2017 |
Reips, Ulf; Garaizar, Pablo Social Lab: An “Open Source Facebook" Book Chapter Sloan, In Quan-Haase & A L (Ed.): Handbook of Social Media Research Methods, pp. 475-485, London: Sage, 2017. Abstract | Links | BibTeX | Tags: big data, Facebook, Internet science, Internet-based research, iscience, open source, social bots, Social Lab, Social media, social networks @inbook{Reips2017, title = {Social Lab: An “Open Source Facebook"}, author = {Ulf Reips and Pablo Garaizar}, editor = {In A. Quan-Haase & L. Sloan}, url = {http://home/learninglabdeust/public_html.uni-konstanz.de/iscience/reips/pubs/papers/chapters/2016ReipsGaraizar.pdf}, year = {2017}, date = {2017-05-24}, booktitle = {Handbook of Social Media Research Methods}, pages = {475-485}, publisher = {London: Sage}, abstract = {The overlap between our every day activities and our behaviours on the Internet is ever increasing. With the advent of social media the social and behavioural sciences are faced with new opportunities and challenges for research into social behaviour. The vast majority of social media are owned by private companies. Despite public application programming interfaces (APIs) being offered by some of these social media, research in proprietary networks is severely limited. Considering the limitations to social media research, we have developed Social Lab, an open source clone of Facebook with most of its features (messaging, sharing, befriending, wall posts, pictures, searching, profiles, privacy settings, etc.). In addition, Social Lab enables researchers to create “social bots” – automated programmable profiles controlled through simple scripts – to facilitate the study of social phenomena. In the present chapter we introduce Social Lab using an example around privacy management in social media, show how to configure social bots in Social Lab, and explain how it can be used in research. The source code of Social Lab is freely available to the scientific community, so any research group can have its own Social Lab to conduct their Internetbased research.}, keywords = {big data, Facebook, Internet science, Internet-based research, iscience, open source, social bots, Social Lab, Social media, social networks}, pubstate = {published}, tppubtype = {inbook} } The overlap between our every day activities and our behaviours on the Internet is ever increasing. With the advent of social media the social and behavioural sciences are faced with new opportunities and challenges for research into social behaviour. The vast majority of social media are owned by private companies. Despite public application programming interfaces (APIs) being offered by some of these social media, research in proprietary networks is severely limited. Considering the limitations to social media research, we have developed Social Lab, an open source clone of Facebook with most of its features (messaging, sharing, befriending, wall posts, pictures, searching, profiles, privacy settings, etc.). In addition, Social Lab enables researchers to create “social bots” – automated programmable profiles controlled through simple scripts – to facilitate the study of social phenomena. In the present chapter we introduce Social Lab using an example around privacy management in social media, show how to configure social bots in Social Lab, and explain how it can be used in research. The source code of Social Lab is freely available to the scientific community, so any research group can have its own Social Lab to conduct their Internetbased research. |
2013 |
Garaizar, Pablo; Reips, Ulf Build your own social network laboratory with Social Lab: A tool for research in social media Journal Article Behavior Research Methods, 46 (2), pp. 430-438, 2013, ISSN: 1554-3528. Abstract | Links | BibTeX | Tags: Internet science, Internet-based research, Open-source software, Social engineering, Social media @article{Garaizar2013b, title = {Build your own social network laboratory with Social Lab: A tool for research in social media}, author = {Pablo Garaizar and Ulf Reips }, url = {http://paginaspersonales.deusto.es/garaizar/papers/BRM2014-PG-UDR.pdf}, doi = {10.3758/s13428-013-0385-3}, issn = {1554-3528}, year = {2013}, date = {2013-09-06}, journal = {Behavior Research Methods}, volume = {46}, number = {2}, pages = {430-438}, abstract = {Social networking has surpassed e-mail and instant messaging as the dominant form of online communication (Meeker, Devitt, & Wu, 2010). Currently, all large social networks are proprietary, making it difficult to impossible for researchers to make changes to such networks for the purpose of study design and access to user-generated data from the networks. To address this issue, the authors have developed and present Social Lab, an Internet-based free and open-source social network software system available from http://home/learninglabdeust/public_html.sociallab.es. Having full availability of navigation and communication data in Social Lab allows researchers to investigate behavior in social media on an individual and group level. Automated artificial users (“bots”) are