Draft Version, originally published in: Ebner, M. (2013). The Influence of Twitter on the Academic Environment. Patrut, B.

, Patrut, M., Cmeciu, C. (ed.). Social Media and the New Academic Environment: Pedagogical Challenges. IGI Global. 2013. pp. 293-307. http://www.igi-global.com/book/social-media-new-academic-environment/69841

The Influence of Twitter on the Academic Environment

Martin Ebner Social Learning, Computer and Information Services, Graz University of Technology, Austria ABSTRACT
In the last few years microblogging has become a phenomenon of our daily live. Communicating, sharing media files, as well as acting on digital social communities platforms using mobile devices assist our everyday activities in a complete new way. Therefore it is very reasonable that academic environments are influenced arbitrarily too. In this publication different settings for the use of microblogging are pointed out for teaching and learning as well as for further scientific purposes such as professional conferences. It can be summarized that there are different possibilities to use microblogging in an academic context; each of them are new advantages for the academic life. The publication gives a short overview and a first insight into the various ways to use microblogging.

INTRODUCTION
Dominating platforms of the World Wide Web of the last years belong to the type called social networks. The most popular ones are Facebook, Twitter, and the newcomer Google+. First of all, a short look at the characteristics of a social network must be taken to understand the typical idea of such systems. According to Koch & Richter (Koch & Richter, 2008) social software is a web based information system of the Web 2.0 generation, which allows interaction within a community in various ways. In contrast to Web 1.0 technologies users are made possible to search, find, and connect to each other as well as exchange multimedia content in a very handsome and easy way. Schmid (Schmidt, 2006) stated that the software itself is not social per se; the people who are using it collaboratively are the moving power to make such software become social. Koch & Richter (Koch & Richter, 2008) also defined the three crucial components of social software: Identity and network management: Allows user to create his/her own profile as well as the possibility to connect with each other. Information management: Allows user to exchange, find, and rate their multimedia data. Interaction and communication: Allows communication and interaction between users in various ways. In the last years many different social networks were introduced to the World Wide Web community. Actually it has become hard to categorize them. Ebner & Lorenz (Ebner & Lorenz, 2012) carried out a model according to the described three crucial components. Each factor displayed in the model represents one axis in a three-dimensional cube. Figure 1 shows different information systems like weblogs, wikis, or even microblogging systems with their representation and relation to social networks. For example, social bookmarking systems and wikis are excellent platforms for delivering information but of less interest for providing identity management or interaction amongst users. In opposite, instant messaging services (like MSN or Skype) allow excellent communication but are not appropriate for presentation of information. [place FIGURE 1 here] Figure 1. Definition and overview of social software according to Ebner & Lorenz (2012)

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Microblogs are very close to social networks according to the definition pointed out in Figure 1 due to their main components such as making friends, becoming ones followers, creating a user profile, and interacting with users via posts and direct messages. Furthermore various multimedia data can be uploaded in order to exchange it with other users (Haewoon et al., 2010). Templeton (Templeton, 2008) defines microblogging as a small-scale form of blogging made up from short, succinct messages, used by both consumers and businesses to share news, post status updates, and carry on conversations. Therefore a clear separation from weblogs (Rosenbloom, 2004) can be done, which are more used to write larger online essays with a personal touch to a specific topic. Maybe the most well-known feature of microblogging systems is the restriction to 140 signs for each post remembering the short-message service of mobile phones. Nevertheless it must be asked, why this service gains such popularity and attracts so many active users. One of the success factors for sure is the simplicity to share ideas, daily situations, as well as multimedia files with anyone in the world. Assisted by mobile phones and the growing popularity of mobile Internet access the service becomes ubiquitous available. So, since 2007 a complete new way to interact and communicate with people independently of time and place has been established. The so called living within a big personal information stream becomes reality and is nowadays part of the information society. Dealing with information was never easier in the history of mankind in principle. Of course, this progress influences also the work of researchers and teachers. Therefore this contribution provides an insight into related research studies into the microblogging platform Twitter in an academic environment. After a short introduction to Twitter explicit examples are given to demonstrate the possibilities for microblogging systems to be useful for teaching and learning as well as for daily research work. The results are discussed and summarized in the last chapters.

