Social Networks Impact on Information Consumption and Usage: e-Marefa Case

Abstract

This chapter presents social networks impact on information usage. Typically, information is being published via different channels that push information to readers. The main vehicle of information publishing is cataloging, indexing, searching, and marketing techniques. However, information that is being published via social networks is pulled and consumed by a participant (more than a reader). Information in social networks is virally published and consumed. This chapter discusses five pillars of social publishing to best utilize its features: (1) determine the nature and the structure of social networks; (2) viralize (viral-ready) the information; (3) evaluate the social information; (4) profile-oriented publishing; and (5) understand social capital as an economic value of social networks. At the end, this chapter presents a case study that embeds the concept of social networks information literacy within the e-Marefa database, which has been chosen as it includes over 252 000 records that could be viralized in social networks. The case study shows how an article could be viralized for self-publishing in an effective and efficient way. The case study found that there is a chance for an article to have one hit in 25 days (~ one month period of time) on the native platform while the same article has a chance to have 25 hits in one day via social networks.

This work was supported by e-Marefa