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Social Gaming

Ahhh so we’ve reached the end of this blog series for my summer unit MDA20009 - Digital Communities.

It has been fun exploring ideas with you all and I hope you guys had as much fun reading into my views and perspectives as I did writing them.

The last topic for blog series is on social gaming and to be quite honest I’m very excited about this topic as it is one I’m very personally involved with.

For those of you who don’t know what social gaming is, social gaming refers to playing games that requires social interaction between players. Although many associate social gaming with internet/online gaming; social gaming has been around for years as many card, turn base, and board games also fall under this category. Games like Speed, Snap, Boggle, Scrabble, and Monopoly are all social games as they require you to interact with others.

(Uno by Mattel 2013)

As this unit is one based on digital communities I will be exploring the realm of online gaming. The gaming industry is one of the largest in the entertainment sector with reporting a 108.9 billion dollars revenue globally in 2017 (McDonald 2017) and included 2.2 billion gamers worldwide (McDonald 2017).

In the world of social gaming there is also a new trend emerging which is watching others play games online through streaming services such as Twitch and has been aided by the rapid rise of eSports.

Twitch is an online streaming service owned by Amazon which focuses exclusively on games. An average of 10 million Americans watches Twitch stream daily (Simic 2017) and popular streamers can make up to $100,000 annually for playing games online (Simic 2017)

(League of Legends eSports Event by Pairingo)

The most popular titles that gain consist high levels of viewership are League of Legends, DoTa and Overwatch. These titles are all MOBAs (Massive Online Battle Arena) games which is a type of Massive Multiplayer Online games (MMOs) and require players to work as a team or in competition to achieve a common objective such as capture the point. The video below is a saved Twitch stream uploaded onto YouTube showcasing how and what Twitch does for both streamer and viewer. 

I have been playing games since a young age and I would call myself an avid gamer and I too enjoy watching streamers play games online.

My top three reasons to why viewing gaming streams has really taken off globally is:

1. The entertainment provides for viewers

2. The social aspect of viewing streams as Twitch provides chat boxes that lets viewers interacted and even collaborate with others

3. It gives a platform for people who don’t has access to games to still enjoy them and can give insight into a gamer prior to purchasing it themselves

Personally, I have had an amazing experience with online social gaming as it has allowed me to pursue my interest without fear of judgement into a very welcoming online/digital community.

I’ve also had a great time being apart of this unit and this digital community with you all.

So farewell my fellow MDA20009 peers and classmates, I wish you all nothing but the best in your future endeavors.

References

Anon 2010, "How Does Online Gaming Affect Social Interactions?", ScienceDaily, viewed 12 January, 2018, <https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2007/09/070915110957.htm>.

Anon 2018, "Topic: MMO gaming statistics", www.statista.com, viewed 12 January, 2018, <https://www.statista.com/topics/2290/mmo-gaming/>.

McDonald, E 2018, "The Global Games Market 2017 | Per Region & Segment | Newzoo", Newzoo, viewed 12 January, 2018, <https://newzoo.com/insights/articles/the-global-games-market-will-reach-108-9-billion-in-2017-with-mobile-taking-42/>.

Simic, I. (2017). Why Do We Watch Others Play Games?. [online] Domain.me. Available at: https://domain.me/videogame-streaming/ [Accessed 12 Jan. 2018].

Sloat, S 2017, "The Social Impact of Social Games", Inverse, viewed 12 January, 2018, <https://www.inverse.com/article/17065-how-next-generation-video-games-will-teach-us-to-think-beyond-player-number-one>.

YouTube. (2016). Overwatch w/ friends (May 23, 2016). [online] Available at: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wMT8Eni3Yi0 [Accessed 12 Jan. 2018].

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“But first, let me take a selfie”

When you hear the world selfie, what comes to mind? Is it silly faces with Snapchat filters or is it girls in a nightclub bathroom pulling the classic duckface? Whatever it is we can agree that we all know what a selfie is.

Over the past few years, the word “selfie” has become such as commonly used term that I was added into the Oxford dictionary in 2013 and event received “Word of the Year” (Oxford Dictionaries 2013). The dictionaries definition of a selfie is: “A photograph that one has taken of oneself, typically one taken with a smartphone or webcam and uploaded to a social media website.”

What might surprise many people is that the word “selfie” was firstly coined by Flickr in 2004 (Day 2013) in unity with the original social media platform MySpace and it’s rising fame into it’s prime. This week’s blog I will be exploring social imaging and in particular Selfie culture.

