His newest book, “Happimetrics – Leveraging AI to Untangle the Surprising Link Between Ethics, Happiness and Business Success” will appear in fall 2022 at Edward Elgar Publishing.

In his interview with the International Finance Magazine, Peter Gloor shares his insights about Twitter bots, metaverse, the COIN project, social media trend predictions, and much more.

Q) Over 65% of B2B businesses use Twitter as a marketing tool. Is the B2B trend shifting to Twitter from Facebook and Instagram?

A) I don’t think Twitter is taking over from Facebook and Instagram. After all, Twitter has been around for a long time. Facebook is more about friends and family, and Instagram is communication by pictures. Twitter is for spreading the word quickly to everybody, it is essential for politicians, companies/brands, and journalists to disseminate their thinking, ideas, and brand. Twitter is its echo chamber; a comparatively small subset is active on Twitter compared to Facebook. But it is a very vocal, active, and engaged subset, so it is like a probe into society, representative of the rest of the population.

Q) Does the removal of bots impact the revenue and reach of Twitter?

A) Of course, bots disturb the metrics of Twitter, as the number of followers, being listed, etc., is a key metric of influence for a Twitter user. If 50% of the followers of a politician are bots, this inflates their importance.

The point is that this is an arms race between Twitter and bot writers, who have a huge incentive to game the system to their advantage, claiming much wider reach than they do.

Twitter is also in a conundrum, as on the one hand more users Twitter has, the higher its reach and valuation (if these users are hidden bots, Twitter still gets the marketing money). On the other hand, Twitter should be able to identify its human users correctly.

Q) What are your views on metaverse? Is the metaverse going to rule the virtual world in the coming years?

A) I think it is a question of time until virtual reality and reality will fuse in a Matrix-like scenario. What this scenario will look like is still open to discussion. But I imagine, for example, that I can virtually travel to Bangalore from Boston, without leaving my office at MIT, and will have “almost” the same experience as traveling there in person by plane. The same will be for office meetings, where you and I can meet in a virtual room, with the same interpersonal experience as if I would meet you in person. The big question will be “fake news”, as it will be difficult for the layperson to distinguish truth from fake in the metaverse.

Q) Can you tell us about the “Sociometrics and Human Relationships” book you have authored? Give us some insights about the book?

A) The book describes a proven and tested framework for measuring interpersonal interaction using online media, such as email, slack, teams, Twitter, or Facebook. It will allow the individuals to learn about their strengths and weaknesses and the organization to improve teamwork and intra- and inter-organizational communication and collaboration.

I would also like to point out my new book “Happimetrics”, which will come out this fall, extends these methods to direct face-to-face interpersonal interaction, and also measures ethics and moral values of a person, to distinguish truth from fake.

Q) Voter manipulation on social media has become a global problem. What do you feel about it?

A) This is indeed a big problem. The remedy is transparency, i.e., educating the voter about all the potential ways of spreading fake information. It is a hugely important task for the trusted mainstream press. Artificial intelligence (AI) can also help by flagging fake news.

Q) Can you tell us about the Collaborative Innovation Networks (COIN) project you are heading at CCI at MIT’s Sloan School of Management?

A) The COIN project was started at MIT in 2002 to study all facets of swarm creativity. It was among the first to dispel the myth of the genius innovator locked away in his office and cranking out one invention after the other. The truth is, we can only innovate in intense collaboration with other like-minded people. In COINs, I have been studying how this collaboration functions in direct interpersonal interaction and online media for the last twenty years.

Q) How will a person be able to predict trends on social media? What are the dos and don’ts?

A) Machine learning makes it extremely easy to construct a time series of social media data, e.g., all the tweets talking about “Donald Trump”. We can then extend the frequency of these tweets and measure their emotionality. Based on previous analysis, we could be tempted to predict that Donald Trump will again win the next US Presidency. This example illustrates how easy it is to mechanically make predictions for the future – but I call this “predicting the past”, as it is far from certain that an AI machine learning model that has worked before will work again in the future.

Q) Why do you think social media has become a major player for most industries in establishing themselves?

A) It is the easiest and cheapest way to reach a broad group of influencers. The challenge is to be authentic; most corporate marketing departments do a miserable job in this regard on online social media. The most successful TikTok influencers are the most authentic ones, meaning that what they say comes from their heart. They genuinely believe in it. For example, Greta Thunberg has been doing this very well.

Q) Can you tell us about your software company Galaxyadvisors? What kind of services do you offer the clients?

A) Galaxyadvisors builds software and provides consulting for coolfarming and coolhunting. Coolfarming means helping companies to innovate and create high-performing teams by building COINs. It involves analyzing their online communication, such as email, MS teams, and slack, and showing them how their teams currently communicate. And how they can communicate better. Coolhunting is finding cool new trends by finding the COINs on online social media that develop and launch these cool new trends. For example, by discovering the virtual tribes that aggregate around cool new products, be it Tesla, Birkenstock, or “Harry Potter”.

Q) Tracking social media trends has never been easy. How have you tracked them, especially after the social media boom?

A) It is comparatively easy to predict tomorrow’s trend, e.g., to predict the stock price of tomorrow or who will win an Oscar, based on a time series analysis of yesterday’s data. It is impossible until now to predict “black swans”, i.e, unpredictable events, such as Donald Trump winning the elections, the outbreak of COVID, or Russia invading Ukraine.

Q) With social media and Artificial Intelligence growing every day, what can we expect shortly?

A) We will get a fusion of augmented and virtual reality with the “true reality”. We might also get a further split into more segmented virtual tribes, across country boundaries, for example, believers in science and believers in “god”. To prevent this split, we need “ethical AI”, which assists in easily identifying fakes from reality, and tools that flag unethical behavior automatically. This is what my current research focuses on.

