third place – Debating Communities and Networks IX

Help A Sister Out: Forging positive connections on Web 2.0

Mia Lindsay

Abstract

This paper examines the Facebook page Help a Sister Out, as an example of an online community and third place. It was created in 2015 as a page for women in Perth to ask for advice and seek connections with other women on the page. By observing it as a Web 2.0 third place, it can be seen that Help a Sister Out has certain features that facilitate positive communication and connections between members. This article highlights these features, how they fit within the third place criteria and the way this creates a safe and comfortable environment for it’s members.

Introduction

The creation of online communities in Web 2.0 has broadened the idea of an active ‘third place’, initiating a movement that has seen people from across the world join together to share common interests or ideas. Aldosemani, et al (2015) defines community as “a psychological condition of feeling close to groups of individuals who share membership, influence, common needs and emotional connection” (p.1020). Help A Sister Out in Perth! (No Boys Allowed), a Facebook group created by Ninya Lishus in 2015, allows exactly this. The page provides a forum that women in Perth can join to ask questions to other members, about anything from personal advice, to restaurant or hotel recommendations, to help using Photoshop, and so on. In the 3 years since its creation, the community has grown to over 32,000 members and has 8 active administrators. The page has in many ways become an active ‘third place’, defined by Oldenburg (1989) as neutral locations where users can voluntarily enter and participate that are outside of home, known as first place, and work, known as second place. Initially this meant cafes, restaurants, parks or clubs, but the generation of Web 2.0 has allowed online forums and communities such as Help A Sister Out, to become a kind of third place. The way friendships between strangers are formed, how help and advice is sought through weak ties in the network and the way the administrative services and guidelines of the page limit negative issues are all ways in which this community facilitates positive communication and connections in a Web 2.0 third place. While there are some dangers in taking unsolicited and often uneducated advice from strangers, particularly regarding medical or financial advice, overall the effect of Help a Sister Out as a third place appears to be a positive one.

Creating and maintaining friendships

“Today we are seeing the advent of social networks formed in cyberspace. People meet in online forums and through online dating services; they keep in touch with an unprecedentedly large number of people via electronic media” (Donath & Boyd, 2004, p.1). The online third place is an important sphere in which established friendships could be maintained and strengthened, and new friendships and relationships can blossom. Baker-Eveleth emphasises how “The places become a home away from home. The third place is a comfortable arena to revisit and interact with friends” (2003, p.17). Help a Sister Out creates a comfortable and inviting third place where members are encouraged to freely ask for and give advice to and from other members. It aims to be a no judgement space where people can connect and seek support without the stresses of home or work. The aim of the community is women helping and building up other women.

In terms of creating new friendships online, Oldenburg states, “Not even to its inhabitants is the third place a particularly intriguing or exciting locale. It is simply there, providing opportunities for experiences and relationships that are otherwise unavailable”. While many question the validity of friendships formed and maintained online, which will be discussed further in later paragraphs, there are many examples of how people are welcomed and common interests are shared on the page. This can lead to online friendships being born, and those online friendships can later become real life friendships.

A friendly environment in which regular visitors encourage quieter non-regulars to participate in conversation is a defining factor in a successful third place (Baker-Eveleth, 2003, p.16). Regular members on Help a Sister Out make the page seem much more like a community than just a forum that people join, and the friendliness of those members are vital to making a friendly environment that new members want to return to.

“Users may browse members’ profiles and statuses, view photo albums, follow links to recommended, and so forth. Exploration helps physically distant users discover similarities and establish social connections, repurposing their usage to meet individual needs”. Aldosemani, et al (2015) highlights how members can utilise the features of the page to their own social advantage, using it to make connections and forge friendships.

By definition, Web 2.0 enables social interaction through networking platforms such as email, chat room or social media forums (Murugesan, 2010). The growth of these networking platforms has reversed the original friendship flow, in which you are friends with someone in real life, and then you become friends on the Internet through various forums. Now it is becoming more common for friendships and relationships to begin online and graduate in to face-to-face. An example of this is one of the many posts on the page where women are looking to make new female friends in their area. They post about their general locations, likes and interests and what they are looking for in friendship, and invite people to connect with them, subsequently forging new friendships that begin online and can later become face-to-face.

