{"title":"A Study of Tweet Veracity to Separate Rumours from Counter-Rumours","authors":"A. Chua, Snehasish Banerjee","doi":"10.1145/3097286.3097290","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1145/3097286.3097290","url":null,"abstract":"Rumours are known to propagate easily through computer-mediated communication channels such as Twitter. Their outbreak is often followed by the spread of 'counter-rumours', which are messages that debunk rumours. The probability of a tweet to be a counter-rumour is referred to as 'tweet veracity' in this paper. Since both rumours and counter-rumours are expected to contain claims of truth, the two might not be easily distinguishable. If Internet users fail to separate rumours from counter-rumours, the latter will not serve its purpose. Hence, this paper investigates the extent to which tweet veracity could be predicted by content as well as contributors' profile. The investigation focuses on the death hoax case of Singapore's first Prime Minister Lee Kuan Yew on Twitter. A total of 1,000 tweets (500 rumours + 500 counter-rumours) are analyzed using binomial logistic regression. Results indicate that tweet veracity could be predicted by clarity, proper nouns, visual cues, references to credible sources, as well as contributors' duration of membership, and number of followers. The significance of these findings are highlighted.","PeriodicalId":130378,"journal":{"name":"Proceedings of the 8th International Conference on Social Media & Society","volume":"7 1","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2017-07-28","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"128425968","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Social Media for Social Good: A Study of Experiences and Opportunities in Rural Australia","authors":"L. Given, D. Winkler, Kathryn Hopps-Wallis","doi":"10.1145/3097286.3097293","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1145/3097286.3097293","url":null,"abstract":"Social media platforms are espoused as helpful for overcoming geographic isolation for rural people and businesses; connecting them with local, national and global communities. Yet, little research has been conducted to document social media use by rural residents. This paper explores the social media experiences of 62 rural Australians, gathered through focus group and individual interviews. Results reveal the varied ways that rural residents use social media, for personal and work activities. Positive and negative perceptions of social media tools provide detailed insights into rural residents' views. Participants highlighted opportunities to harness the potential of social media to further their business interests, to build social networks and to advocate for issues important to rural people.","PeriodicalId":130378,"journal":{"name":"Proceedings of the 8th International Conference on Social Media & Society","volume":"21 1","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2017-07-28","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"132607824","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
J. Introne, L. Iandoli, J. DeCook, I. Yildirim, Shaima Elzeini
{"title":"The Collaborative Construction and Evolution of Pseudo-knowledge in Online Conversations","authors":"J. Introne, L. Iandoli, J. DeCook, I. Yildirim, Shaima Elzeini","doi":"10.1145/3097286.3097297","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1145/3097286.3097297","url":null,"abstract":"Misinformation has found a new natural habitat in the digital age. Thousands of forums, blogs, and alternative news sources amplify inaccurate information to such a degree that it impacts our collective intelligence. Widespread misinformation is troubling, not just because it is wrong, but also because it can persist in the face of attempts to correct it, and thus becomes part of a larger culture of community-based pseudoknowledge (PK). Prior work has focused on the motivations and psychology of those who create and maintain PK but has neglected inspection of the dynamics of collective PK production itself. In this exploratory case study, we illustrate how the active participation of multiple collaborators adapts PK over time through a process we liken to participatory storytelling. We argue that the Internet provides a uniquely well-suited environment for evolving PK that is \"more fit\", in that it is more engaging, easier to defend, and possibly easier to spread.","PeriodicalId":130378,"journal":{"name":"Proceedings of the 8th International Conference on Social Media & Society","volume":"16 1","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2017-07-28","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"125328680","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Labels and sentiment in social media: On the role of perceived agency in online discussions of the refugee crisis","authors":"Ju-Sung Lee, Adina Nerghes","doi":"10.1145/3097286.3097300","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1145/3097286.3097300","url":null,"abstract":"By focusing on the recent events in the Middle East, that have pushed many to flee and seek refuge in neighboring countries or in Europe, we investigate dynamics of label use in social media, the emergent patterns of labeling that can cause further disaffection and tension, and the sentiments associated with the different labels. To achieve this, we examine key labels pertaining to the refugee/migrant crisis and their usage in the user comment thread of a highly viewed and