Aims of the session

1
Aims of the session
To explore the virtual community debate To
discuss virtual community projects To see
examples of virtual community projects
2
Structure of the Session
  What are virtual communities? The origins How
did the concept of virtual communities
evolve? The Internet The WWW Cyberspace  
 How do virtual communities figure in real life
contemporary culture? Academic perceptions of
virtual communities Issues to consider when
investigating the dystopian/utopian viewpoints
A case study Sounding the Site
3
  What are virtual communities The origins
Physical existence Regular intake of energy
resources, such as food and liquid Fully
functioning biological processes
Healthy Psychological existence Stimulation
from external resources Human beings Education
books, Internet, other Multimedia
products Entertainment Theatre, TV, Cinema,
Computer games, DVDS, CD ROMS How do you
think the human body might be affected without
any external stimulation?
4
Points to consider
  How would we know how to Express
emotions? Eat and drink? Communicate? Learn? Pro
create? Survive? Communities have always been an
integral part of human existence.
5
Definitions of the word community
 A group of people living in a particular
area The New Penguin English Dictionary
(2001) A group of people with some common
characteristic, e.g. profession, religion, or
status The New Penguin English Dictionary
(2001)   Communities are far-flung,
loosely-bounded, sparsely-knit, and fragmentary.
Most people operate in multiple,
thinly-connected, partial communities as they
deal with networks of kin, neighbours, friends,
workmates and organizational ties. Barry
Wellman (2001) Communities exist to provide
sociability, support, a sense of belonging and
social identity Barry Wellman (2001)
6
How did the concept of virtual communities evolve?
The Internet is the network of networked
computers. Since it is basically all cables,
wires and microprocessors, the Internet can
carry and kind of data, such as email, and
computer programs. (David Gauntlett,
2000)
7
A new concept for communities?
Before the Internet, communities were people who
lived or worked close to each other. If you
were lucky, you might have a community of
like-minded people, although it was unlikely that
you world get a very compatible bunch all in the
same place. The global Internet transforms this
for those, as always, who have access to it
because it enables like-minded people to form
communities regardless of where they are located
in the physical world. (David Gauntlett, 2000)
8
The World Wide Web (Berners Lee, 1993)
  The introduction of the Web was not only a
technological breakthrough, but also a user
breakthrough. Replacing tricky file transfer
protocol and burdening some gopher with a
simple, point-and-click graphical interface, the
web helped to foster a less technical, more
mainstream Internet populace. (Silver,
2000)
9
Cyberspace (William Gibson 1982) The Virtual
alternative
A conceptual phrase, that aims to describe the
space where words, Human relationships, data,
wealth and power are manifested by people using
Computer Mediated Communication (Rheingold
2000)
10
The mechanics of cyberspace platforms for
computer mediated communication
  Synchronous MUDS (Multi-User
Dungeons) Chat rooms
Asynchronous Mailing Lists Bulletin Boards
11
Communities in extract - synchronous
A says well wondered if you would do me the
massive favour of keeping and looking in
newspapers for rented accomodation, 300,
sharing with someone, 2 beds. i dont reckon im
going to find it. i spoke to my uncle and i'm not
going to buy because it is too much
responsibility to put on my sis and me while im
away. A says but its proving so expensive to
move to win B says well what does he think
might happen to the house when your away? B
says of course i can keep the papers for you A
says nothing, it is just that, and i agree, i
dont want to go away with any responsibilities,
the whole reason i am going away is to have no
responsibilities A says thanks for keeping
papers. B says yeah i suppose so A says only
thing is, is that it does feel like buying is my
only option if i want to move to Kingsworthy B
says well if you rented somewhere you would
certainly be paying less than you are now A
says yep but it isnt looking that way if i want
2 bedrooms
12
Action in MUDS
From rec.games.mud Sun Jan 26 184002 1992From
(Darin Johnson)Newsgroups rec.games.mudSubject
Re MUD practical jokes? gt Has anyone ever
pulled some neato practical jokes on Muds,
whether it be tricking people into paging other
people through spoofed pages, giving newbies fake
rules on how to play, etc? Well, I had a bit of
an elaborate one a couple of us pulled on our
number one wiz Horvendile (I'm number two, so I
can get away with it sometimes). Anyway, we were
talking about putting a casino in somewhere,
however, I was not too fond of this idea right
off, since every other mud has some dorky place
to gamble (esp lpmuds with a laissez faire
management). So while brainstorming into ways to
make this other than the typical casino joint, we
hit upon the a new twist, and made Horvendile the
victim. So we set up our casino which was hidden
behind a secret door in a fireplace. The actual
lpc files were carefully hidden away, giving them
innocuous names in other wizards directories.
These files would then be copied somewhere else,
the room loaded, and then the copies deleted.
This way, source code couldn't be examined to
find out what was going on. (I was planning on
changing mudlib code so a dummy file would show
up if you listed the file, but decided against
it) So finally, things were finished, and we
loaded it up. I sat around snooping Horvendile,
relaying the events to the other cohorts. Odd
sounds were heard behind the fireplace, and some
players were going in and out from there. So
Horvendile pokes around, finds the entrance and
goes in. What he sees is the Ladies Auxiliary
Bingo Game, with numbers being called out at
random. He takes a peek at the file, and
discovers it isn't on the system. Oh well, no
biggie, just destruct the room, probably Darin
forgot to do this after a test.