Helping each other out

The forming of friendships in these communities is not only beneficial emotionally, as discussed in the previous paragraph, but can also be beneficial in other areas of life. This is emphasised by Baker-Eveleth, who says “getting to know people and interacting with them helps create a network or web, broadening our exposure to other experiences” (2003, p.1). Donath and Boyd agree, describing social networks as “sources of emotional and financial support, and of information about jobs, other people and the world at large” (2004, p.1). Thompson (2008) discusses how the growth of weak ties through social media and online communities can help solve problems such as job hunts or information enquiries. Expanding networks beyond friends and family to distant acquaintances can be very useful because “they’re further afield, but still socially intimate enough to want to help you out”. The whole idea behind Help A Sister Out is based off this theory, as members of the group automatically feel willing to give help to people they feel associated with, usually with the knowledge that if the reverse situation was to occur, people on the page would be equally willing to help them.

With over 32,000 members, the Help A Sister Out community supports Gil de Zuniga and Valenzuela’s idea that weak ties within larger networks allow people access to information or opportunities not available within their immediate circle of family and friends (2011). The strength of these communities lies in the cycle of people forming weak ties and accessing information from them, which then encourages more participation in the community, which further forms more weak ties, and so on. Online communities in particular facilitate conversation between weak ties, as the social barriers of culture, race, gender or ethnicity, which so often stop these connections being formed offline, are not as present online.

Benefits of guidelines and administrative services

Aldosemani, et al (2015), highlight how with the inclusion of generally accepted rules and activities, an online space can also be considered a third space. The administrative services in the Help A Sister Out community play an important role in not only allowing it to become a third place, but also facilitating positive communication. Upon entering the Help A Sister Out page, there is a pinned list of rules that apply to all members of the group. These include rules such as; no meanness, nastiness or rudeness, no ‘name and shame’ posts, be polite, helpful, considerate and supportive, and all adult or sensitive posts must have a trigger warning at the top (Help A Sister Out, 2017).

Administrators have the ability to turn off comments on particular posts, delete posts and comment deemed outside of the page guidelines or remove members. These features help maintain a positive environment where women feel they can post and speak freely without fear of judgment or being attacked for their opinions, so long as those opinions aren’t hurtful. Guidelines for the framework of all online communities, not just Help A Sister Out, are important as they limit space for public humiliation or embarrassment and the sharing of private information on a public forum (Ewbank, et al, 2010, p.32). Ewbank, et al, encourage institution and community organizers to create a safe space online by revisiting and revising current codes and guidelines to limit the vulnerabilities of Web 2.0 community platforms before they become larger issues (2010, p.40).

Aldosemani, et al discuss how a third space should be “accessible and user friendly, designed to facilitate conversation, exhibit a low profile and ultimately reside on neutral ground where the organisation assumes a minimal role in fostering and monitoring conversation” (2015, p.1025). This criteria is reflected in the structure and rules of the page, in which all members are equal and the administrators play little to no role in starting conversations, but rather facilitate a forum for the conversations to occur on their own. But by monitoring the conversations and limiting negative or judgmental conversations, again there is more room created for constructive conversations.

Flaws in the community

Despite the positive conversations and connections being made on Help a Sister Out, there are some dangers to such an environment being built in a Web 2.0 third place. Members giving out unsolicited and uneducated advice on medical or financial issues can lead to a number of problems. For example, someone accepting advice on treatments for a sick child without seeking professional medical advice could very quickly go wrong if the child is wrongly diagnosed or treated. Psychologist Tony White (Ryan, 2015) warned members to be cautious when asking for advice on the page, not only for the risk of wrong advice but also that people can respond with hurtful comments if it’s a topic that may be seen as controversial (for example suicide, abortions, children’s vaccinations).

Stewart (2010) also questions the validity of online friends in comparison to real life friends. Similarly, Thompson (2008) asks, “What sort of relationships are these? What does it mean to have hundreds of ‘friends’ on Facebook? What kind of friends are they, anyway?”. He thinks that it’s possible that having so many connections online, and viewing so much content makes a person spread their emotional energy too thin that they don’t have enough for real-life intimate relationships. Donath and Boyd (2004) imply that people seek more connections online in an attempt to boost their own status, verify their sense of personal identity or to maintain a certain reputation, and thus these public connections are not real. It is possible that for many online communities this may be the case, however Help A Sister Out appears for the most part to be about women supporting other women, answering questions they might not have been able ask in their circle of family and friends, and building friendships from weak ties that offline barriers may never allow.

