Manuel Lima

Blogviz: Mapping the Dynamics of Information Diffusion in Blogspace Manuel Lima

Blogging presents one of the most fascinating social phenomenons of our time. This change in the flow of online information might radically change the way we look at news providers and large media conglomerates. The result of a MFA thesis at Parsons School of Design, Blogviz is a flash driven visualization model for mapping the transmission and internal structure of top links across the blogosphere. It explores the idea of meme propagation by assuming a parallel with the spreading of most cited URLs in daily weblog entries. The main goal of Blogviz is to unravel hidden patterns in the topics diffusion process. What?s the life cycle of a topic? How does it start and how does it evolve through time? Are topics constrained to a specific community of users? Who are the most influential and innovative blogs in any topic? Are there any relationships amongst topic proliferators?