The world wide web is rife with\ncommunities serving basically every topic imaginable. In over 20 years the web\nhas grown so much that there is a place online for any interest a person may\nhave, from the common interests of the average person to the perverse, the\nweird and sometimes illegal. In this paper I will discuss the impact these\ncommunities can have, both negative and positive and delve into the reasons\nusers choose to use their real identity, a fake identity, and sometimes\nsomewhere in between and why they choose to use a particular identity in\ncertain circumstances.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
As this topic is very vast I will\nattempt to summarise and cover the similarities between the very large number\nof different online communities and the reasons why users choose their online\nidentity and what they do with them.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Online communities have existed since not\nlong after the creation of the Internet. They mainly serve to connect people\nwho have common interests. As the Internet grew larger over time and eventually\nthe world wide web became publicly available, the proliferation of online\ncommunities has been unending and continues to grow larger. As the adoption of\nthe home computer and access to the web increased over the last 20+ years users\nhave found that they could connect with people with the same interests as them.\nThese people have their reasons why they participate in online communities,\nwhether it be to enjoy a chat with like-minded individuals, make new friends,\nor get support from others. What compels people to communicate this way as\nopposed to more traditional methods?<\/p>\n\n\n\n
One of the earliest forms of an online\ncommunity were BBSs (bulletin board systems) which gained popularity in the\nlate 1970\u2019s\/early 1980\u2019s with Usenet coming along soon after.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Like BBSs Usenet allowed people to enter\n\u2018rooms\u2019 and chat with people about specific topics. Users exchanged information\nabout the topic at hand and Usenet gained popularity as a new virtual way to connect people\ntogether, with many millions of people accessing the network to share\ninformation (Donath, J. 1999). In these early days the question was often asked\n\u2018why do people choose to communicate online as opposed to more traditional\nmethods?\u2019. One reason is that the Internet and its users can\u2019t judge the user\non superficial appearances, and other users can\u2019t see skin colour, gender or\nage, they can only judge others on the words they have typed (Kollock, P.\n1999). They only know what you tell them and anything else is a mystery. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
Another reason, and definitely not the last,\nis that some people have disabilities that prevent them from communicating in\nthe traditional way. “Peter is a 23 yr old physics graduate student…\nheart disease, can’t go outside much. Uses the online game to communicate with\npeople” (Turkle, S. 1994). These examples not only free people from\ndiscrimination but allow them more freedom to communicate than their real life\ncan afford.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
There are many reasons why people choose to\ncommunicate online and why the online discussion world has grown so large over\nthe last 50 years or so. Of course unlike when the members of your local real\nlife community are asleep, the Internet never closes, there will always be\nanother like minded individual waiting to have a chat about your favourite\ntopic of interest.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The one thing that may seem strange to modern\nusers of online communities about Usenet was that it required the users to use\ntheir real identity. It didn\u2019t show what a person looked like or have a profile\nof weight and age however every post had a header of information including each\nposter\u2019s email address (Donath, J. 1999). As home Internet access wasn\u2019t that\ncommon at the time some users were posting to Usenet from their employer\u2019s\nnetwork and their workplace email accounts meaning that not only were the users\neasily identifiable but at the same time creating a sense of responsibility as\nany negativity or hostility could have ramifications in their real life.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
As the Internet grew larger and was adopted\ninto many more homes over the years and decades online communities grew with\nit. Forums and discussion boards were created to cater for anyone\u2019s taste.\nThere was a difference though, a lot of these online communities did not\nrequire the user to reveal their true identity, they could be anyone they\nwanted to be. Some people choose to publicly display their real identity and in\nsome cases also their profile photo, and others use a pseudonym.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Pseudonyms can be useful in many ways, among\nother things they can protect users from malicious actors trying to harvest\npersonal information or potentially committing a crime that would affect other\npeople (Poulsen, K. 2006), they can make someone feel better about who they are\nby pretending to be a different character, or more importantly they can allow a\nuser to communicate with others about sensitive topics that may be embarrassing\nto them if anyone in their social circle found out (i.e. unrevealed\nhomosexuality, planned apostasy, etc). By using a pseudonym they can\ncommunicate, get advice, and learn from other like minded people and\npotentially feel better about their situation without the fear of being\nunmasked. Essentially the user is deceiving other users as to their real\nidentity however unless there is malicious intent, seemingly there is no harm\ndone.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Some would argue that anonymity can cause\nincivility in online communities as evidenced by research from Professor Arthur\nSantana from the University of Houston (Santana, A.D. 2013) however I would\nargue that the level of incivility is limited to the topics of the chosen\ncommunity as heated debates such as political topics can cause people to react\nin an uncivil manner combined with the well known fact that it is quite\ndifficult to convey tone in typed sentences, it is sometimes open to\ninterpretation. In saying that, the real world does not suffer from a lack of\npeople who cannot communicate in a civil manner.