Hello all!
After reading Part 1 of Networked, I decided to create a network of people I interact wit, and who is connected to who. I looked at three different groups of people that interact with frequently: marching chiefs, Tallahassee band directors, and my co-workers at Wakulla High School. In the book, Raine and Wellman talk about how drawing lines between people can get overwhelming, so I decided to see how cumbersome it would be with a small sample size of people (just a few from each group/network). Wow, it got messy real quick. It became very hard to see who was connected to who. Looking back now, it might have been better if I had drawn the names in a circle, and hen connected them instead of the list format. Either way, it became clear that the matrix format they suggested in the book would be the best so that was my next plan of action.
Once I put everything in the matrix, I color-coded the initials to match the ones from the list so I could really see how the connected line and matrix formats compared and differed. I like the matrix format better because I the information is more organized. The only plus with the connect line format is that you can really see how quickly all of these networks easily intertwine. The last thing I did when I had the matrix done was look at how many social connections each of my friends had with one another. In the matrix, I used the same 0, 1, 2 scale that Raine and Wellman used. When I counted these numbers up, I found that my more outgoing friends had more connections than my more secluded ones. Their network reach was much greater. Overall, I really enjoyed Part 1 of this book, and I am excited to see what else this class teaches me about Web 2.0 and networks.
No comments:
Post a Comment