1. What makes a bunch of people a community?
"Community" is one of those words that gets used a lot to refer to many different things. Artists, nurses, hip hop fans, people living in Marrickville, people aged over 65, people who buy a certain brand of bike. We use it because it's handy shorthand and it's nice way of referring to people. "Community" is so much more pleasant that "rabble" or conspiracy".
This lexical laxness is all very well but it starts getting a bit tricky when we have to define what community is in the abstract. Especially what is and what is not a community. Having a list of specifications for what makes a community or not is all very well (and I've got a few lying around if people are interested) but I've come to the conclusion that it's rarely helpful. The definition of community is fuzzy round the edges (as membership of communities often is - but that's post for another day). For every totalizing claim you can make about communities, an exception can be found.
You have a bunch of people who share something. The question is not: "are they a community?", the question is instead: "is what they share sufficient for them to start interacting?" and then the interesting stuff really starts....
2. Identity Parade
The above was just a preamble to the main point of this post. Shawn talks about the mark of a community of practice being members willing to spontaneously identify themselves as members of that community. I am a artist, nurse, hip hop fan, Marrickville dweller, aged over 65, brand x bike owner. This is a very useful corrective to the desire of some institutions to impose the community label on others but I think that we need to drill down into this identity thing a bit deeper.
Mark states that "the pull of identity is strong" and he's right. But sometimes we resist that pull. Many professional communities insist that members use their real full names. One such online community like that ran a Carnival for a week - where the rules were turned upside down - people were actively discouraged from posting under their real names and several people took the opportunity to create multiple identities for themselves. There was some mischief and bad behaviour - but a noticeable increase in activity.
In general in many social groups, authenticity is valued and people prefer to keep a relatively stable online identity. Gavin makes the point that communities are about belonging. To which I would retort that many communities are but at an individual level you can participate in a community and not feel that you belong and at a group level there are communities that do not prize belonging. Gav might respond by saying that his definition of community requires belonging. To which I would say, sure it does - but what about these associations and social groups that don't fit his criteria?
Human beings crave public acknowledgement and social belonging but also require privacy and anonymity. These paradoxical desires makes (un)managing comunities painful & unpredictable. For example, in one internal corporate email list group I helped with, many people would send their questions to the community via me - so their identity wouldn't be revealed. After they got answers, they would decide whether to embark on a conversation with their respondent directly. You can say that was a group with a low level of trust (and you might be right) but that was a pattern that worked for them and their context. I could have enforced complete transparency but that would have been counterproductive and not met their needs. It would have been a betrayal.
Anonymity is not the antithesis of community - it's a contrast to a public identity. Anonymity may or may not be a welcome behaviour in some groups and it may or may not allow useful interactions to occur. Expect to find anonymous behaviour in communities and understand that it may be valid. The members of a community get to negotiate what works and doesn't work for them and really we need to listen vey closely to what people might want (and it will rarely be the same for everyone so we need to build in lots of flexibility and options).
I realise that this may seem like nit-picking and I want to stress that I'm not having a go at anyone mentioned - but I think there are some assumptions here that need taking apart. The better we understand the contradictory pulls of human nature, the more effective we can be in our communities.
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Interesting. I feel like I need to spend a day getting my head around the way we're all talking about and defining these ideas because some of the disagreements start with definitions, semantics.
Sure. And part of the problem is that we're talking at a high level of abstraction about messy human activities that evade concise definitions.
However I think there are some genuine differences there under the semantics.
If I get some time over the next couple of days, I might work on some dilemmas/decision games around communities and then open them up for comment. That may bring a lot of stuff to the surface...
I don't believe you are talking about communities. Work groups aren't communities. And if you don't feel that you belong in a community, then I daresay you aren't a member. Contrast your workplace example re an anonymous work group with a vibrant community of practice/interest. They are very different beasts.
As I said, I think on Mark' second post, community requires an exchange of value of some kind. Without this there is no chance to build trust or build reputation.
And while a short term relaxation of identification in a community may create a brief spike in activity, such carnivalesque situations generally reinforce the pre-existing structures more strongly afterwards.
Another quote that I love about communities, is that you know when you are a *part* of a community if it is noticed when you are not present. I guess, this is closer to Shawn's view as well (about self identification).
I guess the real discussion is not about the definition of "community" but the role of "anonymity" within a community. And in a busy world, I see very little value in engaging in a community that allows for anonymity. Perhaps that's just my preference - or maybe it just leads me towards certain types of communities rather than others ;)
Gav - Thank you for commenting.
Contrast your workplace example re an anonymous work group with a vibrant community of practice/interest.
The thing is, anonymous behaviour in that group co-existed with very open & generous behaviour. And even the anonymous participants would have identified as members of this group in some way. You seem to be positing this as an either/or rather than a both/and. Either there is openness and generousity or there is fear and anonymity. In fact, in most social groups you get a mix.
community requires an exchange of value of some kind. Without this there is no chance to build trust or build reputation.
