A criticism I have of my second article is that lack of acknowledgement of the risks associated with online communities. The article seems to suggest that creating a blog and then creating a network of blogs with online peers to form a community is nothing but beneficial to the user, suggesting that it allows them to “foster peer group relationships.” However, there is little to no acknowledgement of the problems that this could create, such as the trust you put into others in the community.
The article uses the statistic that 92% of blog users provide a name on their blog and 54% of bloggers provide more detailed information about themselves such as age, occupation or geographical location on the home page of their blogs. (Herring et al., 2004a) exclusively as evidence for the argument that blogs create a sense of empowerment as you are revealing your thoughts and feelings without a mask. Nowhere is there any recognition of the problems that this could bring in terms of sharing very specific information about you with an infinite amount of people online and the trust that they are therefore placing in the hands of strangers.
Article Huffaker, D.A. and Calvert S.L. (2005) “Gender, identity, and language use in teenage blogs” Journal of Computer-Mediated Communication, Vol. 10 (Issue 2), http://jcmc.indiana.edu/vol10/issue2/huffaker.html [Accessed 11/03/09]
Showing posts with label sense of community. Show all posts
Showing posts with label sense of community. Show all posts
Friday, 13 March 2009
Friday, 13 February 2009
Sense of Community
Blanchard suggests that when participants experience a feeling of community, they are more likely to increase or maintain their participation in the virtual communities. This seems logical as I would expect the same to occur in real life communities. Within Blanchards article there are two lists of characteristics which make up a sense of community in real life communities and in virtual communities, whilst there are subtle differences, I would overall say that there is a strong similarity between the two.
For instance, McMillan and Chavis (1986) suggest that feelings of being supported by others in the community and also supporting them are important, whilst in virtual communities numerous researchers have suggests that exchange of support among members consists a sense of community, for example Bavm, 1995, 1997, Greer, 2000, Preece, 1999, Rheingold, 1993. To me this indicates that there are universal characteristics which create a sense of community, whether this be online or offline. This again reflects the idea that online communication is as worthwhile as offline communication, as feelings created by online communication are equally as “real” as those created offline, as mentioned in a blog last week.
In realtion to an online community I used to use before it shut down due to lack of funding, I would agree that a sense of support was one of the reasons why I felt a sense of community towards this forum. Whilst there were inevitably the few people who'd always attempt to generate controversy, in general and with the users who I mainly had discussions with, there was a strong sense of community in that you would often see the same people posting, and would get an idea of their personalities and who they were from the posts they made and the things they would say and do. As you would always expect to hear from the same people this meant that there was an element on consistency, which I think drew me back to the forum for about a year.
For instance, McMillan and Chavis (1986) suggest that feelings of being supported by others in the community and also supporting them are important, whilst in virtual communities numerous researchers have suggests that exchange of support among members consists a sense of community, for example Bavm, 1995, 1997, Greer, 2000, Preece, 1999, Rheingold, 1993. To me this indicates that there are universal characteristics which create a sense of community, whether this be online or offline. This again reflects the idea that online communication is as worthwhile as offline communication, as feelings created by online communication are equally as “real” as those created offline, as mentioned in a blog last week.
In realtion to an online community I used to use before it shut down due to lack of funding, I would agree that a sense of support was one of the reasons why I felt a sense of community towards this forum. Whilst there were inevitably the few people who'd always attempt to generate controversy, in general and with the users who I mainly had discussions with, there was a strong sense of community in that you would often see the same people posting, and would get an idea of their personalities and who they were from the posts they made and the things they would say and do. As you would always expect to hear from the same people this meant that there was an element on consistency, which I think drew me back to the forum for about a year.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