(OMG QUOKKA by Toby Costanzo 2014)

Being in my early 20s it’s safe to say that I do have a few hundred images on my phone gallery of myself; from pictures of on a Friday getting ready for a night out on the town to ones of me in my sweatpants on a Sunday night eating dinner and yes, yes, I do post them on my social media accounts.

(Social Media by Jonny Hodgson 2016)

Evan Speigel, founder of the visual communication and social media app Snapchat has argued that:

“The selfie makes sense as the fundamental unit of communication on Snapchat because it marks the transition between digital media as self-expression and digital media as communication.” (Speigel 2014, Herrmen)

And to a large extent I agree, social media has allowed users to communicate with images that are self-expressions. Weather it be posting selfies, or pictures of food or travel pictures; social media has given us platforms to connect and collaborate with others whom share similar interest. It has also allowed long-distance friends and family a means of face-to-face communication which is fun and interactive.

Although it may seem like it is all fun and games it is important for users to understand the ubiquitous side of social imaging.

In my childhood years personal photography to me meant photographs of birthday parties and special occasions like Easter and Christmas. Now in today postmodern society my personal photography catalogue includes various everyday events that occur for me such as my morning coffee and walk by the beach that I share on a global scale through my Instagram.

Prior to the advancements of communication technologies personal photography was something you simply shared with your close network of friends and families as you would generally have photo album of some sort and physically show them but now with digital media many like myself use smartphones with 4G internet access to keep our friends and families updated with a touch of a button.

Be careful of what you post digitally, because once it goes up it never really comes down. Ensure that content is representative of who you are and that you use social media as a means to connect with like-minded individuals to share experiences. Social media can become such a beautiful thing if you used it as intended but many people are yet to learn that lesson.

So I’ve attached a TED talk video which talks about how we all should rethink about how we use the internet and social media interact with others.

References

Day, E. (2013). How selfies became a global phenomenon. [online] the Guardian. Available at: https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2013/jul/14/how-selfies-became-a-global-phenomenon [Accessed 7 Jan. 2018].

Herrman, J. (2014). Meet The Man Who Got Inside Snapchat's Head. [online] BuzzFeed. Available at: https://www.buzzfeed.com/jwherrman/meet-the-unlikely-academic-behind-snapchats-new-pitch?utm_term=.alNVRrgVwR#.nemna1OnLa [Accessed 7 Jan. 2018].

Miller, C. (2013). In Defense Of The Selfie. [online] HuffPost. Available at: https://www.huffingtonpost.com/casey-miller/teens-and-selfies_b_4218454.html [Accessed 7 Jan. 2018].

Oxford Dictionaries | English. (2018). Word of the Year 2013 | Oxford Dictionaries. [online] Available at: https://en.oxforddictionaries.com/word-of-the-year/word-of-the-year-2013 [Accessed 7 Jan. 2018].

Ronson, J. (2018). How one tweet can ruin your life | Jon Ronson. [online] YouTube. Available at: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wAIP6fI0NAI [Accessed 7 Jan. 2018].

Viktorija, G. (2015). 10+ Animals Taking Selfies That Will Make You Smile. [online] Bored Panda. Available at: https://www.boredpanda.com/funny-animal-selfies/ [Accessed 7 Jan. 2018].

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Crowd-sourcing in times of crisis

The power that social media has given everyday users to become instant on-scene reporters which has become very valuable and this information came to light when the devastating 7.0 magnitude earthquake hit the West Indian island of Hispaniola, effecting the nearby countries of Haiti and the Dominican Republic on the 12 of January 2010 (Pallardy 2017). By January 24th, 2010 up to 5 aftershocks of ranging for 4.5 to 5.9 magnitudes also hit and in total caused catastrophic damage including 3.5 million people effected, 300,000 deaths and billion dollars of damage to infrastructure (Disaster Emergency Committee 2017). The most severely affected was Haiti and is commonly referred to as the 2010 Haiti earthquake.

Although there was significant damage to affected nation's communication networks there was still power available as power wasn't cut off for the entire island; many telephone lines unavailable but there was access to internet. Within hours of the earthquake hitting graphic images of people covered in rubble found themselves on Twitter, far ahead of any traditional media sources like TV reporters and cameramen.