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Sites such as Facebook expect their users to\nuse their real names and photos however as they don\u2019t enforce any\nidentification checking so as long as the name sounds real anyone can sign up\nto the service. This enables people to communicate honestly with others online\nbut still keep a level of privacy. However it can also enable others to hide\nbehind their fake online identity to perform malicious activities (Schonfeld,\nE. 2009).<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Should the Internet be regulated to a degree\nwhere everyone knows your name though? Does the Internet have too much freedom\nand therefore enables bad actors to do what they want with no fear of\nrepercussions? Or does the good outweigh the bad?<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Not all online communities have universal\nappeal and the Internet has had its fair share of controversies relating to\ngroups posting objectionable material to their community. Occasionally there\nare calls to shut down online communities that others feel are \u2018abhorrent\u2019,\n\u2018disgusting\u2019 and \u2018spreading hate\u2019. The perpetrator of the 2019 Christchurch\nmassacre was found to posting plans of his attack on a particular mostly\nunmoderated message board and some Internet Service Providers removed their\ncustomers access to that particular site and two others. This sparked a debate\nabout whether it was the right thing to do. On one side of the debate most\npeople found the attackers actions to be abhorrent however the message board in\nquestion has a much larger population that have discussions about a wide range\nof normal<\/em> everyday topics such as politics, celebrities, music, etc. One\nperson\u2019s actions has taken away other the users ability to communicate with the\ncommunity they have chosen.<\/p>\n\n\n\n One thing that people may forget when\ncontroversies happen is that the people who participate in any online community\nare no different to the people who participate in a real life community. There\nwill always be people who can communicate in a civil manner and others who\ncannot, people who agree and those that don\u2019t. By blocking access to certain\nonline communities it is only moving those discussions to another place online,\nnot eliminating them entirely. If a particular community has indicated that\nthey may cause harm to other members of the population then the ideal solution\nwould be to use that community to hold the malicious actors responsible instead\nof pushing them further underground. The internet will never be free of\ncontroversy and neither will the \u2018real world<\/em>\u2019.<\/p>\n\n\n\n With the nature of the Internet and the\nfreedom that it provides to give people a voice and communicate with people\nthey would not normally meet, there are far more useful and good aspects to\nthis freedom then there are bad, despite the devastation that a small minority\ncan cause to people and corporate entities. There is a lot more kindness on the\nInternet than there is nastiness as evidence by survey results conducted by the\nPew Research Center which found that respondents said that \u201c70% of internet\nusers say they had been treated kindly or generously by others online. That\ncompares with 25% who say they have been treated unkindly or been attacked by\nsomeone online\u201d and that \u201c56% of internet users say they have seen an online\ngroup come together to help a person or a community solve a problem. That compares\nwith 25% who say they have left an online group because the interaction became\ntoo heated or members were unpleasant to one another.\u201d (Fox, S & Rainie, L. 2014).<\/p>\n\n\n\n However academics such as Professor Clifford\nNass of Stanford University have found that \u201cNegative emotions generally involve more thinking, and the\ninformation is processed more thoroughly than positive ones. Thus, we tend to\nruminate more about unpleasant events \u2014 and use stronger words to describe them\n\u2014 than happy ones.\u201d (Nass, C. 2010). This naturally\noccurring behaviour can sometimes lead to a negative view of the communication\nmedium when in fact the opposite can be true.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Online communities aren\u2019t just for chatting\nabout common interests, there are plenty of communities that serve to help\nothers with problems they may have. Communities such as wikipedia.org,\nstackoverflow.com, wikipedia, and answers.microsoft.com all have users that are\nwilling to give up their time to help other users with any problems they may\nhave without any perceivable gain. The discussion forum prisontalk.com not only\ngives users advice on an impending incarceration but also offers support for\nfamily and friends of people who have been sentenced to prison all over the\ndeveloped world. This can be useful for people who don\u2019t have anyone in their\nlocal real life community to talk to about these issues, or just feel\nembarrassed talking about them in person.<\/p>\n\n\n\n All of\nthese communities and more also have moderators<\/em> who are tasked with\nmaking sure the community runs smoothly without any hostility, or discussions\nthat may stray off-topic, etc. The question that some may have is \u2018why do\npeople do this?\u2019 What motivates them to spend their time helping others? What\nbenefit do they get out of it? Is it because of human nature to be kind and\nhelpful?<\/p>\n\n\n\n Peter Kollock, an Associate Professor of\nSociology suggests that participants of online communities rise to the ranks of\nmoderators because they want the recognition of helping the community and its\nmembers (Kollock, P. 1999). Other users may wish to moderate their community\nbecause they have real life ties to it, such as a Facebook community\nnoticeboard \/ discussion forum for their local area. In the first example there\nis a likelihood that the majority would be using pseudonyms therefore the only\nrecognition they would be getting is from their online community members\nwhereas in the latter example there is a likelihood that other members of the\ngroup may have come across them in the real life community.