Big Boulder: The Power of Social Data

As I was getting ready to visit Boulder for the #BigBoulder conference, I wasn’t sure what to expect. After the buzz factor is removed, the reality is that social data is in its infancy and what we are witnessing today is just the tip of the iceberg. I was pleasantly surprised to meet many players in the social data ecosystem: from social network / platforms to analytics companies to organizations of all sorts working to leverage social data for a myriad use case. I had the opportunity to meet a number of people doing amazing work. I also met many of the Gnip team members who have been working with our team at MutualMind. The Gnip team did a great job to put together this event!

I am sure we will see many of such gathering because all of the players need to work together to solve some fundamental problems related to measurement and analysis.

The short video below is a good recap of the event.

Big Boulder from Gnip on Vimeo.

A few sessions that caught my attention included Social Data Ecosystem (Twitter), Data Science at LinkedIn, Social Data in the Public Service (Al-Jazeera), Boulder’s Entrepreneurship Rise, Measuring Engagement on Facebook and Social Media Analytics.

Here’s the full session list, you can find transcripts at Gnip Blog.

Day 1 – Thursday, June 21, 2012

• The Social Cocktail: Mixing the Right Ingredients
• Creating the Social Data Ecosystem: An Interview with Twitter’s Ryan Sarver and Doug Williams
• Engaging with Customers Online: An Interview with Get Satisfaction’s Wendy Lea
• Blogs, Comments, Forums and Rich Social Gestures: Panel Discussion About the Myriad Ways People Engage Online
• Distributed vs. Centralized Conversations: An Interview with Jesse Burros from GetGlue
• Data Science at LinkedIn: An Interview with Yael Garten and Jennifer Weedn from LinkedIn
• Industry-Focused Social Networks: An Interview with Howard Lindzon from StockTwits
• Measuring Influence Online: An Interview with Klout’s Joe Fernandez and Matt Thomson
• Social Data in the Public Service: Panel Discussion About the Increasing Use of Social Data by Government and Organizations for Public Good

Day 2 – Friday, June 22, 2012

• Boulder and the Rise of Entrepreneurial Communities: A Discussion with Brad Feld
• Measuring Engagement on Facebook: An Interview with Facebook’s Sean Bruich and Graham Mudd
• Adding the Geo-Spatial Layer to Social Data: An Interview with ESRI’s S.J. Camarata and Myles Sutherland
• From Monologue to Dialogue: An Interview with Daniel Ha and Ro Gupta from Disqus
• Social Media Analytics: What’s Next? Zach Hofer-Shall, Susan Etlinger, Nathan Gilliatt and Shawn Rogers Discuss Emerging Trends in Analyzing Social Data
• Social Data in the Markets: Panel Discussion on Why Hedge Funds, Banks and Financial Services Need Social Data
• Transition at Massive Scale: An Interview with Ken Little, Director of Engineering at Tumblr