I’ve provided a link I found whilst researching for this blog post that I thought might be insightful for others about what kind of tweet were being tweeted about the earthquake from peoples immediately effected.

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2010/jan/13/haiti-twitter-earthquake-disaster

(Information flows in post-earthquake crisis data crowdsourcing, Haiti 2010 by Mulder et al., 2016)

Aside from the on-the-scene twitter updates from those directly affected what helped Haiti an astounding amount is crowdsourcing. Crowdsourcing refers to “the practice of obtaining needed services, ideas, or content by soliciting contributions from a large group of people and especially from the online community rather than from traditional employees or suppliers” (Merriam Webster Online 2014). The type of crowdsourcing which helped Haiti the most was crisis mapping; which refers to the real-time gathering, display and analysis of data during a crisis, usually a natural disaster or social/political conflict (Meier 2011).

The organisation commonly linked with crisis crowdsourcing is Ushahidi Inc. Ushahidi Inc which is a non-profit company who provides aa free and open-source platform that allows interested individuals and groups to create live, interactive maps. The platform can be used to combine citizen reporting with mapping and visualization tools to create a crisis map - a real-time, dynamic, multifaceted snapshot of how a crisis is evolving (Norheim-Hagtun and Meier 2010)

(The Ushahidi Hait Map in the first 24 hours after the earthquake by Ushahidi)

Ushahidi and crisis mapping helped Haiti in the aftermath following the January 12th earthquake by allowing for its network of volunteers to be able to provide humanitarian responders real time in accordance to online activity from survivors. Crisis mapping is an important tool for emergency aid efforts as it helps to gather and make sense of severity of disasters based on geological location and organize a more efficient humanitarian response. Without the help of crisis mapping I believe the death toll of the Haiti earthquake would have been even more devastating. Crisis mapping also allowed for family members of those affected a means to see if their loved ones were safe in such an overwhelming and distressing time.

References

Disasters Emergency Committee. (2017). Haiti Earthquake Facts and Figures. [online] Available at: https://www.dec.org.uk/articles/haiti-earthquake-facts-and-figures [Accessed 2 Jan. 2018].

Kaplan, J. (2010). In Haitian Earthquake Disaster, Twitter Gets the Word Out. [online] Fox News. Available at: http://www.foxnews.com/tech/2010/01/13/haitian-earthquake-disaster-power-twitter-shines.html [Accessed 2 Jan. 2018].

Meier, P. (2012). How Crisis Mapping Saved Lives in Haiti – National Geographic Blog. [online] Blog.nationalgeographic.org. Available at: https://blog.nationalgeographic.org/2012/07/02/how-crisis-mapping-saved-lives-in-haiti/ [Accessed 2 Jan. 2018].

Mulder, F., Ferguson, J., Groenewegen, P., Boersma, K. and Wolbers, J. (2016). Questioning Big Data: Crowdsourcing crisis data towards an inclusive humanitarian response. Big Data & Society, [online] 3(2), p.205395171666205. Available at: https://www.researchgate.net/publication/306051253_Questioning_Big_Data_Crowdsourcing_crisis_data_towards_an_inclusive_humanitarian_response [Accessed 2 Jan. 2018].

Norheim-Hagtun, I. and Meier, P. (2010). Crowdsourcing for Crisis Mapping in Haiti. Innovations: Technology, Governance, Globalization, 5(4), pp.81-89.

Pallardy, R. (2017). Haiti earthquake of 2010 | Effects, Damage, Map, & Facts. [online] Encyclopedia Britannica. Available at: https://www.britannica.com/event/Haiti-earthquake-of-2010 [Accessed 2 Jan. 2018].

Ushahidi. (2018). Haiti and the Power of Crowdsourcing. [online] Available at: https://www.ushahidi.com/blog/2012/01/12/haiti-and-the-power-of-crowdsourcing/ [Accessed 2 Jan. 2018].

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Trolling and Social Media Conflict

Trolls/trolling in the simplest terms refers to when individual exhibits a certain behaviour in order to provoke an emotional response out of an audience.

Having said that trolls and trolling has been around for centuries in different forms to the regular internet troll we see today. From intellectuals like Marcel Duchamp, to comedian Andy Kaufman and even boxing legend Muhammad Ali can all be considered trolls (Goldflarb 2014).

I’d like to use the direct example of Andy Kaufman and his behaviours displayed during many of his television show appearances. He acts a certain way to get a laugh out of the audience and technically is a form of trolling. I’ve included a video below to better showcase the one of a kind comedic genius he is known for being.