Conclusion

The facilitation of positive communication and connections in a Web 2.0 third place is highlighted in the case study of Perth-based Facebook community, Help A Sister Out. Involvement in the Help a Sister Out community is an example of how actively participating in a third space can have a positive affect on the rest of a person’s life. Examples of the ways that the page encourages the maintenance of existing friendships and the blossoming of new ones, how engagement with weak ties within larger communities such as this can help individual members, and the role of administrators and community codes and guidelines show the way Help a Sister Out facilitates positive communication and connections in a Web 2.0 third place. While many hold doubts about the strength of friendships created online and the validity of the advice offered on pages such as these, overall it could be seen that the environment created in these communities is a constructive one. Help a Sister Out in Perth (No Boys Allowed) brings women together from across Perth in a community that encourages women lifting each other up and offering each other immediate, mobile and publicly accessible help, advice, support and friendship in a way that would never have been possible outside an online community.

References

Aldosemani, T. I., Shepherd, C. E., Gashim, I., & Dousay, T. (2015). Developing third places to foster sense of community in online instruction. British Journal of Educational Technology, 47(6), 1020-1031. doi:10.1111/bjet.12315

Baker-Eveleth, L. (2003, August). An online third place: emerging communities of practice.

Donath, J., & boyd, d. (2004). Public Displays of Connection. BT Technology Journal, 22(4), 71-82. DRAFT http://smg.media.mit.edu/papers/Donath/socialnetdisplay.draft.pdf

Ewbank, A. D., Kay, A. G., Foulger, T. S., & Carter, H. L. (n.d.). Conceptualizing Codes of Conduct in Social Networking Communities. Social Computing. doi:10.4018/9781605669847.ch137

Gil de Zúñiga, H., & Valenzuela, S. (2010). The Mediating Path to a Stronger Citizenship: Online and Offline Networks, Weak Ties, and Civic Engagement. Communication Research, 38(3), 397-421. doi:10.1177/0093650210384984Help a Sister Out. (2017). In Facebook [group page]. Retrieved from https://www.facebook.com/groups/1555723208012564/

Oldenburg, R., & Brissett, D. (1982). The third place. Qualitative Sociology, 5(4), 265-284. Retrieved from https://doi.org/10.1007/BF0098675

Ryan, K. (2015 July 18). Help a Sister Out in Perth: Facebook site becomes a support network for WA women. ABC News. Retrieved from http://www.abc.net.au/news/2015-07-18/facebook-site-becomes-a-support-network-for-perth-women/6628318

Stewart, T. (2010). Online communities. Behaviour & Information Technology, 29(6), 555-556. Retrieved from https://doi-org.dbgw.lis.curtin.edu.au/10.1080/0144929X.2010.523615

Thompson, C. (2008). Brave New World of Digital Intimacy. The New York Times. 5 September. http://www.nytimes.com/2008/09/07/magazine/07awareness-t.html?_r=1.

Help A Sister Out: Forging positive connections on Web 2.0 by Mia Lindsay is licensed under Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International (CC BY-NC-ND 4.0)

Gaming Communities changing the way we interact

Gaming Communities PDF

Madison Matta

Abstract

Gaming communities have radically changed the way people interact with one another and its instant nature, allows people to interact and also escape in a way they could never do offline. Although online gaming has been questioned over whether it’s a legitimate community, we see that it has many similar attributes of a physical community and also many advantages, such as no geographical boundaries. Gaming communities can be seen as a ‘third place’ in which people interact in a way that they are unable to in their first place (home) and second place (work). All these concepts will then be explored in the Massively multiplayer online game World of Warcraft, a game which has substantial communities within the game and uses other mediums. It will also explore how gaming capital can directly translate to social capital and what it means to have ‘gaming capital’.

Gaming Communities changing the way we interact

Gaming communities have radically changed the way people interact online and its instant nature for people globally allows people to interact and ‘escape’ in a way they could never do offline. There have been many arguments against the legitimacy of gaming communities and whether they should be classified as ‘real communities’. Critics of online communities write that “life on the net can never be meaningful or complete because it will lead people away from the full range of in person contact. Or, conceding half the debate, they worry that people will get so engulfed in a simulacrum virtual reality, that they will lose contact with “real life’ (Wellman & Gulia,1997). This paper will argue that gaming communities are genuine communities which allow gamers to engage with each other in ways that offline communities never could, creating an ‘escape’ for those who struggle with being a part of offline communities.

