Catherine M. Ridings and David Gefen present several motivations to join traditional groups. I agree with them that Humans have a need to belong and be affiliated with others. Groups provide individuals with a source of information and help in achieving goals. I am also expressed at: “An individual’s self identity results from the membership in a preexisting self-inclusive social group, including vocation and avocation.” At the first glance, I disagree with it. I feel “An individual’s self identity” not just from the results of the membership in a preexisting self-inclusive social group. It should mainly come from our self. Then I ask myself: How do I make self identity? From vocation or from interesting ? I find that it’s very difficult to make self identity without social criticism. Humans have social belong. No matter whether you like it or not, we are affiliated with others. That is the reason there are so many groups exist, traditional, face-to-face groups as well as virtual internet communities.
Catherine M. Ridings and David Gefen point out that the virtual communities can play several roles:
· Information Exchange
· Social Support Exchange
· Friendship
· Recreation
According to my experience in answerbag, Information Exchange plays the most important role to attract people to virtual communities. In answerbag, people can ask all kind of questions and share their information among communities. During the conversation with people behind internet, we obtain much useful information and have fun at the same time. This may be counted as its recreation function. Frankly say, I am confused about the social support exchange. I don’t know whether answerbag has social support exchange function or not. As for friendship, I feel it’s very hard to have in virtual communities. At least, it is much more difficult than in the real world, especially in answerbag. There are so many people ask and answer questions with weird nickname. The chance to meet the same people again is very small let alone friendship.
Trying again to post
ReplyDeleteOK, I just spent a long time creating a response to your comments and I lost it somehow- that's why I sent my previous short sentence attempt.
ReplyDeleteLike you, I am a new social network user and I too joined online communities for this class. I agree with you that it’s very hard to initiate and maintain new relationships in virtual communities. I joined Facebook and I was able to connect with friends from high school and college – as it turns out, we looked for each other unsuccessfully over the years and this site connected us again, which was great. With them, it’s easy to maintain the friendship we had before. There are some people – friends of friends – who have sent me an online friend request but I don’t know them. I don’t know what to say to them and I guess I just don’t want to work so hard at trying to establish a friendship. Maybe I’m just shy online, unlike in the real world???
On Answerbag, I thought that many people had weird nicknames too. I didn’t like signing in using a pseudonym. I actually thought it was kind of creepy.
I hope that you’re enjoying your new experiences with online communities. Thanks for your thoughtful insights in this posting!
Like you, I also observed in my experience that information exchange was a primary motivator for interaction in Answerbag. In my case, it was mainly about food and computers that served this purpose (i.e. asking for a good recipe or advice on a good computer virus software). On the question of social support function in AB, I didn’t quite get a taste of it in my own experience. But it was interesting to read how some of us talked about the popularity of profound emotional questions on relationships, dating, abuse etc (e.g. Jenna’s blog: http://lejenna.blogspot.com/). I can see now that one important aspect of group dynamics in AB is to rally support and give advice.
ReplyDeleteI agree with Denise that it is easier to feel closer to people you already have a connection with (no matter how long ago). My experience with Answerbag started off like my experience with 43 Things. In 43 Things I didn’t know anyone personally and I didn’t feel vested in the community. Initially, I found that some of the answers or comments in Answerbag were very flippant and what I expected from people I didn't know personally. However, I was surprised to find that some of the answers were very touching and I felt that these people were actually providing heart-felt answers. Obviously, I gave those answers as many points as I could and actually followed some of them and answered their questions. I think like any other community, if you support people and treat them with respect, you will find they will do the same for you. I don't think it would be the same as with people you already know, but I do think that you can meet people online through communities in which you have a common interest and get to be real life friends with those people.
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