In today’s world of rapid growth in communication technologies and internet comes internet trolls. Internet trolls/trolling refers to is when a person used the internet to purposely start arguments or upset people online by posting provocative, stiring, and/or off-topic messages in an online forum such as Facebook, YouTube, Reddit, and Instagram comment sections with the intent of provoking users into an emotional response for the troll's amusement.

The rise of the internet and numerous social media platforms like Facebook, YouTube, and Instagram has made trolling a lot easier with the added ability to be an internet troll with animosity. In many instances has made it more appealing for people. Internet trolls generally taken humorously but the truth is that internet trolling can become quite serious and no laughing matter; especially when it involves youths.

(Cyberbullying by Parmadaily n.d)

In Danah Boyd book entitled “It’s Complicated” it analyses the relationship between youth and their use of social and how this new technology has altered relationships formed with their peers and if these technologies have had a direction 

“Although new forms of drama find a home through social media, teens’ behaviours have not significantly changed. Social media has not radically altered the dynamics of bullying, but it has made these dynamics more visible to more people. We must use this visibility, not to justify increased punishment, but to help youth who are actually crying out for attention. Blaming technology or assuming that conflict will disappear if technology usage is minimized is naive. Recognizing where teens are at and why they engage in particular acts of meanness and cruelty is important to creating interventions that work.” (Boyd 2014)

What Danah Boyd is trying to say is that although the relationship between youths and new technologies hasn’t drastically changed the dynamics of bullying there are still a few steps we can take to better the relationship youths have with trolling behaviour.

We all need to focus on helping youth understand their emotions during times of inner conflict as many whom display trolling behaviours are the ones who need attention the most. We must also come to terms with the fact that behaviours related to trolling will continue off screen even if usage is minimised and we are not to blame the medium.

References

Boyd, D. (2014). It’s Complicated: The Social Lives of Networked Teens. Yale Books, pp.128 - 152.

Goldfarb, A. (2014). The World's Greatest Trolls In The Days Before The Internet. [online] MTV News. Available at: http://www.mtv.com/news/2007569/pre-internet-trolls/ [Accessed 20 Dec. 2017].

Moreau, E. (2018). Here's What You Need to Know About Internet Trolling. [online] Lifewire. Available at: https://www.lifewire.com/what-is-internet-trolling-3485891 [Accessed 20 Dec. 2017].

YouTube. (2011). Andy Kaufman Impersonates Elvis Presley and Foreign Man on Johnny Carson's Tonight Show. [online] Available at: https://youtu.be/r59AWfhwpPg [Accessed 20 Dec. 2017].

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Media Activism and Protest

One of the greatest things to come out of social media is the ability it gives individuals to have an online platform to voice opinions that otherwise would be ignored and neglected by mainstream media.

 In this week’s blog I will be talking about media activism. Media activism refers to the broad type of activism that employs communication technologies such as the internet and it’s many websites and apps for social and political movements.

Examples of media activism include publishing, commenting, and sharing of news on websites and social media platforms like Twitter, Facebook, Reddit and YouTube, the organizing of events to raise awareness, and spreading information about protests via communication technologies.

A closely related form of Media Activism is Hashtag Activism which refers to the specific usage of Twitter Hashtags for media activism; hashtags which first began on Twitter but have now grown to include hashtags on other social media platforms such as Facebook and Instagram.

(Black Lives Matter, Michael Owens 2015) This image is a mural made of names of the killed as a result of racial profiling and police brutality since 2014.

For this blog post, I’d like to focus on one movement close to my heart which is the Black Lives Matter movement.

The movement originated in the United States in February 2013 in response to the acquittal of George Zimmerman for the shooting death of unarmed African-American teen Trayvon Martin.

 (Trayvon Martin at an Aviation Camp, Sabrina Fulton/Trayvon’s Mother)

Trayvon Martin was 17-years-old, he had his whole life ahead of him and he was shot and killed by a vile and bigoted individual for nothing more than being a young black man. Trayvon was unarmed. All the had on him was a packet of skittles and a can of ice tea and the American judicial system let a man walk free after because he felted “threatened” and claimed self-defence.

In the years to come the American judicial system continues to fail African-Americans through numerous cases of racial profiling, police brutality and racial inequality. Prominent cases of police brutality including the deaths of another African-American teenage Michael Brown, father of six Eric Garner and Sandra Bland whom all died at the hands of police enforcement.

