DO YOU remember "socially contagious obesity"? It is the idea that one reason people are fat is because they know other fat people. It sounds made up, but the notion is based on solid research by Harvard professor Nicholas Christakis and his colleague James Fowler.

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A SOCIAL graph derived from billions of instant messages validates folklore that there are about six degrees of separation between any two strangers on the planet.

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In the 21st century, it's time to "Fasten your seatbelts and prepare for a rapid descent into the Bellum omnia contra omnes, Thomas Hobbes' "war of all against all." A hyperconnected polity—whether composed of a hundred individuals or a hundred thousand—has resources at its d …

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On February, 1971, Apollo 14 astronaut Edgar Mitchell experienced the little understood phenomenon sometimes called the "Overview Effect". He describes being completely engulfed by a profound sense of universal connectedness.

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A colleague at work recently pointed me to Newsvine's concept of "vineacity." For them, "vineacity" is a quantifiable measure of your behavior on and relationship to, the Newsvine community.

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Syrian authorities have blocked Facebook, the popular Internet hangout, over what seems to be fears of Israeli ''infiltration'' of Syrian social networks on the Net, according to residents and media reports.

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From the article: Twitter scares me. For all its popularity, I see at least three issues: 1) it's a near-perfect example of the psychological principle of intermittent variable reward, the key addictive element of slot machines.

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Globalization: Exploiting or Empowering?

Is globalization but the new form of raw and unadulterated slavery of the past? Are the migrant workers in the U.S.

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