Communication most important factor in emerging of a natural leader

In my Cognitive Modelling class we needed to make a model representing a certain natural phenomena. Our model was about the emergence of natural leaders within peer groups.

After some literature research we found five characteristics that are of influence on leadership.
The first is intrinsic motivation, meaning the motives one has to take actions without the influence of the outside world.
The second one is expertise. An expert will know what to do, which will give him credit. Furthermore, it is easier to follow someone who knows what he is talking about.
The third characteristic is charisma. This is especially important in the getting to know one another stages of the relationship. People will judge someone by the outside within 30 seconds. Do not let people tell you otherwise!
The fourth characteristic, which occurs often in scientific papers is transferred motivation. This is the motivation that a leader successfully can transmit to another person within the group.
The final characteristic is persuasion. It is not just enough to have people that are motivated and have expertise. You also want them to do it in your way.

These characteristics are very well found and very handy for leaders to take into account, but in my opinion the most important one has been left out. Communication is by far more important than these characteristics. How will you persuade a person when you cannot make sense of your arguments? How do you explain something technical when you do not possess the skills to explain it? And what good is your charisma when you open your mouth after 2 minutes and nonsense comes out?

No! Communication is without a doubt the most important factor of a succesful leader, and do not let people tell you otherwise!

Deckers OFF

How did I become so addicted?

The main reason to play computergames is for fun and for the challenge, but there are more influences for playing games. Think for instance about social pressure and boredom (Griffiths, 1997). In addition Yee (2006) also indicates that motivational factors for playing online games can be found within the regions of fulfillment, being social and submergence.
Once someone is  pursued to play an online game, people can easily become addicted. This can have its influences on school grades, family and relationships (Brian & Wiemer-Hastings, 2005).

Online behavior
When we look at behavioral patterns during the online activity, there are multiple processes that can be found.
When we look at the central route, the route with high involvement, you will find that people who use this route will spend a lot of time online. Criteria accompanying high involvement are behavioral problems, conflict, relapse and relocation and withdrawal.
People who follow a more peripheral route, often show more salliance, tollerance and euphoria. There is a significant difference in the behavior of these two behavioral patterns. It also becomes clear that online game addiction cannot just be assigned to one characterflaw, but is a part of a pattern of behavior (Charlton & Danforth, 2005).

Why online, but not offline?
According to Wan en Chiou (2006) satisfaction and dissatisfaction are the most valuable characteristics, when differentiating online and offline games. Their study shows a difference between two groups; addicted and non-addicted people. Addicted people are more drawn towards online games because of the liberation of faillure they experience. Offline games can cause dissatisfaction more easily. Online games make up for an environment where faillure can more easily be accepted.
Non-addicted people however also favor online games, but for them it is because the games online give them more satisfaction.
In prior research that Chou en Ting (2003) conducted you already find some evedence of thse factors. In this research you see a strong correlation between addiction and the, what they call, flow experience. The flow experience is an emotional state, which embrases perceptual distortion and pleasure.
In short, there are a lot of factors making that online games are so addictive. This is only the tip of the iceberg. Think for instance about a lot of social aspects it can bring along, or the urge to be somewhere non of your friends were capable of getting to so quickly. There is still a lot of research that needs to be done in this environment before we can fully understand what makes us tick in the domain of online games.

References: 

Charlton, J.P., & Danforth, I.D.W. (2005). Distinguishing addiction and high engagement in the context of online game playing. Computers in human behavior, 23 (3), 1531-1548.

Chou, T.J., Ting, C.C. (2003). The role of flow experience in cyber-game addiction. Cyberpsychology & Behavior, 6 (3), 663-675.

Griffiths, M. (1997). Computer game playing in early adolescence. Youth & Society, 29, 223-   237.

Wan, C.S., & Chiou, W.B. (2006). Psychological motives and online games addiction: A test of flow theory and humanistic needs theory for Taiwanese adolescents. Cyberpsychology & behavior, 9 (3), 317-324.

Yee, N. (2006). Motivations for play in online games. Cyberpsychology & behavior, 9 (6), 772-  775.

Unravelling the social online network (part 3)

This week we will continue where we left a few weeks ago. In this blog I like to talk with you about the two biggest "check-in"-programs, namely Foursquare and GetGlue.