As official figures of police killings have not been taken by the U.S government a non-for-profit organisation called Fatal Encounters has started gathering data on police brutality cases in the United States since the 2014 killing of another unarmed teenager Michael Brown in Ferguson, Missouri. Fatal Encounters reported “at least 2,902 people killed by police since August 9, 2014” (Lopez and Oh 2017).

Black Lives Matter activist Ashley Yates (@BrownBlaze) explains: “We started to use Twitter and Facebook and Instagram as way to just get the word out, to contrast the stark mainstream media blackout that was occurring.” Yates states media once relied on the bias news sources and police narrative, but not anymore. “Social media has given people on the ground a voice and a validation as a trusted source.” (Parker 2016)

(Black Lives Matter Protest by Renee Jones Schneider, Star Tribune)

Black Lives Matter regularly holds protests to speak out against police killings of black people, and broader issues such as racial profiling, police brutality, and racial inequality. This wouldn’t be such an active movement if it wasn’t for participatory culture, the internet has allowed us to view, share and contribute to things in ways that do not bound us geologically and allow us to support movements that are not broadcasted through mainstream media.

Black Lives Matter is more than a hashtag. It is movement that is fighting for the rights of humans; and if you believe in human rights than this fight should be yours too! Police brutality, racial profiling and inequality of race is something still relevant today even though it isn’t highly highlighted in mainstream media. 

References

Lopez, G. and Oh, S. (2018). Police killings since Ferguson, in one map. [online] Vox.com. Available at: https://www.vox.com/a/police-shootings-ferguson-map [Accessed 15 Dec. 2017].

O'Neil, L. (2017). How many black Americans have been killed by police? Deaths tracked online but official data lacking. [online] CBC News. Available at: http://www.cbc.ca/news/trending/number-of-black-people-killed-by-us-police-still-no-stats-1.3670513 [Accessed 15 Dec. 2017].

Owens, M. (2015). Black Lives Matter Is New Civil Rights. [online] Michael Owens. Available at: https://www.michaeloart.com/black-lives-matter-is-new-civil-rights/ [Accessed 15 Dec. 2017].

Parker, E. (2016). #BlackLivesMatter and the Power and Limits of Social Media. [online] Medium. Available at: https://medium.com/@emilydparker/how-blacklivesmatter-resembles-activism-in-the-authoritarian-world-24d1200864f6 [Accessed 15 Dec. 2017].

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Politics and Social Media

Now when you hear the word politician, social media generally isn't the first thing that comes to mind is it? But maybe it should be? Social media is becoming one of the most influential digital channels for politicians to engage with audiences, especially ones of the younger demographic. Social media has provided political parties and politicians with a public forum to voice and share their opinions online to directly connect with audiences. Many politicians have utilized the communication tools of social media by running active accounts on various platforms such as Facebook and Twitter to earn the attention of younger demographics.

(Presidential Candidate Sen. Barack Obama, by Chris Hondros)

One of the most notable politician to utilize social media to engage with the public and gain recognition is none other than the 44th President of the United States Barack Obama. During his 2008 election campaign Barack Obama rose in popularity through his usage of social media; the platforms applied during his first run for office included Myspace, Facebook, and Twitter. Social media as a form of communication medium in politics at this time was still unknown and no one could anticipate its effects.

Pew Research Center found that “74% of Americans internet users/55% of the entire adult population went online during the 2008 Presidential election to take part in or get news and information about the campaign”. (Young 2010). After Barack Obama a relatively unknown Illinois Senator beat John McCain for the 44th Presidency and made history as the first black president, it was undeniably that social media had paid a substantial role in the win and was a driving force in audience engagement and voting habits. United States Elections Project stated that it was “the highest overall voter turnout was 131 million Americans in the 2008 contest between Barack Obama and John McCain” (Harrington 2016).

(Screenshot from Barack Obama’s Official Twitter Page)

“Were it not for the Internet, Barack Obama would not be president. Were it not for the Internet, Barack Obama would not have been the nominee,” said Arianna Huffington, editor in chief of The Huffington Post.

Barack Obama's usage of social media has since been associated to how Franklin D. Roosevelt and John F. Kennedy's both used the introduction of the radio and television mediums to help them win their previous election campaigns in times of communication technology advancements. These technological advancements changed politics forever; the same way this generation saw how Barack Obama changed politics forever with his usage of social media in his election campaign strategy and ultimately won due to this adaption to society changing.

