Theorizing Networks, Users, Online Communities and Identities

“We were born to unite with our fellow men, and to join in community with the human race.” (Cicero)

I am going to analyze the theorization of the terms mentioned in the topic for this examination by first extracting the main message the authors provide on each of the single terms. Then, in the second chapter of this document, I am going to present three main aspects of their relation that I distilled from the text.

1. Definitions

In this chapter, I am summarizing how the authors define networks, users, online communities and identities. Given the broad discussion of these topics in the book, this can only be a selective summary. I decided to collect those statements made in the source that either appear most important to me or that I find inspiring.

1.1 Networks

The discussion on “networks” begins with a technical evaluation of the Internet as an open architecture, with the authors stating that this architecture is turning the Internet into an enabler for flow and exchange. The “flow” aspect becomes an important point in the discussion, as this is regarded the key feature turning the Internet from a plain node of computers into a platform for sociality. (p.165)

The authors present several interpretations of how a network of computers serves as an enabler for the emergence of new social entities. One of the concepts presented is based on Pierre Lévy, who is talking about the multiplication of spaces where a single person is no longer restricted to physical presence in one place but can participate in social acts in several places synchronously. The collapse and compression of time and physical space is described to be “facilitated by faster and more intense flows” (p.171). This brings us back to where we started from, the network’s role as the enabler of the flow. (p.170-171)

But the authors are also questioning the purely technology-centered view on the emergence of online culture. They point out that the network is not only enabler, but also shaping the culture due to the real-world context the net is built upon: “Cyberspace is produced [...] in the material world through ownership and control of data and data storage space [...]” (p.171).

Over several chapters, the authors explain that the initial construction of CMC as a socio-linguistic discipline has been based on pre-web forms of Internet use, when all communication on that platform was based on plain text. This homogeneity, or better: the lack thereof in newer modes of internet use, becomes a central argument in the discussion of the social change happening on the network (p.166). The, from my point of view, most radical claim by the authors is that the arrival of Berners-Lee’s WWW brought a major change by reducing the level of interactivity on the Internet (p.182).

1.2 Users

Regarding the definition of “users” in the book, the aforementioned division between the pre-web and post-web internet plays an important role again. While the text-based Internet is presented as a somewhat exclusive sphere with participants that are eager to communicate, they describe the web as a platform open for all, which leads to a lower level of involvement. Among other comparisons, they use the image of a participatory versus an interactive “media zone” (p.185). The change to the web age is described as an important shift from an individual networked subject to a subject that is part of the multinational media landscape (p.185-6).

Investigating not only the level of participation with the medium, but also the motivations people have to use it, the authors apply the ‘uses and gratifications’ theory of audience behavior (p.184). Here, the user – the web user in particular – is primarily described as an individual subject whose social behavior is rooted in her real-life social settings.

1.3 Online communities

The theorization of “online community” begins with the insight that not even the term “community” is clearly defined in the field (p.172). However, the general question “What is a community?” is crucial for being able to understand online communities and to be able to distinguish its unique features.

Following the text, traditional definitions of community are rooted around the concept of spatial relationship. This “belonging to one place” as the elementary definition of community poses the question how the participation in online discussions can be perceived as a spatial process. Based on a quote by Howard Rheingold, software is described as a place. (p.172)

Naturally, when we assume the digital space to be a place, access to that place plays a crucial role for the inclusion and exclusion of people. The authors elaborate on the problems related to the “digital divide” (p.172-3), which is particularly discussed in the context of political economy (p.199). It can be said that the digital divide plays a role on all levels, from micro level all the way to uneven globalization when seen in the biggest scope.

In what I consider the most eye-opening part of their “community” discussion, the authors present two ways to define online communities: discourse vs. space. Starting from Emile Durkheim’s definition of group identity as the result of shared values and shared spaces, they use the general assumption of discourse shaping community to explain that online communication is discourse. And while the authors quote Nancy Baym on the ongoing discourse on “stable patterns of social meanings” (p.176) as the origin of community, Quentin Jones’ theory of virtual settlements is presented – defined through the variables of a group, a common space and membership/continuity. So there are two ways to define a community: either through the fact that its members are in a state of discourse or through common spatial factors. (p.174-176)

In a more economical analysis, the book introduces the idea of reformulating “online community” as a method for creating a market. And while the idea of the invasion of mass/pop culture as a threat for the culture of the text-based internet sounds like a somewhat strange thought, Raymond Williams’ explanation that the economic base of society defines its cultural and social formations makes perfect sense. (p.183-186)

1.4 Identities

The concept of identity is discussed in the book mainly under two aspects: on the one hand, the question is posed how an online identity is formed, on the other hand the authors explore the relation between an individual’s online and offline identity.

