Relief

Are you tired of the dry 'assigned' readings? Is Rheingold getting you down? Does your case study need that spark of inspired insight?

Try here for 77 pages of fully-searchable up-to-date community focused articles, from blogs to well, a lot of other cool stuff.

Have fun,

Stew

(Yes, we are now officially overdue!)

Unplugging the Brain

I use my computer a lot, and I'm increasingly having moments where I step outside into the sunshine and realise that I've spent the last few hours with my brain plugged into my PC, not really 'being alive.' It seems to me that in the virtual or computer orientated world, we engage in our humanity in a very intellectual way; the world of ideals, ideas and technical prowess. In doing so however, we deny the animalistic side of being a human, which I think is equally, if not more important. Increasingly fleeting are those moments where we are just content to 'be' (in the Zen sense,) ie. not analalysing, debating, achieving, striving, communicating. I found I am happiest not when 'achieving' something on the computer, but instead when going for a walk by the river as the light starts to fail. I think there is a hidden danger in fulfilling too much of our need for community online; we could become too caught up in our cerebrial abilities and lose what it means to be part of nature. However, I myself am very much caught up in it... with so many interesting ways to use new technologies, its very hard not to be.

Does anyone have any thoughts on this?

Eg. of an Instant Community

Hey, for those that may not have heard about it, the eBay Easter Treasure Hunt has created quite an interesting little instant community.

Discussion board pertaining to the Hunt is lit up brighter than a xmas tree!

Check it out:

http://forums.ebay.com.au/forum.jspa?forumID=3001

MUDs - communities or games?

I'll start this post by confessing that I'm VERY new to MUDding...

But I'd like to pose the question: do you feel MUDs are better defined as being communities or games?

I'm still thinking through my own opinion on this, but in case this is something that might be mulling over in other minds, I stumbled across this site which also explores this..

http://www.mud.co.uk/richard/hcds.htm

Thoughts anyone????

New student

Hi all,

A late arriving student, Farhana, has just been added to Team Ochre.
Can you please invite her at this address:

krewe@graffiti.net

cheers
Stew

More to read and think about...

Hi folks,

I mentioned this week in the lecture a very important piece of early writing on 'virtual identities'. The piece, by Sandy Stone is entitled Will the Real Body please Stand Up?

Meanwhile, lecture notes for this week are online with these questions to consider:

What stories do you tell yourself about virtual communities?
How have you come to form this narrative?
How do we judge whether interactions are ‘authentic’?
Where is the line between communication and community?
Does communication necessarily mean ‘community’?
What ideas about technology does the notion of virtual community serve?

Meanwhile, next week we will be having a guest lecturer, Peter van Schie of Cloud Media, who will be discussing the role of Virtual teams in ebusiness. As the lecture will not cover the e-learning side of this topic I would suggest that you listen to the iLecture on the course site which discusses this side of things. The lecture may also be very helpful when it comes around to the self-reflection at the end of the course.

Virtual Community Humor!

Hi folks...a little humourous reading which actually sheds a fair bit of light on the difficulties of mailing lists and usenet communities:

How many list subscribers does it take to change a light bulb

Enjoy
Stew

Probs with WebCT links?

Hi - Is anyone else having problems with some of the links for readings from the Curriculum on WebCT? I've just tried linking to the suggested readings for helping in Assignment 3 (Module 3.3), but I can only reach one out of the three documents.

Possibly I'm doing something really silly that's causing the problem, but if anyone else is having trouble can you let me know? (Save me from thinking I'm going nuts)

Thanks

Online communities and you....

Can I get other people's thoughts on a question that's occured to me in looking into communities....

At a personal level, does the lack of physicality (and potential anonymity) of an online community make you more inclined to be honest or dishonest about who you are and what you think?

Just interested in getting different views on this.

Sammyjo

Possessing Barbie...

Hey folks,

Good to see the blogs coming along. Just found this interesting piece which was listed in the Guardians top 10 pieces of 'new' game journalism here

The piece is about identity in games but I think it might make for a provocative read for all - examining identity and where 'play' and 'reality' merge. It's called 'Possessing Barbie'

Thoughts?

Meanwhile, a reminder of the questions that appear at the end of this weeks lecture notes:

What constitutes a community: can it be a society, group, association, nation, club, global?
Is it the types of relations between members that defines/identifies a community?
Is community linked to place or religion, common interests or shared practices, or other commonalities?
Can it be experienced and understood entirely through communication or do there also need to be concrete practices that take place – reciprocity, shared processes etc.?
Does a community need continuity/history or is it simply momentary?