Table Of ContentANALYZING SOCIAL MEDIA NETWORKS
WITH NODEXL
Insights from a Connected World
ANALYZING
SOCIAL MEDIA
NETWORKS WITH
NODEXL
Insights from a Connected World
SECOND EDITION
Derek L. Hansen
Ben Shneiderman
Marc A. Smith
Itai Himelboim
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Dedication
Derek: To Maren Hansen
Itai: To Jonathan and Nadav
Ben: To Jennifer Preece
Marc: To my strong ties to Madeline, Eli, and Christine
v
About the Authors
Derek L. Hansen (http://www.et.byu.edu/~dlh24/) computer-mediated collective action: the ways group
is an associate professor of Information Technology dynamics change when they take place in and through
& Cybersecurity at Brigham Young University. His re- social cyberspaces. Many “groups” in cyberspace pro-
search and teaching focus on understanding and design- duce public goods and organize t hemselves in the form
ing social technologies, tools, and games for the public of a commons (for related papers see http://connecte-
good in areas ranging from education to citizen science daction.net/marc-smith). His goal is to visualize social
to fitness to transcription of historical documents. He cyberspaces, mapping and measuring their structure,
has received over $2 million in grants to help develop dynamics, and life cycles. He also oversees the Social
and evaluate novel technical interventions, alternate Media Research Foundation (https://www.smrfoun-
reality games, and educational simulations (called dation.org/), which is a nonprofit organization that
Playable Case Studies) with highly talented faculty, stu- oversees the ongoing development of NodeXL Pro
dents, and professionals from a variety of disciplines. He (https://nodexlgraphgallery.org/) and its use in re-
completed his Ph.D. from the University of Michigan’s search and teaching. The Connected Action consulting
School of Information where he was a National Science group (http://www.connectedaction.net) applies social
Foundation-funded interdisciplinary STIET Fellow fo- science methods in general and social network analysis
cused on understanding and designing effective online techniques in particular to enterprise and Internet social
sociotechnical systems. media usage. He received a B.S. in International Area
Ben Shneiderman (www.cs.umd.edu/~ben) is an Studies from Drexel University in Philadelphia in 1988,
emeritus distinguished university professor in the an M. Phil. in social theory from Cambridge University
Department of Computer Science and founding direc- in 1990, and a Ph.D. in Sociology from UCLA in 2001.
tor (1983–2000) of the Human-Computer Interaction He is a member of the Media-X research consortium at
Laboratory (www.cs.umd.edu/hcil) at the University of Stanford University.
Maryland. He was elected as a fellow of the Association Itai Himelboim is an associate professor at the
for Computing (ACM), the American Association for University of Georgia’s Grady College of Journalism
the Advancement of Science (AAAS), the IEEE, and the and Mass Communication, Department of Advertising
National Academy of Inventors. He received the ACM and Public Relations and a director of the SEE Suite—the
SIGCHI lifetime achievement award and was elected as Social Media Engagement and Evaluation lab (http://
a member of National Academy of Engineering. He is seesuite.uga.edu). He completed his Ph.D. from the
the lead author of Designing the user interface: Strategies University of Minnesota’s School of Journalism and
for effective human-computer interaction (6th ed., 2016). He Mass Communication, focusing on the intersection be-
wrote Leonardo’s laptop: Human values and the new com- tween civil society and computer-mediated social net-
puting technologies and the new ABCs of research: Achieving works. His research and teaching interests include social
breakthrough collaborations. network analysis of large social media data related to
Marc A. Smith is a sociologist specializing in the so- news, brands, politics, health, and international affairs.
cial organization of online communities and computer- In his research, he examines the network structures
mediated interaction. He leads the Connected Action that emerge when users interact on Twitter and other
consulting group and lives and works in Silicon Valley, social media spaces, patterns of information diffusion,
California. He is the coeditor, with Peter Kollock, of the emergence of network clusters as information echo
Communities in cyberspace (Routledge), a collection of es- chambers, key information sources in these networks, as
says exploring the ways identity, interaction, and social well as identifying key users and content that bridges
order develop in online groups. His research focuses on these information silos.
