“Social media has become the dominant method of using the Internet, and it has infiltrated and changed the way millions of people interact and communicate. Social networking in particular has become extremely popular, with over one billion users on Facebook alone and billions more accounts across thousands of social networking sites online. Understanding social networks—both those explicitly formed on social networking websites and those implicitly formed in many other types of social media—has taken on new importance in light of this astounding popularity. Analysis of these social connections and interactions can help us understand who the important people are in a network, what roles a person plays, what subgroups of users are highly interconnected, how things like diseases or rumors will spread through a network, and how users participate. Applications of these analyses are extensive. Organizations can prevent or control the spread of disease outbreaks. Websites can support participation and contributions from many types of users. Businesses can provide immediate assistance to customers who have problems or complaints. Users can band together to better understand their communities and government or take collective action” (from “Analyzing the Social Web”, Golbeck, 2013; image from the book)
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