available to the researcher to simulate and stimulate social networking situations. These bots respond dynamically to situations as they unfold. The bots can easily be configured with scripts and can be used to experimentally manipulate social networking situations in Social Lab. Examples for setting up, configuring, and using Social Lab as a tool for research in social media are provided. }, keywords = {Internet science, Internet-based research, Open-source software, Social engineering, Social media}, pubstate = {published}, tppubtype = {article} } Social networking has surpassed e-mail and instant messaging as the dominant form of online communication (Meeker, Devitt, & Wu, 2010). Currently, all large social networks are proprietary, making it difficult to impossible for researchers to make changes to such networks for the purpose of study design and access to user-generated data from the networks. To address this issue, the authors have developed and present Social Lab, an Internet-based free and open-source social network software system available from http://home/learninglabdeust/public_html.sociallab.es. Having full availability of navigation and communication data in Social Lab allows researchers to investigate behavior in social media on an individual and group level. Automated artificial users (“bots”) are available to the researcher to simulate and stimulate social networking situations. These bots respond dynamically to situations as they unfold. The bots can easily be configured with scripts and can be used to experimentally manipulate social networking situations in Social Lab. Examples for setting up, configuring, and using Social Lab as a tool for research in social media are provided. |
Garaizar, Pablo; Reips, Ulf Social Lab: A social engineering wargame Conference Build your own social network laboratory with Social Lab: A tool for research in social media, 46 (2), Behavior Research Methods, 2013. Abstract | Links | BibTeX | Tags: Internet science, Internet-based research, Open-source software, Social engineering, Social media, Social networking sites @conference{Garaizar2013d, title = {Social Lab: A social engineering wargame}, author = {Pablo Garaizar and Ulf Reips}, url = {http://paginaspersonales.deusto.es/garaizar/papers/BRM2014-PG-UDR.pdf}, doi = {10.3758/s13428-013-0385-3}, year = {2013}, date = {2013-09-06}, booktitle = {Build your own social network laboratory with Social Lab: A tool for research in social media}, volume = {46}, number = {2}, pages = {430-438}, publisher = {Behavior Research Methods}, abstract = {Social networking has surpassed e-mail and instant messaging as the dominant form of online communication (Meeker, Devitt, & Wu, 2010). Currently, all large social networks are proprietary, making it difficult to impossible for researchers to make changes to such networks for the purpose of study design and access to user-generated data from the networks. To address this issue, the authors have developed and present Social Lab, an Internet-based free and open-source social network software system available from http://home/learninglabdeust/public_html.sociallab.es. Having full availability of navigation and communication data in Social Lab allows researchers to investigate behavior in social media on an individual and group level. Automated artificial users (“bots”) are available to the researcher to simulate and stimulate social networking situations. These bots respond dynamically to situations as they unfold. The bots can easily be configured with scripts and can be used to experimentally manipulate social networking situations in Social Lab. Examples for setting up, configuring, and using Social Lab as a tool for research in social media are provided.}, keywords = {Internet science, Internet-based research, Open-source software, Social engineering, Social media, Social networking sites}, pubstate = {published}, tppubtype = {conference} } Social networking has surpassed e-mail and instant messaging as the dominant form of online communication (Meeker, Devitt, & Wu, 2010). Currently, all large social networks are proprietary, making it difficult to impossible for researchers to make changes to such networks for the purpose of study design and access to user-generated data from the networks. To address this issue, the authors have developed and present Social Lab, an Internet-based free and open-source social network software system available from http://home/learninglabdeust/public_html.sociallab.es. Having full availability of navigation and communication data in Social Lab allows researchers to investigate behavior in social media on an individual and group level. Automated artificial users (“bots”) are available to the researcher to simulate and stimulate social networking situations. These bots respond dynamically to situations as they unfold. The bots can easily be configured with scripts and can be used to experimentally manipulate social networking situations in Social Lab. Examples for setting up, configuring, and using Social Lab as a tool for research in social media are provided. |