I decided to trace the network out one and two steps from the focus book. An ego network allows us to see who was in one's network neighborhood, how they are interconnected, and how this structure may influence ego. The gray nodes are two steps away. The yellow node is referred to as ego , and the olive and gray nodes are often called alters . We notice an uneven distribution of ties.
Some nodes have many neighbors in common.
Other nodes connect to nodes that have no other ties. Some clusters are interconnected, another is basically isolated from the rest except for its link through the focus node. To continue my exploration I had to choose a book as my focal point, or ego. I chose Tom Petzinger's The New Pioneers .