A Blue Start: A large-scale pairwise and higher-order social network dataset

Abstract: Large-scale networks have been instrumental in shaping the way that we think about how individuals interact with one another, developing key insights in mathematical epidemiology, computational social science, and biology. However, many of the underlying social systems through which diseases spread, information disseminates, and individuals interact are inherently mediated through groups of arbitrary size, known as higher-order interactions. There is a gap between higher-order dynamics of group formation and fragmentation, contagion spread, and social influence and the data necessary to validate these higher-order mechanisms. Similarly, few datasets bridge the gap between these pairwise and higher-order network data. Because of its open API, the Bluesky social media platform provides a laboratory for observing social ties at scale. In addition to pairwise following relationships, unlike many other social networks, Bluesky features user-curated lists known as "starter packs" as a mechanism for social network growth. We introduce "A Blue Start", a large-scale network dataset comprising 26.7M users and their 1.6B pairwise following relationships and 301.3K groups representing starter packs. This dataset will be an essential resource for the study of higher-order network science.