I read the headline, Best Connected Individuals Are Not the Most Influential Spreaders in Social Networks, and thought there might be something interesting here. Maksim Kitsak at Boston University and a team of researchers are looking at this issue and recently published a paper, Identifying influential spreaders in complex networks, that was documented in Technology Review.

The article reports that the importance of hubs may have been overstated and quotes Kitsak and pals. “In contrast to common belief, the most influential spreaders in a social network do not correspond to the best connected people or to the most central people.”

It goes on to report that by contrast, “a less connected person who is strategically placed in the core of the network will have a significant effect that leads to dissemination through a large fraction of the population.” In fact it is being at the core of networks with the most connections that makes you the most influential.  So, if I understand this correctly, it is being near the core and being near the best connected individuals that makes you the most influential as long as your group is the most connected.  Sounds a bit subtle.

Perhaps the most influential generate the ideas and then those near them who are best connected or their group that is best connected get the ideas out.  Or perhaps it is hanging out with well connected people allows you to get your ideas out. So I should remain in contact with the well connected writers on this group blog but we need to spend more time together as the authors conclude, “When multiple spreaders are considered simultaneously, the distance between them becomes the crucial parameter that determines the extend of the spreading.” Perhaps you need a generator and a spreader but they did not mention this. They do say that their analysis “provides a plausible route for an optimal design of efficient dissemination strategies.”

The BU team tested their idea on a diverse set of networks including the 5.5 million members of LiveJournal.com, the network of email contacts in the computer science department at University College London and the network of actors who have co-starred in adult films as defined by the internet movie database.  I wonder what the differences and similarities were between these somewhat diverse groups.

What has been your experience here? Are you a hub or a spreader? Can you be both?