Gaming as a community

For a long time, there was questions over the legitimacy of online communities and their realness from scholars, “while all this razzle-dazzle connects us electronically, it disconnects us from each other, having us “interfacing” more with computers and TV screens than looking in the face of our fellow human beings’ (Fox, 1995, p. 12). This is simply untrue, and just like in a real life community we see different types of virtual communities are emerging and at the forefront of these is the gaming community. There are many elements that make up a gaming community, A community is a group of people who come together to share similarities and interests. Preece defines online communities as “people who interact socially as they strive to satisfy their own needs to perform special roles. They also have a shared purpose, an interest or need, information exchange, or service that provides a reason for community. A community has policies, rituals, protocols and laws that guide people’s interactions. Computer systems support and mediate the online communities.” (Preece, 2000). All of these elements Preece associates with online communities, particularly the shared purpose and interest, are integral parts of the gaming community. People who are part of online gaming communities all have the shared interest of the game and the games proved a reason for community. These are all factors that make up the vast world that is the gaming community.

How gaming communities differ from offline communities

The major differences of gaming communities when compared to offline communities are what makes them such a popular alternative for people who struggle fitting into physical communities For example, being able to interact with someone from the other side of the world in a game, or being able to switch off and stop interaction whenever they want and being able to find people with shared interests because you have so much more reach. Within each game there is a community of people with at least one common interest, the game itself, and the community is only limited by a person’s access to that game. With no physical space needed to form the community gamers socialise with each other through the medium of the game, many games encouraging communication from players and teamwork to succeed. With no real restrictions on members of the gaming community they “attempt to break through some of the boundaries of race, gender, ethnicity, and geographic location established in physical communities” (Gross, Katz and Rice, 2003). Gaming communities are absent of any real institutional authority and emerge from technology, compared to offline communities which will often have institutional authority and have physical borders and exclude people gaming has a voluntary participation by its members (Katz et al., 2004). This voluntary participation from members and no physical borders are the main reasons the gaming community allows people to interact in a way they could never do in a physical community. People from all different parts of the world, from all walks of life, are brought together in way they never could before, and use these new formed relationships to engage with the game by playing, chatting and connecting with other platforms created by the game.

Gaming as ‘Third Place’

‘Third Place’ refers to the social surrounding which is different to your two usual surroundings, those usually being home (first place) and work (second place). Ray Oldenburg’s book ‘The Great Good place’ talks about the theory of Third Place stating that “individuals may belong to several formal organizations but if they have a third place it is apt to make them feel more a part of the community than those other memberships” (Oldenburg, 1999). The gaming community provides a ‘Third Place’ for its members and allows interactions with it fellow members in a way that communities at home and work cannot. In the reading ‘Online games as ‘third places’’ they explore gaming as the ‘third place’ in Massively multiplayer online video games (MMO). They explore how “By providing spaces for social interaction and relationships beyond the workplace and home, MMOs have the capacity to function as one form of a new “third place” for informal sociability much like the pubs, coffee shops, and other hangouts of old.” (Steinkuehler and Williams, 2006). All of Oldenburg (1999) criteria of the third place are met by online games, such as a neutral ground, communication, easy access and a home away from home. Although there are arguments against a game being a ‘place’ it is a space where people can come together to interact and a form a community and that’s why gaming is an example of a ‘third place’ for so many people around the world.

