As writen before Steffen and I participated in the online voting for the MOOC fellowship. Today the competition finished and I would like to say thank you to everyone who so far participated in the voting in particular to the 435 people supporting our course. I did never image to get that many people to be interested in our course!
The voting period went from May first till today. During this period the user interface of the iversity website changed several times providing different kind of information about the voting to us users. Since I have observed a drastic change in rankings on May 9th and since the process and scores have not been very transparent I have decided on that very day to collect some data about the rankings. I already did some quick analysis on the data and found some interesting facts but I am running out of time right now to conduct an extensive data analysis. So I will share the data set with the public domain:
http://rene-pickhardt.de/mooc.tar.bz2 (33MB)
If you download the zip file and extract it you’ll find folders for every hour after May 9th. In every folder you will find 26 html-files representing the current ranking of the courses at that time and a transaction log of the http-requests which were done to download the 26 html files. There are 26 html files since 10 courses were displayed per page and we had 255 courses participating.
During the time of data collection I had 2 or 3 short down times of my web server so it could be possible that some data points are missing.
I already wrote a “dirty hack” and pushed it on github which also extracts the interesting information out of the downloaded html files.
- There is a file rank.tsv (334 kb) that displays for every course on an hourly basis the rankings
- There is a file vote.tsv (113 kb) that contains for every course on an hourly basis (between may 20th and today) the number of votes the course did acquire. The period of time for vote.tsv is so short since the votes have only been available in the html files during this time.
Skimming the data with my eyes there are already some facts that make me very curious for a deeper data analysis:
- Some courses gained several hundred votes within a short period of time (usually only 2 or 3 hours) whereas most courses (especially those gaining such a large amount of votes) often stayed far under 1000 votes at all.
- Also it is interesting to see how much variation has been going on in the last couple of days.
- Also I haven’t crawled the views of the Youtube videos of the courses and even now after observing the following I did not take a snapshot of them it is interesting that there is such a large difference in conversion rate. Especially the top courses seem to have much more votes than they have views of the application video. Where some really high class and outstanding applications like the ones from Chrstian Spannagel (Math) or Oliver Vornberger (Algorithms and data structures) have two or three times as many views on Youtube as votes. Especially they have about the same amount of views on Youtube as the top voted courses.
I am pretty sure there are some more interesting facts and maybe someone else has collected a better data set over the complete periode of time and including Youtube snapshots as well as Facebook and Twitter mentions.
Since I have been asked several times already: here are the final rankings to download and also as a table in the blog post:
Kursname | Anzahl an votes | |
1 | sectio chirurgica anatomie interaktiv | 8013 |
2 | internationales agrarmanagement 2 | 7557 |
3 | ingenieurmathematik fur jedermann | 2669 |
4 | harry potter and issues in international politics | 2510 |
5 | online surgery | 2365 |
6 | l3t s mooc der offene online kurs uber das lernen und lehren mit technologien | 2270 |
7 | design 101 or design basics 2 | 2216 |
8 | einfuhrung in das sozial und gesundheitswesen sozialraume entdecken und entwickeln | 2124 |
9 | changeprojekte planen nachhaltige entwicklung durch social entrepreneurship | 2083 |
10 | social work open online course swooc14 | 2059 |
11 | understanding sustainability environmental problems collective action and institutions | 1912 |
12 | the dance of functional programming languaging with haskell and python | 1730 |
13 | zyklenbasierte grundung systematische entwicklung von geschaftskonzepten | 1698 |
14 | a virtual living lab course for sustainable housing and lifestyle | 1682 |
15 | family politics domestic life revolution and dictatorships between 1900 1950 | 1476 |
16 | h2o extrem | 1307 |
