Assignment 7: Communities

Amanda Walker claims that “Every advance in communication changes the nature of reality and the way we experience it… The internet is yet another revolutionary method of communication. For the first time in the history of the world I can have an ongoing, fast-moving conversation with people regardless of their physical location, schedule, or other such contraints… The world is changing, and we are the ones doing it, whether we realize it or not” (Wellman & Gulia, 1997). The internet, having so much communication going on at once through different mediums available via the internet, has become so broad and involved that communities have developed. I am personally apart of the Facebook community. I have not had my Facebook account for long but I remember that when it was first introduced it took off in popularity. It used to be only allowed to college students but the rights to use it were recently relinquished to high school students so as a result, communication via Facebook has increased.
The different applications that Facebook has allowed are different ways to communicate at different levels. There are many levels of self disclosure and an individual has set different standards of self disclosure depending on different situations. I myself am a private person so my Facebook profile is rather plain but it has enough of my interests and hobbies listed to give a rough sketch of the type of person I am. I did this so that when others view it, it wouldn’t be completely boring. Being a part of the Facebook community, it almost has a set of standards to go with it. You should have a lot of friends, even if you don’t stay inconact with all of them, lots of interests and hobies, as well as status should be listed, as well as the groups that you belong to. Having filled out all of these things communicates a first impression to the reader. Another form of communication via Facebook is posting messages on “walls.” It’s almost like an IM but you won’t necessarily receive a response rigth away. You can also send your friends “gifts” as it were. They come in all forms of virtual things like an American flag to a zebra. You can also give your friends bumperstickers, post-its, or poke them. They even have a “rate your friends” or “top friends” application. Its showing who is most important. Not all of these things are recieveing verbal communication; in fact most of them can be considered non-verbal responses and not just to the people involved.
All of these things can affect your relationships and social ties with other people who are in the Facebook community. The virtual community’s article emphasizes that even though people can find many social resources on the internet, there is no evidence that points to whether or not the relationships are narrow or broad based even though it fosters many specialized relationships (Wellman and Guilia, 1997). I know that I have many friends on Facebook that I have ablsolutely no connection with anymore, but I don’t think I will ever delete them from my friends list because I did once know them and I will never know what may happen in the future to me socially.
“For many, the category of friend carries an aura of exclusivity and intimacy unlike the categories acquaintance or contact, which suggest familiarity but not closeness” (Boyd, 2006). Facebook field’s communication but it doesn’t provide closeness between people. If my boyfriend and I could only communicate only using Facebook there is a high possibility that we would drift apart. It does not provide constant communication at times and the applications used can give off many of the wrong impressions to people. A lot of it is based on assumption so that is why I think it is very hard to try and gauge relationships and social ties on Facebook.

References:

Boyd, Danah. 2006. Friends, Friendsters, and Top 8: Writing community into being on social
network sites. Retrieved from https://ublearns.buffalo.edu/webapps/portal/frameset.jsp?
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Wellman, Barry & Gulia Milena. 1997. Net Surfers Don’t Ride Alone: Virtual Communities As
Communities. Retrieved from https://ublearns.buffalo.edu/webapps/portal/frameset.jsp?
tab_id=_2_1&url=%2fwebapps%2fblackboard%2fexecute%2flauncher%3ftype%3dCourse%
26id%3d_61661_1%26url%3d