IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/gam/jftint/v12y2020i2p25-d316131.html

Strategies of Success for Social Networks: Mermaids and Temporal Evolution

Author

Listed:
  • Massimo Marchiori

    (European Institute for Science, Media and Democracy, 1040 Brussels, Belgium
    Department of Mathematics, University of Padua, 35121 Padua, Italy)

  • Lino Possamai

    (Department of Mathematics, University of Padua, 35121 Padua, Italy)

Abstract

The main goal of this article is to investigate techniques that can quickly lead to successful social systems by boosting network connectivity. This is especially useful when starting new online communities where the aim is to increase the system utilization as much as possible. This aspect is very important nowadays, given the existence of many online social networks available on the web, and the relatively high level of competition. In other words, attracting users’ attention is becoming a major concern, and time is an essential factor when investing money and resources into online social systems. Our study describes an effective technique that deals with this issue by introducing the notion of mermaids, special attractors that alter the normal evolutive behavior of a social system. We analyze how mermaids can boost social networks, and then provide estimations of fundamental parameters that business strategists can take into account in order to obtain successful systems within a constrained budget.

Suggested Citation

  • Massimo Marchiori & Lino Possamai, 2020. "Strategies of Success for Social Networks: Mermaids and Temporal Evolution," Future Internet, MDPI, vol. 12(2), pages 1-30, February.
    • Handle: RePEc:gam:jftint:v:12:y:2020:i:2:p:25-:d:316131
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://www.mdpi.com/1999-5903/12/2/25/pdf
    Download Restriction: no
    File URL: https://www.mdpi.com/1999-5903/12/2/25/
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Marchiori, Massimo & Latora, Vito, 2000. "Harmony in the small-world," Physica A: Statistical Mechanics and its Applications, Elsevier, vol. 285(3), pages 539-546.
    2. Doyeon Kwak & Wonjoon Kim, 2017. "Understanding the process of social network evolution: Online-offline integrated analysis of social tie formation," PLOS ONE, Public Library of Science, vol. 12(5), pages 1-16, May.
    3. Chengcheng Shao & Giovanni Luca Ciampaglia & Onur Varol & Kai-Cheng Yang & Alessandro Flammini & Filippo Menczer, 2018. "The spread of low-credibility content by social bots," Nature Communications, Nature, vol. 9(1), pages 1-9, December.
    4. Lee, In & Shin, Yong Jae, 2018. "Fintech: Ecosystem, business models, investment decisions, and challenges," Business Horizons, Elsevier, vol. 61(1), pages 35-46.
    5. Robert M. Bond & Christopher J. Fariss & Jason J. Jones & Adam D. I. Kramer & Cameron Marlow & Jaime E. Settle & James H. Fowler, 2012. "A 61-million-person experiment in social influence and political mobilization," Nature, Nature, vol. 489(7415), pages 295-298, September.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Aziz, Abeer Ibtisam & Bischoff, Ivo, 2025. "Social media campaigning and voter behavior–evidence for the German federal election 2021," European Journal of Political Economy, Elsevier, vol. 88(C).
    2. Douven, Igor, 2026. "Flooding-induced fragmentation in an adaptive bounded confidence model," Physica A: Statistical Mechanics and its Applications, Elsevier, vol. 687(C).
    3. Prasha Shrestha & Arun Sathanur & Suraj Maharjan & Emily Saldanha & Dustin Arendt & Svitlana Volkova, 2020. "Multiple social platforms reveal actionable signals for software vulnerability awareness: A study of GitHub, Twitter and Reddit," PLOS ONE, Public Library of Science, vol. 15(3), pages 1-28, March.
    4. Katherin Carrera-Silva & Olga Maritza Rodríguez Ulcuango & Paula Abdo-Peralta & Ángel Gerardo Castelo Salazar & Carmen Amelia Samaniego Erazo & Diego Haro Ávalos, 2024. "Beyond the Financial Horizon: A Critical Review of Social Responsibility in Latin American Credit Unions," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 16(18), pages 1-23, September.
