Connecting the Dotsan IU Network Science Institute blog

IUNI is hiring a new research scientist!

Posted on by Ann McCranie

Update : this position has been filled. 

 

IUNI has an opening for a new research scientist to add to our interdisciplinary team of network scientists to start in October 2018. See below for our position description. Note the deadline of August 17, 2018 and see the full post and application portal for more information. We also encourage you to reach out to our staff via email if you have any questions or would like to learn more.

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Research Scientist, Indiana University Network Science Institute (IUNI), Non-Tenure Track

See the full post and link to the application portal: https://indiana.peopleadmin.com/postings/6216

The Indiana University Network Science Institute (IUNI) seeks applicants for an Assistant Research Scientist position. This position will be appointed for a two-year term with the possibility of renewal based on exemplary performance, programmatic need, and continued funding of the position.

Scientific areas of particular interest include: (1) Analysis and modeling of networks, ideally using both analytical and computational tools; (2) Dynamical processes on networks, especially multilevel biomedical and social networks; (3) computational social science, where massive data from social media is analyzed to answer fundamental questions about individuals and society, with applications spanning from health to political science; (4) science of science, where large scholarly databases are built, analyzed, and modeled to explore topics such as the emergence of scientific fields, the diffusion of knowledge and expertise, the adoption of innovations, the definition of novelty, the prediction of scholarly and societal impact.

Basic Qualifications: The ideal candidate will have completed a PhD in physics, applied math, engineering, computer science or information science and have a strong background and experience in network science and data science. To employ theoretical, empirical, and mixed methods, the researcher will need both analytical/modeling skills and the technical capabilities to deal with big data.

Questions regarding the position or application process can be directed to Lourdes Gonzalez at gonzalou@iu.edu or (812) 855-6010.

To apply, submit a CV, a cover letter describing your research interests, a research plan (not to exceed 2 pages), and the name, email address and institutional affiliation/position of three references.

For Best Consideration Date 08/17/2018
Expected Start Date 10/01/2018

 

Please see the full post and link to the portal: https://indiana.peopleadmin.com/postings/6216

Join the IU networks community: postdoctoral position open

Posted on by Ann McCranie

Update : This  position has been filled. 

 

The Center for Complex Networks and Systems Research (cnets.indiana.edu) at Indiana University, Bloomington has one open postdoctoral position to study critical processes in networks of networks. The appointment starts in August 2018 for one year and is renewable for another year, subject to funding and performance. The salary is competitive and benefits are generous.

The postdoc will join a dynamic and interdisciplinary team that includes computer, physical, and cognitive scientists. The postdoc will work with Prof. Filippo Radicchi.

The ideal candidate will have a PhD in Physics or Applied Mathematics, a strong background in analysis and modeling of complex systems and networks, and solid programming skills necessary to handle big data and develop large scale simulations.

Interested applicants should upload a letter of interest, CV, and contact information for three professional references at  http://indiana.peopleadmin.com/postings/5833. Questions may be sent to by email to Filippo Radicchi. For best consideration, apply by June 1, 2018.

Indiana University is an equal employment and affirmative action employer and a provider of ADA services. All qualified applicants will receive consideration for employment without regard to age, ethnicity, color, race, religion, sex, sexual orientation or identity, national origin, disability status or protected veteran status.

New and Enhanced Social Media Analytics Resources at IU

Posted on by Ann McCranie

SAVE THE DATE! Please join us at the Social Science Research Commons (SSRC), Woodburn Hall 200, on Wednesday, January 17, 2018 at 4:00 p.m. for an information session of this new resource at our upcoming Open Science Meeting. Research scientist Giovanni Luca Ciampaglia will give a brief demonstration of how to use the tool, and an overview of the scientific applications of social media data. For more information see the official announcement.

tool set
OSoMe Tool Set

Starting this November, a novel data resource is available to the research and academic community at Indiana University. IU researchers and students can now obtain access to the Twitter stream through a new data API, provided by the Observatory on Social Media (OSoMe), Indiana University’s warehouse for social media data.

