Rebroadcasting Astrobiology Information Through Social Media Rich Gazan

Department of Information & Computer Sciences, Library & Information Science Program NASA Astrobiology Institute, University of Hawaii Astrobiology Science Conference 2012 • • • Primary NAI outreach focus:

audiences with prior astrobiology interest

Broader outreach requires eliciting attention, discussion and engagement via

influential spreaders

: individuals who post interesting content via social media, and accumulate networks of friends, fans and followers.

Research venue: Social Q&A sites >> 60 million visitors/month. Ongoing evaluation of astrobiology questions (n = 216) submitted to the Answerbag SQA site yielded three core characteristics of content posted by influential spreaders: o Authoritative URL.

Q&A linked to secondary sources such as articles or blog distillations of astrobiology content were rated less highly than those with a NASA URL. o Easy image/video embeds. Top-rated Q&A included embedded images or video, allowing users to stay on the SQA site while discussing astrobiology content. o Embrace speculation. Speculative content invites interaction and diverse interpretations of available evidence. Speculative posts drew higher ratings, more interactions and more contributions. In purely factual posts about astrobiology findings, fewer and briefer discussions took place. This material is based upon work supported by the National Aeronautics and Space Administration through the NASA Astrobiology Institute under Cooperative Agreement No. NNA08DA77A issued through the Office of Space Science. Image credit: NASA