Talk:Online community

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This article was the subject of a Wiki Education Foundation-supported course assignment, between 26 August 2019 and 4 January 2020. Further details are available on the course page. Student editor(s): Tug81154.

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Fixing a source

In Roles section, the article states that "For an online community to flourish there needs to be consistent participation, interest, and motivation." However the source (Tardini & Cantoni 2005) doesn't mention this. So maybe this sentence was quoted from somewhere else. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Mommy's Little Helper (talk • contribs) 10:17, 15 February 2021 (UTC)

history doesn't go back very far

The history starts more or less with: "Some of the earliest forms of online community websites included TheGlobe.com (1994), GeoCities (1994), and Tripod.com (1995)"? What about Usenet (1980), PLATO (1973), or BBSs? --Delirium (talk) 01:44, 26 May 2010 (UTC)

Life cycle section discussion

I am what the article considers a "lurker", yet this is not a circumstance I see I must "proceed forward" from. I am happy with my position relative to this community.

"outbound" also doesn't always happen that way, nor is it always so "pretty". often times the changes are not in the outbound person as implied, they are instead in the organization. Other times, "outbound" is not voluntary. people have been pushed out of most communities in cyberspace.

this is all very much an "idealized" view, more of what is expected to happen as opposed to reality; the corporate view as opposed to what actually happens. 96.24.93.114 (talk) 19:40, 21 January 2012 (UTC)

-- I would have to agree with your understanding of the title lurker. Each person within the life cycle or ecosystem has a level of need that must be present for a user to move beyond their current role. Look at Maslow's Hierarchy of Needs as a good base of backing. Also there are two different kinds of lurkers as well. One active and one passive. Thejournalizer (talk) 19:45, 6 December 2012 (UTC)

Newcomers in online communities

Hi all, First, I changed this discussion section's title into "life cycle section discussion", so that other people have questions regarding to this topic can also fit in.

Second, I am going to add a new section under the "life cycle" part and I am going to talk about the "newcomers in online communities" which I think is really important for online community studies.

For the section I am going to add, I will first from the newcomers' perspective talk about the barriers faced by them when entering the online communities. I will use paper "A systematic literature review on the barriers faced by newcomers to open source software projects" as my main resource.

I will then mainly talk about from the communities side that the challenges and design suggestions when dealing with newcomers. I will use the framework from the book "Building Successful Online Communities" chapter 5: "The challenges of Dealing with Newcomers" to summarize the 5 challenges and design suggestions made in the book.

Thanks, and let me know if you have any other suggestions.

Reference 1: Igor Steinmacher, Marco Aurelio Graciotto Silva, Marco Aurelio Gerosa, David F. Redmiles, A systematic literature review on the barriers faced by newcomers to open source software projects, Information and Software Technology, Volume 59, March 2015, Pages 67-85, ISSN 0950-5849, http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.infsof.2014.11.001.

Reference 2: Robert E. Kraut, Paul Resnick, Sara Kiesler, Yuqing Ren, Yan Chen, Moira Burke, Niki Kittur, John Riedl, and Joseph Konstan. 2012. Building Successful Online Communities: Evidence-Based Social Design. The MIT Press.

---Ang li (talk) 20:05, 27 October 2016 (UTC)

way to see total page views for "online community" ?

i want to see the total page views for "online community" article.. right now, i can see views at the link below, but only in 90 day durations and only by months. I am hoping to find the total views between January 11, 2010, and now. (This is for a research project involving Wikipedia and how Wikipedians define "online community")

http://stats.grok.se/en/latest/Online_community

thank you very much!!

Mollygk (talk) 05:09, 29 November 2012 (UTC)

As I said on -en-help, the answer is 197858. :) Legoktm (talk) 05:44, 29 November 2012 (UTC)

Thank you Legoktm! I posted this before I went into the help chat, and I really appreciate your calculations :) Mollygk (talk) 07:10, 29 November 2012 (UTC)

How about some images?

Some skillfully-placed diagrams, figures, or appropriate representative photographs (i.e. not just the logo of someone's favorite website), would help improve the look of this article. --Animalparty-- (talk) 23:24, 12 November 2013 (UTC)

Removed selfpub/poorly-cited section

I removed the "Lack of real-world social interactions" section in its entirety. It was originally added in a spate of WP:SELFPUB/spam referencing in 2012 - for detailed notes, see https://en.wiki.x.io/wiki/User_talk:70.52.184.6. This section appears to have been edited since then, and contains a huge string of uncited or poorly cited facts and no credible references. If this section is of great interest to someone, please fix at least some of the fact/clarifaction tags, and include credible references, before reverting. X14n (talk) 22:34, 7 June 2014 (UTC)

Dr. Robert E. Kraut's comment on this article

Dr. Robert E. Kraut has recently published the following research publications which are related to this Wikipedia article:

• Reference 1: Zhu, Haiyi, R. E. Kraut, and Aniket Kittur. "Doing What Needs To Be Done: Effects of Goals in Self-Governed Online Production Groups." ACM Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems. 2011., Number of Citations: 1

• Reference 2: Ren, Yuqing, et al. "Increasing commitment to online communities: Designing from theory." University of Minnesota, Minneapolis, MN (2010)., Number of Citations: 3

• Reference 3: Ren, Yuqing, and Robert E. Kraut. "Agent-based modeling to inform online community theory and design: Impact of discussion moderation on member commitment and contribution." Second round revise and resubmit at Information Systems Research (2010)., Number of Citations: 5

• Reference 4: Kiesler, Sara, et al. Regulating behavior in online communities. MIT Press, 2012., Number of Citations: 10

• Reference 5: Kraut, Robert, et al. "Beyond information: Developing the relationship between the individual and the group in online communities." Information Systems Research 10 (2010)., Number of Citations: 11

Professor Robert E. Kraut has reviewed this Wikipedia page, and provided us with the following comments to improve its quality:

The section on Online learning could be substantially reduced, with pointers to the E-learning - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia and Massive Open Online Course (MOOC) - Wikipedia articles.

A Armstrong and J Hagel of the Harvard Business Review, addresses a handful of elements that are key to the growth of an online community and its success in drawing in members. HBR is a tertiary source & shouldn't be relied upon. There are many better reviews of what makes online communities success.

Amy Jo Kim's membership lifecycle's work is both old & impressionistic.

In this example, the article which was available on mendeley.com focuses specifically on online communities related to business, but its points can be transferred and can apply to any online community in general as well. This sounds like personal opinion, not verified info.

Learning trajectory in participation. Refer to Preece & Sheiderman's Reader to Leader Framework. But other research suggests that people who become heavy contributors are heavy at day one. E.g., Panciera, K., Halfaker, A., & Terveen, L. (2009). Wikipedians are born, not made: A study of power editors on Wikipedia Proceedings of the ACM 2009 international conference on supporting group work table of contents (pp. 51-60 ). New York: ACM Press.

We hope Wikipedians on this talk page can take advantage of these comments and improve the quality of the article accordingly.

ExpertIdeasBot (talk) 22:03, 31 October 2014 (UTC)

Trolling

First off, apologies for the edit I quickly slapped together and undid reverts to, repeatedly. But I still hold my position, I believe the trolling & harassment section is in need of large overhaul. I cannot give valid sources for this (apparently), and as useful as UrbanDic is, I see how it is not considered a valid source. In any case, the definition of "trolling" in this article (and others) poorly reflects the actual goals and motivations of trolls, their community itself, and what they actually do in the first place, and rather reflects the bastardised definition the media in recent years has felt the need to vomit outwards into the farthest reaching points of society, this being of the child-like assholes (and on occasion, actual children) on Twitter that so beautifully demonstrate to us how screwed we are in any effort to find a positive use for the lower half of the 21st century's generation. But I digress, this section wholly needs a massive revamp. If any professional Wikipedians are reading, and believe have the ability to complete the difficult task of researching and evaluating for this topic, fulfilling the glorious prophecy I have foretold, and restoring the public image of trolls and trollers alike, I shall forever be in their debt. Thank you. 206.45.27.179 (talk) 15:40, 19 April 2015 (UTC)

I can't help you as I don't have the credentials or confidence to edit the article but I do completely agree. Trolling is NOT about making death threats and rape threats, or in any way associated with racism. It's more about taking a contrary point of view, one you usually don't actually hold, and watch people argue over it (or argue with you) and get flustered. That's what a troll does, they aren't harmful, just like to wind people up for their amusement. I'm certain the mainstream media are bastardizing the term on purpose now. Marko Markovic777 (talk) 21:36, 21 August 2022 (UTC)

Role of invisible audience in online communities

As Michael Bernstein shows in his "Quantifying Invisible Audience in Social Networks", lurkers or invisible audience are one reason of members' participation in online communities. So, following paragraph can be added to the participation or motivation section of the article:

Users’ perception of audience is another reason that makes users participate in online communities. Results showed that users usually underestimate their amount of audiences in online communities. Social media users guess that their audience is 27% of its real size. Regardless of this underestimation, it is shown that amount of audience affect users to self-presentation and also content production which means a higher level of participation.