17 | dark matter in galaxies the last mystery | 1261 |
18 | algorithmen und datenstrukturen | 1207 |
19 | psychology of judgment and decision making | 1168 |
20 | the future of storytelling | 1164 |
21 | web engineering | 1152 |
22 | die autoritat der wissenschaften eine einfuhrung in das wissenschaftstheoretische denken 2 | 1143 |
23 | magic and logic of music a comprehensive course on the foundations of music and its place in life | 1138 |
24 | nmooc nachhaltigkeit fur alle | 1130 |
25 | sovereign bond pricing | 1115 |
26 | soziale arbeit eine einfuhrung | 1034 |
27 | mathematische denk und arbeitsweisen in geometrie und arithmetik | 1016 |
28 | social entrepreneurship wir machen gesellschaftlichen wandel moglich | 1010 |
29 | molecular gastronomy an experimental lecture about food food processing and a bit of physiology | 984 |
30 | fundamentals of remote sensing for earth observation | 920 |
31 | kompetenzkurs ernahrungswissenschaft | 891 |
32 | erfolgreich studieren | 879 |
33 | deciphering ancient texts in the digital age | 868 |
34 | qualitative methods | 861 |
35 | karl der grosse pater europae | 855 |
36 | who am i mind consciousness and body between science and philosophy | 837 |
37 | programmieren mit java | 835 |
38 | systemisches projektmanagement | 811 |
39 | lernen ist sexy | 764 |
40 | modelling and simulation using matlab one mooc more brains an interdisciplinary course not just for experts | 760 |
41 | suchmaschinen verstehen | 712 |
42 | hands on course on embedded computing systems with raspberry pi | 679 |
43 | introduction to mixed methods and doing research online | 676 |
44 | game ai | 649 |
45 | game theory and experimental economic research | 633 |
46 | cooperative innovation | 613 |
47 | blue engineering ingenieurinnen und ingenieure mit sozialer und okologischer verantwortung | 612 |
48 | my car the unkown technical being | 612 |
49 | gesundheit ein besonderes gut eine multidisziplinare erkundung des deutschen gesundheitssystems | 608 |
50 | teaching english as a foreign language tefl part i pronunciation | 597 |
51 | wie kann lesen gelernt gelehrt und gefordert werden lesesozialisation lesedidaktik und leseforderung vom grundschulunterricht bis zur erwachsenenbildung | 593 |
52 | the european dream | 576 |
53 | education of the present what is the future of education | 570 |
54 | faszination kristalle und symmetrie | 561 |
55 | italy today a girlfriend in a coma a walk through today s italy | 557 |
56 | dna from structure to therapy | 556 |
57 | grundlagen der mensch computer interaktion | 549 |
58 | malnutrition in developing countries | 548 |
59 | marketing als strategischer erfolgsfaktor von der produktinnovation bis zur kundenbindung | 540 |
60 | environmental ethics for scientists | 540 |
61 | stem cells in biology and medicine | 528 |
62 | praxiswissen fur den kunstlerischen alltagsdschungel | 509 |
63 | physikvision | 506 |
64 | high five evidence based practice | 505 |
65 | future climate water | 484 |
66 | diversity and communication challenges for integration and mobility | 477 |
67 | social entrepreneurship | 469 |
68 | die kunst des argumentierens | 466 |
69 | der hont feat mit dem farat wek wie kinder schreiben und lesen lernen | 455 |
70 | antikrastination moocen gegen chronisches aufschieben | 454 |
71 | exercise for a healthier life | 454 |
72 | the startup source code | 438 |
73 | web science | 435 |
74 | medizinische immunologie | 433 |
75 | governance in and through human rights | 431 |
76 | europe in the world law and policy aspects of the eu in global governance | 419 |
77 | komplexe welt strukturen selbstorganisation und chaos | 419 |
78 | mooc basics of surgery want to become a real surgeon | 416 |
79 | statistical data analysis for the humanities | 414 |
80 | business math r edux | 406 |
81 | analyzing behavioral dynamics non linear approaches to social and cognitive sciences | 402 |
82 | space technology | 397 |
83 | der erzahler materialitat und virtualitat vom mittelalter bis zur gegenwart | 396 |
84 | kriminologie | 395 |
85 | von e mail skype und xing kommunikation fuhrung und berufliche zusammenarbeit im netz | 394 |
86 | wissenschaft erzahlen das phanomen der grenze | 392 |
87 | nachhaltige entwicklung | 389 |
88 | die nachste gesellschaft gesellschaft unter bedingungen der elektrizitat des computers und des internets | 388 |
89 | die grundrechte | 376 |
90 | medienbildung und mediendidaktik grundbegriffe und praxis | 368 |
91 | bubbles everywhere speculative bubbles in financial markets and in everyday life | 364 |