TWITTER
Twitter was not the first microblogging platform offered for free registration, but it is the most wellknown and most used one so far. Twitters weblog states the impressive numbers of 140 million tweets sent per day in March 2011, or more than 460000 created accounts per day within the same time (Twitter, 2011). Finally the number of mobile users increased from 2010 2011 with 182%. A similar growth can only be noticed for the other two big social networks Facebook and Google+. But those both systems are not typical microblogging platforms at all. Twitter and other microblogging platforms are characterized by: A concept of shortness: The number of signs for each post (in case of Twitter it is called tweet) is usually limited to 140 signs. A concept of friends and followers: Friends are accounts I am following and I am followed back by so called followers. There is no concept of a strong friendship; anyone can follow anyone in principle. A concept of information presentation: Tweets of friends are presented just in an endless list with the newest post at the top. This kind of information stream can be split into different groups. A concept of openness: In general, all posts on Twitter are public. Users can hide their profiles, but it is more or less unusual. A concept of Web services: Already in a very early phase Twitter allowed third-party applications to connect with the service using a provided Application Interface (API). A high number of additional Twitter applications have been developed and made Twitter even much more powerful. Overall it can be concluded that indeed a new service for a new kind of communication has been invented by microblogging. First scientific studies point out the communication aspect (Ebner & Schiefner, 2008) (McFedries, 2007). Beside the new communication culture other publications focus the reasons why people are using Twitter (Java et al., 2007): for daily chats, for conversation, for sharing information, and for reporting news. Boyd (Boyd et al, 2010) mentioned the importance of so-called re-tweets for the social network. By repeating a message this message is offered to another network of followers and in that way distributed further. The power of re-tweeting could be massively monitored for example by the

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death of Michael Jackson (Kim & Gilbers, 2009), the election of Barack Obama, and further political events of great importance (e.g. revolutions such as the Arab Spring). Due to the fact that people are repeating messages or sending tweets using a special hashtag a massive information stream especially on the focused (hashtagged) item can be produced.

TWITTER IN ACADEMIC SETTINGS

Of course, this new communication possibility inspired the interest of researchers. A number of different studies appeared, asking, how Twitter can be used for learning (Grosseck & Holotescu, 2008) (Costa et al., 2008) or for further academic scopes (Reinhardt 2009). In the following, different academic scenarios are described, exemplifying the way Twitter has been used whether for teaching and learning purposes or for the researchers daily work.

Twitter as Tool for Mass Education

Didactical approach: Use of microblogging to allow instant feedback during face-to-face lecturing Technical issues: Use of lecture hashtags to allow a collection of posts on a so called Twitterwall (http://twitterwall.tugraz.at) Mass education is mainly a problem of higher education. Often one lecturer has to teach more than 100 students in big lecture hall. A well-known problem is that the interaction between teachers and students decreases therefore or even does not happen anymore. Anderson (Anderson et al, 2003) pointed out the three main reasons for that: Feedback lag: With the number of attendees the feedback is dramatically increasing Student apprehension: Students simply fear to get blamed by asking questions or doing some other interactions Single speaker paradigm: The only-one speaker syndrome leads to less active participation There are different technological possibilities to overcome these problems, mainly through so-called Audience Response Systems (ARS). Such systems are a combination of hard- and software that allow giving the auditorium instant feedback by polling. The hardware mostly consists of a special developed clicker sending the signal to a server that is interpreting the answers and providing the result. With other words, installing such systems in huge lecture rooms is nearly impossible because of high hardware costs (every student would need a hardware clicker on his/her own) as well as high efforts for organization (the hardware must be given to learners each lecture and collected afterwards). Furthermore such systems can only be used for quizzes or polls, textual feedback is not possible. At Graz University of Technology (TU Graz) a research work has been started to enhance the lecture room interactivity in a meaningful way. It was specified that learners must be able to use their own devices and the existing infrastructure environment of the lecture halls. Too, the application must be as simple to handle as possible. Due to the fact that Twitter is a daily used, primarily mobile application that is little limited by different devices a Twitterwall has been developed (Ebner, 2011). [place FIGURE 2 here] Figure 2. TU Graz Twitterwall (http://twitterwall.tugraz.at) By displaying the Twitterwall during the lecture students nowadays are able to ask questions, comment lecture content, or simply apply it for example by providing. On the left side of Fig. 2 all tweets within a defined time frame are shown (e.g. the time the lecture takes place). On the right side all tweets that contain the lectures hashtag (e.g. #gadi2011) and an additional hashtag (e.g. #question) are displayed. With this application it becomes easily possible to collect tweets and filter them according to different needs as well as to enhance the lecture interactivity. The first practical experiences showed that students use the Twitterwall especially to ask questions in a more or less anonymous way and to collect hyperlinks relevant to the lecture. The lectures feedback was very positive due to the fact that the audiences