informational video of the crisis on YouTube. The use of labels indicate that migration issues are being framed not only through labels characterizing the crisis but also by their describing the individuals themselves. The sentiments associated with these labels depart from what one would normally expect; in particular, negative sentiment is attached to labels that would otherwise be deemed neutral or positive. Interestingly, both positive and negative labels exhibit increased negativity across time. Using topic modeling and sentiment analysis jointly, we discover that the latent topics of the most positive comments show more overlap than those topics of the most negative comments, which are more focused and partitioned. In terms of sentiment, we find that labels indicating some degree of perceived agency or opportunity, such as 'migrant' or 'immigrant', are embedded in less sympathetic comments than those labels indicating a need to escape war-torn regions or persecution (e.g., asylum seeker or refugee). Our study offers valuable insights into the direction of public sentiment and the nature of discussions surrounding this significant societal event, as well as the nature of online opinion sharing.","PeriodicalId":130378,"journal":{"name":"Proceedings of the 8th International Conference on Social Media & Society","volume":"15 1","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2017-07-28","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"125655709","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"'My Data, My Bad ...': Young People's Personal Data Understandings and (Counter)Practices","authors":"Luci Pangrazio, N. Selwyn","doi":"10.1145/3097286.3097338","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1145/3097286.3097338","url":null,"abstract":"Large quantities of personal data are now being generated, collated and processed through young people's uses of social media. Third parties increasingly use these data to profile, predict and position the individuals they are associated with. These developments have prompted calls for individuals to adopt more informed and critical stances toward how and why their data is being used -- i.e., to become vigilant 'data citizens'. Against this background, this paper reports on an ongoing project that explores the extent to which social media users are aware of their personal data and its attendant issues and uses. Drawing on participatory design research with four diverse groups of young people (aged 14 to 18 years), this paper investigates the possibilities of making third party (re)uses of personal data openly available in digitized form for young people to access, interpret and use to develop counter-practices and resistant tactics. The results of these interventions -- while only partially successful -- provide valuable insights into the technical, informatic, organizational and social issues surrounding how young people engage with social media, and how academic concerns over data relate to everyday lived experiences of social media use in a digital age.","PeriodicalId":130378,"journal":{"name":"Proceedings of the 8th International Conference on Social Media & Society","volume":"27 1","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2017-07-28","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"129257980","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Is Twitter a Generalizable Public Sphere?: A Comparison of 2016 Presidential Campaign Issue Importance among General and Twitter Publics","authors":"D. Davis","doi":"10.1145/3097286.3097317","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1145/3097286.3097317","url":null,"abstract":"News media often cite Twitter and other social media metrics as measures of public opinion. This study draws on a quota sample (N=420) of adult American Twitter users to determine the representativeness of the Twitter public in relation to the U.S. general population around 14 issues related to the 2016 presidential campaign, and considers implications for news media coverage of the Twitterverse and other social media populations as representations of the greater public sphere.","PeriodicalId":130378,"journal":{"name":"Proceedings of the 8th International Conference on Social Media & Society","volume":"10 1","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2017-07-28","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"121371272","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Juan Pablo Alperin, E. Hanson, Kenneth Shores, S. Haustein
{"title":"Twitter bot surveys: A discrete choice experiment to increase response rates","authors":"Juan Pablo Alperin, E. Hanson, Kenneth Shores, S. Haustein","doi":"10.1145/3097286.3097313","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1145/3097286.3097313","url":null,"abstract":"This paper presents a new methodology---the Twitter bot survey---that bridges the gap between social media research and web surveys. The methodology uses the Twitter APIs to identify a target population and then uses the API to deliver a question in the form of a regular Tweet. We hypothesized that this method would yield high response rates because users are posed a question within the social media platform and are not asked, as is the case with most web surveys, to follow a link away to a third party. To evaluate the response rate and identify the most effective mechanism for increasing it, we conducted a discrete choice experiment that evaluated three factors: question type, the use of an egoistic