World of Warcraft

If we now look specifically at the game World of Warcraft (WoW) and how it changed the way people interact and allows people to interact in a way they could never do offline. ‘World of Warcraft (WoW) is one of the most popular massively multiplayer games (MMOs) to date, with more than 6 million subscribers worldwide’ (Ducheneaut Yee, Nickell & Moore, 2006), players can play against the environment or they can play against one another, players can also choose to role-play. The journal article ‘the social life of guilds in World of Warcraft’ explored the social dynamics of the game and its players. There studies discovered that “players were found to use the game to extend real-life relationships, meet new people, form relationships of varying strength, and also use others merely as a backdrop. The key moderator of these outcomes appears to be the game’s mechanic, which encourages some kinds of interactions while discouraging others.” (Williams et al., 2006). This shows that MMO such as WoW are so popular not just because of the gameplay but because of the relationships they can facilitate through the games mechanics. When people of shared interest are coming together to discuss create and play, they are fulfilling the elements scholars define to be what is needed for a community. Which further proves how games are radically changing the way people interact. When studying the relationships within the guilds, they found that they meant far more then the functional purposes they posses in the game (Williams et al., 2006). The studies found that “In nearly every social guild that lasted more than a month, members and leaders were aware of the need for a certain level of maturity, responsibility, and player welfare. This level of what can only be described as caring is remarkable given that the game is centred ostensibly around functional, not psychological or social goals. It is clear that social guilds go well past the game’s goals in creating and maintaining communities.” (Williams et al., 2006). All their findings found the MMO of WoW to be a game where the games format encouraged interaction and successfully developed relationships and attributes of a community. Concluding that “WoW is in fact a vibrant third place, populated with a range of social experiences ranging from ephemeral impersonal groups to sustained and deep relationships that extend offline.” (Williams et al., 2006).

Online gaming and Social Capital

Social capital is a form of cultural capital where social networks and groups are central to your influence. Social capital, is an integral part of analysing relationships and personal interactions and can be seen in gaming communities like World of Warcraft. The gaming mechanics for MMO affects how important it is for the players to co-operate and compete with others and how useful it is to form different kinds of sub-communities with people of greater ability establishing a higher social capital in the gaming communities. This bridging of social capital into the online gaming communities can be have positive affects on an individuals overall social capital. The journal article “Gaming Social Capital: Exploring Civic Value in Multiplayer Video Games” looks at gaming social capital and “Theorizes that gamers who develop ties and work together with a community of fellow gamers build gaming social capital, one’s sense of belonging to and participating in a gaming community which can be leveraged for individual benefit or collective good. In other words, the concept of social capital recognizes that there is some value inherent in one’s connections to other community members” (Molyneux, Vasudevan & Gil de Zúñiga, 2015) This further proves the value of being in a gaming community and why online gaming is a ‘third place’ for people to interact and react to others, with the study finding that “multiplayer video games are indeed associated with forming social ties within a community of gaming peers, a concept we call gaming social capital. This concept is distinct from but theoretically and empirically related to broader face-to-face social capital. Results suggest that gamers who develop gaming social capital are likely to develop face-to-face ties with others in their real-world community. Thus we observe a spill over effect from gaming social capital to social capital in the real world.” (Molyneux, Vasudevan & Gil de Zúñiga, 2015) This development of face-to-face ties and a spill over of social capital in the physical world shows how influential the interactions which take place online in video games can be.

Online Gaming communities have radically changed the way people can interact with one another and allows people to network in a way they could never do offline. Although there are arguments against the value of virtual communities and its ‘razzle dazzle’ from scholars such as Fox, its been proven that the attributes of a virtual gaming community have many advantages over physical communities, such as successfully breaking down boundaries of race, gender, ethnicity, and geographic location established in physical communities” (Gross, Katz and Rice, 2003). Gaming is a ‘third place’ for many people and it allows people to interact in a way that there first place (home) and second place (work) don’t allow. The MMO game World of Warcraft is an example of a third place and the interactions that take place. The way these gaming communities grow as a ‘third place’ then begins to establish an order of social capital within its members.

This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License.

References

Ducheneaut, N., Yee, N., Nickell, E., & Moore, R. (2006). Building an MMO With Mass Appeal. Games And Culture, 1(4), 281-317. doi: 10.1177/1555412006292613

Fox, Robert. 1995. “Newstrack.”communications of the ACM 38 (8): 11-12.

Gross, M., Katz, J., & Rice, R. (2003). Social Consequences of Internet Use: Access, Involvement, and Interaction. Contemporary Sociology, 32(6), 691.

Katz, J. E., Rice, R. E., Acord, S., Dasgupta, K., & David, K. (2004). Personal Mediated Communication and the Concept of Community in Theory and Practice. In P. Kalbfleisch (Ed.), Communication and Community: Communication Yearbook 28 (pp. 315-371). Mahwah, NJ: Erlbaum.