In their discussion of the online identity, the writers make three major points:

• Presentation of self: The online individual makes use of the network’s anonymity to put herself in the light she wants, often presenting herself with different attributes than she really owns. This is, in addition to a process of self-redefinition also a process of a reflection of self. (p.166)
• Remediation: The networked communication, particularly when using nicknames as in chat rooms and the like, is a space used by individuals for experimentation and risk taking. The authors describe this as “remediation”. A good example for this is the difference between “e-mail self” and “letter self”, where – even when addressing the same person – different styles are used. (p.166-167)
• Retreat vs. part of reality: Two competing paradigms are presented in the book. In one, the cyberspace is described as a retreat from social reality, whereas in the other it is seen as a part of the existing social reality, an extension of the individual’s identity. The latter concept clearly appears to be the focus of the writers. (p.168)

2. Relations

I could find three major topics around the question of relating the concepts of networks, users, online communities and identities. First the interpretation of cyberspace as a public sphere, secondly the question of the individual’s identity on the network and thirdly the question of how the virtual world and the real world are integrated with each other.

2.1 The public sphere

According to the authors, the perception of networks as a “public sphere” (p.176) has been criticized as a “techno-utopian vision”. In the light of that critique, the network appears more as a public communication space, not a real public sphere that would be totally interweaved with the social and everyday life of the individual. (p.181)

This discourse shows just how close – but also argued – the relation between the network, its users and most importantly their identities really is. Some see technology as a “human extension” (p.167), making the users with their identities the nodes of the network. Others prefer to call it a communication space, a concept that clearly separates the network from its users. Also the definition of “online community“ is biased by this discussion: is the online community the entity of all the users forming the network or is it a place that individuals with altered identities gather around to interact in a way clearly separated from their real lives? While some see the emergence of CMC as a new public sphere as the democratization of media production, others interpret it as a construct capable of representing new subjectivities (p.177).

But the book also mentions concerns that the “more recent domination of the Internet by far lower levels of interactive participation offered by the World Wide Web might argue that the peak moment for the consideration of the significance of ‘online community’ has already passed” (p.176), referring to the increased use of the network for retail and marketing purposes.

2.2 The identity of the individual

Related to the question of the public sphere, the identity of the individual is the second key aspect in this discussion.

When, through the flow-enabling network, identity is no longer based on physical presence, it is possible for the individual to experiment with their own identity. People are “wandering like nomads” (Pierre Lévy, p.170) in the virtual space, both as users (virtual embodiment) and as themselves with their personal identities (“communicating our selves over distance”, p.167). The main conclusion that can be derived from this is that online relations are by no means “virtual”, but the online communities built on the network connect real people and their real identities – even if they might present themselves with a second, “online identity”. (p.167-170)

2.3 The Integration with the “real world”

Both aspects mentioned above, the public sphere of the online and identity’s role in the networked world, merge into the third relation I found from the discussion in the book: the integration of the online and the offline world. In fact, this is not a topic specific to this assessment of “networks, users, online communities and identities”, but one of the main messages of the entire book: “new media” as one part of the big world, nothing entirely new, radically different (though more versatile) or something that could be assessed isolated from its context.

The authors state that “new media are as much the product of social, political and economical forces as they are of technological endeavour” (p.190). In other words: the networks are shaped by the users; more specifically, by the realities of the world these individuals live in. To my understanding, this again brings in the identity aspect: if we assume online communities to be a public sphere, this means that the social, political and economic factors that are affecting the user’s identity as well influence the forming of the network’s use.

But as a side effect of this connection with the real world – the book is here widely discussing aspects of political economy that I am not going to elaborate on in this examination – the aforementioned social, political and economical factors are also slowing down the momentum of development in the online communities. The authors are here talking about the “interactive and communicative potential” of the public sphere that is “weakened […] through integration with existing economic patterns” (p.186). I already mentioned this aspect when talking about commercialization in chapter 2.1 of this document.

3. Summary

I have analyzed the authors’ theorization of the relations between networks, users, online communities and identities through their definitions of these four terms and through what I understand as the three main relations discussed in the source text.

Summarizing the third chapter of the book, it is – not suprisingly – in full compliance with the broader message of the critical approach towards new media: context. Networks are presented not as a technical but a social enabler, users not as computer users but as users of that enabler network, online communities not as an isolated hangout for users but as a public sphere enhancing the social sphere of their lives and identities not as the online identity of the user but their real life identities’ representation in the virtual dimension.

To me as a sociologist, these thoughts are not new. Also, the authors’ message in its entirety is something I fully agree with. The three relations I think to have sensed in the text are biased by that, for sure. When contextualizing “new media” with its environment (media history, social realities, economy, politics), there is no other sensible outcome than seeing it as a medium that serves the same purposes as media has done ever before, just in a new way. What this approach does – and this is the picture I have of the “critital approach” the authors represent – is to turn the attention away from the obvious (computers, interfaces, discussion boards, nicknames) to its role in the social context of the medium: the provision of contemporary means of interaction.