3. Virtual Community and Social Networks

3.    

Virtual Community and Social Networks

Virtual communities are networks where the community members are the human component. These communities have a group identity, values and norms that are shared between the group members. There is insider knowledge, sustained participation, shared sites in which the members spend time on and common relationships that are formed in these virtual communities. The communities are self sustaining and depend upon human feeling to form relationships and group dynamics in cyberspace. It is more common for virtual community members to be face-to-face strangers. This social aspect of the internet has potential positive and negative consequences. I will look at my flat mate’s membership in a virtual community and through this case study I will analyse the potential consequences involved.

    

My flatmate is a member of a virtual community that started from MOGs (Multi-player online game) through the interest of internet games. Since meeting on the 'Dark Orbit' game his community has moved onto other game sites such as ;Shire' which they collectively play. Through this interest he has found other people like him and this helps with the human need to belong. His community (he calls a guild) is called Dirty Dozen and currently there are 34  members originating from all around the world. Of the potential positives, he has gotten to know his friends/members without physical distractions. They are social connections that would otherwise not exist in real life and he has spoken with people who has broadened his horizons in a way he would not have in real life, such as talking to people from an array of cultures and finding out what each culture tolerates etc. Virtual communities, such as Chaise’s community, has united people across different races and socio-economic classes. Virtual communities can help real life situations, such as activism through to being a support system/mediation/listener for a member. The last positive consequence of this virtual community is chaise’s social identification. Utz (2008) describes “Social identity is that part of an individual’s self-concept which derives from his knowledge of his membership of a social group (or groups) together with the value and emotional significance attached to that membership.” (P. 260).  

           Beginning the potential negative consequences, social identity also has some negative characteristics which can also features for any type of group, both virtual and in real life. They include conformity to the group norms, group influence in an individual’s decision, cohesion and solidarity. Basically, a potential risk of community/group membership is losing one’s individuality and voice as one complies to the norms and behaviour of the group. A person can use group membership and the internet to ignore or avoid reality. Relationship on the internet can become more important than real life relationships. Because one can do no more but trust in their word, a member could be glamorised or made out to be someone they are not and the members would be none the wiser as they are unable to see the person’s warts, so to speak. The last and what I believe to be the most important negative consequence is that I feel Chaise is suffering from being obsessed with the virtual world and community. He spends each waking moment he is home with his community. I can’t even have a proper conversation with him without him interrupting to speak to a group member or not hearing a word I say. Rheingold (2001) affirms “To the millions who have been drawn into it, the richness and vitality of computer-linked cultures is attractive even addictive.” (P. 274).

References

Rheingold, H. (2001). The Virtual Community. Reading Digital Culture. David Trend (Ed.). Massachusetts: Blackwell.

Utz, S. (2008).  Social Identification with virtual communities. Mediated Interpersonal Communication. (Konikm, A. S., Utz, S., Tanis, M., & Barnes, B. S. Eds.). New York: Routledge.