Foursquare

Foursquare is the biggest check-in program momentarily. This program allows you to check in to locations. Everything from a bar to a residence house can be checked into. What if the location does not yet exist? No problem, you just create it and name it. Foursquare needs a location to operate from (i.e. a city name). The program uses this name to look for check-in points close to your location that look similar to your check-in search. The check-in part of the program can only be run on mobile devices, not on laptops and personal computers. When you check-in to a place some of your friends are you can see this, also you can see the last check-ins that were done recently. Meaning, if you go clubbing, you can see which friends are in the same pub as you are and which friends recently checked in to the pubs close to you. At least, this is the idea. The program still needs to improve their codes to make this work smoother and better, but given to exponential growth of the program, this will not take too long.

The program can be linked with social network home and can generate nice posts for it. For instance on Facebook it will let you check-in, combine the posts if friends just posted it a well, lets you see how many people checked in there and shows a little map of your location next to it, whereas on Twitter the map is replaced by a short url.

GetGlue

GetGlue is a fairly new program, but growing fast. It is called the Foursquare of entertainment. GetGlue, however, has some other features as well.

It is indeed true, you can check into entertainment, like you would check in to a location. The check in can be done from a mobile device, but from static devices as well. You earn points by checking in (which is also the case with foursquare). In GetGlue you can collect stickers of your favorite shows, movies and music. Furthermore, GetGlue set out some stickers of their own. When you collect 20 stickers, you have the option to send them to your address for free in physical form. This combines online and offline collecting of things, of which I think it is a nice move.

This program also features the like-button concept. I goes without saying, you can use it to like movies, shows, music etc. The main problem with this program, though I understand why the developers did it, is the fact that you are not allowed to easily upload shows, movies and music that is not yet in the system of GetGlue, or change pictures that are accompanying the artist or movie. In example, when you search for the British version of Top Gear (one of the top shows globally), you find a description of the BBC-show, but in the picture it says "BBC America", which is in this matter just incorrect, because this is the British and not the American version. GetGlue, still has a long way to go in my opinion, but the idea is promising.

GetGlue can be linked with every social home base, in a similar matter as Foursquare.

Making Science Simple

In this blog a short webvideo about facial recognition techniques that computers can use. The interview is conducted at Tilburg University with the help of prof. dr. Eric Postma.

Hope you like it, let's make science simple together!


MSS - Episode 1: Facial Recognition Techniques from Paul Deckers on Vimeo.

Ten Top Twitter Tips

I found with my last blog that a had a lot to say about twitter, a lot I have not said yet. That is why I made this “in-between” blog about Twitter.

I want to give you guys some tips about how to create and keep followers. So, here are Deckers’ Top Tips:

1.       Profile name
When choosing a profile name, look for a serious or semi-serious name. This can be your real name, but also the thing you twitter about. If, for instance, your field of expertise is social media, you could pick a name like “Social wizard”. Do not use immature names like “sexychick86” or something like that.

2.       Use the 70-30 rule

When posting, make 70 percent of your messages informational or intend them to send to all your followers. The remaining 30 percent can be more of an informal nature.

3.       Post catchy, clear and comic

When you post a message, make sure it is clear on the topic. Besides this most important point, try to make it funny or catchy as well. People will enjoy the message more this way.

4.       Follow and thou will be followed

Following people is a great way of getting more followers yourself. Follow people you know or people you share a group or interest with. Followers that follow you, but are not yet followed by you, you should also follow. That is called politeness.

5.       Make every character count

Because of the limit of characters you can put in one message, you should use the space as effective as possible. So use shortened urls, from bit.ly or tinyurl for example, when you want to link to something. Put the message down in as few words as possible, but make complete sentences. Do not make incorrect or incomplete sentences. However, use abbreviations, especially the ones that are promoted within Twitter itself.

6.       Tag the message

Using Tags is a very good way to get into list people are searching for. When a soccer match is on and you use the hash-tag #uefa or #barche for instance, you will show up in the list of users who search for the topic. Also, you can be posted in constantly updating Twitter-feeds on sites. This is a great way to get in touch with people you do not know yet.

7.       Feel good vibes

Stay positive in your messages. Also when you reply to someway, try to stay positive, other people could be following the conversation as well. Show interest in your followers and they will show interest in you. Stay positive towards you followers and they will be positive to and speak positive of you. It is as simple as that.

8.       When you personal message, really personal message

When replying to another person, use the @-sign followed by this person his Twitter name. When you do so, do it at the beginning of a sentence. This has multiple advantages, like you can switch off that the message also will be posted in a linked program like Facebook (option is switched on and off in Facebook), but also you make directly clear for who the message is intended, making it easier on your followers.

