ScaleFreeNetworks

ThoughtStorms Wiki

Barbasi in Linked : TheNewScienceOfNetworks :

"Real networks are not static, as all graph theoretic models were until recently. Instead, growth plays a key role in shaping their topology. They are not as centralized as a star network is. Rather, there is a hierarchy of hubs that keep these networks together, a heavily connected node closely followed by several less connected ones, trailed by even smaller nodes. No central node sits in the middle of the spider web, controlling and monitoring every link and node. There is no single node whose removal could break the web. A scale-free network is a web without a spider...Real networks are self-organized. Their spiderless scale-free topology is an unavoidable consequence of their evolution... The robustness of the laws governing the emergence of complex networks is the explanation for the ubiquity of the scale-free topology, describing such diverse systems as the network behind language, the links between the proteins in the cell, sexual relationships between people, the wiring diagram of a computer chip, the Internet, Hollywood, the web of scientists linked by coauthorships, and the intricate collaborative web behind the economy, to name only a few." (p. 221)