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Internet and Communities of Interest |
The most obvious way of examining how IT relates to communities
is to look at communities of interest. Essentially, the Internet and surrounding
technologies can be thought of as enabling communities to form outside the boundaries
of physical space. To find others of similar interests, we need not rely on
personal acquaintances, official trade groups or associations, magazines, etc.
Combining the ability of anyone to publish with the searchability of the World
Wide Web (and now Usenet),
it is possible to find people with almost any
interest and connect with those people.
As a result, many have bragged that the Internet will make us free
from local communities, create a true society of ideas and other such utopian
dreams.
It is true that these dreams are very enticing. It is easy to see a surrounding,
established society as limiting, if one chooses to specialize in any direction
away from the accepted norm. A gay teenager in the Midwestern United States
may feel that his community is something to be escaped, and finds nurturing
communities to help him cope with his immediate surroundings; parents of children
with rare diseases would never be able to find a support group in their
local area. Less extreme, we see academics able to communicate and share research
with great ease across institutions, countries, and even disciplines. Hobbyists
can find specialty goods; craftspeople can target specific audiences.
There are, however, numerous criticisms to this perspective, and to the entire
social phenomenon of the Internet. This text deals with one: what about the
local communities? Are they to be a relic of history? How about the communities
that lack access to IT technologies? Aside
from issues of how IT can be seen to interact with community development, other
attacks may be leveled against an Internet-enabled society.
Paul Virilio attacks how IT affects human relationships. Studies have shown
how Internet use can harm one's social life.
We can also grow concerned about the increase of specialization. As academics
focus more and more on a interdisciplinary topics of research, should we grow
concerned that one might have more to do with a dozen colleagues around the
world than ones own department? Attention must be paid to what is being devalued
as new potentials are being exploited. Some study has been done on how using
the Internet affects the social patterns
of individuals.
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Allan Friedman
January, 2002