Comments on: Being happily Confused about Communities

By: Joshua Gay

Joshua Gay — Tue, 18 Mar 2008 00:28:37 +0000

So, I don’t think the Gemeinschaft should be looked at as word for community, but rather as a way of characterising the nature of a given association. I would say that Facebook is not an association in and of itself, but rather, it is a platform in which associations and groups are formed, each of which can be characterized with being somewhat Gemeinschaft in nature or somewhat Gesellschaft in nature.

By: Dusting off the Weber « Vendorprisey

Dusting off the Weber « Vendorprisey — Sat, 23 Feb 2008 14:08:39 +0000

[...] great social theory thinkers of the past 150 odd years; Tonnies, Parsons, Durkheim, Comte, Spencer, Mill, Bentham, Weber, and even Marx can teach us a [...]

By: Dr. Kai-Uwe Hellmann

Dr. Kai-Uwe Hellmann — Mon, 26 Nov 2007 13:13:32 +0000

Dear Stephen Smoliar, thanks for your attention concerning my interest on discussing the ancient contribution and actual relevance of Ferdinand TÃ¶nnies, the originator of the scientific “Gemeinschaft”-debate, to the current debate about building communities anywhere.
I will read your comment which you recommend to me as soon as possible and then I will answer there again.
Good bye Kai-Uwe Hellmann

By: Stephen Smoliar

Stephen Smoliar — Sat, 17 Nov 2007 22:57:48 +0000

Dr. Hellman, if you use the Search tool on this blog page, I am afraid you will see that the acknowledgment of TÃ¶nnies was a “flash in the pan,” which did not lead to the “continuous flow of exchange of arguments” for which you hoped. If you wish to give the process another try, you might check my own post at:

http://therehearsalstudio.blogspot.com/2007/08/interaction-rituals-introduction.html

The floor is still open for discussion over there, but it is not the sort of discussion the thrives in the blogosphere!

By: Dr. Kai-Uwe Hellmann

Dr. Kai-Uwe Hellmann — Sat, 17 Nov 2007 17:03:58 +0000

false emailadress

By: Dr. Kai-Uwe Hellmann

Dr. Kai-Uwe Hellmann — Sat, 17 Nov 2007 17:03:08 +0000

It’s just encouraging to see that the random use of the term “community” which dominantes the social network discussion all around sometimes remembers the origin of this term (original: “Gemeinschaft”) generated from Ferdinand TÃ¶nnies who had a very specific understanding of this phenomenon which doesn’t fit at all to most of the social networks at the moment. May be there is a small chance to build up a more continous flow of exchange of arguments concerning this point…

By: Stephen Smoliar

Stephen Smoliar — Sat, 25 Aug 2007 16:40:18 +0000

JP, I am REALLY happy at the cycles you have devoted to TÃ¶nnies; and, while I still think that the Wikipedia entries are not the best source, I appreciate their usefulness when one is on the road)! I think your current confusion derives from a lack of familiarity with Usenet history. I can appreciate that you were probably not part of that world; but, by all rights, someone like Rheingold should have been aware of these things. So, if he could not communicate them through his writings, then I think all the less of him for it!

The fundamental truth that you hit on was that the communities existed before there was Usenet, but their members were spatially separated. As a result, to invoke Goffman-speak, their interaction rituals (which, of course, include conversations) were significantly limited. Usenet provided a technology to enable those rituals that was not impeded by separations in space or time. My own involvement was primarily with two of those pre-existing communities: cognitive science and music theory. In both cases Usenet had a major impact on face-to-face behavior at conferences, where conversations would not be both continued and initiated, then reflecting back into Usenet activity for the benefit of those not physically present.

Note that neither speed nor ease-of-use had very much to do with community maintenance. Indeed, as I previously remarked, these were factors that ultimately undermined the communities when the Internet opened the floodgates:

http://confusedofcalcutta.com/2007/08/24/facebook-and-the-enterprise-part-7-communities/#comment-178032

The music theorists reacted by building their own walled garden, which was serving as an excellent replacement for Usenet while I was still in that game. (I have not been there for a while, but I gather that is is still thriving.)

I suppose what bugs me the most about that Rheingold quote is that he really does not grok that nature of the interaction ritual and the role it plays in how people engaged with each other, even then the engagement is mediated by software. Unfortunately, I just checked Wikipedia; and, while there is an entry for Goffman, it really does not address the interaction ritual side of his work. Perhaps I should take this as an opportunity to write something on my own blog (since I still do not really buy into the Wikipedia process).