Here is the link of supporting article: http://static2.volkskrant.nl/static/asset/2013/Facebook_1462.pdf

Daraei.sara (talk) 22:17, 5 December 2016 (UTC)Daraei.sara

@Daraei.sara: Could you please add this information to the article? Btw. please don't forget to sign your talk page posts. --Fixuture (talk) 08:14, 2 November 2016 (UTC)

Online health communities

As another type of online communities, online health communities could be added to this article because of heavy usage of online health communities by internet users. I am interested to use these articles in order to add this parts. Here is what I think is good to be added to the article:

Online health communities is one example of online communities which is heavily used by internet users [1, 2, 3]. A key benefit of online health communities is providing user access to other users with similar problems or experiences which has a significant impact on the lives of their members [1]. Through people participation, online health communities will be able to offer patients opportunities for emotional support [4, 5] and also will provide them access to experience-based information about particular problem or possible treatment strategies. Even in some studies, it is shown that users find experienced-based information more relevant than information which was prescribed by professionals [6, 7, 8]. Moreover, allowing patients to collaborate anonymously in some of online health communities suggests users a non-judgmental environment to share their problems, knowledge, and experiences [9].

These are some sources I am willing to use:

[1] Neal, Lisa, et al. "Online health communities." CHI'07 Extended Abstracts on Human Factors in Computing Systems. ACM, 2007.

[2] Chou, Wen-Ying Sylvia, et al. "Social media use in the United States: implications for health communication." Journal of medical Internet research 11.4 (2009): e48.

[3] Chou, Wen-ying Sylvia, et al. "Health-related Internet use among cancer survivors: data from the Health Information National Trends Survey, 2003–2008." Journal of Cancer Survivorship 5.3 (2011): 263-270.

[4] Farnham, S., et al. HutchWorld: clinical study of computer-mediated social support for cancer patients and their caregivers. (2002) In Proc. CHI 2002, 375-382.

[5] Maloney-Krichmar, D. and Preece, J. A multilevel analysis of sociability, usability, and community dynamics in an online health community. (2005) ACM TOCHI 12, 2, 201-232.

[6] Lasker, J.N., Sogolow, E.D., and Sharim, R.R. The role of an online community for people with a rare disease: content analysis of messages posted on a primary biliary cirrhosis mailinglist. (2005) Journal of Medical Internet Research 7, 1, e10.

[7] Frost, J. and Massagli, M. PatientsLikeMe the case for a data-centered patient community and how ALS patients use the community to inform treatment decisions and manage pulmonary health. (2009) Chronic Respiratory Disease 6, 4, 225 -229.

[8] Preece, J. Empathic communities: reaching out across the Web. (1998) interactions 5, 2, 32-43.

[9]. Hwang, K.O., et al. Social support in an Internet weight loss community. (2010) International Journal of Medical Informatics 79, 1, 5-13.

Daraei.sara (talk) 22:17, 5 December 2016 (UTC)Daraei.sara

@Daraei.sara: Could you please add this to the article yourself as well? It's more than good as it stands and if people would like to improve it they can simply edit the article.

Oh and for the references instead of numbering and listing them you simply write <ref>Neal, Lisa, et al. "Online health communities." CHI'07 Extended Abstracts on Human Factors in Computing Systems. ACM, 2007.</ref> where you wrote [1] etc.--Fixuture (talk) 08:14, 2 November 2016 (UTC)

Removal of Online Health and Online Learning sections

At the end of the article there are two sections for Online Health Communities, and Online Learning Communities. I would query whether these sections are necessary given that there are already two existing articles about these topics (that are more indepth) here and here. I would suggest removing these two sections and adding in references to the two existing sections in the See Also section. Perhaps it would be pertinent to include a section on Typologies which would encompass these? Let me know what you think.

Gallags6 (talk) 14:50, 16 March 2017 (UTC)

Support for merging these sections out to their articles and only linking to them from the see alsos. Good finding. Btw I'm not sure if {{Split section}} should have been used. --Fixuture (talk) 19:27, 24 April 2017 (UTC)

Merging the two articles Virtual community & Web community into Online community

Discussion at talkpage of Web community: [[Link]] CN1 (talk) 15:49, 23 July 2017 (UTC)

Online Communities

Online Communities.

Social Networks have improved the system of online communication, with Facebook being the big step up for it, being introduced in 2004, this has helped Communities around the world from being small to big just by getting people who have interests in a specific area to join the community.

If it wasn't for social networking we are sure to have a overly boring life because barely anyone would want to share their interests.

Online Communities are very thankful for how they have pages like Instagram, snap chat, Facebook and latest step ups being Skype and Discord have been introduced as it has brought the world together. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Shaughn KeighleyCollege16 (talk • contribs) 14:02, 11 October 2018 (UTC)

A negative impact on a online community are that they have a bad impact on humans as the time spent online is worse than it has ever been and it is making people look down on there phones than look up where they are going or what they are missing. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Ryan Hills16 (talk • contribs) 14:59, 11 October 2018 (UTC)

Niche online communities

Much of this article, like much of the academic research, focuses on fairly large communities and treats community growth as the most important outcome. We published an article last year where we surveyed founders about their motivations and goals for starting new communities (article here, pdf here). Our research suggests that most communities are never intended to grow large but intentionally cover niche topics.

