#3 DataBeersBCN - "How to get into the news with Social networks analysis" by Andreas Kaltenbrunner from EURECAT at 3rd DataBeersBCN

1. How to get into the news with
Social network analysis
How to get into the news with
Social network analysis
Andreas Kaltenbrunner
Eurecat | Barcelona Media
databeersbcn, Jul 22, Barcelona

2. 2www.eurecat.org
How to get in into the news with SNA
@akalten_bcn
Recipe to get in the news
1. Find an interesting SN Dataset
2. Main ingredient: Do some Ranking
3. Find a catchy title
4. Publish on Archive
5. Wait

3. Eurecat: new Technology centre
Merger of:
- Barcelona Media
- Barcelona Digital
- Ascamm
- Cetemmsa
- CTM
How to get in into the news with SNA

4. 4www.eurecat.org
Computational
Social Science
Social Media Research Group
Digital Humanities Department @ Barcelona Media | Eurecat
@akalten_bcn
How to get in into the news with SNA

5. 5www.eurecat.org
How to get in into the news with SNA
@akalten_bcn
Example 1: Who is the best
Tennis player in history
Radicchi F (2011) Who Is the Best Player Ever? A Complex
Network Analysis of the History of Professional Tennis. PLoS
ONE 6(2): e17249.
Generate a SN using matches
played by professional tennis
players between 1968 and 2010

6. 6www.eurecat.org
Example 1: Tennis players
How to get in into the news with SNA

7. 7www.eurecat.org
How to get in into the news with SNA
@akalten_bcn
Example 2: Sister Cities
Kaltenbrunner A., Aragón P., Laniado D., Volkovich Y.,
(2013) Not all paths lead to Rome: Analysing the network of
sister cities, IWSOS 2013 - 7th International Workshop on
Self-Organizing Systems, Palma de Mallorca, Spain
- Analyse the social network of
cities
- Group by countries

8. 8www.eurecat.org
How to get in into the news with SNA
@akalten_bcn
Example 2: Sister Cities

9. 9www.eurecat.org
Example 2: Sister Cities
@akalten_bcn
Distance between
cities does not matter
=> death of distance

10. 10www.eurecat.org @akalten_bcn

11. 11www.eurecat.org
How to get in into the news with SNA
@akalten_bcn
Example 3: Biographies on Wikipedia
Eom Y., Aragón P., Laniado D., Kaltenbrunner A., Vigna S.,
Shepelyansky D. L. (2015)
Interactions of cultures and top people of Wikipedia from
ranking of 24 language editions,
PLoS ONE, 10, 3, 2015, e0114825
Aragón P., Kaltenbrunner A., Laniado D., Volkovich Y. (2012)
Biographical Social Networks on Wikipedia - A cross-cultural
study of links that made history,
WikiSym'12- 8th International Symposium on Wikis and
Open Collaboration, Linz, Austria..
- Analyse the hyper-link network of Wikipedia
- Rank articles about persons
- Compare different language editions

12. 12www.eurecat.org
Ranking for English Wikipedia Ranking in Multiple languages
ΘA is the ranking score of algorithm A;
NA is the number of appearances of a given person in
the top100 rank for all editions.
Example 3: Biographies on Wikipedia
@akalten_bcn
How to get in into the news with SNA
← Network of similar language editions

13. 13www.eurecat.org
Results: Birth place distribution of top ranked biographies
Sum of appearances of historical figures from a given country in the 24 lists of top 100 persons for PageRank.
Color changes from zero (white) to 233 for Germany (black).
Overall Western
11 editions are not European (AR, FA, HE, HI, JA, KO, MS, TH, TR,VI, ZH)
How to get in into the news with SNA
@akalten_bcn

14. 14www.eurecat.org
Overlap with alternative rankings:
 Hart’s Influential personas in History: 43%
 Top 100 people Pantheon MIT list: 44%
Not bigger than Jesus, but relevant from an encyclopedic
point of view
Example 3: Biographies on Wikipedia
@akalten_bcn
How to get in into the news with SNA

15. 15www.eurecat.org
How to get in into the news with SNA
@akalten_bcn
For extra impact:
Add minor comment about
the relation of the results
with a controversial topic
For example
- Gender bias
- Climate Change
- Political Polarisation
Source: Saturday Morning Breakfast Cereal
http://www.smbc-comics.com/

16. 16www.eurecat.org
How to get in into the news with SNA
Number of females in the top 100 PageRank historical
figures of different Wikpedia editions
Overall male skewed
Ran
k
TH PageRank
1 Sirindhorn
2 Bhumibol Adulyadej
3 Sirikit
4 Thaksin Shinawatra
5 Gautama Buddha
6 Adolf Hitler
7 Taksin
8 Queen Victoria
9 Abhisit Vejjajiva
10 Pridi Banomyong
11 Yingluck Shinawatra
12 Galyani Vadhana
13 Srinagarindra
14 J. R. R. Tolkien
15 Samak Sundaravej
How to get in into the news with SNA
Example 3: Biographies on Wikipedia
@akalten_bcn

17. 17www.eurecat.org @akalten_bcn
How to get in into the news with SNA

18. 18www.eurecat.org
A Final Suggestion:
Do not read the comments!
If you do, do not answer!
@akalten_bcn
How to get in into the news with SNA

19. www.eurecat.org
Disclaimer:
Getting in the news does not
give you more citations
@akalten_bcn
How to get in into the news with SNA

20. 20www.eurecat.org
How to get in into the news with SNA
@akalten_bcn
QUESTIONS?
We are hiring

Post Doc Position
 Data Scientist
 Computational Sociologist

Phd in
– Mathematics
– Phyisics
– or Computer Science

More info at http://bit.ly/DATASCIENTIST