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response definitely increases compared to prior years. The next release of the Twitterwall will also allow to post without a Twitter account and also to rate tweets of other students to rank more important questions.

Twitter as Tool for Discussing beyond Face-to-Face Lectures

Didactical approach: Use of microblogging to post status updates of activities concerning the lecture outside classrooms Technical issues: Use of an own microblogging platform (http://mblog.tugraz.at) Another didactical approach is the use of microblogging to stay in contact with learners beyond

the traditional face-to-face lectures. Especially Twitter with its communicational quality allows students to post status updates of their current activities concerning the lecture and report about what they are currently doing. In this case, lecturers can interact with students in real time, answer questions when they occur and discuss them. Ebner (Ebner et al, 2010a) showed in a practical study that within a time period of 6 weeks students were using the microblogging platform very extensively. More than 11.000 recorded and analyzed posts (tweets) result in the fact that in average each student wrote 7,5 tweets each day. Due to the fact that most of all updates were relevant to the lecture and served as assistance to students communication, it was pointed out that microblogging assists the communication behavior in a very new way.
[place FIGURE 3 here] Figure 3. Communication by subject (Ebner et al., 2010a)

Figure 3 points out that course-related work posts are a minority not more than 10-20% each day. Vice versa, updates belonging to the discussion subject, or just for small talk, or private content cover 60-70% of all updates per day. The lecturers as well as the authors of microblogging posts keep the dialogue beyond the classroom running which allows processoriented learning and helps students to keep in touch with each other as well with the lecturers. Furthermore, more than 60% of all posts contain the sign @, which means that the post is directly related to another person and more or less a personal message to him/her. This means that theses posts are from a directed communicative nature. Finally, oral evaluations pointed out that many users unfamiliar with microblogging systems report an unwieldy information flow, known as information overload. So the need of different strategies for consuming massive information becomes an important task. Otherwise this kind of information stream can also be described as constant murmuring in the background where the user takes an active part when he/she wants to do so. The function of communication by this understanding is exclusively social an exchange of trivial information. Malinowski (1922) referred to this as a phatic function. It serves to keep in contact with others and as an assurance of group identity (Honeycutt, 2009). Twitter as Tool for Exchange of Lecture Content (GADI)
Didactical approach: Use of microblogging to collect and exchange relevant lecture content in a fast and easy way Technical issues: Use of a microblogging platform (e.g. http://mblog.tugraz.at) and a defined hashtag

5 According to that approach another practical example was carried out in the lecture called Social Aspects of Information Technology. This course is an obligatory one for students of informatics during their bachelor program. It educates students to have a critical view on the ways informatics influence human society today. More than 200 students attend this course every year to listen to about 17 presentations held by different experts in different fields: Topics are for example Human Computer Interaction, eHealth, Google, weblogs as well as virtual worlds or the use of informatics in civil engineering. In recent years, students had to write two essays about topics of their own choice to pass the lecture. Based on the strict scientific rules a high amount of text documents had been composed. The big drawback of this method is that nobody is reading the text of the students but the teachers. From a very critical point of view it can be argued that the students work more or less equaled a concentrated version of the experts presentations. Therefore nearly no further discussion on the topics took place during the whole lecture. Hence a new didactical concept was needed to increase students activity. Therefore four groups were introduced Scientific Writer (still have to write a short essay), Scientific Reviewer (have to review the essays of the Scientific Writers), Blogger (have to write short blog posts about the topic of their choice) and Mircoblogger (have to write microblogs about the topic of their choice).
[place FIGURE 4 here] Figure 4. Communication by category (Ebner & Maurer, 2008)

