That’s so Meta! Usability of a Hypergraph-Based Discussion Model

Massive online communication systems such as social networks, message boards and comment sections are widely used, yet fail in conveying a diverse public opinion. Limitations of models and protocols do not allow users to precisely express their intention and to maintain a complete overview in large-scale discussions. Data-driven approaches fail as well, as they remove the nuances of human communication and use coarse representations like trends, summaries and abstract visualizations. We argue that a new discussion model and a large-scale communication protocol is needed. We evaluate the comprehensibility of a hyperedge connection in modeling arguments for online discussions. An initial mechanical turk study (\(n=200\)) revealed that 30% of the subjects intuitively considered using hyperedges. This was followed by a user study of a prototype (\(n=51\)), where 80% actively used hyperedges. Both findings were independent of user diversity factors (age, gender, graph theory knowledge). The prototypical implementation was evaluated positively.