, 2012. Submissions can be made until December 1, 2011.

Social Media Network Analysis

Session Convenor: Robert Ackland, Australian National University

This session is focused on innovative approaches for collecting and analysing social media network data in the context of social science research. Relevant data sources include digital trace data from newsgroups, WWW hyperlink networks, virtual worlds, social network sites (e.g. Facebook), blogs and micro-blogs (e.g. Twitter). While all papers focused on innovative research methods for born-digital social data are welcome, preference will be given to those involving statistical social network analysis techniques. We are also interested in papers focusing on computational social science and the challenges (and opportunities) for social scientists in an era of abundance of large-scale social media data sets.

Reflections on the #AOM2011

I just got back from my first Academy of Management Conference. The AOM Conference is the largest annual gathering of management scholars in the world. This year, it was attended by roughly 10,000 people from around the world and it took place in San Antonio, TX, USA. At the conference there are a number of panels, symposia, workshops and special programs for doctoral students. Doubtlessly, I was privileged to go.

I thought I’ll give a quick overview of what it was like, followed by blog posts on the doctoral workshop I attended, outstanding events & people as well as tips for getting research published. In order to find out more, check out the conversations around the meeting by having a look at the Twitter Hashtag #AOM2011.

Going through the program beforehand, I recognized a number of names that I had come across in my research. The AOM Conference surely is a great chance to put faces to the articles one is normally reading. As mentioned above, there were different session formats, each serving a particular purpose. The most powerful type of event, to my mind, are the professional development workshops. I attended such a PhD workshop by the AOM Division on Organizational Change and Development and another one for new doctoral students. Furthermore, I went to a Symposium on Dynamic Capabilities, for example, which constitutes a central topic of my doctoral program. This gave me a chance to hear the dicussions scholars are currently having. Their talks usually started by summarizing the literature in their particular fields and then they went right into the controversies. Roundtable discussions were useful to get a feel for the questions other scholars are likely to ask in response to particular papers or studies which are in the process of being published. One such Discussion Session was on Relationships, another component of my PhD program. Last but not least there are the socials, of course, which took place at numerous locations around the city. You can tell networking is an essential part of the event and much room is given for such activities. There is even an AOM Party Account on Twitter and a Google Calendar published for this purpose. My personal favorite was Monday night’s reception on the Tower of the Americas. All in all, the AOM Conference is great value for money.

I’ll close this post with a quote from Bill Pasmore, who’s the editor of the journal Research in Organizational Change and Development and who was also part of the above mentioned workshop: “You tell us where to go, because you are the future of change!” In this sense, it was inspiring to see the big shots in the management field while at the same time we were introduced to the academic profession and made aware of the fact that it is our research that will drive the discipline and will be published 5-10 years from now.

6th UK Social Networks Conference

The 6th UK Social Networks Conference will take place in Manchester from the 12th to the 16th of April, 2010, and offers an interdisciplinary venue for social and behavioural scientists, sociologists, educationalists, political scientists, mathematicians, computer scientists, physicists, practitioners and others to present their work in the area of social networks. The primary objective of the conference is to facilitate interactions between the many different disciplines interested in network analysis. The conference provides a unique opportunity for the dissemination and debate of recent advances in theoretical and experimental network research.

This year special attention would be dedicated to the history of network analysis, its link to mixing methods techniques and environment and network evolution.

Keynote Speakers

  • Professor Linton Freeman, University of California, Irvine The history of SNA and the Manchester group (an outsider’s view)
  • Professor Russell Bernard, University of Florida Mixing methods in social network research
  • Professor Patrick Doreian, University of Pittsburgh, University of Ljubljana Environments, network and network evolution
via socialsciences.manchester.ac.uk

When Real-Time Isn’t Fast Enough by @jowyang


via ustream.tv

This is a video of Jeremiah Owyang, who is a Partner at the Altimeter Group, a strategy consulting firm. The other day he gave a presentation at LeWeb, Europe’s largest internet conference. The points that he makes are quite interesting. Below you can find a brief summary of my notes.

1) Start listening now, and quickly offer social personalization features

  • Include contextual information based on social profiles
  • Allow access to services such as FB connect, analyze behavior, and customize the product offers accordingly

2) Develop an unpaid army of advocates who can respond when you’re not there

  • Work with customers and evangelists and use them as an unpaid R&D team
  • Give them recognition and access to exclusive information, not cash

3) Start to invest in systems –like social CRM– that can support the overall strategy

  • Integrative strategy counts; all customer data needs to be stored in one location
  • Future: match Twitter and other accounts with trad. CRM systems and detect customer problems as they occur

If you would like to have a look at the entire presentation, check Jeremiah’s blog.