Mining Social Software Interactions to Develop the Enterprise Social Graph

In doing some research, we came across an excellent white paper by Laurence Lock Lee, James Matheson and Stewart Mader. In WikiMining, WikiNetworks and Wikinomics, the authors studied the co-editing and commenting interactions of participants in the wikipatterns.com wiki community.

Objectives of this research included:

• Measuring the health of the wiki community,
• Understanding which participants had the highest network centrality, and
• Seeing how well this interaction analysis correlated to the actual social relationships among participants

We've written previously about social network analysis and its value in a corporate setting. While the wikipatterns.com research is not in the enterprise, much of its analysis is consistent with Professor Rob Cross's work on employee networks inside organizations. Read the paper for some good real-world context to the principles of social network analysis.

What especially caught our eye were these two findings:

1. Correlation of inferred social networks to surveyed actual social networks
2. Percentage of relationships that occurred strictly because of the wiki

Let's examine these two findings a bit more.

Correlation to Actual Social Networks

The study's authors mined the editing and commenting interactions among the wiki participants. The idea here is that if you and a colleague both edit a wiki page, that is tallied as a "relationship unit" between the two of you. By analyzing the depth and breadth of these relationships, the authors constructed a social graph among the participants. These map of the social graph, called a sociogram, is shown below:

 

The authors then surveyed wikipattern.com participants, asking them to identify their actual social relationships within the wiki community. Only a subset of people responded, but enough did to construct a meaningful stated social network for participants.

The authors then compared the inferred social network to the stated social network. The basis of comparison was "degree centrality", which analyzes the number of connections a person has. The table below shows the Top 5 participants based on degree centrality:

 

In looking at the top five most central participants, four names show up in both lists. In reviewing all participants, the authors find a statistically significant 0.77 correlation.

What this says is that there is likely a way to use social software, such as wikis, to mine the enterprise social graph. The study authors are appropriately cautious with this declaration. Their study is one of the first we've seen that tackles this idea.

Social Software Fosters New Relationships

An important benefit of social software is the diversification of one's relationships, which we've discussed here before. Finding and interacting with others outside of your regular internal contacts has tremendous value for you personally, and for your company overall.

In conducting the wikipattern.com user survey, participants were asked to characterize the relationships they had with others on the wiki. There were four options:

• Prior relationship > 2 years
• Prior relationship < 2 years
• Relationship created through the wiki but now extending beyond it
• Relationship through the wiki only

The survey participants characterized a totla of 117 relationships based on one of these four options. Of those 117 relationships, 37 were the latter two types - formed through the wiki. In other words nearly a third of the relationships were based on participating in the wiki.

This finding is valuable. It shows that providing an open collaboraiton and sharing platform results in new connections not previously made. Which is a key benefit of Enterprise 2.0.

Looking forward to more research in this area.

Comments

[billycripe]

It's a great piece. Leveraging implicit or organic social networks that emerge from other activities will is the next step. I published about doing this with email last September in Computer Technology Review http://tinyurl.com/csage2 and in chapter 10 of my book, "Reshaping Your Business With Web 2.0" (McGraw-Hill 2008). It is really nice to see study / statistical validation of the concept.

[Michael]

The blog is getting spammed (3 of 4 comments here are spam) and Connectbeam does not answer mails or phone. Do anybody know what is going on?

[Force Factor Supplements]

Really a educative and informative post, the post is good in all regards,I am glad to read this post

[social bookmarking]

good work
bravo

[Sollynaljesony]

When I read your entire comments then I really impress with your site.There are good information you share here . Thanks for sharing information.I have checked out this website
and I would like to show this site to my friends to check them out as well. Thanks and I’ll keep an eye of this comments.
Forex Trading System

[Email Database]

Hey I love your style, would you consider doing a guest post on my blog in return for a link maybe? Please email me back Loving your stuff once again.

[Where To Buy Venapro]

Confused about where to buy Venapro? Venapro is a new hemorrhoids medication.

[Lemon For Acne]

Looking for a way to treat your Acne? Have you tried Lemon Juice?

[Food Recipes]

To do this, they isolated thin slices of rat brain containing intact sensory, vasopressin-releasing and clock neurons. Even when removed from the brain, clock neurons continue to mark time. Food Recipes
Food Recipes
Radiation Protection

[Ajf 4]

Luckily I read your blog, like your blog, this is the one I've been worried, thank you.

[Cho Yung Tea]

The first thing you need to know is what is your business and what is your product.

[duvalCS]

I think this has just been proven again with the latest facebook breach, read more about it at my site: http://www.duvalcomputingservices.com/blog/

[Five finger shoes]

Practically, most of young ladies may pay a lot of money to the famous bags, such as Miu Miu bags. There is no doubt, the bag is necessary for all the women. No matter the Miu Miu bags or Marc Jacobs bag, even the Burberry bag, they are really a status symbol and they always play the most important role in their life. You cannot ignore the superiority of Burberry bag.

[Katheringlily]

I love your article. It can help me get much useful information. Hope to see more words in it. I think you will have interests to see http://www.shoesnumber1.com.

[Trading news]

Came by. Looks pretty complicated. Hope next time I would understand better. Thanks anyway.
forex news trading rules

[uggs on sale]

Rats and horses can't burp, nor vomit.

[cheap uggs]

Americans consider burping to be rude.

[LebedevArtemij34]

Все знают, что студенты хотят увидеть разные места. Что ж разные организации презентуют такие услуги как [url=www.bustrans.com.ua]пассажирские перевозки[/url], что значительно упрощает жизнь людей.

[Stimelex review]

It would be,If this Mining Social Software will do something for itself and Develop for Social Graph.Because Which are know for his work quality in ecnomic sector.And which are useful equipment of this structure.

[Xtreme No]

Really graph increase after create the software so I am agree with this blog..

[dermalift]

really it's good work for here. i tell you only it's well work for here.

[fds]

ugg bootsburberry bags accessorize

[ugg boots on sale]

We all live on 21st century,health is most important thing,keep our body well is good for you and me.Here we recommend an health shoes to you,named mbt,it is an history shoes from last century ,we provide

[Nitro Muscle Mass]

Great information and Social marketing and Social We are living in right now in ultramodern era,so therefore,it is most important face to us.

[Ultra Bronze]

There's important information related to social graph stricture in here.Studies has found some criticizes thing in social graph.Which has told in above.