9.       Use external links

When posting your messages you will often find restriction. Make links to things you intend to accompany the message, so to photo’s, or your blog for instance. People like the idea they can find more behind a link about the posted topic if they want to.

10.   Retweet

Interesting messages you see from people you follow and you think are interesting for a lot of your followers as well, you can retweet. Remember, when you retweet someone’s message, always give credit. It is only polite.

Hope you learned a thing or two about responsible using Twitter. Next time, we have a very special video, treat for you. Curious? Keep checking the blog.

Deckers OFF

Unravelling the social online network (part 2)

In this blog I will look at four of the greater blog systems, that are additions to your home base (see part 1).

Twitter

Twitter is probably one of the biggest blog systems. It is a short blog system (a blog may consist of 140 characters at maximum per post). One of the most prominent features of this system is that people can follow each other as well as famous people or opinion leaders. If you have not protected your tweets (the short blog messages), you will see that a lot of companies will start following you in no time. Protect your tweets, so you do not have 20 mattress-suppliers following you from the time you make one post about going to bed. Twitter is a good medium for professional use, but is often use for personal messages. When you use personal messages, it is even more beneficial to protect your tweets.

Due to the limited capacity of text, there are a lot of twitter-abbreviations (sort of like SMS-language) to fit more data into one tweet. Also a lot of links are used, for linking towards longer blogs or pictures for instance. When you want to post an URL on Twitter, you can use tinyurl.com for instance to shorten your link-URL so you have more space left to write an accompanying message. Finally, you can also use hash tags to label your messages, so that people who search for a specific word or concept can find your tweets.

When you use Twitter more professional (like for news-messages and reviews for instance), you can link Twitter to LinkedIn. When you use it more personal, it is a better idea to link it to Facebook or Hyves.

Twitter is a short blogging service mostly used for status updates, so use it in this way.

Tumblr

Personally, I am not that familiar with this system. It is kind of the midway between Blogger/Wordpress and Twitter. Though you can make fairly long posts, it is most commonly used for posting pictures with an corresponding message or for blogging poetry or song lyrics. These messages are of medium length, most of the time around 10-15 sentences. This medium is more used for personal cultural expressions and can better be linked to Hyves/Facebook then to the more professional systems. When linked, new posts will automatically generate new posts containing a introduction and link in the personal feed of the home base system.

This system has the great benefit that it lets you share anything, from songs to movies and from photo’s to quotes.

Blogger/Wordpress

Blogger and Wordpress are more or less developed for the same purpose, namely to blog in the traditional way. Here you can write long blogs without any limit. Also you can customize the lay-out of the site and personalize it. You can link blogger to all home base systems, and every time you publish a new blog post, it will automatically appear in your personal feed.

Blogs written here can be about everything. Mostly the blogs are used for one of the next two reasons. The first is to give an opinion. This can be about a movie you saw, a new medium or even the public transport you had to take to get home yesterday. The second reason is to inform people. These blogs give elaborate updates about upcoming events, or give scientific findings of yourself or for instance your University.

These blogs are not for status updates, but for elaborated findings and your views on life.

As you might have noticed, due to the structure of this blog I proponed Foursquare. This will be probably be in my next blog though, so not to worry. It will be explained in one of the next blogs for sure.

Deckers OFF

Unravelling the social online network (part 1)

The last few years social media have popped up like mushrooms in autumn. This calls for specialization of the systems. There are so many of these systems nowadays that people tend to lose track. Not to worry, below you will find a quick guide through the systems and how to use them, where to use them, and which to integrate.

Facebook/Hyves
This is the homebase of your social structure. These systems are designed to have the social experience online. Here you keep track of your whole personal network. You can make photo-albums, follow pages that define you and post pictures of, for example, your vacation. This makes sites like picasa obsolete. These systems is can be linked with almost every other social system. Also, it is the home of your network because you will spent the most time here, chatting, commenting on posts and tagging photo's of your friends. Important to note is that this system is more personal. Be aware which people you allow to be your friends. Do you really want your boss to see all your party pics? Also mind which information non-friends, like your boss for instance, can see. Companies can use this information to get a more personal notion of you, though most companies are not interested in this information at all.

LinkedIn
LinkedIn on the other hand is developed to promote your professional self. Companies actively use this network to search for potential employees. This is much less socially active as Facebook and Hyves. On this system you can upload your CV and add professional relationships like collegues and partners. Also is this system nice to keep track of schoolmates. The only problem (in the Netherlands at least) is the use of the system. It is growing fast, but there are still only a select few of your friends on this site probably.
This system can be integrated with your home network system (Facebook/Hyves), but is not recommended by me. The system is too different and can better be seen as a third starting point of your social online network.

