Information Technology Reference
In-Depth Information
platforms for social communion emphasise the
declaration of real offline identities to participate
in the networking phenomenon. While the fore-
runners of social networking sites in the 1990s
included sites such as Classmates.com, the advent
of the new millennium heralded a new genera-
tion of websites which celebrated the creation of
self-profiles with the launch of Friendster in 2002
which attracted over 5 million registered users in
a span of a few months (See Rosen, 2007; Mika
2004; Mislove et al. 2007; DiMicco & Millen
2007). Friendster was soon followed by MySpace,
Livejournal.com, and Facebook; these sites con-
vened around existing offline communities such as
college students. In the case of MySpace the site
was originally launched by musicians to upload
and share videos while Facebook initially catered
to college students but is presently open to anyone
who wants to network socially online. Some of
these sites have witnessed phenomenal growth
since their inception. MySpace, for example, has
grown from 1 million accounts to 250 million in
2008 (Caverlee et al. 2008: 1163). Additionally,
several of the top ten most visited sites on the
web are social networking sites (cf. Golbeck &
Wasser 2007: 2381).
The creation and exhibition of self-profiles
can be historically located and is not unique to
the new media environment. Christine Rosen
(2007) points out that historically the rich and
powerful documented their existence and their
status through painted portraits. In contemporary
culture, using a social networking site is akin to
having one's portrait painted, although the com-
parative costs make social networking sites much
more egalitarian. She contends that these digital
'self-portraits' signify both the need to re-create
identity through the online platform as well as to
form social connections. Invariably images play
a role in the representation of self and in fostering
communication (See Froehlich et al.2002; Schiano
et al. 2004Bentley et al. 2006). For Rosen (2007:
15), the resonant strand that emerges is the 'time-
less human desire for attention'.
Undoubtedly, users join such sites with their
friends and use the various messaging tools to
socialize, share cultural artefacts and ideas, and
communicate with one another (Boyd, 2007). As
such, these sites thrive on a sense of immediacy
and community (Barnes, 2006). With social net-
working sites there is a shift in the re-making of
identity. While social connection sites in the 1990s
illuminated the sense of place with home pages,
global villages, and cities, with social networking
sites there has been an emphasis on the creation
of the 'self' through hobbies, interests, interac-
tions, and a display of users' contacts through
multimedia formats (Rosen, 2007). According
to Boyd and Heer (2006: 2), 'the performance of
social identity and relationships through profiles
has shifted these from being a static representation
of self to a communicative body in conversation
with other represented bodies.' The emphasis of
self-expression, through the creation of profiles,
anchors publicity, play, and performance at the
core of identity formation and communication.As
such, identity is mutable online and not embodied
by the body, and often the need to disclose real-life
identities is intimately tied to this community's
code of authenticity in making identity claims
where friends and peers can verify claims made
in the profiles (Donath & Boyd, 2004).
Social networking sites can support a variety
of shared multimedia content beyond photos to
include video and music, can be constitutive of
self-identity and representation, and can become
a playground for the creativity of millions (Geyer
et al. 2008:1545). Geyer et al. (2008) point out
that while such sites connect people with each
other through content and profile sharing, some
sites focus on a single content type as in the case
of Flickr and YouTube when communities form
through the sharing of photos or videos. Other
sites may entail the sharing of many types of
content.
In assessing SNS's, Boyd and Ellison (2007)
highlight three distinctive features: the user's abil-
ity to construct a public profile, articulate a list of
Search WWH ::
Custom Search