Figure 4 displays the relation between the four groups. With a special eye on the microblogging group it can be pointed out that these students have to search the Web for interesting and relevant content concerning the defined topics. Furthermore they have close contact to the blogger group for discussions and exchange of interesting information. Ebner and Maurer (Ebner & Maurer, 2008) stated that this didactical approach leads to a better performance of the courses outcome. Furthermore students that are member of the microblogging group gave a very positive feedback; theyreported that they felt constantly involved during the whole time period of the lecture. A pencil based evaluation carried out amongst the students resulted in the very interesting aspect that due to the fact that students read other contributions more often also informal learning effects occur as a result of blogging and microblogging activities. Ebner and Maurer concluded in their final paper (Ebner & Maurer, 2008) that mainly three effects occurred: Reflection: Students attending the microblogging group wrote more reflective contributions in a personal and subjective style Discussion: Students of the blogging and microblogging groups commented more often than their colleagues of the other groups; their feedback and statements provided were more detailed. Quality: Teachers mentioned that the quality of the contributions increased arbitrarily to former years at all. Twitter as Tool for Documentation and Retrieve of Information
Didactical approach: Use of microblogging for documentation of lecture issues or other relevant content Technical issues: Use of a tool that allows collection of tweets, to store collected tweets offline and provide a search function (http://grabeeter.tugraz.at)

6 A very simple possibility to collect information is to use microblogging streams of different sources. In our contex different sources are meant to be events or lectures, a learning unit or simply a traditional face-to-face lecture with writing on blackboards, or showing something on the Internet, or using the projector for presenting learning content. In that way events are even documented on base of their microblogging activities. Due to the fact that students own smartphones or similar devices, it becomes quite easy to take pictures, browse hyperlinks, or simply take some notes during the lecture. For the later learning phase it would be advantageous to have just one application providing and organizing all notes taken in the course of an event. So the research idea was to develop a web-based application that can also be used offline for information retrieval and knowledge discovery based on a micro-content system like Twitter. In 2010 the application called Grabeeter (http://grabeeter.tugraz.at) has been launched. Grabeeter consists of two main parts (Mhlburger et al., 2010). The first part is a web application that retrieves tweets and user information from Twitter using the official Twitter API. The second part of Grabeeter consists of a client application developed in JavaFX technology for accessing the stored information on a client side.
[place FIGURE 5 here] Figure 5. Grabeeter web application

Figure 5 shows a screenshot of the web application Grabeeter of a Twitter user. Once a user is registered within the application each single tweet of the user will be stored automatically in the Grabeeter database and can be accessed online via the web application as well as offline with the client application. On the right sidebar an export possibility of all tweets of the user is offered in the standard formats XML and JSON. An API allows third party applications to use the stored tweets for other purposes. Finally a short statistic shows how many posts of all tweets ever posted on Twitter are currently stored. With the help of Grabeeter the following approaches were made possible: Micro-content (e.g. a tweet) is achievable offline due to the fact that any tweet can be retrieved at anytime from a local hard-drive Micro-content is storable in a way that the user can distinguish between different events Micro-content is searchable along keywords, hashtags, time frames as well as different entities (URLs, @ ... ) Due to these facts Grabeeter become an application used by more than 1500 users very extensively to document their events especially in a learning or research context. Different research studies pointed out that also monitoring events became an interesting variant to use Grabeeter (Ebner et al., 2010b). Finally Twitter became also a useful tool to spread and store scientific messages (Letierce et al., 2010). Twitter as Tool for Academic Conferences A similar approach can be gained using the application called Twitterwall. With Twitterwall the interaction in a huge lecture hall can be enhanced. But Twitterwall is for the usage during academic conferences too in order to collect and filter microblogging content. In 2008 (Ebner, 2009) for the first time, during the EdMedia conference tweets including the defined hashtag (#edmedia08) were collected to enhance the conference by virtual statements, opinions, pictures, hyperlinks, or just private discussion among conference participants. This special Twitter stream