In the next part we shall go deeper into more specific systems like twitter and foursquare.

Deckers OFF 

April fools by Google

Today, on the first of April, a lot of companies did something as sort of a joke. Especially internetcorporations and websites are actively trying to find new and original jokes. The best joke by far I've seen however is the one by Google introducting the new "Google Motion". It is a revolutionizing way to communicate through gmail. Using body movements to preform tasks and even write whole messages. Could this really be the future of interaction between human and computer?
Check out the video and/or website:

http://mail.google.com/mail/help/motion.html

The growing of populism in society

The term populism refers to a style, more than it refers to an ideology. The term has many different meanings. In this blog we will apply the following definition: Populism is the defending of "the people" against the ruling elites. Over the last years more and more political parties are being formed that apply some form of populism to gain their votes. Is this a bad thing, or just a blessing in disguise? Let us look at some pros and cons.

Populism is formed on the idea that a group of elites are in power and that there must be resistance against those people, for the good of all. Now, this concept in itself is really strange, because when you oppose the people in power, then you become the people in power, hence you should be against your own views. Populist are always against the operating power, so they always try to break down current evolvements. It is participating without participating. This is not good for society at all.

A second argument against populism is the definition of "the people". In the populist style, "the people" have a clear and unanimous voice. In reality this cannot take place, because then you would have no minorities. There are always minorities. Everybody has been a minority many times in their life probably. Think about it for a second.

Without minorities and with only one voice, there would be no need for democracy at all.

Another consequence of the populism increase in politics is that politics became tougher, rougher and more uncensored. The elite and correct usage of words must make place for the language spoken in the streets. This is especially notable in the one-liners politicians utter nowadays and are front page news the next. This also shaken up the debates and make them more aggressive. Whether this is a positive or negative evolution I leave up to you...

Is populism really that bad. Currently, parties who conduct the populism style are taken under heavy criticism in many media and by many people. However, most of these parties do not seem to find their party for all people. They are getting strong by standing up really strong for a minority. By gaining many to all votes from this minority, these parties grow strong. How a minority can have that much impact? Because we need to be convinced to go to the election offices. About 50% of the people in most countries have not been convinced yet, leaving a lot of room for new populist parties to be founded.

Also, populist parties are under heavy fire because they would mislead the people with their tactics, but when you really look at all the parties, can you honestly say that one of those parties does not use populism as a promotion tool? But if all use it, can it really still be labeled as populism?

Deckers OFF

(Blog based on symposium "De zegen van het populisme" which was given at Tilburg University on March 23th)

Media is getting smarter, men is getting dumber

There has been an enormous increase in possibilities to gather information or being entertained. TV-shows started using the internet and social media to increase their interaction with their public. Another famous medium that flowered the past few years is the voting by phone. Shows allow you to cast your vote against a small amount of money. In this way you can actively influence the show.

Sound great, all this interaction between the "followers" and the show, but when you look closer at which programs it is considered in, you will soon find out that it is pretty limited to two kinds of shows, namely reality programs and talent competitions. Both of which I would not label under intelligent shows.

There really is a growth in these shows the last few years. We just seem to be obsessed by watching other people live and interact (maybe this also explains the success of social media and the status options within it). Strangely however is that we do not seem to care for intelligent people who have information to share. We specifically tune in to dumb people or people which show unnatural and ridiculous behavior. Think for example about all the reality shows that have been since the days of Big Brother. Every show has to be more extreme than the last one. Putting people in a show that play extra dumb or crazy just to be on TV. And the world...They all tune in to see it. Why do we look to these shows instead of informational or documentary shows? Is it because of the interaction forms that are already fully integrated into these shows, but have not seem to reach other types of shows yet? Or is it just because people can identify themselves more with these dumb or crazy people? After all...monkey see, monkey do.

Think for example about the show "New Kids" and the way people behave after seeing it. 

And repend!

Deckers OFF

The future of gaming is here, hop on in!

In America they managed to build the first sphere for gaming that actually makes you a part of the game. The globe is about four meters in diameter. When you stand inside you put on your game spectacles and put up your weapon. Than (now still from the outside by an external person) the game is started.

You are allowed to move freely through the space, look where you want. This adds a new dimension to the freedom of gaming. But how does it work?

