The Generativity of Social Media: Opportunities, Challenges, and Guidelines for Conducting Experimental Research

Human-computer interaction research on online social media has mainly focused on the use of single platforms such as Twitter and Facebook. However, this context is not entirely representative of the ever-increasing number of ways that social media manifests. A rising number of online services combine features and data that originate from multiple sources and platforms, including social media. In this article, we present an expanded view of social media by examining hybrid social media networks, defined as the combinatorial arrangements that result from connecting social media to other non-social platforms. We explain why they are important and how to study them using an experimental approach. Our conclusions and recommendations are illustrated by two case studies.