Molyneux, L., Vasudevan, K., & Gil de Zúñiga, H. (2015). Gaming Social Capital: Exploring Civic Value in Multiplayer Video Games. Journal Of Computer-Mediated Communication, 20(4), 381-399.

Oldenburg, R. (1999). The great good place: Cafés, coffee shops, bookstores, bars, hair salons, and other hangouts at the heart of a community. New York: Marlowe: Cambridge, MA : Da Capo Press.

Preece, J. (2000). Online Communities: Designing Usability, Supporting Sociability. 100(9), pp.459-460.

Steinkuehler, C. & Williams, D. (2006). Where Everybody Knows Your (Screen) Name: Online Games as “Third Places”. Journal of Computer Mediated Communication, 11(4), article http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/j.1083-6101.2006.00300.x/full

Wellman, B., & Gulia, M. (1999). Net Surfers Don’t Ride Alone: Virtual Communities as Communities. In P. Kollock, & M. Smith (Eds.), Communities and Cyberspace. New York: Routledge.

Williams, D., Ducheneaut, N., Zhang, L., Yee, N., & Nickell, E. (2006). From Tree House to Barracks: The Social Life of Guilds in World of Warcraft. Games & Culture, 1(4), 338-361.

Gaming Communities in and beyond Game Worlds

Gaming Communities in and beyond Game Worlds (Click for PDF)

Zachary Riordan

Curtin University: Bentley

Correspondence: Zachary.Riordan@student.curtin.edu.au

Abstract

This paper discusses many of the most important aspects of community in gaming, within and beyond the game world. This includes: how communities form in online games and how activities centred around gaming facilitate online communities. The paper argues that games, and online subsidiary activities centred around them, provide social benefits to participants that compliment off-line social interaction by promoting the growth of communities both within and beyond the game world. More specifically, this paper analyses and explores: game worlds, “third place”, flow, hallucination of the real, text-based messaging, Voice over Internet Protocol, playing with friends, social media content creation, and “modding”; and relates these aspects to social benefits including: bridging and bonding social capital, agency, social proximity, familiarity, and weak and strong ties.

Keywords: community, gaming, social capital, weak and strong ties.

Gaming Communities in and beyond Game Worlds

The social benefits of game play and communities created within games have been extensively researched (Trepte, Reinecke, and Juechems, 2012). In the context of 2018, communities not only thrive within games themselves but also the secondary activities surrounding the games. This paper argues that: games, and online subsidiary activities centred around them, provide social benefits to participants that compliment off-line social interaction by promoting the growth of communities both within and beyond the game world. This paper will firstly discuss how communities form within game worlds and the types of communities created. Then it will explore how these, and new, communities form and prosper via subsidiary online activities that centre around games. These subsidiary activities include, but are not limited to, social media content creation and modifying games. Throughout the paper I will also analyse the social benefits that players and participants attain because of the communities they become a part of.

In-Game Communities and Immersive Game Worlds

Online gaming has developed over multiple decades, with video games dating back over 45 years (Leaver, 2018). The realism, expansiveness and detail in video games has, obviously, increased extensively over this time. This, and the number of participants is likely to continue to increase in future years (Leaver, 2018; Kim, Lee, Thomas, and Dombrowski, 2009). Far from the likes of static games such as “Pong”, these games are detailed enough for players to express themselves within the game (Leaver, 2018). Furthermore, because of technologies such as the World Wide Web, players can interact with not only the game world but other players. This interaction, as well as communication, forms the basis for online communities to develop and grow (Steinkuehler, and Williams, 2006). As detailed below, player interaction occurs within games and using other platforms such as social media.