I'm likely biased because it's my area of research, but I'd love to see some coverage of niche communities in this article. --Jdfoote (talk) 19:46, 11 December 2018 (UTC)

@Jdfoote: It is a good idea. To the extent that the claims in your paper generalize to online communities in general and do not only apply to Wikia I would invite you to share it here.

Wikipedia seeks to cite the best available sources and if you found those or created those in your research then please edit Wikipedia what what you have. Bluerasberry (talk) 19:15, 10 January 2019 (UTC)

Step Zero: define "member"

I studied this stuff two decades ago, intending to turn it eventually into a book or at least magazine article, which didn't happen. Still, I'm sensitive to what's being missed here.

The fourteenth word in the article is member, which doesn't appear to be in any way defined, or link to someone else's definition.

In the real world (i.e., interacting with other human beings without need for electrical power), "a member of a group" requires that an individual at some point actually show up & be part of a physical gaggle. Meanwhile, to be "a member of an organization," the implication is that the individual has paid a fee or dues or in some other way contributed in an ongoing manner to the group. Quite different, but two vital points in common:

1. the group somehow chooses to accept someone as member, &
2. the individual contributes to the group, with the implication that lack of contribution interrupts or ends the membership.

In contrast, "an online community" is probably something that allows anyone to wander freely in, without input in any way from the group, generally at the whim of some owner, Administrator, or Moderator, and by whim as simply removed (suspended, banned) without input from the group at large & maybe even against the clearly stated wishes of the majority.

Furthermore, nobody is required to interact, & often not even required to connect their interactions in some way to the explicit stated purpose of the "community."

Depending what site you visit, you will see "member" used to mean

• someone who has posted in the past month
• someone who applied for an account & was accepted but has never again interacted with any other person on the site
• someone who arrived via a Google hit for one small piece of interaction, & has never returned but is being tracked across the Internet by a site cookie
• someone who started an account ten years ago, but ceased interacting (including banning & death)
• accounts launched by software without human interaction

A discussion site mentioned in Music community says of their 111,830 "members," 38,717 have posted at least once, at some time. This is cited to rationalize the site being called "a music community."

Depending on context, "the Wikipedia community" might mean all users, or those who registered to edit, or the editors who actually edit, or the editors who interact in discussions about the site, or the editors who attend real-world events. At the moment, "[t]here are 35,460,507 registered users" with 125,285 active users who "have performed an action in the last 30 days". Even then, Wikipedia:About waffles, saying "[t]here are about 72,000 active contributors" across all the Wikipedias, calling to question the differences between "member" & "user" & "contributor."

If people are talking about wildly different things, it seems (at best) disingenuous to pretend they are somehow meaning the same thing. For purposes of making a properly encyclopedic article, shouldn't this be nailed down?
Weeb Dingle (talk) 21:06, 19 January 2019 (UTC)

New Introductory Paragraph

I added a new introductory paragraph to the "Online Community" page that allows for a further investigation into the subtopics that relate to the online community, including the gaming community. I was able to pull further research which will be added into the page as well. — Preceding unsigned comment added by MooreOrLess31 (talk • contribs) 20:44, 22 November 2020 (UTC)

Added Image to the Categorization Topic

I added an image titled "Visual representation of online global communities" in order to provide a better visual interpretation to those that visit the "Online Communities" page. Thus, viewers and readers are then able to notes what an online community may look like as well as how the global structure of commutation looks like. — Preceding unsigned comment added by MooreOrLess31 (talk • contribs) 20:51, 22 November 2020 (UTC)

Video "Gaming" and Online Interactions

I added this section as there was little to no information of the roles that online communities have in connection to the gaming universe. There are both positive and negatives of having an online community in games, as there may be consequences of those that seek out any destructive behavior or attitudes against others. Those negatives or problems of the gaming communities are also referenced in this section. — Preceding unsigned comment added by MooreOrLess31 (talk • contribs) 20:57, 22 November 2020 (UTC)

Monetization

I believe that this article should include a section on 'Monetization', as this has become a major part of all popular online communities, and has allowed users, businesses as well as those managing the communities to generate income from ads, donations and subscriptions. I might get round to adding this section if I have time and remember to do it. Noahdomingues (talk) 11:16, 11 August 2022 (UTC)

@Noahdomingues: It is a good idea. I encourage you to try.

I did a search for sources; here is one you might consider citing for this.

Clark, Dorie (25 September 2019). "How to Create an Online Community That People Will Pay For". Harvard Business Review.

Bluerasberry (talk) 13:27, 11 August 2022 (UTC)

Wiki Education assignment: Human Dimensions of Global Environmental Change

This article is currently the subject of a Wiki Education Foundation-supported course assignment, between 27 August 2024 and 16 December 2024. Further details are available on the course page. Student editor(s): Vhanway (article contribs).

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