DESCRIPTION:
Social Computing technologies have become very prominent in our society and have changed many aspects of our lives, the way we interact, we read news, socialize, or play games. This course is designed to provide you with understanding of social computing technologies, including design of such systems, and how we can study them to understand how the systems are used, how they impact their users and communities, and the society at a large. Social Computing is an interdisciplinary course, drawing from the fields of Computer Science, Information Science, Psychology, and Economics. Throughout the course, we will cover key theories and technologies of social computing. Broadly, social computing can be understood as (1) computer systems supporting social behavior and (2) socially intelligent computing carried out by groups of individuals. As student in this class, you will have a chance to explore social computing systems, get experience with social data analyses and focus on design, and evaluation of a social software as their final project for the course.
COURSE FORMAT:
This course is designed following the flipped classroom model; i.e. short lecture recordings (around 15 min) are going to be available online for you to watch before the class. During the class time, we will spend time for discussion of concepts in the lectures and interaction around activities, assignments, and the course project. You are expected to watch the video recordings before the class. The recordings will be about 60 minutes for each week.
PREREQUISITES:
(INFSCI 0410 or INFSCI 1044) and (INFSCI 0510 or INFSCI 0419 or INFSCI 0019) and (INFSCI 0610 or INFSCI 1070). Also since this is an upper-level course and a rather research-based course, it involves critical thinking, desire to learn and being challenged with new topics, and hard work.
TEXT:
We will be reading excerpts from a large number of books and articles. Links to electronic copies are provided.
GRADING:
- In-class activities [15 points]
- 2 Quizzes [10 points]: Social network analysis, and Recommender systems
- Wikipedia assignment [25 points]: This is a group assignment, allowing you to practice participation in one of most important social computing systems and contribute your knowledge to it. Details are at Wikipedia Assignment Dashboard
- Social data analysis assignment [15 points]: this is an individual assignment giving you an opportunity to practice use of social media APIs, network analysis, and visualization
- Final project [35 points]
OFFICE HOUR:
Email or online meetings by appointment:
- Instructor email: rfarzan at pitt dot edu
SYLLABUS:
| # | Date | Topic | Details | Activities |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | 2020-09-01 | Introduction and overview | Course logistics and requirements Overview of what social computing is about and what you will learn in this course | Introduction activity Discussion of the movie Social Dilemma |
| 2 | 2020-09-08 | Social software | What is social software? What are examples of social software? What should we know about social software Connecting people through technology Building blocks of social software | Social programming Building a blogging software Discussion: What makes Twitter successful |
| 3 | 2020-09-15 | Distributed collaboration software | Computer supported collaboration tools Content sharing Open source software development Project observation notes | Survival task experiment Introducing Wikipedia assignment Create Wikipedia account and user page |
| 4 | 2020-09-22 | Virtual Worlds | MUDs Cases studies in using virtual worlds to understand real world phenomena Virtual worlds during the Covid-19 pandemic Project interview questions | Virtual Ethnography |
| 5 | 2020-09-29 | Design challenges | Participation online Attention economy in social media Attracting new members Retention of established members Wikipedia assignment: Evaluate Wikipedia | designing a social media campaign |
| 6 | 2020-10-06 | Project | Presentation of proposals Initial project proposal |