Often but that "exchange" can take a multitude of forms. Many communities do require the active building of reputation & trust through stable identities. But not all.
And while a short term relaxation of identification in a community may create a brief spike in activity, such carnivalesque situations generally reinforce the pre-existing structures more strongly afterwards.
Which is what medieval carnivals often did - brief periods of anarchy to make grinding repression bearable. But the point here is that a stable identity is not required all the times in all groups - sometimes anonymity can be valuable.
And in a busy world, I see very little value in engaging in a community that allows for anonymity. Perhaps that's just my preference - or maybe it just leads me towards certain types of communities rather than others ;)
Well that's a valid personal choice. But that's all it is. Would it be fair to say that not everyone has the same preferences as you? And if it is, what does that imply for the range of social interactions we might find in the outside world?
So my problem with the positions I believe you & Mark taking are not that you are absolutely wrong. They have large dollops of truth in them. But that making generalizations around these fuzzy and diverse social structures is a bit foolish*.
The issue of anonymity/identity is a really important one for many groups and individuals. I am arguing that anonymity is sometimes a valid choice depending on context - and allowing people the breathing space of anonymity can be important when stewarding a community.
*All claims about communities needs some kind of health warning attached to them.
I get your point, though I guess we will have to agree to disagree. However, I think we are actually closer to agreement.
In Mark's and Jules' conversation we were talking about communities that are predicated on anonymity - and whether they are, in fact, communities.
You are right, existing communities can benefit from anonymity at various points (eg conflict resolution etc). But my view is that you cannot have community based on anonymity. And that's not just based on a name or ID -- it also encompasses the different traces which announce "me" such as style of writing, frequent words, visual style, time of posting etc (after all we can often pick someone's involvement by the way that they express themselves, even in anonymous forums).
Do you have any examples of real communities which have been created based on anonymity? Even on sites like WoW or SL where anonymity is possible to a degree, our alter-egos are defined by the consistent (or inconsistent) actions and behaviours of our avatars. I just don't believe that anonymous communities exist.
Gav - The obvious one is Flash Mobs. Most participants are anonymous to each other and yet come together and do cool stuff. Then disperse. There is bond that is forged for a moment and then disappears.
You may reply: "Ah but those aren't communities."
To which I answer: "I don't care."
If I could, I would either ban the use of the word "community" for the next decade or I would insist that we upgrade our vocab and invent a whole new range of words to describe what these social forms are (which we are doing but slowly).
I'm interested in a whole range of human interaction including prediction markets, collective intelligence and flash mobs. Not all of these are predicated on a sense of belonging although belonging may be involved. Whether you call the communities or not is kinda irrelevant (unless calling something a community will get you more attention - in which case it's a purely tactical move).
N.B. An anonymous collective where participants do not have a history (which is one way of understanding what identity is) will always be a continual series of "nows", of interactions in the present.
But we still belong to the flash mob via the stories that mark us as participants ;)
Now, I don't know what we are discussing anymore. I think we have disappeared up our own arses. In fact, I think communities might be a bunch of arse:
http://andasifbymagic.com/archives/2009/01/13/the-%e2%80%9eand-as-if-by-magic%e2%80%9c-bunch-of-arse-tweet-competition/
But we still belong to the flash mob via the stories that mark us as participants ;)
I'm not sure we do (I suspect that has to be a beer-based discussion). Anyway how do you link that point back to anonymity?
Now, I don't know what we are discussing anymore. I think we have disappeared up our own arses. In fact, I think communities might be a bunch of arse
Push the button man, do it, do it...
Great discussion guys, even if I lost track of you up your own arses (to quote you Gavin) there towards the end
I've been thinking about offline communities and online communities and how different they may or may not be. Still thinking.
The gay and lesbian community is one example of a community that can be characterised by both anonymity (e.g for fear of discrimination) as well as 'loud and proud' openness and identification of one's sexuality. So I don't think anon always discounts the notion of community.
Hello Kate
The online/offline distinction is a very interesting one - and it's another line that's getting increasingly blurred. We interact with our RL friends online and we meet up our online friends physically. That's potentially a whole other discussion.
As for the gay/lesbian community (or communities), you're right. Anonymity is important. But it's also viewed ambiguously. "Out" gay people can be disparaging of "closeted" types in an oddly similar way to online community members disparaging "lurkers" - they are parasitic on the efforts of the rest us, what are they afraid of, etc. But there's also a culture of anonymous sexual encounters among gay men. Again can't really do justice to this in the comments section.
Any chance of a blog post or two on these topics?
Yup it's a can of worms.
Maybe a blog post to celebrate Mardi Gras.
Kate - Yes please. Looking forward to it...
Brilliant post. In my KM work I'm always looking at how community is developed and trust is established within that community to enable sharing and this really gave me a lot to think about. I'll be reading and re-reading it for a good while. Thank you!
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