xi
Contributors
Md. Mahbub Or Rahman Bhuyan Department of Sociology Bryan M. Trude Department of Advertising & Public Rela-
and Anthropology, Ohio University, Athens, OH, United tions, Grady College of Journalism and Mass Communica-
States tion, University of Georgia, Athens, Georgia
Nina Cesare School of Public Health, Boston University, Howard T. Welser Department of Sociology and Anthropol-
Boston, MA, United States ogy, Ohio University, Athens, OH, United States
Jen Golbeck College of Information Studies, University of
Maryland, College Park, MD, United States
xiii
Preface
We live in the era of networks. Occasionally the aspi- Contributors to the foundation are distributed across
rations of academic researchers are in harmony with the the United States, Europe, and Asia with links to others
needs of software developers, entrepreneurs, and gov- around the world. Our members have created plugins
ernment agency staffers. In our case, the authors brought and features for extending NodeXL, adding support for
together complementary backgrounds in information language and content analysis, better visualizations, and
studies, communications, computer science, and sociol- better reports and presentations.
ogy, as well as a shared interest in the interdisciplinary NodeXL has continued to support the academic com-
topics of human-computer interaction, network analysis, munity, who have used the tool to publish over 7000
social media, and information visualization. Together, articles citing NodeXL or the first version of this book.
we have worked to build tools that broaden access to in- Scholars from dozens of disciplines ranging from com-
sights into complex connected network structures. puter science to communications to digital humanities to
Networks are a topic that is gaining interest from the history have used NodeXL to tell stories about the net-
growing community of entrepreneurs who are coping works that underlie our society. They have also found
with the success of social media commercial platforms NodeXL to be an invaluable tool in teaching social net-
such as Twitter, Facebook, YouTube, and the equally work analysis to undergraduate and graduate students
remarkable open source communities that produce valu- across the world. Its integration with the familiar Excel
able resources such as Wikipedia. Social media is now spreadsheet program, built-in importers from social me-
perceived of as a collection of complex networks which dia sites, and rich analysis and visualization features
can be best understood by drawing on social science make it ideal for those starting to learn social network
methods designed to help identify connections, influ- analysis.
encers, and social roles. Meanwhile, NodeXL has transitioned from a pri-
Tools for social media network analysis and visualiza- marily academic project into a viable commercial tool,
tion have been emerging from many research groups and as companies have turned to NodeXL to understand
startup companies. These pioneering network analysis how social media users are engaging with their brand,
tools often require programming skills and knowledge of products, and competitors. There have been hundreds of
technical network terminology, making it a challenge for thousands of downloads of NodeXL since its inception.
those without programming skills to import and make Companies use NodeXL to identify thought leaders in
sense of network data. Today measurements of networks new markets and recognize how they fit into the larger
are a mature topic, but research questions remain on social media landscape. The ongoing success of NodeXL
the best way to layout and cluster networks with algo- has allowed it to continue developing into an increas-
rithms. Network innovation has expanded dramatically ingly sophisticated network and content analysis and vi-
in the past decades, producing breakthroughs that ex- sualization tool that fills an important niche in the social
panded the scale and level of insight into networks that network analysis landscape.
are possible to capture. Similarly, strategies for filtering, The future of NodeXL looks bright, with a highly ac-
visualizing, and decluttering networks have matured as tive research and development community that spans
more users tackle a broader variety of problems with in- the globe, a growing number of users, and an excel-
creasingly large networks. lent core team of developers. An increasing number of
The authors have been fortunate to be part of a team YouTube videos, online tutorials, and supplemental ma-
with unique skills that continue to develop the NodeXL terials are becoming available; though this book is by far
tool. The project was originally funded by Microsoft the most comprehensive introduction to NodeXL avail-
Research and for over 10 years it has been sponsored able. Updates continue to be pushed at least monthly,
by the Social Media Research Foundation (http://smr- and it is spotlighted at numerous workshops and confer-
foundation.org), a nonprofit organization dedicated to ence presentations each year. New features and devel-
the development of NodeXL and related tools. The SMR opments are designed to meet the needs of the NodeXL
Foundation is focused on supporting scholarship related community members and questions or bugs are quickly
to social media via tool building and research assistance. resolved when uncovered.
xv
xvi PREFACE
The success of NodeXL has validated our initial goal actionable insights from social media analytics.
of making social network analysis, especially of social Although we are pleased with what NodeXL users are
media data, more accessible to the masses. Constant able to accomplish, we are humbled by the richness and
feedback from researchers and practitioners using diversity of social media analytical possibilities. The op-
NodeXL has helped us improve usability, envision portunities and challenges are substantial, which will
new features, and raised our aspirations about what keep researchers and developers productively engaged
we and our users could accomplish in terms of gaining for many years to come.
