I did think that some of Galston’s other ideas were interesting, especially when looking at Social Network sites. Galston suggested “that we focus on the four key structural features of community … limited membership, shared norms, affective ties, and a sense of mutual obligation—and investigate, as empirical questions, their relationship to computer-mediated communication.”
In Social Network sites, membership is limited by those who join the site, as well as by any preferences set by a member. I would tend to agree with Galston that this is an area that study should be focused on. In this context, in addition to the Social Network site, users are also able to limit their communities. This can be done through allowing a limited amount of individuals to be their pals or friends. As far as I know, additional limiting features are put in place. This take the form of “confirming a pal/friend” or “accepting” or “denying” the request. This allows a user to limit the amount of people that the allow into their “circle”. This is what we, as humans do with respect to our everyday social interactions and building fact-to-face communities. This also ties into shared norms, affective ties and a sense of mutual obligation.
I think that this idea connects with Weeks’ article. According to the Weeks article, social media do present an underexplored dimension in human relations…” When I read this part of the article, as well as Albrechtslund’s article on Participatory Surveillance, especially as it relates to Lateral Surveillance, it made me think. “I wondered if it was really possible to limit those who you want in your community based on shared values and norms, especially given that an individual could review your information and then seek to conform their norms and values to yours or what they perceive as being desirable to you.”
This brought me back to Weeks article that stated, “we are connecting two people largely through text. Text is an impoverished medium for communicating emotion, intent, real meaning.” If you combine the fact that communicating with text is quite limiting in of itself, as well as the fact that lateral surveillance it does raise serious questions in my mind as to how valuable these communities that are being built are. Whether this rises to the level of what is identified into the Weeks article, “we are connecting to a much wider range of people who don't know us, as well as to those who live close to us geographically. There is a flattening of relationships."
I think that a lot of the issues raised in Rosen’s article would be of benefit. These issues range from the pictures we paint of ourselves and how this relates to what we put out when we seek friendship, love and the pursuit of our career paths.
Do we create communities or do communities arise around us through Social Networks. I think there is room for discussion on social sorting as described by Albrechtslund’s article. In other words, how does social sorting take place.
This is something that I would l
ike to explore further the the investigation.I have created an account on Maoli World. My idea is to complete my profile in accordance with my own personal views on the subjects covered in this network. I know full well that my personal beliefs and opinions contradict those of other individuals. I will attempt to add these individuals and see whether or not they accept or deny me based on the profile I create.
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Text certainly does not transmit how we truly feel. Sometimes, when I instant message my friends on AIM or Skype, I am careful with what I type as it may convey the wrong idea--I am fortunate, on the other hand, that I have friends who are in the same major as me (computer science), and they already understand this limitation. Because of our inability to display emotion through text, I surmise that we developed smilies and other emoticons for nearly all Web 2.0 applications so that they can help fill in that void.
ReplyDeleteYou asked, "Do we create communities, or do communities arise around us through social networks?" I think the answer is both: we create communities by taking the initiative to form a group that is open to everyone and, at first, revolves around our own interest(s), which is then shared by all of the people who become a part of that group. On the other hand, social network sites have already built the communities for us--thousands of people have joined MySpace since its inception--because most of them provide at least one thing to which we can connect (e.g., career goals, music groups, and sports teams). In both cases, in addition to our common interests, we also bring along our own individual ideas to the communities to which we belong, which often times builds and strengthens them.
If online communities lean more towards interests and content as opposed to building social connections, do you think text the the better alternative? Text can be archived, categorized, and searched in effective ways. It also seems to force users to clearly think and organize when compared to verbal communication. Even in online courses which can be thought of as some form of community, it forces students to be concise (at least in my experience) and clear in written form.
ReplyDeleteThe social sorting angle is interesting, and creating a profile which people can accept or deny might lead to some interesting statistical results--how many invites are you sending out, and how are you choosing the invitees?
ReplyDeleteI look forward to reading your report.
I invited 11 individuals. My selection of these individuals was based on a cursory review of their profiles. I chose to create a "counter-profile" which reflected nearly opposite values of what was indicated on their profile.
ReplyDeleteThe results were not what I expected. Of the 11 individuals 7 accepted me. I received an immediate response from one individual, for that reason, I believe that they had some type of automatic setting that approved my request.
