The Interplay of Structure and Content in On-Line Social Interaction - Jon Kleinberg

Jon Kleinberg, Professor of Computer Science at Cornell University

Abstract

The interactions that take place in on-line social networks can be usefully analyzed through both the underlying network structure and also the text content that is exchanged between people. A number of interesting research questions grow out of the interplay between these two sources of information.

Here we consider this combination of structure and content in several related settings. We begin by considering how this type of information helps guide the problem of on-line "conversational curation", in which a Web site must help users manage the discussion threads that they are participating in. Network connectivity among participants, patterns of turn-taking, and probabilistic models of the underlying language use all provide information about the dynamics of this process. We then consider how fine-grained properties of the content can offer insights into a set of other issues, including the "memorability" of text and the relative levels of power between participants.

The talk is based on joint work with Lars Backstrom, Justin Cheng, Cristian Danescu-Niculescu-Mizil, Lillian Lee, and Bo Pang.