Acknowledgments
The authors would like to thank the many people Sue Beckingham, Sheffield Hallym University
who have made this document and the NodeXL proj- Steve Boland, Next in Non-Profits
ect possible. First, the core members of the NodeXL Kirk D Borne, Booz Allen Hamilton
design and development team include Harald Meier Katy Borner, Indiana University
and Arber Ceni on whom we depend for their remark- Aras Bozkurt, Anadolu University
able programming prowess, thoughtful discussions Marie Brugere, Social media expert
about features, and always courteous help to us and Julian Chin, University of Illinois, Urbana Champaign
the NodeXL user community. In addition, Natasa Milic- Diane Cline, George Washington University
Frayling from the University of Nottingham, Eduarda Noshir Contractor, Northwestern University
Mendes Rodrigues from the UK Mobile Phone company James Cook, University of Maine, Augusta
Giff Gaff, Cody Dunne at Northeastern University, Jana Rob Cross, University of Virginia
Diesner at University of Illinois, Urbana Champaign, Helen Darling, Sumfood
and Jure Leskovec at Stanford University all have made Wayne deFremery, Sogang University
significant contributions to the NodeXL project. We are Scott Dempwolf, University of Maryland
grateful also to Adam Perer from IBM Research for his Daniel Erasmus, NewsConsole
intellectual contributions to our grand adventure. We Randy Farmer, online community expert
remain in debt to Tony Capone for his software develop- Liam Farrell, Author
ment work in the initial years of NodeXL. Kyle Findlay, Kantar Analytics
We also thank Emily Mason, Chad Doran, and Rachel Lise Getoor, University of California, Santa Cruz
Collins, who collected datasets used in the book as part Scott Golder, Capital One
of their coursework and came up with compelling anal- Ian Griffin, Executive Communications
yses of them. Special thanks to Chris Wilson of Slate Jacob Groshek, Boston University
Magazine for sharing the Senate 2007 voting data and Libby Hemphill, University of Michigan
Jared Stewart for creating a comparable datasets for Bernie Hogan, Oxford University, Oxford Internet
more recent years. Institute
The students of several classes who were assigned Bill Johnston, Structure3C
projects with NodeXL have been patient and forgiving David Kaplan, Global Investigative Journalism
as we refined the rough edges. Many hundreds of thou- Network
sands of people have downloaded NodeXL, and many Brian Keegan, University of Colorado
have created research and business results using the John Kelly, Grafika
tool. We appreciate the time and attention our users give Gohar Khan, Waikato University
the tool and the project and hope they will continue to Leo Kim, Ars Praxia, Korea
upgrade with us as the project grows. We are grateful Valdis Krebs, Orgnet
to these and many other people for their efforts to make Cliff Lampe, University of Michigan
NodeXL an easy and useful tool for understanding com- Jeremy Harris Lipschultz, University of Nebraska,
plex networks. Omaha
Ai Addyson-Zhang, Stockton University Graham Mackenzie, Scottish National Health Service
Hayan Ajjan, Elon University Surgeon
Julie Albright, University of Southern California Sorin Matei, Purdue University
Wasim Ahmed, University of Northumbria Fil Menzcer, Indiana University
Harith Alani, Open University Anne Merick, The Bravo Group
Nasir Asar, Highpoint University Nasri Messarra, Saint Joseph University
Diana Asher, University of California, Los Angeles Luisa Milic, Ideya.eu
Brandy Aven, Carnegie Mellon University Aldo de Moor, Online Community Expert
Vladimir Barash, Grafika Scott Moore, Online Community Expert
George Barnett, University of California at Davis Miriam Notten, LaRed Consulting
Daniel Bassill, TutorMentor Katherine Ognyanova, Rutgers University
xvii
