Jeanne asked what up with social networking sites like MySpace and Facebook. She's skeptical about their uses. I thought I would start with a brief explanation of where social networking is going and why. We are studying and creating global networks through my doc program, it's a requirement.
The big thing in business and education currently are communities of practice. I will give you the most widely used definition of it introduced by modern social learning theorist Lave & Wenger. These are the social learning guru's of today who believe in situated learning by actively being involved through a community environment (co-participation).
According to Etienne Wenger (1998), a community of practice defines itself along three dimensions:
What it is about – its joint enterprise as understood and continually renegotiated by its members.
How it functions - mutual engagement that bind members together into a social entity.
What capability it has produced – the shared repertoire of communal resources (routines, sensibilities, artefacts, vocabulary, styles, etc.) that members have developed over time. (see, also Wenger 1999: 73-84)
So the social networking sites are way of building a community of practice (interests). It's a tool (artifact) used in the practice. These people do meet up or collaborate in real life at conferences, through grants, research and projects. These networks and collaborative efforts may have been a result of joining an online community. It's having a global presence that is important and the web is the best way for reaching beyond the immediate realm of your workplace. Going beyond your workplace to a national or even international presence. By doing this you are not limiting your expertise you are expanding your possibilities for greater success.
So what's up with social networking?
ReplyDeleteWell, it is about rapid communication. It's about having control over your content and having the ability to post instantly and have an effect on pop culture (if you are lucky - check out the number of views "Leave Britney alone" video on YouTube).
All this new and wondrous technology enables everyone to communicate on the same level. Editorial filters are fading into the background. Intellectual property issues loom large. And it's impact on "old media" (You Tube presidential debates)has been evident for some time.
SN was/is being picked up the younger crowd but it will be adopted by business as a tool - if not already.
At one time rock and roll was considered a teenage fad.
Check out a band called The Rolling Stones.
Pam -- Thanks for your review of this topic. I think we will indeed move beyond email to communities of Interest. I think for many of my projects we will be setting up "share point" communities using NMSU's free software. I really don't like the fact it is microsoft, but it has the security we need for the Afghanistan project.
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