Loomio
Tue 14 Aug 2018 11:02AM

Ouishare Fest impact : how people connect at Ouishare Fest ?

HV Hélène Vuaroqueaux Public Seen by 169

Context

For the second year, at Ouishare Fest 2017, we had Paola Tubaro, researcher on social networks interviewing participants of the event. Here are few of her last publications (in French).

Insights from the 2017 research study

Below, you’ll find three data visualizations of the connections at the event.

  • The first image shows the people who answered the survey (circles in light blue) and their contacts already existing before the event (orange circles). It is interesting to note that most of them are already connected to others, directly or indirectly, forming a large connected component. Although obviously, not everyone has previous connections (blue circles without contacts, mostly newbies that did not participate in other Ouishare Fest before).

  • The second image adds new contacts that respondents formed at Ouishare Fest 2017 (links in yellow). It is clear that the social circle of the participants widens. Those who did not know anyone at the beginning, have made some acquaintances (look for example at the two blue circles at the top left).

  • The third image shows the relationships that, according to the respondents, are likely to lead to collaborations in the future. They are indicated by thicker lines. There is a slight dominance of the yellow lines (relationships that have just been formed) on the grey (already existing relationships). People go to Ouishare Fest to create new relationships and they are most likely to create things with those then with people already in their network.

The data of 2017 also confirm a result found for 2016: the Ouishare Fest facilitates the formation of relations with women !

Initially, respondents (women and men) who already know someone, tend to mention men. On the other hand, the new contacts formed during the event are more diverse: the respondents mention men and women almost equally. Women remain fairly egalitarian in the relationships they want to pursue in the future, while men return (albeit more nuanced) to their tendency to mention more men than women.

Overall, we can say that this result shows a positive effect of the event on the participation of women in the sector, even if men seem to oppose a little resistance.

With the 2016 data, Paola also found that people tend to get out of their "comfort zone" with regard to their home countries. Pre-existing relationships are often with people from the same country, while those made during the event, as well as possible future collaborations, are more heterogeneous.

That's all for now. Let me know if any questions !

F

Francesca Tue 14 Aug 2018 12:18PM

Super cool @helenevuaroqueaux , awesome that Paula has continued the research for so long! I'd be very curious if she sees any interesting differences between 2016 and 17?

HV

Hélène Vuaroqueaux Tue 14 Aug 2018 12:51PM

yes, she actually told me when we first met that in 2016 there was a "core connectors" effect : a group of people who was highly connected to the rest of the participants. It's not so much the case in 2017. We assumed it's due to the fact that people with tickets have less time together (from 9 to 6pm in 2016 // from 2pm to 6pm in 2017)

JS

Justyna Swat Thu 16 Aug 2018 10:30AM

This is super interesting. I guess we are all aware on the networking role and effect of the OSF but it's great to have some data and acctuall reaserch on that topic. I am curious to know if there is more data on age and 'fields od interest'. It also interesting to know if she has compared the data with similar events.

SM

Scott Maxwell Sun 16 Sep 2018 9:05PM

I'm discussing these sorts of metrics with the people who are hosting the IABC conference next year here in Vancouver. I think they'd probably love to do something similar, maybe it'd be good to have a conversation about next steps to collaborate?