Attractiveness of Online Communities and Popular Online Communities - Essay Example

Internet Communities Internet and Communication have profoundly changed our lifestyles, evolved our cultures and made us more interactive with other people. However for some, this change is not that exciting and they say that it has made their lives more complex. One often heard remark from the people in our society we hear is "Internet has made our lives faster"! In this paper these are some of the facts that we will be analyzing in detail. Specifically the focus will be on Online Communities that have taken the world up by storm in the last 3 years. The impact on social life and type of online communities will also be discussed. [2] Online Community Online Communities are social networks found online. It is supported by a computer mediated space where people from all cultures come together for some common purpose or some activity forming 'webs of relationships'. The communication that happens between the people can take place with only one person or hundreds of people simultaneously. It is conversation that does not depend on geographical location or social hierarchies. It is a place where people can commune with others on topics of their own choosing. It is, in fact, a virtual village where a series of interactions between community members take place. [2] [3] History Some experts foresaw the evolution of virtual communities when the first email message was sent in 1973. They saw the potential of long distance communication with loved ones and business executives. With the growth of online services like AOL and MINITEL in the 1980s, this idea was further expanded to include communication with all known people around the globe. Lotus Notes in the late 1980s further evolved the concept of communication by forming communities of people who can work together online. Then came in commerce communities, like Amazon and Ebay, which started selling products and interacting online with their customers. Slowly the shift came towards 'blogging' in late 1990s. Yahoo and Google groups started to become increasingly popular when suddenly in 2003 the world was hit by the MySpace.com that provided the users the opportunity to interact with people sharing similar activities. With the increasing user base of MySpace.com, other online communities started to creep up to form the new way of life we have come to know of now. [1] Popular Online Communities My Space.com My Space was formed in August 2003 with the goal of providing a chance for people to meet new people. It is an online community that lets a person meet their friends' friends. The website requires a person to register and then add friends their respective profiles. People can add their pictures, videos, music etc and write blogs. Orkut.com Orkut is an online service which was started in January 2004 by Google. It is another online community that allows a person to build personalized webpages which other people can view. Initially any body could view anybody's profile but to some privacy concerns, the site now offers a restricted access depending on user's needs. Users can share pictures and send scraps of messages to maintain existing relationships and build new ones. Facebook.com One of the most popular online communities currently is Facebook which has a user base of over 59 million active users with this figure doubling every six months. The website offers an extremely comprehensive coverage of activities and communities that people can join. Applications can be attached to personalized pages and contests can be held through these applications with other users. ManHunt.net Manhunt is an online social network for gay men. It gives an opportunity for men to meet other men online, date them and to get to know them better. Men can post their pictures and information which other people can search and find the ones with similar interests. The website has seen an increasing number of men posting nude pictures and vulgar messages. Match.com Match.com was formed in 1995 with the purpose of giving men and women chances to meet their matches online. It's an online dating service whose popularity rose in 2004 when Guinness World Records recognized Match.com as the largest online dating site in the world but over the years the service has seen a decline in active users. Others Other online communities like LiveSpace, Wikipedia, Instant messaging applications such as Msn or Yahoo Messenger, Geocities and consumer sites such as Amazon and Ebay technically support the interaction of people over the web. They differ in the services that they offer and this is that creates a competitive advantage for them to earn more revenues and higher profits. Attractiveness of Online Communities No person wants to live alone and indeed it becomes extremely difficult if one has to live in isolation. Solitary confinements have seen strong and fit people losing their minds. After being ship wrecked on a deserted island, Robinson Crusoe (from the book by Daniel Defoe) had the services of this faithful dog and later on his servant, Friday, to talk and communicate with. The point here is that everyone is a part of many social groups and people are always expanding their networks by meeting and interacting with new people. People want to be known, want to hear and to be heard, want to enjoy and at times want to depend on others. According to the structural-functionalism theory, the world has provided us with the structure for interaction. Our parents, relatives and friends are the basis of this structure and it from here we learn to function to find our place inside this structure. [4] According to the social change theory of Talcott Parsons, every society and its structure is in a constant movement of change which eventually finds equilibrium at its own pace. The changes brought by the internet revolution cannot be ignored as they are profoundly changing the way of life of every person each day. The shifting focus from just emailing towards forming online communities has changed the lives we live today. [5] The symbolic interactions with textual and graphical interfaces have infused a new life into online communication. People are now more interested in