13
Communities in extract - asynchronous
After running Security Update 2002-11-21 via
Software Update, I restarted to a kernel
panic. Booting off my os 10.2 installer disk and
running Disk Repair, I was told Disk Repair had
found problems but could not repair them.
Restarted into os 9.2.2 from my second hard
drive, and ran Diskwarrior. Diskwarrior reported
the following (as you can see my username is
"jesse" and my hard drive is "Euclid")
------------------- Overlapped files are
files that occupy portions of the disk already
occupied by another file. These files will be
relocated after replacing the directory. You must
inspect these files to determine which of them
had been overwritten and damaged. Be aware that
opening damaged files can cause the computer to
crash. ------------------- After running
Diskwarrior, my computer boots to the login
window, but logging in as "jesse" causes the
computer to hang up forever. I can only
successfully login as my second ("Guest")
account. At this point, running Disk Repair from
my os 10.2 disk results in "No problems found".
Since I'm running the newest version of os 10.2,
I cannot (according to Apple) reinstall from
my 10.2 disk without erasing the drive. Surely
there is something else I can do? Any help
appreciated.
14
Action on the discussion board
Re November, a rough month in teaching.
  You would think it would be easy. Getting
through the beginning of a new school year
and having days off for Veteran's Day, Election
Day, and The Thanksgiving Holiday. I find this
month very stressful and wondered if others also
do and why? It seems to happen to me every year
and I can't figure out why? I agree with you. I
think the students have the days off and they
tend to loose their concentration. With the
holiday season (beginning with Thanksgiving)
approaching they are more hyper. The weather gets
cooler/colder and lets face it if you live where
the leaves fall, it could look and feel gloomier
for all. Also, it gets dark early. It takes me a
while to get use to late fall and I tend to
be stressed out more with personal things like my
kids coming home from college and cooking a big
turkey next week.
15
Critics define virtual communities
Virtual communitiesare incontrovertibly social
spaces in which people still meet face-to-face,
but under new definitions of both meet and
face. (Stone 1991)   A group of
people who may or may not meet one another
face-to-face, and who exchange words and ideas
through the mediation of computer bulletin boards
and networkswe chat and argue, engage in
intellectual discourseshare emotional supportgos
sip, feud, fall in love, find friends and lose
them, play gameswe do everything people do when
people get together, but we do it with words on
computer screens, leaving our bodies behind.
(Rheingold 1993)
16
Rather than providing a replacement for the
crumbling public realm, virtual communities are
actually contributing to its decline. Theyre
another thing keeping people indoors and off the
streets. Just as TV produces couch potatoes, so
on-line culture creates mouse potatoes, people
who hide from real life and spend their whole
life goofing off in cyberspace.
(McClellan 1994)   The Internet is
another in a line of modern technologies that
undermine traditional notions of civil society
that require unity and shun multiplicity while
giving impressions that they in fact re-create
such a society. (Jones 1997)  
17
The dystopian rants, or the utopian raves
(Silver 2000)
18
The rant
Dystopians (Birkerts, Sale, Stoll), blame virtual
communities/ cyberspace for Deteriorating
Literacy Political and economic
alienation Social fragmentation
19
The rave
The Utopians (Rheingold, Rossetto, Keegan, Vice
President Al Gore (1995) believe Cyberspace/
virtual communities To be a new frontier of
civilisation Foster democratic
participation End social and economic inequities

20
Issues to consider
If the Internet can foster communities of
like-minded artists and poets, it can also give a
home to groups of like-minded Nazis and child
Molesters. (David Gauntlett, 2000)
21
Misunderstandings in text- based virtual
communities
YOU ARE SUCH A PIG
?YOU ARE SUCH A PIG !!?
22
Cultural impact on Real Life - Gender stereotypes
Womenjoining existing forums have found
themselves in unfamiliar, and sometimes hostile
territory (Brail, 1995, Camp, 1995, Kendall,
1995, 1998a)
23
Issues of Gender in Virtual Communities
Florin has arrived. Shub says Baron Florin of
Shamptabarung Copperhead says hi Florin Florin
says Shub, copperhead, who the hell is
copperhead? Shub says Copperhead is your future
wife, Florin Copperhead WHULPS at the thought of
being Florins wife Florin says bah. Every woman
on this earth bleeds from the crotch at the
thought of being my wife Florin isnt sure
whether its GOOD or BAD, but thats what they
DO Allia(a woman) thinks every women on this
earth gets a yeast infection at the thought of
being Florins wife. Florin says SILENCE UNSHORN
HUSSY
24
The new Public Space vs. the Digital Divide
In the 1990s, Internet enthusiasts noted the
kinds of discussions taking Place taking place in
newsgroups (text discussion forums), and argued
that, when even more people had access, the net
would bring about a healthy public
sphere. (David Gauntlett, 2000)
25
The Digital Divide
the digital divide between certain groups of
Americans has increased between 1994 and 1997 so
that there is now an even greater disparity in
penetration levels among some groups. There is a
widening gap, for example between those at upper
and lower income levels. Additionally, even
though all racial groups now own more computers
that they did in 1994, Blacks and Hispanics now
lag even further behind Whites in their levels
of PC ownership and Online access (NTIA
1998)
26
Real life cultural impact Exploring the
possibilities
  Virtual reality need not be a prison. It can
be the raft, the ladder, the transitional space,
the moratorium that is discarded after reaching
greater freedom. We dont have to reject life
on the screen, but we dont have to treat it as
an alternative life either. (Sherry Turkle,
1995)
27
Sounding the Site
28
The interface design