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18 Jul 13
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17 Mar 13
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nges in the nature of computer-mediated communication both reflect and foster the development of networked individuali
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10 Jan 13
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Networked Individualism and E-Citizenship
Although our discussion is primarily about relationships, our special concern here is the impact of the Internet on the change in society away from groups and towards networked individualism. This change is not only occurring at the interpersonal level but at the organizational, interorganizational and even the world-systems levels. It is the move from densely-knit and tightly-bounded groups to sparsely-knit and loosely-bounded networks. This move to networked societies has profound implications for how people mobilize and how people and governments relate to each other � in all forms of societies � but especially in democracies
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18 Sep 12
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We review the evidence from a number of surveys in which our NetLab has been involved about the extent to which the Internet is transforming or enhancing community. The studies show that the Internet is used for connectivity locally as well as globally, although the nature of its use varies in different countries. Internet use is adding on to other forms of communication, rather than replacing them. Internet use is reinforcing the pre-existing turn to societies in the developed world that are organized around networked individualism rather than group or local solidarities. The result has important implications for civic involvement.
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The Internet Becomes Embedded in Community Life
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As the Internet evolves, its users and uses grow and diversify globally.
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1. Do people communicate more because the Internet offers them the capability to contact people at a distance?
2. Do they primarily communicate via the Internet or are face-to-face meetings, phone calls, and gatherings still important in creating closeness and providing emotional support? More specifically, we have been asking: -
- Are people reaching out to neighbors and to their communities?
- Are they getting involved in neighborhood associations and in public activities?
- Does the Internet reduce the time we have available to dedicate to community life?
- How do people use their networks, social communication, and computer to access information at home, work, and leisure?
- What sense of belonging to communities do networked people have?
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- How many people (citizens and non-citizens) will seek to participate in civic matters and government, on and off the Internet?
- What kinds of people will seek to participate, in terms of demographic characteristics and social variety?
- What sorts of information will they seek and obtain?
- What is the structure of interpersonal relations and communities that seek participation in civic matters and government? (see also Fountain, in press; Malina, in press).
- In all of these matters, what is the interplay between Internet use and other, more physical, forms of involvement and participation.
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- An ethnographic and survey study of a wired suburb, �Netville.�
- A very large Web-survey (�Survey 2000�) hosted at the Website of National Geographic Society.
- International data from the same survey with respondents from 178 countries.
- A study of Catalans and their uses of the Internet.
- Results from a study of Japanese users and uses of the Internet.
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Rethinking Sociability, Neighborhood, and Community
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Community has obviously expanded well beyond the neighborhood so that in the developed world, the modal community is probably a community of shared interests, be they shared friendships, bridge playing, child-rearing, or cultural pursuits. Indeed, neighborhood communities can well be seen as one, partial community of shared interest, that pertaining to shared proximity. At a different spatial scale, electronic diasporas link friends, kin, and former neighbors across nations and oceans (Mitra, in press). One common shared interest is work: Hence, communities of practice (Wenger, 1998) and learning (Haythornthwaite, in press) are flourishing, as similarly-occupied people share knowledge within and between organizations.
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Technological Changes Create Social Affordances
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Broader Bandwidth
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Always Connected
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Personalization
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Wireless Portability
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Globalized Connectivity
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Documenting the Current Situation of the Internet
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What Are the Internet's Effects on Community?
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The Internet Decreases Community
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The Internet Transforms Community
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The Internet Supplements Community
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Netville: Neighboring and Long-Distance Community in a Highly Wired Suburb
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Community Networks in North America
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Experience Counts
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The More the More
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Distance Still Matters
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Organizational Involvement
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International Users and Uses of the Internet
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The Rise of Networked Individualism
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(E-) Citizenship in a Networked Society
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30 Jul 12
Trudi Van WykWe review the evidence from a number of surveys in which our NetLab has been involved about the extent to which the Internet is transforming or enhancing community. The studies show that the Internet is used for connectivity locally as well as globally, although the nature of its use varies in different countries. Internet use is adding on to other forms of communication, rather than replacing them. Internet use is reinforcing the pre-existing turn to societies in the developed world that are organized around networked individualism rather than group or local solidarities. The result has important implications for civic involvement.
