TLDR; I would like to study the Fediverse and I am looking for recommendations and connections with like minded people/researchers.
I have a CS degree and I have aspirations for an academic career. In the past, I was interested in programming languages and the theory of computation. The past year I have been more interested in social issues like isolation, freedom of press, misinformation, and access to information. I have been following the fediverse closely and I truly believe in its potential.
My goal is to study social media as a computational system, how a bunch of people interacting with each other can generate reliable information. Topics I have been thinking about include: How neurodivergency awareness has been booming through social media, how scientific research can be done in a global collaborative environment instead of an institution focused, and how misinformation could be combatted with small interconnected social circles like mastodon.
I have been considering getting a master’s degree in a related field like social computing. The Human Technology Interaction program of Eindhoven University seems interesting, especially the Behavioural and Social Computing track. Also, there is the option of diving into a PhD right away.
Either way I am broke right now, so I should probably start studying on my own while I try to create a safety net that would allow me to make my next step in 2025.
So, if you made it through my autistic info dump, I thank you and I was hoping to get your feedback. While any feedback is appreciated, I have the following questions in my mind:
- Are there any other terms like social computing that would help me understand the field?
- Are there any researchers you would I suggest I follow?
- Any books or papers recommendations?
- If you are a researcher/student with similar concerns, would like to have a chat? You can find my matrix handle on my profile.
- Any other universities I should look into?
Last but not least, let me know if you are interested for me to make a follow-up post with any information I gather.
This is tangential, but I hope it will be helpful.
My advice if you want to study this, is to first spend at least one year working a tech job with that CS degree, and sock away as much cash as you can.
Any endeavor in life benefits from having $25k in the bank, so you have a buffer and don’t need to scramble in response to financial emergencies.
Like, if you get a job offer to research this kind of thing, but you have a bad gut feeling about the people who would hire you or their actual commitment to learning, you can pass it up to hold out for the better on, if you have $25k in the bank. But if you’re broke, you can’t pass up any job offer.
One year now spent simply earning high salary and saving lots of money, can save you five years later on of fucking around and backtracking bad decisions made from financial desperation.
My advice if you want to study this, is to first spend at least one year working a tech job with that CS degree, and sock away as much cash as you can.
Also learning about financial Independence (FIRE) a vanguard (investment bank owned by customers) index fund will probably double your money every about ten years, maybe faster because there is evidence the stock market is becoming more efficient, 5 years will give you about 40 percent.
I’m not an academic, but this was a good book:
The University of Washington in Seattle has a Center For an Informed Public that’s relevant to your interests i think.
Hope that’s helpful
I would be interested in any findings. If you just post here again in the future, that’ll probably be good enough.
This particular intersection of such a sweeping range of “hard” and “soft” sciences has always fascinated me, I feel like really wrapping your head around it requires proficiency in such a wide range of skillsets that it’s almost prohibitively difficult to pursue.
But if we’re going to understand it, we don’t have much of a choice.
To be honest, setting such a goal is scary to me, I have been working on my self-confidence, and I wouldn’t have been able to do it a few years ago. I try to remind myself that I am an autistic with ADHD: if I had food, meds, a bed, a place to study, and the frequent affirmation of a similarly interested peer group I would be happily studying 12 hours a day.
Super Crunchers seems like a good place to start, it’s a book about how quantitiative analysis can be used for social sciences.
Fear is appropriate, being aware of it indicates a healthy amount of EQ. I think this will be an asset during your path.