The games' sphere is made up of pressure pads. These pressure pads are connected to make up the globe. The structure is so strong it stays round on itself, even with you inside. The globe is then put on four wheels which allow it to roll freely. The glasses and game controllers had moving and gravity sensors to indicate where you are and at what angle your looking or holding your controller. This systems works much like the Wii or Kinect system that is already available for purchase nowadays. The spheres can easily be connected to one another, so even big online games like World of Warcraft will not give any problems.

Just imagine being able to run inside, duck behind a wall in real life when you are playing Counterstrike.

This all sounds pretty good, but there is one obvious downside to all this...It will take up a whole room of your house. So you will literally have a game room in your house in the future.

But if you have to money, and have the room, then hop on in, in a few years...literally.

Deckers OFF

Social Television, the next best thing?

Social media are thriving at the moment. Think for instance of the facebook- or twitterrevolution of the last few years. Also music-stations are slowly adapting social media into their systems. Look at 3fm, a Dutch radiochannel, for example. They now make what they call "social radio". Interacting with their listeners through the show, calling and tweeting. Also they can be watched with webcams on the site.

The market of social media is rapidly expanding and every new area in which it operates , it seems to be a success. In my opinion social television will be the next hype. Imagine watching shows when you like and seeing which of your friends are watching the show aswell. Chatting with friends or even strangers about the show and the events you just seen. Connecting your other social networks automatically to your television set, making appointments to watch shows together or host movienights through your television...and much more.

 Social media seem to initiate in everything people use often to communicate or belong. The internet was the first area in which this kind of social networks existed, but is soon spread to smartphones. Think for instance of the blackberry network. Now that social media are prominent on computers, phones and smaller digital gadgets, it seems like a logical step to spread to the mass-media system pur sang...the television.

Hope to chat with you about a television show we are both watching soon.

Deckers OFF

Bursting the bubble?

A few days ago one of Google's top employees made the news by publishing in the tabloid Bilanz that there are signs of a new internet bubble. According to Eric Smidt, many companies are overrated in their worth, just as with the last internet bubble.

The principle rests on the idea of consumers that the companies (like Facebook and Zygna) will make huge profits in the future. This will make consumers overrate the company and invest until the bubble finally bursts and the companies go under, because of newer/better programs or because it just simply is not a trend anymore and the hype goes silent.

On the contrary, I think that the course of these companies can take a whole different direction. These companies can beside burst, just grow forever. Growing ever more powerful and influential and ,eventually, take over whole markets. Think of sites like Facebook that actually take over the website world as we know it by integrating websites in their own website. Another possibility is to take over television. Think of Google for example, which is already well on its way to do this (Google TV, Youtube). Especially with the approaching social television (read more about this in my next blog).  The reason I think these bubble do not need to burst eventually, is because these companies thrive on the wisdom of the crowds. As long as people can apply input to the programs, and the programs will keep satisfying the market, consumers will stay.

Bursting or overcrowding? Which is the better alternative?

Free will does not exist.

"There is no such thing as free will and I will prove it to you in the next hour" argues neuroscientist Victor Lamme in front of a packed lecture room at the Tilburg University.

Many of the systems men put in place, assume that people have a free will.

Consider the law-system for instance. People can be trialed for breaking the law, but are not as heavy charged for the crimes they committed, when they cannot account for their actions. In these systems it is assumed that normal people act rational.

It is however very clear that people in emotional, ethical and moral dilemmas think with their hearts instead of their minds. People that make rational decisions in every scenario, often have brain damage. People need to be emotional. There is nothing wrong with being this way. It is what made us survive.

Now back to the topic of free will. People who are emotional, also can be influenced. Last few years there have been discussions about subliminal marketing and priming (consider the example in the movie below).

As you can see in the movie, it is fairly easy to predict how people will act like before they even know it their selves. People think they know what is going on in their minds, but they have no idea. This principle gives us the illusion that we are free beings. However, our actions prove otherwise.

Think for example of the MILGRAM-experiments. People, knowingly they would  kill someone, still take the action of chocking the person to an extent that actually surpasses the level of dying. It are our actions that say we are not free.

The last few years, a technique (called brain-reading) has been developed which allows us to actually look inside the brain of people and see which units of the brain are being activated at a given time. These studies show that our brains make decisions for us, far before we know anything about them. Researchers in neuroscience argue that with this technique people can be read like a book. The brain never lies, even if the person does, and even if the person does not know he is lying.

Brain-reading opens a new world of exploration, but also breaches our privacy. Think for instance the possibility that you can see who is a pedophile, just by reading his mind. The technique will allow us to get a better comprehension of what makes people tick, but at what cost?

Brain-reading...A blessing or a curse?