At the beginning of this month, a group called the Web Ecology Project published a very interesting report called The Influentials that proposes a far more advanced approach than we’ve seen to date. Frankly it’s not a moment too soon – although the ecology that has built up around Twitter is pretty massive and loads of fun, most of the tools in the analytical sphere should properly be considered toys, not true analytical tools.
What’s most interesting about the Web Ecology Project‘s work is not the results (Sockington FTW!) but the approach they propose. It represents nothing less than the beginning of a real discussion about how Twitter activity should be analyzed.
Exvisu has been working with Twitter for some time, and based on that experience the thing that strikes me about measuring influence is that although it’s interesting on a macro level (master-influencer lists will surely be developed based on approaches such as this), it’s even more interesting with respect to a limited (by content or other factors) group of Twitter users.
Identifying influencers related to a specific subject is likely to be a great deal more useful – and quite a bit more difficult to calculate. Can’t wait to help make that happen!
See also the preview of the WEP’s report on Afghanistan and its election on Twitter. Great stuff!
