According to Hugh Pickens “Network World reports that Facebook has just
released an analysis of the [1]word usage for about one million status updates from its US English speakers with the words in updates organized into 68 different word categories based on the Linguistic Inquiry and Word Count (LIWC)–a text analysis software program that calculates the degree to which people use different categories of words across a wide array of texts. The results? [2]To be popular on Facebook all you have to do is write longer status updates, talk about music and sports, don’t be overly emotional, don’t talk about your family, don’t refer to time and use the word ‘you’ a lot. Facebook’s study also confirms something that bloggers and Fox News have known for years: negative comments produce more online activity. Sure, Facebook users might click the like button more often on updates expressing positive emotion. But Facebook found you can’t beat negativity for user engagement, as dismal status updates garnered more comments than positive ones.”
Discuss this story at: https://tech.slashdot.org/story/10/12/26/0758218/How-To-Be-Popular-On-Facebook-Quantified?from=newsletter#commentlisting
Links: 0. http://hughpickens.com/ 1. http://www.networkworld.com/news/2010/122410-facebook-offers-tips-on-being.html?hpg1=bn 2. http://www.facebook.com/notes/facebook-data-team/whats-on-your-mind/477517358858
I’m not sure if people would want to become more popular on facebook if it involved writing negativity all the time. Negativity usually breeds negativity and I’d rather have 1 or 2 positive comments then a load of negative ones.
As mentioned in the article, I’ve found using words such as ‘you’ and ‘your’ in my status updates has increased the amount of feedback I get.