Many games have enough detail that immersive worlds are created, where players are, at-least for the most part, solely focused on what is happening in the game. Frostling-Henningsson (2009), describes this state of being as “flow”. Sufficiently detailed games can take multiple forms and include multiple genres of games. However, game genres such as Massively Multiplayer Online Role-Playing Games (MMORPGs) are the most profound examples of online game worlds. These games can be described as “Third places”, which are “crucial… for civic interaction” (Williams, Ducheneaut, Zhang, Yee, and Nickell, 2006; Oldenburg, 1997). This is because of the extensiveness of the game and the actions available to the player (Williams and Ducheneaut, et. al., 2006). There are many roles a player can play, hence role-playing game, and no one player can be a master of everything. Therefore, to prosper in these “worlds” (Frostling-Henningsson, 2009) players should not only communicate but also cooperate with each other (Williams and Ducheneaut, et. al., 2006). This cooperation leads to communities forming within the game. Katz, Rice, Acord, Dasgupta, and David (2004) describe this type of community as a “pseudo-community”. This does not mean that the community is not real, but rather the community is based in a virtual world and has a group focus. The community type “Social Network” could also apply for some players or groups who exhibit individual centred attributes (Katz, et al., 2004). Furthermore, common goals and ongoing communication lead to partnerships, friendships and strong ties developing in the game (Williams and Ducheneaut, et. al., 2006; Domahidi, Festl, and Quandt, 2014).

One well researched game is popular MMORPG “World of Warcraft”, which at its peak had twenty million monthly paid players (Leaver, 2018). This game’s popularity can largely be attributed to the communities around and in the game that were developed because of the immersive, detailed, and continuing world centred around engaging gameplay (Williams and Ducheneaut, et. al., 2006). Game mechanics, such as an in-depth virtual economy and levelling system, lead to a “hallucination of the real” (Frostling-Henningsson, 2009) where new personas, personalities and lifestyles are created and/or expressed.

The state of “flow” and the “hallucination of the real” are both ways of describing the level of immersion games facilitate. This does not only occur in MMORPGs but also First-Person Shooters (FPSs). In these games, players are looking through the eyes of a soldier that they control. Online gameplay is centred around fighting against, and with, other players. Candy (2012) describes his level of extreme focus on trying to keep himself but more importantly, his teammates alive. With games such as “Counter Strike: Global Offensive” (CS: GO) a team of players work together to fight against another team. Much like a virtually violent sport (Williams and Ducheneaut, et. al., 2006). Candy (2012) states that the level of cooperation and fast paced nature of the games lead to strong friendships being formed. This can be described as bonding social capital which develops into strong ties (Steinkuehler, and Williams, 2006). These players turn their team into a community, one of which, the members are very close. Even so much so that once virtual friendships expand past their initial “third place” into the offline world (Candy, 2012).

As stated above, being able to communicate is obviously a key driver in forming social bonds and communities. There are many ways in which games facilitate and promote communication between players. The simplest way many games facilitate online communication, is through in-game chat. This allows players to communicate using text-based messages. However, this is crude by 2018’s standards. The time taken to create a message causes a delay between when the producer wants to communicate the message and when the viewer receives it. The, relatively, long time that the message takes to create, means that this form of communication is less often used in fast paced games and/or is often limited to use for greetings when gameplay is slower. This limits the ability for players to acquire bonding social capital or develop strong ties through using in-game, text-based messaging alone. In saying this, the messenger’s in-game name is associated with the message, meaning social proximately, familiarity, and bridging social capital is created using in-game chat (Trepte, Reinecke, and Juechems, 2012).

In many online FPSs, like “CS: GO”, Voice over Internet Protocol (VoIP) is a feature that allows players to speak to other players while in the game. VoIP within the game can facilitate the communication between players who are not friends. In the case of “CS: GO”, in-game VoIP is commonly used when matchmaking with-out friends. This means the players who become part of your team are not players that you personally know. VoIP allows these new teammates to strategize, give “call outs”, or simply communicate in real time. Strategizing or simply giving good call outs result in social capital and a sense of agency for the communicator and would not be possible with-out the use of Voice over Internet Protocol (Candy, 2012). Real time communication also promotes a sense of “flow”, develops the game into a “third place”, and encourages players to form communities (Frostling-Henningsson, 2009; Williams and Ducheneaut, et. al., 2006; Candy, 2012).

Games have also used other ways of connecting players with each other. A standard feature in any online game in 2018, the ability to create a list of friends and easily join each other’s games, should not be overlooked as the most important aspect of facilitating social gameplay. The widespread inclusion is likely due to social reasons being the main cause of gameplay (Frostling-Henningsson, 2009; Domahidi, Festl, and Quandt, 2014) and the exclusion of this feature, and therefore social gameplay, would be essentially unacceptable for many gamers.

