Hi Peter, (01)
It's been almost a year since we spoke at the Blue Oxen launch. I'm
glad we're connecting again after a long pause. (02)
On Jan 8, 2004, at 11:46 AM, Peter P. Jones wrote: (03)
> Could you expand a little on the 'quality of a user's identity...'?
> In your article it seems to correspond with 'non-dissonant ego-
> tripping'. Quoting:
> "Once a user has established an online identity, he experiences the
> “community effect,” a sense of belonging that binds him to where his
> identity is as long as his status of being a recognized personality
> is maintained." (04)
Ah, this was just a way of saying that once you feel like you're a part
of something bigger, you tend to invest more of your energy in keeping
a good thing going, but if things start falling apart, people start
thinking of jumping ship. I'm sure all of us on this list are a part
of number of lists or communities, but we've got our favorites or
perhaps even a single favorite one. If we have that one favorite
group, it's likely because there's an element of non-dissonant
ego-tripping involved. It's nice to be acknowledged and addressed
directly, yeah? (05)
> Surely there are people who bind to communities yet lurk
> unobtrusively. Do they have 'recognised personality' motivation? (06)
This is certainly true and their motivation is really the same as the
underlying motivation of those who have the 'recognized personality'
motivation. When I picked 'identity' as the quality to key in on, it's
because it's something that's easier to provide than the even more
amorphous quality of "sense of belonging." (07)
Lurkers are indeed a sleeping factor of all online communities. While
most of them have very little public identity, many do identify with
the community as a whole. Since there's not a whole lot that you can
do to gauge the level of engagement that you're getting with lurkers,
just provide them with the best user experience possible and focus on
the visible participants who'll largely determine the overall
personality of the community. (08)
Now, I may have downplayed the role of utility in managing an online
community, but I'm not suggesting that utility isn't that big of a
deal. Especially for lurkers, utility is a very important value. What
I'm really suggesting is that in an environment where it's so chaotic
that identity is impossible, utility is going to suffer as well. (09)
> Relatedly, I'm quite noisy on this list, but I'm not sure I'm here to
> ego-trip (honest). I'm just hanging about because I know there are
> geniuses out there just dying to be noisier and fry my neurons with
> great ideas. (010)
I'm here for the same reasons! (011)
Sheldon (012)
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