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01 Jul 12
Tamer MowafyWe review the evidence from a number of surveys in which our NetLab has been involved about the extent to which the Internet is transforming or enhancing community. The studies show that the Internet is used for connectivity locally as well as globally, although the nature of its use varies in different countries. Internet use is adding on to other forms of communication, rather than replacing them. Internet use is reinforcing the pre-existing turn to societies in the developed world that are organized around networked individualism rather than group or local solidarities. The result has important implications for civic involvement.
revolution organization community research internet networked_individualism
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14 Jan 12
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23 Oct 11
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21 Oct 11
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29 Sep 11
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06 Sep 11
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30 May 11
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08 Feb 11
Keith HamonWe review the evidence from a number of surveys in which our NetLab has been involved about the extent to which the Internet is transforming or enhancing community. The studies show that the Internet is used for connectivity locally as well as globally, although the nature of its use varies in different countries. Internet use is adding on to other forms of communication, rather than replacing them. Internet use is reinforcing the pre-existing turn to societies in the developed world that are organized around networked individualism rather than group or local solidarities. The result has important implications for civic involvement.
Barry Wellman Anabel Quan-Haase Jeffrey Boase Wenhong Chen Keith Hampton Isabel Isla de Diaz Kakuko Miyata networked individualism PLN social networking
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23 Jan 11
Victoria BurchThis website has an overview of how the internet is involved with community networks, numerous social aspects of the internet, effects of the internet on community and global and local connectivity. It explores the questions of how people communicate through the internet vs real world communication, how people find individualism and friendships through the internet, and how the internet affects our ability to communicate in a "real time" manner.
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19 Jan 11
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02 Jan 11
David McGavock"The Internet Becomes Embedded in Community Life
As the Internet evolves, its users and uses grow and diversify globally. Many analysts, mesmerized by the power of the Internet, persist in thinking about the Internet as a separate sociotechnical system. Yet, the Internet has become embedded in the daily lives of much of the developed world (DiMaggio et al., 2001; Howard, Rainie & Jones, 2002; Wellman & Haythornthwaite, 2002).1 Hence, we think it more useful to understand what the consequences of the extensive diffusion and intensive use of the Internet are for people�s lives.
The time of gazing in awe at the Internet is over. There has been a widespread analytic turn since the late 1990s to documenting the impact of the Internet in people�s lives. We present here knowledge gathered from a number of such studies done around the world by our NetLab about how the Internet affects community. We have been concerned with how the Internet is influencing interpersonal relationships and organization involvement in their social networks cum communities:
1. Do people communicate more because the Internet offers them the capability to contact people at a distance?
2. Do they primarily communicate via the Internet or are face-to-face meetings, phone calls, and gatherings still important in creating closeness and providing emotional support? More specifically, we have been asking:
* Are people reaching out to neighbors and to their communities?
* Are they getting involved in neighborhood associations and in public activities?
* Does the Internet reduce the time we have available to dedicate to community life?
* How do people use their networks, social communication, and computer to access information at home, work, and leisure?