In some cases, game features connect existing players with their friends whom may not play the game. Social games, or games based on social networking platforms, have used this technique for many years (Di Loreto, and Gouaich, 2010). More games, and games of different genres, are starting to utilize this technique. A recent example (2017/2018) is “Fortnite” (Bedford, 2018). When a player is not in a game of “Fortnite” they are firstly prompted to invite other friends that are online. However, players are also prompted to link their game account to Facebook. This is a clear example of “Fortnite” utilising in-game features, and other digital networking technologies, to extend the gaming community for the specific player and to increase the size of “Fortnite’s” community. This results in bonding social capital being created between existing friends who were Facebook friends but can now easily game together and strengthen their bond.

Communities in Subsidiary Activities Centred Around Gaming

Being part of a gaming community can offer much more than just playing a game. As detailed above, very strong sub-communities can form within a game itself. However, arguably to benefit most from the community around a specific game, the player should participate in multiple aspects of the community. This includes many subsidiary activities that centre around a game but are beyond gameplay. The biggest activity, in terms of active participants, is being involved in social media based on the game. The social media coverage of games is very large and complex (Minguez, 2014). The communities formed on social media platforms are not necessarily the same as the ones formed within games, but any content created by, from, or about a game is still centred around that game and connects to the game itself. Social media coverage of a game and any communities that form because of this are extensions of the game and the communities it promotes.

The media created based on games is essentially infinite and impossible to analyse in its entirety. Due to the shear amount of content, social media content about games, or a specific game, should be broken down into three groups: non-professional user-generated content, professional user-generated content, and industry generated content. Furthermore, where there is a group of participants that can share commonalities, there is a community (MacQueen, et al., 2001). This means that the members of each of these groups can be classified as a community. For example, a group of social media marketers working for a company would be considered a community.

Communities also interact with each other on social media. For example, industry members often promote professional content-creators’ work. This shares some of the industry’s agency with the content creator as a gift for creating content on their game. Specifically, “Fortnite” representatives often use their institutional authority to share and promote video content made by aspiring content creators (Fortnite, 2018). Industry members also “like” or “favourite” non-professional user-generated content. This gives the player social capital and agency in several sub-communities such as their friends or other players. Both actions, and others not mentioned, create mutual benefits and provide motivation for all parties.

Another important subsidiary activity based on gaming, is “modding” or modifying games. “Mods” or modifications to a game are quite commonplace in certain single player games such as “Fallout” (Bailey, 2018). Communities around “mods” or certain “modders” (modifiers) are also quite extensive. Because of the advancement in hardware and software used to create “mods” and the large number of people interest in games, many “mods” have been made. However, the ability to create useful, or even professional, “mods” is highly respected in the gaming community. This has meant “modders”, especially the best ones, receive a large amount of agency and social capital within their sub-community, and even the gaming community in general.

“Mods” can range in size from very small, to whole new games created in a different game engine (Bailey, 2018). The small “mods” can be made by one person, however, the largest “mods” are made by a team. This team requires large amounts of cooperation and collective problem solving. Furthermore, a team of “modders” can spend many years creating a “mod” without guaranteed financial compensation. Because of this, and the passion required to undertake such a task, the group can form a strong community based on gaming. Social capital is created within the community and received from beyond the “modding” community as detailed above. Furthermore, the feeling of belonging and accomplishment, and the friendships developed are just some of the social benefits that occur because of this subsidiary activity of gaming (Koivisto, 2003).

Conclusion

The communities formed within and beyond games can provide large social benefits to the participants. This includes but is not limited to, bridging and bonding social capital, agency, and social proximity and familiarity. All, or some, of these benefits combine and allow participants of gaming communities to create and develop friendships and belong to their community(s). This can occur within the game world or outside of it, through online subsidiary activities. However, both are centred around gaming and the communities that occur because of it.

The concept of communities, even within a gaming stream, is very large. Moreover, gaming as a stream is very broad and complex. This has meant this paper cannot, and has not, explored all aspects of community within gaming. More specifically, aspects including: e-sports, cosplay, gaming events, gaming lounges, and more, have not been discussed. Also, greater depth in the aspects discussed could occur if the focus of the paper was narrower. However, this paper has discussed many of the most important aspects of community in gaming, including: game worlds, “third place”, flow, hallucination of the real, text-based messaging, VoIP, playing with friends, social media content creation, and “modding”.

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