Online Community COM125: Intro to Internet Spring 2007

What is community? A social institution, comprised of people who identify as a group. Can be based on location or identity.

Changing notions of community Sociologists have argued that the notion of “community” has changed with the rise of industrialism and cities. Gemeinschaft => Gesellschaft (Tönnies, 1887) Ideas about “decline” of community.

Are we “Bowling Alone”? Putnam (2000) argues that community and public participation has declined.

Are we “Bowling Alone”? Social Capital "refers to the collective value of all 'social networks' and the inclinations that arise from these networks to do things for each other”. (Putnam, 2000)

Are we “Bowling Alone”? Social capital refers to: connections among individuals norms of reciprocity and trustworthiness that come from social networks three dimensions - bonding, bridging, linking (Putnam, 2000)

Are we “Bowling Alone”? Emergence of social capital is useful as a conceptual tool for examining various communities.

“Third Place” Oldenburg’s (1991) three essential places: –Home –Workplace –“third places” Community and civic life is built in third places.

“Third Place” example Starbucks uses the term the third place in its marketing. The café section is often outfitted with tables and comfortable chairs. Free electricity outlets and wireless internet access. Larger stores also host "mini- concerts" for local musicians.

The technology mindset What makes the internet different from previous communication media? Presentism the belief that present circumstances are not connected to historical circumstances (Wellman & Gulia, 1996)

The technology mindset Presentism is related to the problematic question of history and moral judgments. For example: When writing history about slavery in an era when the practice was widely accepted, some believe that using language that condemns slavery as "wrong" or "evil" would be presentist, and should be avoided.

The technology mindset Are virtual communities necessarily worse than physical communities? Is there such a thing as a physical community? What would be the online communities of the 1870s?

Utopian dreams… I found it full of twenty-four-hour compassionate ears and souls. They not only listened, they talked back. They helped. I found myself keeping a kind of online journal in the company of these people I'd never laid eyes on. It seemed kind of miraculous, really, this communion late at night in front of the screen. (Catalfo, 1993, p. 167)

…and dystopian nightmares. [R]ather than providing a replacement for the crumbling public realm, virtual communities are actually contributing to its decline. They're another thing keeping people indoors and off the streets. Just as TV produces couch potatoes, so on-line culture creates mouse potatoes, people who hide from real life and spend their whole life goofing off in cyberspace. (McClellan, 1994, p. 10)

Source:

Ties that bind Strong ties and weak ties (Granovetter, 1973) Strong ties bind us to people who are like us Weak ties provide links to other social networks Major debate of internet community: Is it possible to develop strong ties online?

Community membership Costs of entry and exit New communities (weak and strong ties) or neo-tribalism (strong ties)?

Virtual vs. “real life” Is “real life” a good distinction? Effects of online interaction on offline communities Suggestion: Today’s community mediated to greater or lesser extent by technology Privatization of community?

Virtual Communities as Communities

Interest in virtual or online community What is a virtual community? Who participates in a VC? Why is it important to understand how VCs function? To whom is it important? What makes a community different from a “social network”?

Consider this… Wellman and Gulia’s (1996) seven key questions

Question #1 Are relationships on the net narrow and specialized or are they broadly based? What kinds of support can one expect to find in virtual community?

Question #2 How does the net affect people’s ability to sustain weaker, less intimate relationships and to develop new relationships? Why do net participants help those they hardly know?

Question #3 Is support given on the net reciprocated? Do participants develop attachment to virtual communities so that commitment, solidarity and norms of reciprocity develop?

Question #4 To what extent are strong, intimate relationships possible on the net?

Question #5 What is high involvement in virtual community doing to other forms of “real- life” community involvement?

Question #6 To what extent does participation on the net increase the diversity of community ties? To what extent do such diverse ties help to integrate heterogeneous groups?

Question #7 How does the architecture of the net affect the nature of virtual community? To what extent are virtual communities solitary groups, or thinly-connected webs? Are virtual communities like “real-life” communities? To what extent are virtual communities entities in themselves or integrated into people’s overall communities?

Non-traditional online communities