The new API provides historical access to billions of  tweets, with tens of millions of tweets sampled every day directly from the Twitter stream. On top of Twitter’s Enterprise streaming API endpoints, OSoMe’s new Enhanced Data API  provides advanced filtering and analytics capabilities, which can be used to query the collection for fine-grained data collection, analysis, and presentation.

New data snapshots are added to the collection on a daily basis. Access to raw data, in JSON format, is provided, with no caps on the amount of data available for download. An interactive, Web-based query builder (Moe’s Tavern) is available for users who wish to get started immediately without having to learn how to use Hadoop or other big data engines.

This new data resource is available thanks to support from the Indiana University Network Science Institute (IUNI) and the Digital Science Center (DSC).

By virtue of its academic partnership with Twitter, free access to the data is provided for research and academic purposes only. All faculty, students, and staff at IU are eligible to apply for access to the data. For more information, please visit: http://iuni.iu.edu/resources/osome

 

Frequently Asked Questions

 Background and how to apply

How do I access the data?

There is a form that any IU user can complete to request access to the dataset; requests are evaluated by IUNI’s data steward. The full access policy is available here, together with the link to the form: http://iuni.iu.edu/resources/osome#enhanced-data

Is this a free resource?

Yes, but it can be used only for academic and educational purposes.

I am an IU faculty/staff/student but I am not based on the Bloomington campus. May I still access this resource?

Yes, you may. People from all IU campuses are eligible to apply for access to the data.

Do I need to file for IRB review to use this resource?

It depends. As a general rule of thumb, access to the OSoMe Enhanced Data API does not absolve a user from any responsibilities required by the Office of Research Compliance.

Do I need to create a Twitter account to collect these data?

No, you do not have to create a Twitter account.

Am I going to breach the privacy of Twitter users by collecting these data?

No. Only data from the public Twitter stream can be accessed via the Enhanced Data API. In particular, we comply with the terms of the Twitter Developer Agreement and Policy, and honor the intent of Twitter users to remove from our database any tweet that they decide to delete. Please note that in order to apply for access to the Enhanced Data API you also have to agree and comply with those terms.

Data characteristics, sampling, tools and resources

Can I download the data? How large is the file?

The data are only available for download through the OSoMe Enhanced Access API.  File size will depend on the type of query you run.

 How much data is available?

The API will return tweets from the last 18 months. The collection is based on a 10% sample of all public tweets.

I need to access tweets that are older than 18 months. Can you please make older data available?

Unfortunately due to the limited size of our cluster we cannot maintain more than 18 months worth of data at any give time. If you are interested in supporting the expansion of the Observatory on Social Media please drop us a line and we would be happy to discuss it with you.

How is this different from the standard Twitter API?

The free Twitter Search API returns only results from the last seven days. The new Premium 30-day Search API extends to the last 30 days but is not free. OSoMe’s Enhanced Data API returns results from the last 18 months and is free to any IU students, faculty, or staff, and includes a range of advanced data aggregation and filtering methods.

Is the sample statistically valid?

The API takes advantage of Twitter’s Enterprise real-time sampling algorithms to collect a statistically valid sample of 10% of all public tweets. Please note that this is different from the free Twitter Streaming API, which has been shown to be affected by sampling biases.

I have used the OSoMe tools before. How does this differ the rest of the tools of the Observatory on Social Media?

To comply with Twitter’s Developer Agreement, the amount of data that you can export from our current public front end tools is capped. Moreover, you can only export numerical tweet and user IDs. This means that even when your data fits within the limit, you still have to use the Twitter API to collect each individual tweet. The new Enhanced Access API is not restricted by these limits, but is available only to IU users by virtue of an academic partnership between Indiana University and Twitter, inc.

I have heard that a lot of Twitter users are fake or automated. How can I tell which tweets are from human users?

Please check Botometer, our free social bot detection tool.

Can I visualize these data?

With the Observatory on Social Media you can visualize temporal trends, geographic distributions, and diffusion networks, and even make movies. For the full list of public tools, please see osome.iuni.iu.edu/tools

Can I read more about OSoMe? How can I acknowledge this resource in my work?

