Social Media: In & Around Research

Jennifer M. Jones School of Media Culture and Society

University of the West of Scotland

Research Seminar for School of Education, 25th of November 2014 2-4pm contact: jennifer.jones@uws.ac.uk @jennifermjones http://www.jennifermjones.net

Themes of session

Examine the relationship and differences between social media as a research topic, research tool and research practice;

Exploring case studies (PhD & practice-research) where social media has been embedded within the process;

Application in practice, explicit and implicit roles that social media can have across research practice -personal, professional, method & impact.

Things that this could be…

An opportunity to hear about how social media can be used in and around research - using researcher-led case studies.

A reflection on how certain available digital technologies can be used in an academic context and an cursory overview of what is possible.

An argument for the need for critical discussion around media/digital literacies, information management & wider engagement around the tools & practices in this area.

An ongoing dialogue.

Things this is not…

A one-size fits all approach.

A tick box training course.

Social Media 101.

HOW FAR HAVE WE CAME?

http://xkcd.com/802/

Self-publishing web-logging14 YEARS AGO

ACCESS LOWERING THE THRESHOLD TO PUBLISH CONTENT

3rd party facilities to host multimedia content9 YEARS AGO

ABILITYREMOVES THE NEED FOR TECHNICAL EXPERIENCE AND/OR DEDICATED SERVER SPACE

Smartphones as the default tool7 YEARS AGO

MOBILEPRODUCE AND ACCESS SMALL USER-GENERATED MEDIA ON THE GO

The ‘Twitter’ Olympics – Over related 150,000,000 tweets over 16 days 2 YEAR AGO

CRITICAL MASSSOCIAL MEDIA MOVES INTO THE MAINSTREAM, POLICIES AND STRATEGIES REFLECT THIS – ACCESS TO VAST QUANTITIES OF SOCIAL DATA

• Application and/or Platform based (through websites such as Facebook and Twitter)

• Personalized networked environment

• Access through multiple screens and devices, often on the go.

• Driven by granular sharing, emoting and describing

• Real-time – making the implicit, explicit

THE STATE OF THE WEB

http://www.tweetdeck.com

Immediacy – validity – connectedness - participatory – big data NOW?

Networked across sectors, keywords, events, contexts, location…VISUALISE YOUR COMMUNITY

mentionmapp.com

How could social media be used in research?

Gathering and generating data;

Archiving and visualising data;

Access to knowledge;

Networking and collaboration;

Feedback and reflection.

How could social media be used around research?

Learning & teaching and pedagogical implications;

Personal (learning environments & development;)

Evaluation and demonstrating impact;

Amplified events and activity;

Friend of a friend (FOAF) and the network effect.

No two account feeds are the same, we construct our own personalised environmentNETWORKED INDIVIDUALISM

Competing attentions, brands sit between friends, between news, between videos of cats, all waiting to be passed on via a ‘like’ or a ‘retweet’ button.

ATTENTION ECONOMY

SOCIAL MEDIAPRACTICE OVER TECHNOLOGY

NO FIXED APPROACHResearch Collaboration Display Promote Listen Reflect Evaluate

RESEARCH

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E.G. TWITTER TOOLS

https://twitter.com/search-advancedhttp://www.twitonomy.com/

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COLLABORATIONhttp://drive.google.com

DISPLAY

TELL MORESTORIESYOU’LL GET A BETTER, MORE ENGAGED RESPONSE

PROMOTE(Important, but not the focus)

LISTEN

MOST IMPORTANTPARTYOU DON’T ALWAYS NEED TO RESPOND, BUT YOU CAN ALWAYS LISTEN

ASK QUESTIONSGIVE YOUR FOLLOWERS AN OPPORTUNITY TO ANSWER BACK

JOIN THE CONVERSATIONTELL STORIES, TALK ABOUT THOSE STORIES AND PROMOTION WILL FOLLOW

REFLECT

GO BEYONDCOPYIF YOU WANT FEEDBACK, JOIN THE CONVERSATION, REFLECT ON PROCESS

MAKING IMPLICIT, EXPLICITTO GET THE MOST OUT OF USING SOCIAL MEDIA TECHNOLOGIES, YOU MUST ALSO CONTRIBUTE SOMETHING

MONITOR

SOCIAL MEDIA IS EPHEMERALCONTEXT CAN COLLAPSE WITHIN A WEEK, SEARCHING BECOMES DIFFICULT

ARCHIVEEmpheral

storify.com

TELL STORIES WITH DATASOCIAL MEDIA CAN ILLUSTRATE AND ADD LIFE TO REPORTS (VIDEO, AUDIO AND PHOTO FEEDBACK)

VISUALISE

NEXT STEPS FOR UWS?CHAMPIONING SOCIAL MEDIA IN & AROUND RESEARCH

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THANKSQUESTIONS?

jennifermjones.net @jennifermjones