Three Faces of Teen Popularity
https://srcd.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/full/10.1111/cdev.13269 This paper discusses a recent study that examined how certain traits in young adults have affected their popularity. Most young people are concerned about their image and status within their peer group. Popularity, gained through both positive and negative adjustment outcomes, tends to be preferred to being liked. In the past, researchers had concluded […]
Instagram Connections
https://www.nytimes.com/2017/12/21/style/instagram-thirst-traps-dating-breakups.html Instagram has changed the way in which dating and new relationships are being formed. It is no longer common for someone to meet someone else for the first time in person and have a face to face conversation, but that your first interaction with someone is over an app. The original form of […]
Snap Detailed Facebook’s Aggressive Tactics in ‘Project Voldemort’ Dossier
This article describes Facebook’s aggressive tactics in driving off competition in the social media industry and becoming a Silicon Valley “gorilla.” These tactics include discouraging influencers from promoting their Snapchat accounts on their Instagram pages (Instagram is owned by Facebook whereas Snapchat is a competitor), acquiring startups likely to become competitors in the future, and threatening […]
An Analysis of the New Match Making Procedures for Fortnight and It’s Implications
Fortnight is a popular first-person shooting game with millions of users across the globe. While initially designed as a story mode video game, the company launched an online competition maps which quickly garnered a large audience. Their online service links millions of users to groups of other players. Therefore, individuals can play against pools including, […]
Facebook’s Mission and its Impact on the World: a Networks Approach
Article: https://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/hughes-in-partnership-with-facebook-launches-wi-fi-hotspots-in-colombia-using-express-wi-fi-software-platform-300910985.html PR Newswire, in its article regarding increased internet access in rural parts of Colombia, focuses on the entrepreneurial benefits of satellite-assisted internet access. Facebook’s goal is providing cheap, universally accessible Wi-Fi to places “unserved or underserved” (PR Newswire). How has Facebook been working to achieve its goal? By assisting service providers […]
The Optimal Poker Strategy
https://math.mit.edu/~apost/courses/18.204_2018/Jingyu_Li_paper.pdf Poker is a widely studied game in many fields, especially in game theory. In this post, we will discuss heads-up (2 player) Texas Hold’em Poker, wherein each player tries to maximize the value of their hand given the amount of information they have access to. What this means in most contexts is that a […]
Echo Chambers: A hindrance to the Spread of Movements
https://datascience.virginia.edu/projects/echo-chambers-audience-and-community Many studies have explored the effect of echo chambers on social media sites like Facebook and Twitter. Echo chambers shape how users view online discourse as well as political climates. One challenge that movements such as #MeToo and #BlackLivesMattter should take into consideration is that the spread of their movements can be hindered by […]
The Ripple Effect of 9/11
Source: https://www.semanticscholar.org/paper/Estimating-the-Ripple-Effect-of-a-Disaster-1-Bernard-Killworth/cd79e71b0b0126fed25a5c511fa647e8d2f5be71 With the 18th anniversary of the attacks on 9/11/2001, it seemed like everyone was memorializing at least someone. It got me wondering if it was because I am from New York that everyone seemed to know someone affected by 9/11 or was could the effects of 9/11 truly be felt by the […]
The Online Dating Matching Market
https://www.wsj.com/articles/how-economists-would-fix-online-dating-1454907660 Online dating sites are a common space where people with similar interests get paired up to potentially form a true connection. Beyond the algorithms that make this possible, online dating sites are a good example of matching markets. In an online market, there is a ‘thick’ market, in other words, the market is full […]
Why you shouldn’t let “donation matching” affect your giving?
https://blog.givewell.org/2011/12/15/why-you-shouldnt-let-donation-matching-affect-your-giving/ The article discussed a common marketing method employed by top charities – donation matching. Donation matching” refers to when a large funder offers to give $X to a particular charity for every $Y other people give – for example, “For every $1 you give to this charity, a large funder will contribute another $1, […]
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