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Other sites such as reddit.com chose to\nimplement a voting format where other users decide which posts and comments are\nvaluable and worth reading and which are not, meaning that the community is in\ncharge of what content they feel is worth reading and viewing. The website\nstill has volunteer moderators however they are mainly tasked with removing\noffensive or off-topic content. This has worked well when used in the way it\nwas intended as it means that the quality content is easily seen whereas the\n\u2018downvoted\u2019 content is only viewable if the user chooses to do so (Medvedev, A., Lambiotte, R., & Delvenne, J.\n2018). This is just one of the reasons why reddit.com is favoured by\nmany and is usually listed as one of the most visited sites on the web, the\nability to remain anonymous while discussing a topic is another.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Online communities do not replace traditional\ncommunities, there is no one or the other. If anything online communities\ncomplement traditional communities by giving the users something that\u2019s missing\nin both, whether that be due to a lack of local population who participate in a\nperson\u2019s interests or a lack of face to face communication, to name just two.\nOnline communities bring people together forming new friendships, they connect\npeople who would not normally have access to the others and they create this\nbond without judgement on factors such as class, gender or race. Sites such as\nFacebook allow users to stay in contact with friends and family even if they\nreside or travel to the other side of the world. <\/p>\n\n\n\n Pseudonyms play a grand role in the modern\nonline group of communities and the benefits far outweigh the negatives. The\nInternet, the world wide web, and in turn online communities have enable the\npopulation of the world to freely interact with one another and discuss\nwhatever topic they want without fear of being shut down or persecuted for\ntheir ideas and viewpoints (with the exception of certain dictatorships). This\npowerful tool can be abused by some however many more users act responsibly\nwhile communicating online than those who don\u2019t and even though mental,\nphysical, and\/or financial damage can be caused while communcating online, we\ncan\u2019t let a few bad apples spoil the bunch, the choice of anonymity is one that\nshould not be taken away.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Donath, J. (1996). Identity\nand Deception in the Virtual Community. Retrieved from\nhttp:\/\/smg.media.mit.edu\/people\/Judith\/Identity\/IdentityDeception.html<\/p>\n\n\n\n Smith, M., & Kollock, P.\n(1999). Communities in cyberspace<\/em>. London: Routledge.<\/p>\n\n\n\n POULSEN, K. (2006). MySpace\nPredator Caught by Code. Retrieved from\nhttps:\/\/www.wired.com\/2006\/10\/myspace-predator-caught-by-code\/<\/p>\n\n\n\n Santana, A. (2013). Virtuous\nor Vitriolic. Journalism Practice<\/em>, 8<\/em>(1), 18-33. doi: 10.1080\/17512786.2013.813194<\/p>\n\n\n\n Schonfeld, E. (2009).\nThousands Of MySpace Sex Offender Refugees Found On Facebook. Retrieved from\nhttps:\/\/techcrunch.com\/2009\/02\/03\/thousands-of-myspace-sex-offender-refugees-found-on-facebook\/<\/p>\n\n\n\n Fox, S & Rainie, L (2014)\nPart 2: Americans\u2019 views about the role of the internet in their lives.\nRetrieved from\nhttps:\/\/www.pewinternet.org\/2014\/02\/27\/part-2-americans-views-about-the-role-of-the-internet-in-their-lives\/<\/p>\n\n\n\n Nass, C., & Yen, C.\n(2010). The man who lied to his laptop: <\/em>What Machines Teach Us About Human\nRelationships<\/em>. New York:\nPenguin.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Medvedev, A., Lambiotte, R.,\n& Delvenne, J. (2018). The anatomy of Reddit: An overview of academic\nresearch. Retrieved from https:\/\/arxiv.org\/abs\/1810.10881<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Abstract The world wide web is rife with communities serving basically every topic imaginable. In over 20 years the web has grown so much that there is a place online for any interest a person may have, from the common interests of the average person to the perverse, the weird and sometimes illegal. In this… Continue reading Online identities: the real, the fake, and the inbetween.<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":12,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[45,169,170],"class_list":["post-412","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-identity","tag-communities","tag-community-identity","tag-online-anonymity"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/networkconference.netstudies.org\/2019Open\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/412","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/networkconference.netstudies.org\/2019Open\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/networkconference.netstudies.org\/2019Open\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/networkconference.netstudies.org\/2019Open\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/12"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/networkconference.netstudies.org\/2019Open\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=412"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/networkconference.netstudies.org\/2019Open\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/412\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":413,"href":"https:\/\/networkconference.netstudies.org\/2019Open\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/412\/revisions\/413"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/networkconference.netstudies.org\/2019Open\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=412"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/networkconference.netstudies.org\/2019Open\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=412"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/networkconference.netstudies.org\/2019Open\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=412"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}Conclusion<\/h2>\n\n\n\n
References<\/h1>\n\n\n\n