92 | the heart of creativity | 363 |
93 | physik und weltraum | 358 |
94 | sim suchmaschinenimplementierung als mooc | 354 |
95 | order of magnitude physics from atomic nuclei to the universe | 350 |
96 | entwurfsmethodik eingebetteter systeme | 343 |
97 | monte carlo methods in finance | 335 |
98 | texte professionell mit latex erstellen | 331 |
99 | wissenschaftlich arbeiten wissenschaftlich schreiben | 330 |
100 | e x cite join the game of social research | 330 |
101 | forschungsmethoden | 323 |
102 | complex problem solving | 321 |
103 | programmieren lernen mit effekt | 317 |
104 | molecular devices and machines | 317 |
105 | wie man erfolgreich ein startup aufbaut | 315 |
106 | grundlagen der prozeduralen und objektorientierten programmierung | 314 |
107 | introduction to disability studies | 314 |
108 | eu2c the european union explained by two partners cologne and cife | 313 |
109 | the english language a linguistic introduction 2 | 311 |
110 | allgemeine betriebswirtschaftslehre | 293 |
111 | interaction design open design | 293 |
112 | how we learn nowadays possibilities and difficulties | 288 |
113 | foundations of educational technology | 288 |
114 | projektmanagement und designbasiertes lernen | 281 |
115 | human rights | 278 |
116 | kompetenz des horens technische gehorbildung | 278 |
117 | it infrastructure management | 276 |
118 | a media history in 10 artefacts | 274 |
119 | introduction to the practice of statistics and regression | 271 |
120 | what is a good society introduction to social philosophy | 268 |
121 | modellierungsmethoden in der wirtschaftsinformatik | 265 |
122 | objektorientierte programmierung von web anwendungen von anfang an | 262 |
123 | intercultural diversity networking vielfalt interkulturell vernetzen | 260 |
124 | foundations of entrepreneurship | 259 |
125 | business communication for impact and results | 257 |
126 | gamification | 257 |
127 | creativity and design in innovation management | 256 |
128 | mechanik i | 252 |
129 | global virtual project management | 252 |
130 | digital signal processing for everyone | 249 |
131 | kompetenzen fur klimaschutz anpassung | 248 |
132 | digital economy and social innovation | 246 |
133 | synthetic biology | 245 |
134 | english phonetics and phonology | 245 |
135 | leibspeisen nahrung im wandel der zeiten molekule brot kase fleisch schokolade und andere lebensmittel | 243 |
136 | critical decision making in the contemporary globalized world | 238 |
137 | einfuhrung in die allgemeine betriebswirtschaftslehre schwerpunkt organisation personalmanagement und unternehmensfuhrung | 236 |
138 | didaktisches design | 235 |
139 | an invitation to complex analysis | 235 |
140 | grundlagen der programmierung teil 1 | 234 |
141 | allgemein und viszeralchirurgie | 233 |
142 | mathematik 1 fur ingenieure | 231 |
143 | consumption and identity you are what you buy | 231 |
144 | vampire fictions | 230 |
145 | grundlagen der anasthesiologie | 228 |
146 | marketing strategy and brand management | 227 |
147 | political economy an introduction | 225 |
148 | gesundheit | 221 |
149 | object oriented databases | 219 |
150 | lebenswelten perspektiven fur menschen mit demenz | 217 |
151 | applications of graphs to real life problems | 210 |
152 | introduction to epidemiology epimooc | 207 |
153 | network security | 207 |
154 | global civics | 207 |
155 | wissenschaftliches arbeiten | 204 |
156 | annaherungen an zukunfte wie lassen sich mogliche wahrscheinliche und wunschbare zukunfte bestimmen | 202 |
157 | einstieg wissenschaft | 200 |
158 | engineering english | 199 |
159 | das erklaren erklaren wie infografik klart erklart und wissen vermittelt | 198 |
160 | betriebswirtschaftliche und rechtliche grundlagen fur das nonprofit management | 192 |
161 | art and mathematics | 191 |
162 | vom phanomen zum modell mathematische modellierung von natur und alltag an ausgewahlten beispielen | 190 |
163 | design interaktiver medien technische grundlagen | 189 |
164 | business englisch | 187 |
165 | erziehung sehen analysieren gestalten | 184 |
166 | basic clinical research methods | 184 |
167 | ordinary differential equations and laplace transforms | 180 |
168 | mathematische logik | 179 |
169 | die geburt der materie in der evolution des universums | 179 |
170 | innovationsmanagement von kleinen und mittelstandischen unternehmen kmu | 176 |
171 | introduction to qualitative methods in the social sciences | 175 |
172 | advert retard wirkung industrieller interessen auf rationale arzneimitteltherapie | 175 |