* What sense of belonging to communities do networked people have? "social community network culture technology web identity research
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01 Nov 10
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30 Aug 10
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15 Aug 10
Anne Marie CunninghamThe Social Affordances of the Internet for Networked Individualism (2003) @barrywellman et al http://bit.ly/bVnm7l again via @nancybaym book
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30 Jun 10
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19 Jun 10
Robert RichardsWe review the evidence from a number of surveys in which our NetLab has been involved about the extent to which the Internet is transforming or enhancing community. The studies show that the Internet is used for connectivity locally as well as globally, a
Barry_Wellman Yochai_Benkler internet_studies Internet_research eparticipation egovernment political_communication online_political_communication for:@twitter
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08 May 10
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08 Dec 09
anamvpaivaWellman, B; Quan-Haase, A; Boase, J; Chen, W; Hampton, K; Diaz, I.& Miyata, K. (2003). "The Social Affordances of the Internet for Networked Individualism". Journal of Computer-Mediated Communication,8 (3), 28p. http://chass.utoronto.ca/~wellman/publications/social_affordances_of_the_internet_for_networked_individualism /social_affordances_of_the_internet_for_networked_individualism.pdf
Abstract: We review the evidence from a number of surveys in which our NetLab has been involved about the extent to which the Internet is transforming or enhancing community. The studies show that the Internet is used for connectivity locally as well as globally, although the nature of its use varies in different countries. Internet use is adding on to other forms of communication, rather than replacing them. Internet use is reinforcing the pre-existing turn to societies in the developed world that are organized around networked individualism rather than group or local solidarities.(...)internet community socialnetwork culture research barry_wellman journals jcmc
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30 Nov 09
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28 Nov 09
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The Social Affordances of the Internet for Networked Individualism
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14 Oct 09
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Communities and societies have been changing towards networked societies where boundaries are more permeable, interactions are with diverse others, linkages switch between multiple networks, and hierarchies are flatter and more recursive
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26 Sep 09
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25 Sep 09
paul jonesWe review the evidence from a number of surveys in which our NetLab has been involved about the extent to which the Internet is transforming or enhancing community. The studies show that the Internet is used for connectivity locally as well as globally, a
internet community social culture Identity technology web research wellman isolation jomc449
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12 Aug 09
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30 Jul 09
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17 Jun 09
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08 Apr 09
allgood2 AllgoodJournal of Computer-Mediated Communication, Vol. 8, No. 3
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Although our discussion is primarily about relationships, our special concern here is the impact of the Internet on the change in society away from groups and towards networked individualism. This change is not only occurring at the interpersonal level but at the organizational, interorganizational and even the world-systems levels. It is the move from densely-knit and tightly-bounded groups to sparsely-knit and loosely-bounded networks. This move to networked societies has profound implications for how people mobilize and how people and governments relate to each other � in all forms of societies � but especially in democracies. That is because democracies are heavily in the business of dealing with the aggregated demands of their citizenries. Historically, these demands have had geographically-defined, multilevel aggregation, with local and regional groups dealing with central groups who represent them to central governments.
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05 Apr 09
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in all forms of societies � but especially in democracies. That is because democracies are heavily in the business of dealing with the aggregated demands of their citizenries. Historically, these demands have had geographically-defined, multilevel aggregation, with local and regional groups dealing with central groups who represent them to central governments. To some extent, electronic citizenship can merely replicate this pattern., with e-mail being just another way to communicate between such groups, and the Web being just another way for central groups and governments to communicate to local groups and citizens. For example, the Scottish Parliament now accepts petitions on e-mail and publishes much of its discussion. This exercise in e-citizenship speeds up communication and information diffusion. But such e-citizenship also facilitates, and to some extent reinforces, mass society, with the individual in direct relationship with the state without the intermediary of local and even central groups.
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Our research suggests that the Internet is not a self-contained world. Rather than operating at the expense of the �real� face-to-face world, it is an extension, with people using all means of communication to connect with friends and relatives. The Internet is another means of communication that is being integrated into the regular patterns of social life. Other NetLab research suggests that this integration of online and offline life is also true for communities of practice at work (Haythornthwaite & Wellman, 1998; Koku, Nazer, & Wellman, 2001; Koku & Wellman, in press).
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Communities and societies have been changing towards networked societies where boundaries are more permeable, interactions are with diverse others, linkages switch between multiple networks, and hierarchies are flatter and more recursive (Castells, 2000; Wellman, 1997, 1999, 2001). Hence, many people and organizations communicate with others in ways that ramify across group boundaries. Rather than relating to one group, they cycle through interactions with a variety of others, at work or in the community. Their work and community networks are diffuse, sparsely knit, with vague, overlapping, social and spatial boundaries.
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The developing personalization, wireless portability, and ubiquitous connectivity of the Internet all facilitate networked individualism as the basis of community.
