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Online Communities
Jenny Preece
- What is an Online Community?
- Introduction: different ways of defining an online community
- Brief history
- From the development of email to the Internet
- Pioneers
- Roxanne Hiltz and Murray Turoff
- Howard Rheingold
- Doug Schuler
- Sherry Turkle
- Sproull and Kiesler
- Impact of the Internet, E-commerce etc.
- Communities for different topics
- E-commerce
- Health
- Education
- Communities of Practice
- General interest
- Software Genres
- Briefly review main genres
- Synchronous and asynchronous
- Listserver communities
- Bulletin board communities
- Chats
- Web-based communities
- MUDs, MOOs, Computer Virtual environments (cross ref ch 31)
- Key theoretical issues
- Psychology of interacting online
- Presence - text, avatars, and other forms of representation of self
- Benefits of not being face to face
- Problems of not being face to face
- Social dynamics online
- Developing common ground
- Critical mass
- Reciprocity, social dilemmas, co-operation and trust
- Challenges and Agenda for Developers
- Communities evolve they are not just designed.
- The goal: attract members and encourage them to come back.
- Purposes, people, policies,
- Places and activities
- How developing online communities is different from developing other software.
- Designing for Usability and sociability.
- Community-centered development.
- Challenges and Agenda for Moderators and Managers
- Supporting evolution. How much control and presence?
- The goal: to make sure people come back.
- Supporting the community’s purpose. Staying on topic.
- Taking a lead and encouraging others.
- Dealing with inappropriate behavior.
- Challenges and Agenda for Researchers
- Application and development of appropriate theory for understanding online communities.
- Supporting the interaction issues discussed in chapter 5.
- Measuring success.
- Research methods for studying online communities.
- Summary and conclusions
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