173 | animation beyond the bouncing ball | 174 |
174 | entropie einfuhrung in die physikalische chemie | 172 |
175 | edufutur education for a sustainable future | 165 |
176 | social network effects on everyday life | 164 |
177 | pharmaskills for africa | 163 |
178 | nachhaltige energiewirtschaft | 162 |
179 | qualitat in der fruhpadagogik auf den anfang kommt es an | 158 |
180 | dementias | 157 |
181 | beyond armed confrontation multidisciplinary approaches and challenges from colombia s conflict | 154 |
182 | investition und finanzierung | 150 |
183 | praxis des wissensmanagements | 149 |
184 | gutenberg to google the social construction of the communciations revolution | 145 |
185 | value innovation and blue oceans | 145 |
186 | kontrapunkt | 144 |
187 | shakespeare s politics | 142 |
188 | jetzt erst recht wissen schaffen uber recht | 141 |
189 | rechtliche probleme von sozialen netzwerken | 138 |
190 | augmented tuesday suppers | 137 |
191 | positive padagogik | 137 |
192 | digital storytelling mit bewegenden bildern erzahlen | 136 |
193 | wirtschaftsethik | 134 |
194 | energieeffizientes bauen | 134 |
195 | advising startups | 133 |
196 | urban design and communication | 133 |
197 | bildungsreform 2 0 | 132 |
198 | mooc management basics | 130 |
199 | healthy teeth a life long course of preventive dentistry | 129 |
200 | digitales tourismus marketing | 127 |
201 | the arctic game the struggle for control over the melting ice | 127 |
202 | disease mechanisms | 127 |
203 | special operations from raids to drones | 125 |
204 | introduction to geospatial technology | 120 |
205 | social media marketing strategy smms | 119 |
206 | korpusbasierte analyse sprechsprachlichen problemlosungsverhaltens | 116 |
207 | introduction to marketing | 115 |
208 | creative coding | 114 |
209 | mooc meets 3d | 110 |
210 | unternehmenswert die einzig sinnvolle spitzenkennzahl fur unternehmen | 110 |
211 | forming behaviour gestaltung und konzeption von web applications | 109 |
212 | technology demonstration | 108 |
213 | lebensmittelmikrobiologie und hygiene | 105 |
214 | estudi erfolgreich studieren mit dem internet | 105 |
215 | moderne geldtheorie eine paische perspektive | 103 |
216 | kollektive intelligenz | 103 |
217 | geschichte der optischen medien | 100 |
218 | alter und soziale arbeit | 99 |
219 | semantik eine theorie visueller kommunikation | 97 |
220 | erziehung und beratung in familie und schule | 96 |
221 | foreign language learning in indian context | 95 |
222 | bildgebende verfahren | 92 |
223 | applied biology | 92 |
224 | bildung in der wissensgesellschaft gerechtigkeit | 92 |
225 | standortmanagement | 92 |
226 | europe a solution from history | 90 |
227 | methodology of research in international law | 90 |
228 | when african americans came to paris | 90 |
229 | contemporary architecture | 89 |
230 | past recent encounters turkey and germany | 88 |
231 | wars to end all wars | 83 |
232 | online learning management systems | 82 |
233 | software applications | 81 |
234 | business in germany | 78 |
235 | requirements engineering | 77 |
236 | anything relationship management xrm | 77 |
237 | global standards and local practices | 76 |
238 | prodima professionalisation of disaster medicine and management | 75 |
239 | cytology with a virtual correlative light and electron microscope | 75 |
240 | the organisation of innovation | 75 |
241 | sensors for all | 75 |
242 | diagnostik in der beruflichen bildung | 73 |
243 | scientific working | 71 |
244 | escience saxony lectures | 71 |
245 | internet marketing strategy how to gain influence and spread your message online | 69 |
246 | grundlagen des e business | 69 |
247 | principles of public health | 64 |
248 | methods for shear wave velocity measurements in urban areas | 64 |
249 | democracy in america | 64 |
250 | building typology studies gebaudelehre | 63 |
251 | multi media based learning environments at the interface of science and practice hamburg university of applied sciences prof dr andrea berger klein | 61 |
252 | math mooc challenge | 60 |
253 | the value of the social | 58 |
254 | dienstleistungsmanagement und informationssysteme | 57 |
255 | ict integration in education systems e readiness e integration e transformation | 56 |
concerning youtube views, you should consider that some videos have a “no public” view setting
Yes that is true but the problem is that while crawling the data I decided against crawling Youtube data so taking Youtube into the full analysis will not make sense here.