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Computer-supported communication is everywhere, but it is situated nowhere. It is I-alone that is reachable wherever I am: at a home, hotel, office, highway, or shopping center. The person has become the portal.
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This shift facilitates personal communities that supply the essentials of community separately to each individual: support, sociability, information, social identities, and a sense of belonging. The person, rather than the household or group, is the primary unit of connectivity. Just as 24/7/365 Internet computing means the ready availability of people in specific places, the proliferation of mobile phones and wireless computing increasingly is coming to mean an even greater availability of people without regard to place. Supportive convoys travel ethereally with each person (Ling & Ytrri, 2002; Katz, 2002).
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Networked individualism should have profound effects on social cohesion. Rather than feeling a part of a hierarchy of encompassing polities, like nesting Russian dolls, people believe they belong to multiple, partial communities and polities. Some may be global, such as is found in electronic diasporas linking dispersed members of emigrant ethnic groups (Mitra, 2003). Some may be traditional local groups of neighbors with connectivity enhanced by listservs and other forms of computer-mediated communication (Hampton, 2001), for NetLab�s research has fit into the growing realization that the McLuhanesque �global village� (1962) complements traditional communities rather than replacing them. McLuhan argued, �the new electronic interdependence recreates the world in the image of a global village.� Yet, in a person�s �glocalized� world (Wellman, 2003, in press), extensive local involvements fit together with far-flung communities of friendship, kinship and shared interest. This is especially true today when almost all computers are physically wired into the Internet, rooting people to their desk chairs. Yet even as the world goes wireless, the persistence of tangible interests, such as neighborly get-togethers or local intruders, will keep the local important. E-citizenship will be both local and global.
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10 Mar 09
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09 Mar 09
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01 Feb 09
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14 Jan 09
Andi VidaJournal of Computer-Mediated Communication, Vol. 8, No. 3. "We review the evidence from a number of surveys in which our NetLab has been involved about the extent to which the Internet is transforming or enhancing community. The studies show that the Internet is used for connectivity locally as well as globally, although the nature of its use varies in different countries. Internet use is adding on to other forms of communication, rather than replacing them. Internet use is reinforcing the pre-existing turn to societies in the developed world that are organized around networked individualism rather than group or local solidarities. The result has important implications for civic involvement."
konnektivizmus hálózati individualizmus internet közösség e-közösség glokalizáció kommunikáció e-kommunikáció connectivism network community social
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03 Oct 08
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04 Sep 08
James BonTempoWe review the evidence from a number of surveys in which our NetLab has been involved about the extent to which the Internet is transforming or enhancing community. The studies show that the Internet is used for connectivity locally as well as globally, a
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14 Aug 08
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10 Aug 08
Will RichardsonWe review the evidence from a number of surveys in which our NetLab has been involved about the extent to which the Internet is transforming or enhancing community. The studies show that the Internet is used for connectivity locally as well as globally, a
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09 Aug 08
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06 Aug 08
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16 Jun 08
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11 Jun 08
pedro_daltroestudo interessante sobre as consequências da internet na sociedade. aprofundar
individualimso tecnologia sociedade internet comportamento redessociais estudo análise aprofundar
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09 Jun 08
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26 May 08
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Communication will be everywhere, but because it is independent of place, it will be situated nowhere.
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Person-to-person communication is supplanting door-to-door and place-to-place communication
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04 Apr 08
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29 Mar 08
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16 Jan 08
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03 Jan 08
Yann LerouxThe Social Affordances of the Internet for Networked Individualism
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02 Jan 08
Tim IsganitisJournal of Computer-Mediated Communication, Vol. 8, No. 3
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David Feld"We review the evidence from a number of surveys in which our NetLab has been involved about the extent to which the Internet is transforming or enhancing community."
community socialnetworking technology computers web internet online culture identity social individualism toread
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05 Nov 07
Scott LeslieAlan pointed out quite rightly that this is where the phrase "permeable organizations" comes from
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08 Oct 07
avivajazz jazzavivaGovernmental hierarchies used to dealing with localized communities. The internet is helping to create communities consisting of multiple, shifting sets of glocalized ties. New, fluid forms of democracy are needed.