    5. Liu, Yongtuan & Wang, Kewei, 2024. "Asymmetric impacts of coal prices, fintech, and financial stress on clean energy stocks," Resources Policy, Elsevier, vol. 92(C).
    6. Iván Sosa Gómez & Óscar Montes Pineda, 2023. "What is an InsurTech? A scientific approach for defining the term," Risk Management and Insurance Review, American Risk and Insurance Association, vol. 26(2), pages 125-173, July.
    7. Bouchard St-Amant, Pier-AndrÃl’, 2012. "Getting the Right Spin: A Theory of Value of Social Networks," Queen's Economics Department Working Papers 274613, Queen's University - Department of Economics.
    8. Guillaume Edou Tchidi & Wei Zhang, 2025. "Mediating effect of financial inclusion on FinTech innovations and economic development in West Africa: Evidence from the Benin Republic," International Journal of Finance & Economics, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 30(2), pages 1032-1048, April.
    9. Mark J. O. Bagley, 2019. "Networks, geography and the survival of the firm," Journal of Evolutionary Economics, Springer, vol. 29(4), pages 1173-1209, September.
    10. Alaassar, Ahmad & Mention, Anne-Laure & Aas, Tor Helge, 2021. "Exploring a new incubation model for FinTechs: Regulatory sandboxes," Technovation, Elsevier, vol. 103(C).
    11. Beibei Zhao, 2025. "RETRACTED ARTICLE: Examining the Transformative Influence of Digital Finance on Green Technological Innovation: Empirical Insights from China," Journal of the Knowledge Economy, Springer;Portland International Center for Management of Engineering and Technology (PICMET), vol. 16(1), pages 2068-2081, March.
    12. Ruyi Ge & Juan Feng & Bin Gu, 2016. "Borrower’s default and self-disclosure of social media information in P2P lending," Financial Innovation, Springer;Southwestern University of Finance and Economics, vol. 2(1), pages 1-6, December.
    13. Jiang, Lincheng & Zhao, Xiang & Ge, Bin & Xiao, Weidong & Ruan, Yirun, 2019. "An efficient algorithm for mining a set of influential spreaders in complex networks," Physica A: Statistical Mechanics and its Applications, Elsevier, vol. 516(C), pages 58-65.
    14. van Gils, Freek & Müller, Wieland & Prufer, Jens, 2026. "Microtargeting and voters’ unawareness: Experimental results," Other publications TiSEM 692dadf6-f0e5-4e35-9441-d, Tilburg University, School of Economics and Management.
    15. Yann Algan & Quoc-Anh Do & Nicolò Dalvit & Alexis Le Chapelain & Yves Zenou, 2015. "How Social Networks Shape Our Beliefs: A Natural Experiment among Future French Politicians," Working Papers hal-03459820, HAL.
    16. Daniele Barchiesi & Helen Susannah Moat & Christian Alis & Steven Bishop & Tobias Preis, 2015. "Quantifying International Travel Flows Using Flickr," PLOS ONE, Public Library of Science, vol. 10(7), pages 1-8, July.
    17. repec:spo:wpmain:info:hdl:2441/78vacv4udu92eq3fec89svm9uv is not listed on IDEAS
    18. Shimei Jiang & Yimei Hu & Ziyuan Wang, 2019. "Core Firm Based View on the Mechanism of Constructing an Enterprise Innovation Ecosystem: A Case Study of Haier Group," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 11(11), pages 1-26, June.
    19. Julian Freitag & Anna Kerkhof & Johannes Münster, 2021. "Selective sharing of news items and the political position of news outlets," ECONtribute Discussion Papers Series 056, University of Bonn and University of Cologne, Germany.
    20. Lackner, Teresa & Fierro, Luca E. & Mellacher, Patrick, 2025. "Opinion dynamics meet agent-based climate economics: An integrated analysis of carbon taxation," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 229(C).
    21. Donati, Dante, 2023. "Mobile Internet access and political outcomes: Evidence from South Africa," Journal of Development Economics, Elsevier, vol. 162(C).

    More about this item

    Keywords

    ;
    ;
    ;
    ;
    ;

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:gam:jftint:v:12:y:2020:i:2:p:25-:d:316131. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: MDPI Indexing Manager The email address of this maintainer does not seem to be valid anymore. Please ask MDPI Indexing Manager to update the entry or send us the correct address (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://www.mdpi.com .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.