University of Haifa (03/08/10)

An online chat channel is more likely to survive over time when the community is heterogeneous, or when it has turnover and new members continue to join the group, according to researchers at the University of Haifa and the New Jersey Institute of Technology. The team surveyed 282 chat channels begun on the same day over the course of six months. The survey found that the greater the turnover among members, the more likely a chat community will sustain itself over time. Moreover, chat groups are more likely to survive when they have a higher number of messages between members from the first day of activity through the end of its second week. The researchers also found that chat communities that have an irregular ratio between the number of messages and the number of members after two weeks are more likely to survive. “The present study shows that prediction of an online community’s survival chances cannot be based on quantitative data relating to the size of the group or even to its growth rate alone,” says Haifa’s Daphne Raban. “A social predictor, on the other hand, can much better predict its chances.”
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