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07 Oct 07
Alan LevineInternet use is reinforcing the pre-existing turn to societies in the developed world that are organized around networked individualism rather than group or local solidarities. The result has important implications for civic involvement.
social community identity media network research socialsoftware cogdogroo
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08 Oct 06
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13 May 06
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09 May 06
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29 Apr 06
Howard RheingoldWe review the evidence from a number of surveys in which our NetLab has been involved about the extent to which the Internet is transforming or enhancing community. The studies show that the Internet is used for connectivity locally as well as globally, a
community social_networks social_software social_capital online_community
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We review the evidence from a number of surveys in which our NetLab has been involved about the extent to which the Internet is transforming or enhancing community. The studies show that the Internet is used for connectivity locally as well as globally, although the nature of its use varies in different countries. Internet use is adding on to other forms of communication, rather than replacing them. Internet use is reinforcing the pre-existing turn to societies in the developed world that are organized around networked individualism rather than group or local solidarities. The result has important implications for civic involvement.
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our special concern here is the impact of the Internet on the change in society away from groups and towards networked individualism. This change is not only occurring at the interpersonal level but at the organizational, interorganizational and even the world-systems levels. It is the move from densely-knit and tightly-bounded groups to sparsely-knit and loosely-bounded networks. This move to networked societies has profound implications for how people mobilize and how people and governments relate to each other � in all forms of societies � but especially in democracies. That is because democracies are heavily in the business of dealing with the aggregated demands of their citizenries.
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The developed world has been experiencing for over a century a shift away from communities based on small-group-like villages and neighborhoods and towards flexible partial communities based on networked households and individuals.
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As �community� is partially defined by social interactions among a set of persons who know each other, the composite definition of a �neighborhood community� is of a bounded geographical area in which many of the residents know each other.
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the �Community Question� (Wellman, 1979). This Community Question wonders how societal changes such as informatization, computerization, bureaucratization, industrialization, and urbanization have affected community. Reciprocally, it also wonders how the changing nature of community affects society. This Community Question has evolved as community scholars changed their ideas about what constituted community and where to find it.
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Both fieldwork and survey research show that sociable community relations continue to be abundant and strong. Large institutions have neither destroyed nor withered communal relations. To the contrary: the larger and more inflexible the institutions, the more people seem to depend on their informal ties to deal with them.
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neighborhood communities can well be seen as one, partial community of shared interest, that pertaining to shared proximity. At a different spatial scale, electronic diasporas link friends, kin, and former neighbors across nations and oceans (Mitra, in press). One common shared interest is work: Hence, communities of practice (Wenger, 1998) and learning (Haythornthwaite, in press) are flourishing, as similarly-occupied people share knowledge within and between organizations.
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The Internet is not a one-dimensional technology. Rather, it merges several media into one medium. Nor is it static. A set of current and imminent changes creates possibilities � social affordances � for how the Internet can influence everyday life:
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Broader Bandwidth
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Always Connected
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Personalization
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Wireless Portability
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Globalized Connectivity
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This transmutation of the Internet from elite tool and toy to everyday information and communication appliance points to its significance for e-citizenship. It is becoming a prime means by which a great many people in the developed world obtain information, transmit information, and discuss this information with others, one-on-one and in large and small groups.
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Analysts have proposed three basic ways in which the Internet may affect community:
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The Internet Decreases Community
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(Nie, Hillygus, & Erbring, 2002)
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The Internet Transforms Community
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(Barlow, 1995; Rheingold, 2000; Wellman, 2001)
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The Internet Supplements Community
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(Wellman & Gulia, 1999)
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One might expect that the global reach of the Internet would encourage people to direct their interpersonal energies over long-distances at the cost of local ties. This would be consistent with the research finding that time-use is zero-sum: if people spend more time on one thing they spend less time on something else (Robinson & Godbey, 1997; Robinson, in press). Yet, �wired� Netville residents with high-speed Internet connections have much more informal contact with neighbors than did the �non-wired� residents who had moved into the same development but had not yet received their high-speed access. Wired residents know the names of 25 neighbors, while non-wired residents knew only eight. They talk to twice as many neighbors as do the non-wired neighbors. Wired residents make 50% more visits to each other�s homes, and their contacts with neighbors were more widely dispersed in the development.