7 was displayed on several walls with simple projectors and screens. Besides those walls located at meeting points also a projection of the stream beside the keynote slides was provided. It could be shown that the murmuring of the audience during the talks made visible as well as additional information posted enhanced the live talk in a way never done before. A research study (Ebner, 2009) carried out that the audience use Twitter for comments to the presentation, for discussion, for collection of additional hyperlinks, and repeating statements.
[place FIGURE 6 here] Figure 6. Twitter stream beside keynote presentation at EdMedia 2008

Figure 6 gives an impression of the setting at EdMedia 2008. Since then the Twitterwall has become a standard surplus for every keynote speech at further EdMedia conferences and other conferences too. Furthermore the number of tweets regarding the conference did not only increase during the conference but also before and after the event (Ebner & Reinhardt, 2010). Hence it can be noticed that social networking turned out to be just more than a professional tool for communication during events. Figure 7 shows the result of a survey amongst participants of conferences (Reinhardt et al., 2009). Besides communicating with others, resources are shared through tweets, parallel discussions/events are followed, notes are jotted down, the online presence is established and enhanced, and organizational questions are raised. Figure 7 represents the main reasons why the surveyed conference delegates used Twitter while attending the learning event.
[place FIGURE 7 here] Figure 7. Purposes of using Twitter by attendees (role) at conferences (Reinhardt et al., 2009)

Microblogging at conferences is an additional way of discussing presented topics and exchanging additional information. It is not limited to the face-to-face audience or the location of the conference. Microblogging virtually allows anyone to actively participate in the thematic debates. Different research studies (Ebner, 2009) (Reinhardt et al., 2009) point out that several conference speakers and attendees are using Twitter for various purposes. Nowadays microblogging often is necessary to meet participants needs for communication during academic events. Reinhardt (2009b) also pointed out the increasing dynamic of academic communities using social networks for their communication. Twitter as Tool for Semantic Profiling and Visualization A very new approach is to use posts for semantic profiling or keyword extraction to visualize crucial event topics. As described before, conference participants tweet about what they have noticed, what they have remarked as interesting for their own needs. What if we could connect these users by using this information? An application is needed for a profiling of researchers. The fact that the data produced in social networks can have true value if properly annotated and interlinked between different services. It can be done by choosing community approved ontologies and linked open data resources. A second requirement is to create a suitable interface for further treatment of that information. Using the described Grabeeter API an application to allow researchers on Twitter to connect with each other regarding to their profiles and interests has been developed, it is called Researcher Affinity Browser (De Vocht et al., 2011).

[place FIGURE 8 here] Figure 8. Researcher Affinity Browser (http://affinitybrowser.semanticprofiling.net/)

Figure 8 shows a screenshot of the Researcher Affinity Browser. The left column tells the different affinity facets that can be explored. The center view displays the results in a grid, an affinity plot, and a map. Details about a person and the persons different affinities are to be seen in the bottom zone. The Researcher Affinity Browser application retrieves a list of relevant users using the Researcher profiling API. The results are a current snapshot, not static data. Every time users produce new content on social networks, the analyzed data evolves with it. The relevance is measured according to the number of common entities (thus affinities) that are shared with the user. The different affinity facets are displayed on the left. Within the demo version users can explore three types of affinities: conferences, tags, and mentions. Activating a certain affinity narrows down and filters the list of matching persons. Users can explore their matches in several ways. First there is the result table that displays detailed information about each person and how many affinities are shared. Second there is a map view and an affinity plot synchronized with the result table. The purpose of the map is to visualize the locations of the affiliations of the found persons. The affinity plot visualizes in a quick overview how good the affinity to the user is. One dimension shows the mentions, the other dimension shows the tags. The more to the top right corner a persons dot is plotted, the more affinity there is to the user. Finally, users can double click on any person within the result list to get a tab that displays a profile with more information and allows them to get more insight into certain affinities of that person. They can also click on contact links to get in touch with that person. For example, if the profile of someone is extracted from Twitter, a link to the Twitter profile will be displayed. This application aims at gaining more knowledge and getting usable social data out of microblogs with a framework driven methodology based upon semantic web standards and tools. Some other efforts deal with the extraction of keywords of tweets and try to visualize them in a meaningful way to get a clue about what people are writing, who is writing, and which topics are focused (Ebner et al., 2011a). With the help of semantic web standards and linked data social networks like twitter will help to combine data in a complete new way as well as offering new insights and dependencies (Bojrs et al., 2008). DISCUSSION Twitter as well as microblogging in principle can be used in very different ways to enhance academic communication and cooperation. Tab. 1 gives a short overview about the described different research studies and points out the approaches used as well as its technical realization by TU Graz. Academic environment Enhance interaction for mass education Discussion beyond faceto-face lecture Exchange lecture content Approach Allow anonymous posts on a Twitterwall Provide a Twitter channel for communication Provide a Twitter channel Technical implementation http://twitterwall.tugraz.at http://twitter.com + lecture hashtag http://twitter.com + lecture hashtag

