Social Media in China
Sina Weibo: weibo.com
WeiboScope (fall 2011)
So what is WeiboScope?
A visual version of Weibo "trending topics"
A program that can recover deleted posts
You can use it to find funny GIFs and perhaps pick up a story idea.
Before going to China
Life before 2009
The places I call home: Montreal and Hong Kong
Media I followed as a kid growing up in Quebec who wanted to know more about China
Bridge blogs
EastSouthWestNorth Blog (ESWN)
Roland Soong: blogger of ESWN
What the Chinese are saying is often not being represented in English. My website presents what the most interesting, popular Chinese news are.
Social news on ESWN
Chinese memes on ESWN
How do I follow China stuff today?
Mostly through this:
Living and working in Hong Kong
From 2009
The Journalism and Media Studies Centre (JMSC) at HKU
People of JMSC / HKU
How did our social media data projects start? (summer 2010)
- Blogs and forums
- American SNS: Twitter, Facebook and Google+.
- Chinese SNS: Sina Weibo and QQ Weibo.
Sina Weibo Open API
Data collection strategy: the API
In the beginning, there was data.
And then the data was parsed.
Data collection strategy
What, ALL the most popular users?
- Using the API's search function, it was possible in 2010.
- Collect all the users by region.
- Aggregate.
- Discover new popular users through popular posts.
- Friends of friends.
Their timelines too.
- Timelines > Streams
- Some control over your user sample.
- Staggered snapshots (once a day, couple of days).
In the database...
Ok, I want to see visual stuff now
Enough of text-only mode
Weibo reposting vs. Twitter retweeting
- Current user's weibo (referring to another weibo)
- Original poster's weibo
- Number of comments and reposts on current user's weibo
China Meme Machine (fall 2010)
Counting emoticons (January 2011)
Sentiment analysis for lazy people
Helping reporters covering China (like our JMSC colleagues at China Media Project)
China Media Project reporting on the death of a college student from Hebei province
- 23 January 2011: Zhao Wei dies on a train bound for Tianjin. Ruled suicide by train authorities.
- 27 January 2011: Parents sign a letter suspecting foul play in death.
- 27 February 2011: Letter gets posted on online forum.
- 28 February 2011: The letter goes on Sina Weibo (http://www.weibo.com/1780771814/5en0XnsFMKZ).
- 2 March 2011: News gets picked up by David Bandurski of CMP through China Meme Machine (http://cmp.hku.hk/2011/03/03/10393/).
- March-April 2011: The Guardian picks it up.
Social Media (e-mail) Report
China Sina Weibo Scoop Machine (April 2011)
The important 1% inspiration
WeiboScope (fall 2011)
WeiboScope (search easter egg!)
Finding deleted posts (January 2012)
Finding deleted posts (January 2012)
What does the Sina Weibo API say about deleted posts?
WeiboScope Search (fall 2011)
China Media Project's (**pun alert**) Anti-Social List
So, did I learn anything?
Now in 2013
Lesson #1: Get out of your comfort zone
Lesson #2: Multidisciplinarity
Lesson #3: Avoid bandwagons
Lesson #4: There is a lot of space
Lesson #5: Don't let constraints of the system stop you
<Thank You!>
http://cedric.sam.name/
