http://mappingonlinepublics.net/http://mappingonlinepublics.net/

Archiving the Immediate: How and Why Archives Should Approach Social Media

Assoc. Prof. Axel BrunsARC Centre of Excellence for Creative Industries and InnovationQueensland University of TechnologyBrisbane, Australia

a.bruns@qut.edu.au / @snurb_dot_infohttp://mappingonlinepublics.net/

http://mappingonlinepublics.net/

Why Social Media?

o Social Media:o Facebook: 10+ million users in Australiao Twitter: 1-2 million users in Australiao User-generated content and discussionso Themes from the personal to the public

(news.com.au) (theage.com.au) (abc.net.au)

http://mappingonlinepublics.net/

Background: Researching Twitter

o Mapping Online Publics:o ARC Discovery project, 2010-12:

Assoc. Prof. Axel Bruns and Dr. Jean Burgess, QUTo Methodology and outcomes: http://mappingonlinepublics.net/o Further projects on social media and crisis communication

under development

o Tools for Twitter analysis:o yourTwapperkeeper: API-based data captureo Gawk – open source, multiplatform, programmable command-

line tool for processing CSV documentso WordStat – commercial, PC-only text analysis tool; generates

concept co-occurrence data that can be exported for visualisation

o Gephi – open source, multiplatform network visualisation tool

#spill: 23 June 2010, 6-7 p.m.

#spill: 23 June 2010, 7-8 p.m.

#spill: 23 June 2010, 8-9 p.m.

#qldfloods Tweets10 Jan 2011 11 Jan 2011 12 Jan 2011 13 Jan 2011 14 Jan 2011 15 Jan 2011

http://mappingonlinepublics.net/

#qldfloods @replies

mainstream media

authorities

http://mappingonlinepublics.net/

#qldfloods Themes

From CCI Report on the use of Twitter in the Queensland floods – Shaw et al. (forthcoming, 2011).

Every 20th tweet coded.

http://mappingonlinepublics.net/

#ausvotes: Leaders

http://mappingonlinepublics.net/

#ausvotes: Themes

http://mappingonlinepublics.net/

#ausvotes: Discussion Network

(17 July to 25 Aug. 2010 / All @replies / Node size: Indegree / Node colours: betweenness centrality)

http://mappingonlinepublics.net/

#royalwedding (29 Apr. 2011)

http://mappingonlinepublics.net/

Why Do We Care?

o Historical significance:o Social media coverage as a first draft of the presento Especially Twitter: flat, open, self-organising networko First-hand, unfiltered, direct insights into Australians’ viewso Rich data on specific events and on long-term trends We archive journalistic publications, so why not this?

o Readily available, but easily lost:o Access to rich data (and metadata) through standard APIso Especially on Twitter, limited immediate ethical concernso Ephemeral content which is lost to posterity unless archivedo ‘Big data’, but far from unmanageable Better start archiving now than make up for lost material later

http://mappingonlinepublics.net/

How to Archive Social Media

o Twitter:o U.S. Library of Congress already receives full feed of all

tweetso Made accessible after six-month delay (from when? to

whom?)o Potential to join partnership or set up similar deal for

Australia?

o Twitter access to high-volume tweet feeds via Gnip.como Flat fee + volume cost of US$1/10,000 tweets receivedo Potential to negotiate discount for Australian public

archives?

o Different levels of inclusiveness in trackingo Track all Australian Twitter users? Top 500,000? Top

100,000?o Raw datasets in standard formats, and/or in-house

processingo Show leadership in developing ethical usage protocols

Wine

Adelaide

Food

Fashion / Style / Parenting

Fashion / Magazines

Music / Triple J

Teens / TV Hits

Teens / Short Stack

Filipinos

Perth / PR

Marketing / PR

News / Business

Football (Soccer)

AFL

Sports

Journalism / Politics / News

Celebrities / Media

CricketNRL

Radio

Arts

Julia Gillard

Kevin Rudd

Malcolm Turnbull

Mumbrella

ABC News

Triple J

Mia Freedman

Sunrise on 7

Matt Preston

Wil Anderson

Annabel Crabb

Leigh Sales

Latika Bourke

Marie Claire

Hamish and Andy

Joe Hockey

Laurie Oakes

Tony Abbott

Crikey

TV

7pm Project

Australia on Twitter

(follower/followee network – 140,000 most connected Australia users, of 550,000 processed so far)

http://mappingonlinepublics.net/

The Promise of ‘Big Data’ Research

o Insights on Australian public communication on Twitter:o Micro: @reply and retweet conversationso Meso: hashtag ‘communities’o Macro: follower/followee networks Multiple overlapping publics / networks

o Evidence of processes in the Australian public sphere:o What drives the formation and dissipation of online

publics?o How do they interact and interweave?o How are they interleaved with the wider

media ecology?o How is information disseminated across complex

networks?

http://mappingonlinepublics.net/http://mappingonlinepublics.net/

http://mappingonlinepublics.net/

@snurb_dot_info@jeanburgess@_StephenH@DrTNitins@timhighfield