9 or install an own platform Use an application that allows collection of posts Provide Twitterwalls at conferences for exchange Semantic profiling

Documentation and information retrieval Enhance academic conferences Become friend of researchers with similar interests

http://grabeeter.tugraz.at http://twitterwall.tugraz.at + conference hashtag http://affinitybrowser.semanticprofi ling.net/

Table 1. Overview about usage of microblogging in academic context

Table 1 points out that microblogging can be used for lecturing as well as for research purposes. All cases in common are that the possibility of updating a status online is not only a fast way but also a way to express feelings, statements or comments on other thoughts. So the nature of microblogging is primarily about communication between people of same interests (at academic conferences) or people with the same goal (lecture). After thoroughly research studies over a long time period some crucial factors for using microblogging in academic environments can be carried out. It can be also seen as a kind of preconditions to get the community running: 1. Mobility: Between microblogging and mobility is a strong correlation or relationship. Different research studies1 pointed out that more than 50% of all users mostly access Twitter with a mobile device. Therefore microblogging is heavily used on the go or on the move as well as during waiting times. The foreground is more or less to get information from the stream or to post anything from a location. Smartphones with an onboard camera offer a very interesting option to share something with the community. Therefore especially for this purpose programmed apps are nowadays available (for example Instagram is a mobile photo community, which can only be used and shared with mobile phones) and allow us to deal with pictures in real time. 2. Communication: Microblogging allows us to communicate in a short and efficient way as pointed out in different studies (Ebner et al., 2010). In the nature of a mobile society contact to each other is an important precondition. This allows to keep in touch with colleagues, teachers as well as students for exchanging thoughts, pictures, and statements or simply to ask questions. 3. Collection: Finally a very interesting possibility is offered through microblogging, the use of hashtags, and the search possibility. A community (for example lecture participants) can save bookmarks, pictures or even videos by using an event hashtag. Because of the simple possibility to do such posts this is maybe one of the most effective ways to enhance lectures as well as conferences. CONCLUSION Mircoblogging became part of our daily life as well as other social network activities (Ebner et al., 2011b). Today it is quite normal do use a smartphone for writing posts, sharing photos or
1

http://www.slideshare.net/mebner/social-networks-danger-big-business-or-simply-big-chance (last visited February 2012)

10 simply to communicate with a worldwide (academic) community. From this perspective the use of Twitter or similar software in higher education as well as academic context must be taken into account. As shown in this publication there are various possibilities to enhance lectures or scientific events (conferences) through sharing and collecting related content. Based on different research studies (Costa et al., 2008) (Grosseck & Holotescu, 2008) (Ebner et al., 2010a) this field of research seems well progressed the next research step should point to semantic analyses of social networks, to address questions that can be answered in an implicit way. For example, what is the post of a specific person about, how can be a person assisted by linked data because of his/her posts. First research attempts were already done to combine people with same interest researchers, teachers as well as learners (Thonhauser et al., 2012). Microblogging is primarily about communication and we have to think how we can assist it in a meaningful way. REFERENCES
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