Q) Crypto social media platforms are gaining traction across the world. What is your take on it?

A) Crypto social media is an interesting concept, it would be a way to get rid of bots, and it could also be made traceable and relatively tamper-proof. However, the problem is that some vendors use beautiful words to mask their search for a quick buck by combining it with a new cryptocurrency. The other problem is that blockchain does not yet scale to the level needed for a system like Twitter.

The post Black swans are impossible to predict: Research Scientist Peter Gloor appeared first on International Finance.

Most individuals end up spending significant time on social media which has now become one of the top economy spinners as well. Revenue worth trillions of dollars is generated by social media giants like Facebook, Twitter, and Google. But at the same time, they also end up controlling and censoring what one can see on their platform.

While Google forces people to opt for YouTube’s paid ‘premium’ service to avoid ads on its platform, Facebook uses the “protecting their community” card to censor users. And a locked-down verified accounts system is used by Twitter.

With many growing tired of having to go through all this, now social media users have found an easy way out. No privacy concerns, no moderation practices, and no more silencing people for their opposite views.

The world of crypto social media platforms is here.

Blockchain
In today’s world, one of the most popular and ground-breaking technologies is blockchain. It seems like we are finding new applications for blockchain technology every year. Blockchain technology has applications in a variety of industries, including finance, music, media, and food. And now, we’ll go deeper into how blockchain has transformed social media and take you through the top nine crypto social media platforms.

Torum
Torum is a revolutionary SocialFi (Social + DeFi + NFT) Metaverse ecosystem designed to connect worldwide cryptocurrency users. One might find it as a mix of both Facebook and Twitter. It rewards frequent users with a unique token. In exchange for high-quality content, users can also gift coins to each other. This network provides company sites and clans, more intimate forums that are goal-oriented.

LinkedIn-like capabilities are also available on Torum, allowing you to communicate with other individuals and businesses while also adding team members and posting to the page. It is also easy to use.

You may use the search feature to find users, new acquaintances, clans, and businesses. Torum does not yet have a mobile application, however, its browser version is quite mobile-friendly.

Twenty prominent investors have backed Torum, including Huobi Ventures, U21, and Consensus Lab. It’s the first social network for cryptocurrency enthusiasts and an NFT+DeFi platform that expands more quickly than any other crypto network, with a monthly user growth rate of more than 20%.

Minds
Eron Wolf, the creator of Yahoo Games and WhatsApp seed investor, created the social media network Minds in 2015 to enable open communication and cryptocurrency income.

Minds is a cutting-edge social network that gives individuals prizes and new privacy controls while reclaiming informational power from businesses. This open-source network prioritises privacy and refrains from mining user data for advertising purposes.

Futo, a freedom-focused tech firm, gave Minds USD 10 million in June 2021. Many believe that Minds is a viable alternative to Twitter and other traditional social networks, with 15 million active users, instant chat capabilities, and income prospects. It is incredibly mobile-friendly and includes all the features that YouTube, Facebook, and Twitter have.

Everyone is allowed to express their views and opinions on the Minds without any restrictions or censorship. Depending on the activity you take, you can earn tokens when you upload anything or interact with other people’s content. For instance, you can gain a few points by checking your feed or liking someone else’s post. You will gain more, though, if you create a blog article or share an insightful link.

Tokens from Minds.com can be used to promote your work. A thousand impressions can be added to a post with one token. In addition, if your post receives more engagement and users find it fascinating, you can get your tokens back, recoup the cost of boosting it, and perhaps even make a profit. As of now, since the tokens are only available on the testnet, it is difficult to calculate their monetary value.

DTube
DTube is considered an alternative to YouTube and many feel that it’s even much better than the latter. Having many similarities with YouTube, experts feel that the users can adapt to DTube easily.

Unlike YouTube, which plays numerous ads, DTube doesn’t include any. As a result, users might feel that DTube is much better than its rival which has been there for around 17 years.

Furthermore, DTube’s search results are shown in accordance with their relevance to your query and are unaffected by any of the algorithms used by centralised search engines. It functions as a decentralised video search engine.

On DTube, everyone who is active on the site can receive rewards. For instance, as a content producer, you can get paid according to how many people like and comment on your videos. According to users, each comment is valued at about USD 0.05.

Some of the key features of DTube include:

A video once uploaded cannot be forcefully edited or removed
No advertisement nor premium subscription
No censorship
One can see who liked or disliked videos
Both content creators and content consumers earn money on DTube

Ignite
Ignite is a decentralised microblogging site that was built with the intention of creating a platform that is completely independent. The founders of this project constructed it on top of The Prometheus Framework, with speed, security, and decentralisation as their primary goals.

The significance of free speech, the struggle against censorship, and the defence of anonymity serve as the inspiration for Ignite. It enables everyone with access to the internet in the present age to exchange ideas and express their opinions without being concerned about being silenced or having their identity revealed.

Data about users can be sold in a number of ways thanks to the Prometeus network. For instance, you can buy or sell data in a decentralised and anonymous manner like documents, videos or photos.

Flote
Flote is a social network without any censorship and ambiguous community standards. People can freely express themselves on Flote, form communities, and make money online by creating useful content.

Users can livestream, publish audio, video, photos, and text in this community-driven project. Fans can sign up for a membership similar to Patreon through it. They can also receive unique content from creators in exchange for a monthly tip.

There are no platform fees on Flote. You may buy BTC using your debit or credit card thanks to the integrated Bitcoin wallet it contains.

The project’s founders have huge ambitions for the future, including the Flote market, a decentralised exchange, support for other cryptocurrencies, and much more.

The post Top 5 Crypto social media platforms in 2022 appeared first on International Finance.