Argumentative discussions-on-the-web-2013-02-bretagne

Copyright 2011 Digital Enterprise Research Institute. All rights reserved.

Digital Enterprise Research Institute www.deri.ie

Enabling Networked Knowledge

Argumentative Discussions on the Web

Jodi Schneider@jschneider

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“Towards a Virtual Institute for the Measurement, Evaluation, and Management of Open Online Communities” - EST Exploratory WorkshopTelecom Bretagne, Brest, France

Wednesday 6 Feb 2013

Ph.D. student

o Study the Web & sociotechical systems

o Multidisciplinary approaches

o Create new methods & repurpose existing ones

o Bias: structure data

@jschneider jodischneider.com

Key Point

The overall popularity of an opinion is not as important as the reasons supporting it

Image credit: http://www.nickmilton.com/2012/03/when-people-trust-crowds.html

Arguments

Claim: Jaffa Cakes are cakesJustification: official EU ruling; cakes go hard

when stale

Tweet by @robeastaway https://twitter.com/robeastaway/status/135838892694839296

Arguments

o Claim: If Canon does not make the repair, you should take them to small claims court.

o Justification: it’s easy, cheap, and can be done online; it’s within your rights

Joint work with Adam Wyner (Aberdeen)

What aspects of social media are relevant to extracting and representing argumentation?

o Genreo Metadatao Properties of userso Goals of a particular dialogueo Contexto Informal languageo Implicit infoo Sentiment techniqueso Subjectivity and objectivity

Jodi Schneider, Brian Davis, and Adam Wyner. “Dimensions of Argumentation in Social Media.” In 18th International Conference on Knowledge Engineering and Knowledge Management (EKAW 2012).

Genre

Metadata

Properties of Users

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Goals

Walton & Krabbe. D. N. Walton. Commitment in dialogue. State University of New York Press, Albany, 1995.

Goals of #election2012 tweets?

My thesis in the Social Semantic Web

o Investigate Wikipedia discussionso Provide semantic supporto Evaluate the impact on the community

Deletion threatens Wikipedia

o 1 in 4 new Wikipedia articles is deleted – within minutes or hours

o Demotivating! • 1 in 3 newcomers start by writing a new article• 7X less likely to stay if their article is deleted!

o Can we support editor retention?

Article creators

o Misunderstand policy• “I do understand that articles on wikipedia need to

be sourced… it is due to have two [sources] once [our website goes] live”

o Express high levels of emotion• “To be honest it's been a real turn off adding

articles to WP and I don't think I will add articles again. So smile and enjoy.”

o Learn from discussions• “much as it would break my heart … it is perhaps

sensible that the piece is deleted.”

Jodi Schneider, Alexandre Passant, and Stefan Decker. “Deletion Discussions in Wikipedia: Decision Factors and Outcomes.” In WikiSym2012.

Novices’ arguments

o Structurally different to experts’ argumentso More problematic arguments from novices

• Personal preference• Requesting a favor• Analogy to other cases• No harm in keeping an article• Large number of search engine hits

Jodi Schneider, Krystian Samp, Alexandre Passant, Stefan Decker. “Arguments about Deletion: How Experience Improves the Acceptability of Arguments in Ad-hoc Online Task Groups”. In CSCW 2013.

Articulate criteria

4 Factors cover• 91% of

comments• 70% of

discussions

Factor Example (used to justify `keep')

Notability Anyone covered by another encyclopedic reference is considered notable enough for inclusion in Wikipedia.

Sources Basic information about this album at a minimum is certainly verifiable, it's a major label release, and a highly notable band.

Maintenance

…this article is savable but at its current state, needs a lot of improvement.

Bias It is by no means spam (it does not promote the products).

Other I'm advocating a blanket "hangon" for all articles on newly-drafted players

Jodi Schneider, Alexandre Passant, and Stefan Decker. “Deletion Discussions in Wikipedia: Decision Factors and Outcomes.” In WikiSym2012.

Add semantic structure

Implementation based on Jodi Schneider and Krystian Samp “Alternative Interfaces for Deletion Discussions in Wikipedia: Some Proposals Using Decision Factors. [Demo]” In WikiSym2012.

84% prefer our system

“Information is structured and I can quickly get an overview of the key arguments.”

“The ability to navigate the comments made it a bit easier to filter my mind set and to come to a conclusion.”

“It offers the structure needed to consider each factor separately, thus making the decision easier. Also, the number of comments per factor offers a quick indication of the relevance and the deepness of the decision.”

Thanks!

o Questions? o Comments?

o [email protected] @jschneider

Acknowledgements

o Thanks to collaborators!• Adam Wyner• Brian Davis• Krystian Samp

o Overall Ph.D. funding, Science Foundation Ireland Grant No. SFI/08/CE/I1380 (Líon-2), advised by Alexandre Passant & Stefan Decker

Linked Data Cloud

http://lod-cloud.net

image credit: Alexandre Passant