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Wellman

Wellman stresses the importance of acknowledging how social organization no longer fits the group model that is heavily interconnected and clearly bounded. Wellman says we are now residing in networked societies, of which boundaries are more permeable with more diverse interactions and flatter hierarchies.

*Irickard writes in his blog about how the social relationship between him and his boss flattening because of the networked society maybe far from his current experiences. Initially, I was also a bit confused about Wellman’s such argument. However, looking at the problem from the framework of Castell’s ‘Rising of the networked society’ (which Wellman referred to) made it easier to agree with Wellman. In my understanding, what Wellman argued when he was talking about ‘hierarchies’ was not necessarily about the social roles, but more about the communication flow. In another words, his intentions of using the word ‘hierarchies’ may have not solely been about boss—employee relationship, but about the shape of communication flow being top-down. In networked societies, communication flows are more recursive and interactive among individuals through sparsely connected nodes (that indicates each individual), as opposed to very organized group nodes that have dense interconnections that are directional.

Powazek begins with the Algebra class desktop bulletin board. Features included a "spark that unites," dealing with abusive content, questions of community size, and filtering mechanisms. After this introduction, the author addresses bad reasons for adding community features to a website and then addressed some of the good reasons for doing so. Once you decide on whether community features are right for you, Powazek presents some key steps:

• Know your audience
• Create content that will be meaningful for them
• Then choose specific community mechanisms (asynchronous, chronological, etc.)

Very much a workbook approach. The interview questions at the end seem geared toward moving the reader through a community design process.

Examines third places. Oldenberg is clearly in favor of the concept, and writes lovingly of these convivial meeting grounds.

Third places are neutral spaces, separate from home or work, that level the social playing field. Defined by a playful warmth, these spaces are fertile ground for the art of conversation. Oldenberg actually references various "rules of conversation" on page 28. Regular users or visitors are integral to such locales, and various processes by which newcomers become accepted regulars are necessary for a third space. "Accessibility and accomodation" are both listed as key factors of a third place, factors which are directly portable to eCommunities. Oldenberg spends some time at the end of the article comparing third places to well-functioning home spaces.

A viewpoint/lit review from Barry Wellman of the University of Toronto (social networking guru). Argues that the move from a group-based to a network-based social interaction model necessitates the use of social network concepts and tools in studying the Internet. At "the intersection of computer networks [and] ...networked society," Professor Wellman examines two new areas:

• "Community networks on- and offline"
• "Knowledge access"

An overview and generalized definition of online communities. Introduces two key themes:

• Sociability: Seems to be defined as the social interaction of the community? This casts a broad net, including a community's purpose, goals and policies of interaction. All these things "determine what [the community] is like" (p. 6). This seems to be as close as he comes to a definition of sociability.
• Usability: Used in the classic HCI sense to support "rapid learning, high skill retention, and low error rates" (p. 6).

Preece lays out a working definition of online communities, which we may (?) return to in class. She intentionally reduced constrictions on his definition, especially in comparison to the ACM core attributes list and in recognition of the commercialization of some online communities. His definition is made up of:

• People interacting socially to satisfy needs/perform roles
• Shared purpose
• Policies to guide interaction (may be loose or strong)
• Computer systems to support/mediate social interaction

Preece examines other perspectives of online communities:

• the multidisciplinary brainstorm from an ACM CHI conference
• the sociologists (social network theory, etc. "focus on social interaction...is a welcome counterbalance to the intense technological hype often [associated] with the Internet" [p. 10].)
• the technologists ("'Geek speak'...says little or nothing about social organization and interaction" [p. 10].)
• Virtual worlds (MOO/MUD)
• E-commerce ("Entrepreneurs take a very broad view of [online] community" [p. 10].).

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