interacting from their computers typing in text rather than talking face-to-face. Here are some of the reasons why people are flocking towards online communities: Make New Friends The first and the most important reason why people join online communities is to expand their social circle. As mentioned above, people are afraid of being alone, hence people want to make new friends so that if a need arises, they can depend on new friends. People also make new friends to pass their time or to discover new kinds of people and activities. Match making and dating also come within the need of love and security. [4] Cultural Diversity Online communities give a chance to people to learn about international cultures, ones they cannot experience first hand due to physical and geographical constraints. To beat out the curiosity, people do join in online communities and learn about the way of life other people have. [4] Globalization People cannot always remain in touch with the knowledge of the entire world. Online communities give a common platform to knowledge seekers to come online and share knowledge and discuss the changes that are taking place. Within wider community groups like Orkut, Facebook or Myspace, people can join other communities according to their interests and start a discussion relating to that topic of interest. [4] Impact on the Lifestyle of People One of the people's primary requirements is to interact with the people they are already close to so that they can maintain the relationships and come even closer. All of the online communities discussed above want to promote this concept in people. These online services provide an opportunity for the people to communicate online through messages, share pictures or view videos. Any picture taken at a moment can be shared across various communities and users. This type of interaction has helped many young people to realize their dreams. A photographer, who put his pictures on this profile, gets a million views and suddenly sees himself becoming a pro. Some teenage rock band put up their songs on their personalized pages and suddenly they became overnight sensations. There would be a million other examples of the benefits people have reaped out of joining online communities, however, the credit goes to these online companies who provided the opportunity to people in the first place. [4] It is a proved that the online communication has become a hit, however critics have found that this has had a negative impact on the lives of people. A person who used to go to a fitness gym, play sports, spend time with his friends, go to parties and date occasionally is now is person slave to his computer. With just a PC and an online connection, that person can indoors chatting and messaging without any physical activity. Critics ask what is the use of such socialization when in the real life of a person becomes totally virtual [6] Virtual vs. Real World The home life of people has started to degrade because of the addictiveness to the virtual world. A woman who has to take care of his kids and cook the meal for her family, uses the computer to socialize all day long will negate her responsibilities and hence degrade the quality of real-life while improving the quality of virtual life. This concept is very seriously taken in the German sociological sense as there is a remarkable tradition of theories stating a 'loss of community' in the traditional form of families, neighborhoods, or professional groups. Also in other cultures the sense of 'community' is deviating sociologically. According to Putnam, more and more members of the modern community are 'bowling alone' rather than working as a closely knit unit (Putnam, 1995). So if effect what online communities have done is brought the geographically distant people closer together and pushed the closer ones further apart. [6] The purpose of online communities to bring distant and unknown people closer has been fulfilled but at the cost of creating a gap between the ones who were already close. This notion fits exactly into the concept of social change set forth by Talcott Parsons who said that society has to remain in equilibrium by making adjustments in other parts of the society when occurs. [5] Conclusion Internet may have brought a revolution that is commendable but there needs to be balance between the real life and virtual life. It is good to socialize online and make new friends and learn new knowledge, but we must never forget our roots and our closest ones. Practicing online communication calls for social control from self rather than relying on technology to keep a person with boundaries. Many lives have been destroyed online through virtual sex, online marriages, scams etc. The principle of cultural relativism must me maintained according to our cultures (not through ethnocentrism) and others should interpret the activities in a similar manner. Although the mind and the heart may be at conflict with each other, we must learn self restraint and maintain a balance in our lives since "excess of everything is bad." Works Cited 1. Ambrozek, Jenny and Cothrel, Joseph (2004), "Online Communities in Business: Past Progress, Future Directions", Accessed on December 20, 2007 from www.sageway.com/ocibreport.pdf 2. Baker, Terry (2001), "Online Communities: A Brief Overview", Accessed on December 20, 2007 from www.sedi.org/dataregv2-unified/capnet-summarypapers/online%20communities%20paper.pdf 3. Haythornthwaite, Caroline (2002), "Computer-Mediated Communication and the 'Liberated' Sociologist", CJC Online, Accessed on December 20, 2007 from www.cjsonline.ca/pdf/haythorn.pdf 4. Lin, Peyina and McDonald, David (2001), "Exploring the social realities of online communities through the lens of a Human Information Behavior framework", Social Informatics Research Symposia, Accessed on December 20, 2007 from www.dlist.sir.arizona.edu/1521/01/LinMcD2.pdf 5. Mayhew, Leonard (1982), "Talcott Parsons, 1902-79: A Biographical Note" in Talcott Parsons, Talcott Parsons on institutions and social evolution, Pp: xi-xii. Chicago: University of Chicago Press 6. Putnam, Robert (1995), "Bowling Alone: America's Declining Social Capital" Journal of Democracy Vol. 6 Sec. 1: pp. 65-78 Read More