Anyway my crawled data set is only a small snapshot of what has really happened. I have send an email to Iversity asking for logfiles which would help a lot but I didn’t get any response yet.
yes, it would be interesting to see all the data.
Anyway iversity changed the displayed ranking, in many cases (e.g. number 2 or 12 in your ranking list) taking away lots of votes for some reasons and in some instances changing radically their position in the list (e.g. 22 or 23)
Well that is what I am trying to say. There are some processes going on and they are hard to understand if one does not have access to the full log files. The user interface of the website which I crawled changed frequently displaying different data. That is the reason why the number of votes can only be extracted from my crawl for a view dates.
actually they removed votes from basically everybody, compared to your list…
interestingly after I contacted iversity I did not receive any reply. but the two courses ranked first again in the top courses. Especially they now have less votes than they did before (according to my crawled results)
Also the current result list has a lot of courses with less scores than before.
Especially after closing the votes there must have been re rankings by iversity! I kept my crawler turned on and on May 25th 4:15 the web science mooc had 436 votes and we where listed on the 8th result page.
One hour later the web science mooc had 428 votes and was listed on the 7th result page.
So for some reason we lost 8 votes but gained several rankings (probably because others also lost votes)
All of this is happening without any transparency and without any information being propagated.
We made similar observations during the MOOC voting period. We are the Linguistic Engineering Team of Marburg University, are currently running an extremely successful MOOC on our platform http://www.linguistics-online.com (420 participants from 58 nations) and are taking part in the MOOC-competition with “Teaching English as a Foreign Language – Part I: Pronunciation”.
On 17 May , we realized that voting with fake e-mail registrations was possible. We immediately mailed this to iVersity without getting any response. Here is our mail to iVersity:
“Ich habe meine Zweifel, ob die Abstimmung wirklich „echt“ ist: Man kann schließlich mit „gefakten“ E-Mail-Adressen abstimmen, da offenbar keine Verifizierung durchgeführt wird. Wir haben das einmal versucht (und uns 1 Stimme gegeben). Theoretisch könnte ich so meine Hilfskräfte hinsetzen und sie tagelang mit Fantasie-E-Mail Adressen für uns abstimmen lassen. Damit ist die Abstimmung, so wie sie zur Zeit läuft, nicht gerade sehr aussagekräftig. Die 1 Stimme sollten Sie bei unserem MOOC-Vorschlag übrigens wieder abziehen, die falsche E-Mail-Adresse ist oem@oem.com.”
And on 24 May (after the voting phase), we mentioned the YouTube/voting discrepancy to iVersity:
“Viele Projekte haben weit weniger Video-Views bezogen auf das Application Video zu verzeichnen als Votes in der Abstimmung. Was heißt das? Aus meiner Sicht ganz klar: Es wurden massiv “blind votes” vergeben, ohne sich das Projekt überhaupt anzuschauen. Für die zukünftige Nutzung eines MOOC durch iVersity heißt das, dass Sie sich sehr genau anschauen sollten, wie viele Male das Video aufgerufen wurde und darüber hinaus, wie viele LIKES und DISLIKES es dabei gab. Hier ein Beispiel: Das Projekt Internationaler Masterkurs Agrarmanagement hat ca. 7.000 Votes aber nur 1800 YouTube Views, davon ganze 7 LIKES und sogar 2 DISLIKES. Und nebenbei bemerkt – ein Masterkurs entspricht nicht dem Profil eines MOOCs. Dass es allerdings auch Gegenbeispiele gibt, wissen Sie selbst. Tausende von Video Views mit vielen LIKES und keinen DISLIKES, dazu noch mit aufschlussreichen Kommentaren, die zeigen, wo die wahren Interessen liegen.”
… and of course we did not receive any reply.
In addition to this, I don’t think that an open vote system is not relevant fat all. It does not show the quality of an application but tells us how many supporters the applicants could activate through their networks. Whether they will eventually take part in the MOOC is a completely different question. And then, some applications had the advantage of being mentioned in the media (spiegel online) whereas others weren’t ~ no equal chances for all.
By the way, our own proposal got 591 votes but the video was viewed 2.500 times with a record of 65 LIKES no DISLIKE and 22 overwhelmingly positive comments.
Nice post. One hour subsequent the world wide web science mooc had 428 votes and was recorded on the 7th result sheet. There are some methods going on and they are hard to understand if one does not have get get access to to to the full log documents.