The other 6 individuals added me over a period of 2 days. I even tried to post controversial blogs on the site in order to get some type of responses, but that did not go far.
I don't think this was really a large enough sample to get valid results, but I believe it was a manageable size.
I think I will follow through with this and see how it works out. I did not expect this many people to add me, especially based on my profile. I think it would have been more effective to start a page on a larger social network site, I think maybe local people from Hawaii may be a little more accepting of differing views.
I'm slightly confused by your question, but after hearing you describe your experiment I think I understand it. You're essentially looking at diversity within a social community - will we still add members to our social circle if their opinions are completely divergent from ours? I can see where this would arise within a real world relationship where you have a social circle that can have forced memberships with others (such as a work group or a school class). But in a virtual environment do we need to seek out diversity of opinions in our friends, or can we select for similar opinions / outlooks?
ReplyDeleteI think that one problem you may have with your experiment is the possibility of someone refusing your friendship not for your views but because they don't know you from a real-world relationship. Interesting study, though - I'll be interested in your results.
This was an interesting test. I think it would be easier to maintain a relationship with those who have diametrically apposed positions using the Internet. I have found that when I run accross such people is real life I have a strong tendency and desire to not bother with them. It would be interesting to see how long you remain on friendly terms. One student made the a comment regarding this situation and online dating, in summary it was if I seem to able available to you in email, get the hint. I wonder if this would be the same.
ReplyDeleteInteresting experiment. This makes me think of some of my experiences on facebook. I have quite a few friends on facebook that I knew in high school or from work that have very different views, politically and socially, from me. It’s fine because I know them in real life and I know they are good people even though I strongly disagree with many of their beliefs. However, I have unfriended someone partially due to the face they had very different political opinions than me. I was never friends with this person and only slightly knew their name from high school. In addition they seemed to collect friends which I’m not at all interested in. Anyway, I got tired of seeing their comments on facebook, it wasn’t just that I disagreed with them but I found their arguments to lack intelligence and rational thought.
ReplyDeleteI agree with LeJenna that you can’t be sure as to why someone did not accept your request, but still interesting, keep us updated.
In your first paragraph, you mention that the SNS allows individuals to be a part of a community that is “inline with their individual choice.” This is a very powerful idea because the Internet has definitely changed the dynamics of our social groupings. Before the Internet became mainstream, we were limited to our physical location in building our social groups (communities). We were “forced” create groups with people that we may not have shared interests. In order to maintain the community, we may have had to change our interests, separate ourselves from the community, or influence others to change their interests. With the Internet, we have the freedom to explore and develop our own interests by browsing the interests of others and joining groups that we find interesting. This freedom allows us to cultivate a more personal identity or sense of our own being.
ReplyDeleteIn your third paragraph you mentioned that “membership is limited by those who join the site, as well as by any preferences set by a member.” I was wondering what some of the reasons you have as to why this should be an area of focus? I am personally interested in this topic as well because I am a very private person. I tend to be very cautious with which groups I join. I’m not a superhero but as a regular everyday person, I still enjoy my anonymity.
You have a question as to how valuable online communities are in regards to using text and lateral surveillance. After reading the Bigge article, I began to wonder as well if online group membership was a necessity. What would I benefits from an online community? The Bigge article did not convince me of the necessity of online groups. It was only after reading the experiences and comments from our ICS 691 classmates, that I began to realize that online connections are an economically feasible way to maintain networks over vast geographical locations. In some cases the online community is the only means of maintaining communication.
Regarding your main question regarding social sorting, I am interested to see the results of social sorting in an online setting. Would we see something that we would not expect because online communities are not constrained by the same physical space laws as mentioned in the Albrechtslund article.
I don't think communities are built on text anymore. While direct interactions are still generally text based, many asynchronous forms of communication involve pictures, audio, and video. Partly in response to Dean, these richer media are also being categorized, archived, and searched in creative ways too (e.g. user meta tagging).
ReplyDeleteYour experiment adds a new twist to the typical open community. After all, websites are still driven by money; more people means more eyes looking at ads and more fingers clicking them. But seeing how quickly you were accepted, even with opposing views, would at least argue that communities are either much more open, or that the concept of private communities (i.e. country clubs) with exclusive memberships are much more limited online. Maybe the differences are drivers for interactions? Or that since online interactions are not as rich or fulfilling as real world interactions, people will choose quantity over quality...