For more information and/or a suggested citation, please refer to our open-access publication on the Observatory on Social Media:

Davis CA, Ciampaglia GL, Aiello LM, Chung K, Conover MD, Ferrara E, Flammini A, Fox GC, Gao X, Gonçalves B, Grabowicz PA, Hong K, Hui P, McCaulay S, McKelvey K, Meiss MR, Patil S, Peli Kankanamalage C, Pentchev V, Qiu J, Ratkiewicz J, Rudnick A, Serrette B, Shiralkar P, Varol O, Weng L, Wu T, Younge AJ, Menczer F. (2016) OSoMe: the IUNI observatory on social media. PeerJ Computer Science 2:e87 https://doi.org/10.7717/peerj-cs.87

If you use OSoMe and/or the new Enhanced Access API in your work, please acknowledge support from the Indiana University Network Science Institute. Suggested acknowledgement formula:

Access to Twitter data was obtained thanks to support from the Indiana University Network Science Institute through the Observatory on Social Media (osome.iuni.iu.edu), which is also supported by the Digital Science Center (dsc.sice.indiana.edu) and the Center for Complex Networks and Systems Research (cnets.indiana.edu).

Call for Papers: “New Frontiers in Egocentric Networks” in Network Science

Posted on by Ann McCranie

CALL FOR PAPERS

“New Frontiers in Egocentric Networks,” a special issue of Network Science

Special Editors:  Brea L. Perry, Bernice A. Pescosolido, and Mario L. Small

Deadline for letter of intent:  December 15, 2017

Deadline for full paper: June 15, 2018

Egocentric network analysis has a long and rich tradition that includes works in sociology, political science, anthropology, psychology, public opinion, communication, and health and medicine.  Studying networks from the perspective of the individual creates important and unique advantages, including flexibility in data collection, generalizability to national populations, and the ability to capture networks beyond a single context. Such advantages have helped bring network perspectives to research in substantive areas such as inequality, health, political movements, immigration, culture, and many others. The spectacular growth of sociocentric network research in recent years creates the opportunity to revisit the particular strengths of egocentric perspectives, their relation to sociocentric ones, and the possibility of innovative ways of bridging the perspectives. This special issue of Network Science seeks to target new advances in theory, method, and analysis in ego-networks, per se, as well as push the integration of this and other approaches to the study of networks and network-related phenomena.

Topics of particular interest to the editors include:

  • cognition, perception, and heuristics,
  • decision-making, choice, and agency,
  • contexts of social interaction,
  • dynamics of tie formation and dissolution,
  • help-seeking behavior, network mobilization, and tie activation,
  • the process of alter recall,
  • culture and meaning-making,
  • social support, resilience, and mobility,
  • frequency, types, and forms of talk and communication, and
  • measurement and methods, including innovative uses of qualitative, online, or mobile data collection.

A letter of intent should be sent to egonetworkscience@gmail.com by December 15, 2017. It should include a draft title, author list, designated corresponding author, and either an extended abstract or brief description of the paper.  

Full papers will be due on June 15, 2018 and will be sent out for double-blind peer review.

Submission criteria for full manuscripts can be found at Network Science. Please direct questions to egonetworkscience@gmail.com.

Welcome!

Posted on by Ann McCranie

This is the site of the new Indiana University Network Science Institute (IUNI) blog, Connecting the Dots.  This is a group blog authored by IUNI-affiliated faculty and staff about networks research. IUNI, a cross-campus institute at IU, aims to improve the theories, methods, analytic tools, and practice of network science, and to foster collaborative, interdisciplinary network science approaches to understanding and improving the complex challenges of our world. We hope to be a catalytic force in this exciting environment of over 170 faculty members who engage in networks research.

If you are a faculty member or graduate student at IU and you are interested in participating in our new blog team, contact Ann McCranie at amccrani@indiana.edu. We welcome new regular contributors or occasional guest posts about networks issues, events, research, and news.

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