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I'm a computer scientist, and I call the (very old) study of graphs "graph theory". How is "network theory" different? And is it just me, or is it painful to

by dwine 16y ago

I'm a computer scientist, and I call the (very old) study of graphs "graph theory". How is "network theory" different? And is it just me, or is it painful to read this? It has the feel of a student taking an intro course on optimization, then exclaiming, "everything is an optimization problem!" I mean, sure, this is true, but it's tautological and feels forced to me. And sorry, but Twitter's main innovation was discarding symmetry? People have been subscribing (an asymmetric relation) to things on the internet and otherwise for ages.

bsaunder 16y ago
...(an asymmetric relation) to things on the internet You mean a link? ;) With regards to your other points, I do think the general premise of the post is correct that the pendulum is swinging back (?) towards more flexible data structures (e.g. graphs). The writing does come across as though the author just had an epiphany ... hey... these things are all graphs... Yeah, and so are lots of other things.
- sorbus 16y ago
  Social Graph is (or graphs in general are) the buzzword of the day, or perhaps year. It's not surprising that everything is being phrased in terms of it.
aamar 16y ago
> Twitter's main innovation was discarding symmetry? This is a common statement that benefits from explicit context: Twitter's innovation specifically was importing the "asymmetric follow" into a social network, a graph in which nodes represent individual people and in which relations are generally public.
- dwine 16y ago
  What was the social network with public relations between people that failed because the "follow" was symmetric?
  - huangm 16y ago
    Symmetric follow doesn't have to fail for asymmetric follow to succeed. Twitter's innovation allowed them to create and serve new use-cases. That's all
- mgdiaz 16y ago
  I agree. It was about building the structure of a social network around the "asymmetric follow," and doing it in a way that facilitated the curated transitivity that Chris talks about.
ojbyrne 16y ago
My experience is that mathematicians and computer scientists use "graph," and engineers use "network." I specifically took a course in an engineering faculty called "network theory."
jpeterson 16y ago
'Graph' is the next hottest buzzword on the internet, thanks to Facebook.
kvs 16y ago
I down voted you by accident! My bad. Yes, it was painful to read and I missed the whole point of the post unless it is just listing of where we find and use "graphs." I think this is a post out of his comfirt zone; I like his VC and startup posts better.

by dwine 16y ago

bsaunder 16y ago

...(an asymmetric relation) to things on the internet You mean a link? ;) With regards to your other points, I do think the general premise of the post is correct that the pendulum is swinging back (?) towards more flexible data structures (e.g. graphs). The writing does come across as though the author just had an epiphany ... hey... these things are all graphs... Yeah, and so are lots of other things.

sorbus 16y ago
Social Graph is (or graphs in general are) the buzzword of the day, or perhaps year. It's not surprising that everything is being phrased in terms of it.

aamar 16y ago

> Twitter's main innovation was discarding symmetry? This is a common statement that benefits from explicit context: Twitter's innovation specifically was importing the "asymmetric follow" into a social network, a graph in which nodes represent individual people and in which relations are generally public.

dwine 16y ago
What was the social network with public relations between people that failed because the "follow" was symmetric?
- huangm 16y ago
  Symmetric follow doesn't have to fail for asymmetric follow to succeed. Twitter's innovation allowed them to create and serve new use-cases. That's all
mgdiaz 16y ago
I agree. It was about building the structure of a social network around the "asymmetric follow," and doing it in a way that facilitated the curated transitivity that Chris talks about.

ojbyrne 16y ago

My experience is that mathematicians and computer scientists use "graph," and engineers use "network." I specifically took a course in an engineering faculty called "network theory."

jpeterson 16y ago

'Graph' is the next hottest buzzword on the internet, thanks to Facebook.

kvs 16y ago

I down voted you by accident! My bad. Yes, it was painful to read and I missed the whole point of the post unless it is just listing of where we find and use "graphs." I think this is a post out of his comfirt zone; I like his VC and startup posts better.