I've been away taking care of personal stuff. But on one of the plane rides to or from all of that, I had the pleasure of reading danah boyd's Friends, Friendsters, and Top 8: writing community into being on social network sites. I admit that this has been on my reading list since I saw her post on many2many back in early December, but I made a point to read this now so that I'd (hopefully) have something intelligent to say to her when we meet later this weekend at ALA-Midwinter (btw: so looking forward to seeing folks in person!).
This doesn't happen to me a lot, I promise, but I think I have an intellectual crush (don't worry, it's very professional) on danah boyd. And when I meet her, I might, if I'm not too shy, ask her what she thinks (if anything) of the distinction between speaking and writing, and if she thinks the format of our communication makes any difference in the formation of social connections in online communities. I thought of this after reading her paper, and then Richard Powers' essay How to Speak a Book (NYT Book Review Jan 07, 2007). Will speaking our communities into being be another bridge between real-time and virtual connection?
Side note: the thought of switching to speak from write terrifies me. But maybe that's a sign that I am getting older and set in my tappity tap ways. Maybe. I guess we'll see...
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3 comments:
I promise i don't bite.
The unfortunate thing about todays world is we communicate less through speech and more virtual or online.
I am a big victim of this, i never phone people, i instant message on my PC.
I run several successfully businesses all of which are online. I order car parts online, i do my banking online.
My entire livelihood and communications is online, whether its getting customers their car parts, or ordering stock of car parts, or dealing with vehicle salvage.
in many ways it drives you nuts, however without it i would not be who i am today
"I am a big victim of this, i never phone people, i instant message on my PC."
That is my dream world, never having to talk to people on the phone, I hate telephones. It's so much easier for me to email or IM or SMS.
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