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Yet, this expanded local contact does not exhaust the Netville residents� supply of sociability. Wired Netville residents also maintained more long-distance contact with friends and relatives than non-wired residents did.
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After moving into their new suburban homes, 82% of wired residents reported no change in social support with friends and relatives living 50-500 km. away, only 6% reported a decrease, and 12% even reported an increase. By contrast, the majority of non-wired residents (55%) reported a decrease in support. Only 5% reported an increase and only 40% reported that support stayed at about the same level (Hampton & Wellman, 2002).
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Taken together, the evidence suggests that wired residents have become �glocalized,� involved in both local and long-distance relationships (Hampton & Wellman, in press; Wellman, in press).
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Community Networks in North America
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Experience Counts
The longer that people have been online, the more they use the Internet. -
The More the More
Rather than weakening community, the Internet supplements existing face-to-face and telephone contact. Heavy Internet users have a greater overall volume of contact with community members because Internet use suppplements telephone and face-to-face contact. It does not displace it. -
Distance Still Matters
Although the Internet increases the number and intensity of friendship and kinship ties that can be sustained at long distances, relatively local ties remain important. -
Organizational Involvement
Organizational involvement is limited, offline as well as online. -
Throughout the world, frequent users use the Internet in multiple ways � socially, instrumentally and recreationally � and combine it with face-to-face and telephone contact. However, as our focused Catalan and Japanese studies show, particular social, spatial, and economic conditions affect Internet use in societally specific ways that vary markedly from the original American-centric Internet
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rather than operating at the expense of the �real� face-to-face world, it is a part of it, with people using all means of communication to connect with friends and relatives. The Internet is another means of communication, which is being integrated into the regular patterns of social life
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Catalan use of the Internet is clearly different than the extensive American and Canadian use of the Internet to keep in touch with relatives and friends. This does not seem a matter of Catalans' not catching up yet to the American norm, for even experienced Catalans use the Internet differently.
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The North American mode of using the Internet has been viewed incorrectly as a norm diffusing around the world. Yet, Catalans have taken a different route to building social capital in a modern society than have North Americans. The implications for e-citizenship are important. Catalans use the Internet extensively for obtaining information, including political information, and to some extent for arranging get-togethers to discuss shared interests. But their interpersonal solidarity is local as well as interest-based.
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NetLab�s cooperative research into Japanese users of computer-mediated comunication also shows a society using computer-mediated communication quite differently from the supposed North American norm.
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more settled adults use PCs, but often in conjunction with their mobile phones. The more media used, the more communication exchanged holds true here too. Those who use both PCs and Webphones to exchange e-mail have more ties (and espcially more weak ties) than those who only use PCs or Webphones. By contrast, those who use only Webphones are less skilled in using computers and less active in communication.
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The different media, PC and Webphone are supplementing each other and other media as well in facilitating communication. Although messages are short, recent experience in mobile-using Indonesia and the Philippines shows that they can play significant roles in connecting citizens to organize collective social movements (Tkach Kawaski, in press).
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- Even before the coming of the Internet, other social, economic and technological phenomena affected the transition from groups to networks:
- Social Changes: Birth control and liberalized divorce laws and dual-career families have both reflected and driven the transition from a place-to-place to a person-to-person mode of domestic and community life.
- Land-Use Changes: Zoning separation of residential from commercial and work uses meant that people had less contact with coworkers in the community and that their travel time had eaten into their community networking time.
- Technological Changes: The proliferation of car ownership, expressways, affordable air transportation, and inexpensive long-distance telephony enabled people to have more frequent meaningful contact with physically distant relatives and friends.
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Our research suggests that the Internet is not a self-contained world. Rather than operating at the expense of the �real� face-to-face world, it is an extension, with people using all means of communication to connect with friends and relatives.