appeal, and the presence of contextual information. We found that, similar to traditional web surveys, multiple choice questions, egoistic appeals, and contextual information all contributed to higher response rates. Question variants that combined all three yielded a 40.0% response rate, thereby outperforming most other web surveys and demonstrating the promise of this new methodology. The approach can be extended to any other social media platforms where users typically interact with one another. The approach also offers the opportunity to bring together the advantages of social media research using APIs with the richness of information that can be collected from surveys.","PeriodicalId":130378,"journal":{"name":"Proceedings of the 8th International Conference on Social Media & Society","volume":"106 1","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2017-07-28","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"116005809","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Angels and Devils of Digital Social Norm Enforcement: A Theory about Aggressive versus Civilized Online Comments","authors":"L. Stahel, K. Rost","doi":"10.1145/3097286.3097304","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1145/3097286.3097304","url":null,"abstract":"We develop a theory that explains when commenters choose to be aggressive versus civilized in social media depending on their personal social norm context. In particular, we enrich traditional social norm theory by introducing the concept of moral legitimacy. This concept suggests that justifications, particularly those that put social norm violators outside of moral boundaries, cause aggression. Using the diversity of 45,982 comments of a real-world online firestorm, our results confirm that social norm contexts matter strongly for online behavior. The developed theory challenges existing speculations about online aggression and helps to develop strategies to encourage enlightened, civilized discourse on the Internet.","PeriodicalId":130378,"journal":{"name":"Proceedings of the 8th International Conference on Social Media & Society","volume":"1 1","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2017-07-28","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"128127749","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Spiral of Silence 2.0: Political Self-Censorship among Young Facebook Users","authors":"C. Hoffmann, C. Lutz","doi":"10.1145/3097286.3097296","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1145/3097286.3097296","url":null,"abstract":"This study applies the spiral of silence theory to political discourse among digital natives on Facebook. Using structural equation modeling on a survey of 967 Facebook users in Germany under the age of 30, we find that network heterogeneity increases the perception of the opinion climate as adverse, which, in turn leads to self-censorship. Moreover, political interest and active Facebook use foster users' willingness to speak out, while fear of isolation and communication apprehension lower it. We discuss the findings, embed them into discourses about impression management and context collapse, and show the usefulness of the spiral of silence theory in social media research.","PeriodicalId":130378,"journal":{"name":"Proceedings of the 8th International Conference on Social Media & Society","volume":"10 1","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2017-07-28","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"122452419","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Platform-Specific Self-Branding: Imagined Affordances of the Social Media Ecology","authors":"B. Duffy, Urszula Pruchniewska, Leah M. Scolere","doi":"10.1145/3097286.3097291","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1145/3097286.3097291","url":null,"abstract":"Despite the recent uptick in academic literature on self-branding across the fields of Internet studies, business/marketing, and media/cultural industries, the ways in which the digital self-brand gets reproduced across a sprawling social media ecology remains comparatively under-theorized. Our paper draws upon in-depth interviews with 42 creative workers---including designers/artists, bloggers/writers, online content creators, and marketers/publicists---to understand how independent professionals present themselves and their work in the digital economy. We show that despite the common refrain of maintaining a \"consistent\" online persona, creative workers continuously negotiate their self-presentation activities through a logic we term 'platform-specific self-branding'. The platform-specific self-brand, we contend, is based upon the \"imagined affordances\" [44] of individual platforms and their placement within the larger social media ecology. Such imaginations are constructed through the interplay of: 1) platform features; 2) assumptions about the audience; and 3) the producer's own self-concept. We conclude that creative workers' incitement to incessantly monitor and re-fashion their digital personae in platform-specific ways marks an intensification of the 'always on' laboring subjectivity required to vie for attention in a precarious creative economy.","PeriodicalId":130378,"journal":{"name":"Proceedings of the 8th International Conference on Social Media & Society","volume":"4 1","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2017-07-28","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"122670839","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}