Overview

The Social Data Revolution (SDR) is the shift in human communication patterns towards increased personal information sharing and its related implications, made possible by the rise of social networks in early 2000s. While social networks were used in the early days to privately share photos and private messages, the subsequent trend towards people passively and actively sharing personal information more broadly has resulted in unprecedented

Big data

Big data are datasets that grow so large that they become awkward to work with using on-hand database management tools. Difficulties include capture, storage, search, sharing, analytics, and visualizing...

 amounts of public data.

This large and frequently updated data source has been described as a new type of scientific instrument for the social sciences. Several independentent researchers have used social data to "nowcast" and forecast trends such as unemployment, flu outbreaks, travel spending and political opinions in a way that is faster, more accurate and cheaper than standard government reports or Gallup polls.

Summary

Social data refers to data individuals create that is knowingly and voluntarily shared by them. Cost and overhead previously rendered this semi-public form of communication unfeasible, but advances in social networking technology from 2004-2010 has made broader concepts of sharing possible. The types of data users are sharing include geolocation

Geolocation

Geolocation is the identification of the real-world geographic location of an object, such as a radar, mobile phone or an Internet-connected computer terminal...

, medical data, dating preferences, open thoughts, interesting news articles, etc. Technology continues to track user behavior with more and more precision, resulting in products and services that can be mass customized to a broad range of users. The rise of semi-public data has rapidly advanced the sophistication of thought around Social Capital

Social capital

Social capital is a sociological concept, which refers to connections within and between social networks. The concept of social capital highlights the value of social relations and the role of cooperation and confidence to get collective or economic results. The term social capital is frequently...

. The rapid expansion of Digital Exhaust

Digital exhaust

The term digital exhaust or exhaust data has several meanings but can be defined through the following:* The output of human beings using the internet....

 will only cause these trends to accelerate.

Early examples of social data are Craigslist and the wishlists of Amazon.com. Both enable users to communicate information to anybody who is looking for it. They differ in their approach to identity

Identity (social science)

Identity is a term used to describe a person's conception and expression of their individuality or group affiliations . The term is used more specifically in psychology and sociology, and is given a great deal of attention in social psychology...

. Craigslist leverages the power of anonymity, while Amazon.com leverages the power of persistent identity, based on the history of the customer with the firm. The job market is even being shaped by the information people share about themselves on sites like LinkedIn

LinkedIn

LinkedIn is a business-related social networking site. Founded in December 2002 and launched in May 2003, it is mainly used for professional networking. , LinkedIn reports more than 120 million registered users in more than 200 countries and territories. The site is available in English, French,...

 and Facebook

Facebook

Facebook is a social networking service and website launched in February 2004, operated and privately owned by Facebook, Inc. , Facebook has more than 800 million active users. Users must register before using the site, after which they may create a personal profile, add other users as...

.

Examples of more mature social data are Twitter

Twitter

Twitter is an online social networking and microblogging service that enables its users to send and read text-based posts of up to 140 characters, informally known as "tweets".Twitter was created in March 2006 by Jack Dorsey and launched that July...

 and Facebook

Facebook

Facebook is a social networking service and website launched in February 2004, operated and privately owned by Facebook, Inc. , Facebook has more than 800 million active users. Users must register before using the site, after which they may create a personal profile, add other users as...

. On Twitter, sending a message or tweet is as simple as sending an SMS text message. Twitter made this C2W, customer to world: Any tweet a users sends can potentially be read by the entire world. Facebook focuses on interactions between friends, C2C in traditional language. It provides many ways for collecting data from its users: “tag

Tag (metadata)

In online computer systems terminology, a tag is a non-hierarchical keyword or term assigned to a piece of information . This kind of metadata helps describe an item and allows it to be found again by browsing or searching...

” a friend in a photo, “comment” on what they posted, or just “like” it. These data are the basis for sophisticated models of the relationships between users. They can be used to significantly increase the relevance of what is shown to the user, and for advertising purposes. While tweets are public, Facebook requires users to be bi-directionally approved “friends” to access information. Our understanding of social data will continue to evolve as new services are created taking advantage of the unprecedented amounts of data flowing through the internet.

See also

• Social Capital
  Social capital
  Social capital is a sociological concept, which refers to connections within and between social networks. The concept of social capital highlights the value of social relations and the role of cooperation and confidence to get collective or economic results. The term social capital is frequently...
  
  
• Digital Exhaust
  Digital exhaust
  The term digital exhaust or exhaust data has several meanings but can be defined through the following:* The output of human beings using the internet....
  
  
• Social Graph
  Social graph
  The social graph is a term coined by scientists working in the social areas of graph theory. It has been described as "the global mapping of everybody and how they're related"...
  
  
• Open Data
  Open Data
  Open data is the idea that certain data should be freely available to everyone to use and republish as they wish, without restrictions from copyright, patents or other mechanisms of control. The goals of the open data movement are similar to those of other "Open" movements such as open source, open...
  
  
• Big Data
  Big data
  Big data are datasets that grow so large that they become awkward to work with using on-hand database management tools. Difficulties include capture, storage, search, sharing, analytics, and visualizing...
  
  
• Digital Revolution
  Digital Revolution
  The Digital Revolution is the change from analog mechanical and electronic technology to digital technology that has taken place since c. 1980 and continues to the present day. Implicitly, the term also refers to the sweeping changes brought about by digital computing and communication technology...
  
  
• Social Data Analysis
  Social Data Analysis
  Social data analysis is a style of analysis in which people work in a social, collaborative context to make sense of data. The term was introduced by Martin Wattenberg in 2005...
  
  
• Tag (Metadata)
  Tag (metadata)
  In online computer systems terminology, a tag is a non-hierarchical keyword or term assigned to a piece of information . This kind of metadata helps describe an item and allows it to be found again by browsing or searching...
  
  
• Recommendation engine