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Changes in the nature of computer-mediated communication both reflect and foster the development of networked individualism in networked societies. Internet and mobile phone connectivity is to persons and not to jacked-in telephones that ring in a fixed place for anyone in the room or house to pick up. The developing personalization, wireless portability, and ubiquitous connectivity of the Internet all facilitate networked individualism as the basis of community. Because connections are to people and not to places, the technology affords shifting of work and community ties from linking people-in-places to linking people at any place. Computer-supported communication is everywhere, but it is situated nowhere. It is I-alone that is reachable wherever I am: at a home, hotel, office, highway, or shopping center. The person has become the portal.
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the proliferation of mobile phones and wireless computing increasingly is coming to mean an even greater availability of people without regard to place. Supportive convoys travel ethereally with each person (Ling & Ytrri, 2002; Katz, 2002).
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Each person is a switchboard, between ties and networks. People remain connected, but as individuals, rather than being rooted in the home bases of work unit and household. Each person operates a separate personal community network, and switches rapidly among multiple sub-networks. Even in more localistic Catalonia, people appear to meet their friends as individuals and not in family groups. In effect, the Internet and other new communication technology are helping each individual to personalize his or her own community. This is neither a prima facie loss nor gain in community, but rather a complex, fundamental transformation in the nature of community.
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Not only has the volume of communication increased, we suspect that the velocity of communication has also increased.
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It is not clear whether the high use of computer-mediated communication will foster more densely-knit communities � good for conserving resources � or more sparsely-knit communities � good for obtaining new information and other resources. On the one hand, some characteristics of the Internet foster denser networks: the ability of Internet users to communicate simultaneously with multiple others, and the ease of copying and forward messages to others. In such cases, it is more likely for the friend of my friend to become my friend. On the other hand, as social networks become larger it is often more difficult for them to maintain their density. As the size of the network increases arithmetically, the number of ties must increase geometrically to maintain the same level of density.
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The turn towards networked individualism before and during the age of the Internet suggests more people maneuvering through multiple communities of choice where kinship and neighboring contacts become more of a choice than a requirement (Greer, 1962; Wellman, 1999). This suggests a fragmentation of citizenship. Rather than a unified neighborhood, people increasingly operate in a number of specialized communities that rarely grab their entire, impassioned or sustained attention. To be sure, when attention is gained, computer-mediated communication can facilitate mobilized citizenship as happened on the national level where short text messages via mobile phones were used to organize political demonstrations in the Philippines and on the local level where agitated members of a wired suburb organized against further construction of homes (Hampton, 2001). The multiplicity of communities should reduce informal social control, as it is easier for people to leave unpleasantly-controlling partial communities and increase their involvement in other, more accepting, ones. This may lead to increased state control, as governments fill the once-informal role.
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Social capital, like communities, is becoming both more specialized and more mobilizable via the Internet.
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Even household units are losing their solidarity, with separate schedules and agendas, and as the lure of computer-mediated connectivity with the outside world draws people away from their household relations (Nie, Hillygus, & Erbring, 2002; Putnam, 2000). Networked individualism should have profound effects on social cohesion. Rather than feeling a part of a hierarchy of encompassing polities, like nesting Russian dolls, people believe they belong to multiple, partial communities and polities.
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The personal communities of a networked world are both homogeneous and heterogeneous.
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Moreover, the properties of computer-mediated communication easily allow inclusion of others in conversations through multiple address lines and chatting. While ostensibly this will expand the scope of homogeneous discussion, in practice the larger the net the more heterogeneous the participants (Feld, 1982).
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Thus, the move towards a networked society creates interesting possibilities for governments more used to dealing with hierarchies of local solidarities. No longer are communities local, all-encompassing, and stable. Instead, people have multiple, shifting sets of glocalized ties. The local becomes only one kind of �special interest.� Even more than in the past social mobilization will be apt to develop over non-territorial issues, be it shared affect (�ecology,� �Islam�) or shared material interests.
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To cope with and serve such a networked society, there will be a need for new, fluid forms of government and democracy. To date, such needs are scarcely met, online or offline.
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