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Social software: the building blocks
of online communities
IMKE CSC2006
Kaido Kikkas
Innovation or another buzzword?
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IT 'magic words' through the ages:
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programming
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expert system
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multimedia
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e- (learning, banking, work etc)
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new media
Social software? Yes and no
Hard to define
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Roughly overlapping with new media
New communication technologies plus their
impact on human interaction and formation of
virtual communities
Stowe Boyd: SoSo is the antithesis of groupware:
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traditional collaborative software approach – projectbased, 'top-down'
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social software approach – stemming from individual,
spontaneous, 'bottom-up'
Boyd's criteria
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Support for conversational interaction between
individuals or groups – incl. chance to determine
the pace of interaction by choosing a suitable
channel (see previous lecture)
Support for social feedback – E. S. Raymond and
CatB: reputation as the basis (whether connected
to the real identity or not). Sometimes can have
direct financial influence
Support for social networks – reflects existing
relationships and builds new ones. 6 degrees!
Matt Webb: 6 factors
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identity: steady <= social capital (reputation)
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presence: awareness of others; state indicators
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relationships: friendship => privileges
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conversations: ct. messaging – cont. vs discrete
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reputation: objective or tradeable
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sharing: helping, community building, fame
Categories of social software
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Today's Internet is not only a 'network of network'
but a network of very diverse social applications
All the previously seen factors are evident, but
the proportions vary a lot
Mailing lists
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Among the oldest, sometimes not counted among
social software proper
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First attempts soon after 1972
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Wider spread after the software arrived:
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LISTSERV 1986
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Majordomo 1992
Usenet
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Probably one of the least known
1979 UUCP, 1985 NNTP (TCP/IP) - “Usenet is
not Internet”
Network of news servers, each hosts a number of
newsgroups
An article posted to one server is forwarded to
others
A “pull” medium (ct. lists)
The Great 8
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comp.*: computer-related discussions (comp.software, comp.sys.amiga)
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misc.*: Miscellaneous topics (misc.education, misc.forsale, misc.kids)
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news.*: Discussions and announcements about news (meaning Usenet,
not current events) (news.groups, news.admin)
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rec.*: Recreation and entertainment (rec.music, rec.arts.movies)
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sci.*: Science related discussions (sci.psychology, sci.research)
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soc.*: Social discussions (soc.college.org, soc.culture.african)
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talk.*: Talk about various controversial topics (talk.religion, talk.politics,
talk.origins)
humanities.*: Fine arts, literature, and philosophy (humanities.classics,
humanities.design.misc)
Others
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alt.* - informal, more freedom, specific groups
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alt.binaries.* - various files
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Regional and language groups
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Business groups
Web groups
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Similar to the previous ones, but has a Web
interface and users can choose the operation
mode:
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purely web-based (like a web forum)
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like a newsgroup (messages are downloaded)
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like a mailing list (messages are mailed)
Big players: Yahoo!, Google, MSN
IRC
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Internet Relay Chat , Jarkko Oikarinen 1988
Usenet-like server system, channels, text-based
communication
Dynamic and informal (no logins)
Was used during many international crises to
forward objective information
Talkers & chatrooms
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Virtual spaces for real-time interaction
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First one 1984, the golden age were the 90s
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Layout often imitates reality
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Three-level conversation
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Telnet vs clients vs Web interface
IM
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I Seek You => ICQ, 1995
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MSN, AIM, Yahoo!, Jabber
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Multi-protocol messengers:
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Trillian
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GAIM
Web forums
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Simpler than the web groups, but
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easier to maintain (more control locally)
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easier to build one's own
Lots of free/open-source packages:
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phpBB
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Slash
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PHP-Nuke ....
Blogs
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Early ones: Tim Berners Lee, Justin Hall
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“Weblog” 1997
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“We blog” 1999
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The boom <== aggregation standards (RSS etc)
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Like IRC, have been used as free-speech tool
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Photo- and videoblogs
Podcasting
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iPod + broadcasting – actually iPod was not
needed
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Audio blog or on-demand radio
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uses RSS to spread the content
Wiki
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wiki <= “quickly”. “Wiki-wiki!”
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Ward Cunningham 1995 – WikiWikiWeb
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everyone can edit
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editing is simple, no need for HTML
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Wikipedia, NuPedia, GNUpedia
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Wider use
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Less open now, 'soft security' is not enough
Social bookmarking, tagging
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First link repository: Yahoo! 1994
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attempts during the dot-com boom
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del.icio.us – 1999
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bookmarks + tags
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Tagging is superior to automatic metadata
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Technorati – blog search + tags
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Targetted advertising
Media sharing
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Wild times – beginning of the 90s
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Mad times – end of the 90s
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New century brought some reason
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Flickr – photoes; many use CC licenses
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YouTube – Flash-based videos
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community censorship
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large players start to reconsider their position
Online games
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First MUDs - automatic AD&D
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90s
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New century: MMORPG
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MUDs are still alive
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Pictures: ready-made vs DIY?
Social networking
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Personal profiles + something else
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groups
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messaging
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ratings
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...
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MySpace, Friendster, Orkut...
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Various problems
Social shopping
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Introduction of many SoSo features to online
shops (especially Amazon.com)
Parallel with real life: shopping centres =>
entertainment facilities
Social citations
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More scientific variant of social bookmarking –
exact quotes and references are needed
Connotea, BibSonomy
Evolutionary computing
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aka human-based computation
specific parts of a problem are assigned to
different people, solutions are synthesized from
answers
Google Answers, Yahoo! Answers, 3form.com
Virtual or real? Or both?
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Clay Shirky's experiment:
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Real-life meeting
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online chat between people in the same room
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Two-tier communication
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Ct. EUDORA LEARN IP 2006 Haapsalu
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Sometimes gives good results
Conclusions
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SoSo is a crucial component in widening the
influence of IT
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Like all IT, changes rapidly
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Sometimes mixing real and virtual pays off