Masters of Networks 3 in Review

As part of our work with Purpose and the CATALYST consortium, I have spent the last couple of days in Rome, Italy at the Masters of Networks 3 hackathon. 

Masters of Networks 3 is a two-day hackathon for network scientists, active members of online communities and people interested in participatory democracy to get together, discuss, and make sense of what we know about online communities.

Here are two Medium posts that I wrote documenting the event. You can also check out #MoN3 on Twitter to see tweets related to the hackathon.

What can we learn by looking at online communities as networks of interactions?

Is a Hashtag a Community?

Benjamin Renoust did a data analysis and visualization of the activity around the #LOTE4 hashtag on Twitter. He found a "community" of 8000 accounts who tweeted and/or retweeted the hashtag. He then drilled down to find a core group of 18 Twitter accounts who were actively engaged in sustained conversations with each other (replies & counter-replies). Read the team documentation notes here.  

Also check out Noemi Salantiu's post about what she learned at Masters of Networks.

What I learned at Masters of Networks: time for more data driven community management.