References

Harrington, K. (2016). Election Voter Turnout Records. [online] Business Insider. Available at: https://www.businessinsider.com.au/voter-turnout-records-history-obama-clinton-2016-11?r=US&IR=T [Accessed 11 Dec. 2017].

INSEAD Knowledge. (2009). How Obama used social networking tools to win. [online] Available at: https://knowledge.insead.edu/innovation/how-obama-used-social-networking-tools-to-win-1600 [Accessed 11 Dec. 2017].

Miller, C. (2018). How Obama's Internet Campaign Changed Politics. [online] Bits Blog. Available at: https://bits.blogs.nytimes.com/2008/11/07/how-obamas-internet-campaign-changed-politics/ [Accessed 11 Dec. 2017].

Young, S. (2011). How Australia decides. Port Melbourne: Cambridge University Press, pp.203 - 206.

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What are “affordances”?

Don't stress if you were just like me a month ago scratching my head about what affordances are.

Social affordances refer to the properties of an object or environment that permit social actions (Ferri, Campione, Dalla Volta, Gianelli and Gentilucci 2011).

It seems a lot more complicated than it is so here’s a quick video by Don Norman on affordances which I watched for my digital communities class to help me grasp the meaning better.

But for this post when I say affordances I’ll be talking about social affordances.

I just like many of us have numerous social media accounts. I personally have a Facebook, Instagram, Snapchat two Tumblr blogs, Twitter and a LinkedIn account which I’m active on daily.

I’m currently a Media and Communications student with a major in Social Media and have many social circles which range from the people I play Dungeons and Dragons on a Saturday night to people I work and build business relationships with so the platforms I choose to interact with these people can affect and influence how they view and perceive our relationship.

So in regards to social media platforms and their affordances it is how the structure and environment of the social media platform lets us interact with each other.

For example it is common practice to “connect” with your general manager on LinkedIn but not so much to friend your general manager on Facebook. LinkedIn has a more professional structure which is built around affordances of how we can interact with other users whilst Facebook is a little more casual in allowing us to share, post, like and react to post with funny and silly emojis.

Another example would be how Twitter has a 240 character limit per post/tweet. This brings to life the fast paced nature of the social media site and how short, straight to the point messages can be received instantly and with far reach of audience.

Although it may seem like a feature it is actually an affordance and a way for the developers to track, analyses and dictate how we use their social media platform.

I’m not complaining as I’m a big believer in social media is just a new way to connect and build relationships you just have to think a little before you posting what onto which site.

References

100, T., Users, T., PERRY, K., Bieber, J., Obama, B., Swift, T., DeGeneres, E., Gaga, L. and Ronaldo, C. (2017). Top 100 Most Followed Users on Twitter. [online] twittercounter. Available at: https://twittercounter.com/pages/100 [Accessed 7 Dec. 2017].

Baymard Institute. (2017). Social Media: Analyze Affordances, Not Features. [online] Available at: https://baymard.com/blog/analyzing-social-affordances [Accessed 7 Dec. 2017].

Ferri, F., Campione, G., Dalla Volta, R., Gianelli, C. and Gentilucci, M. (2011). Social Requests and Social Affordances: How They Affect the Kinematics of Motor Sequences during Interactions between Conspecifics. PLoS ONE, 6(1), p.e15855.

NewsComAu. (2017). The 10 smartest celebrities on Twitter. [online] Available at: http://www.news.com.au/entertainment/celebrity-life/the-10-smartest-celebrities-on-twitter-according-to-time-magazine/news-story/67b36a60939aedc7a73be8d33e837b74 [Accessed 7 Dec. 2017].

TIME.com. (2017). Top 10 Celebrity Twitter Feeds - TIME. [online] Available at: http://content.time.com/time/specials/packages/completelist/0,29569,1878865,00.html [Accessed 7 Dec. 2017].

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Digital Communities and Social Media

I'm not new to blogging by all means as I've been blogging for 5+ years on this very site but this time it's for a different reason. This blog is a little more serious than what some of you who follow my personal blog might find but bare with me it is for university (college). Each week I'll be covering subject matter from politics and activism to gaming and visual communities and how the growing dominance of social media as a factor of our social, political, financial and cultural lives. The topic of this first week and opening blog is to explore and define what terms "digital communities" and "social media".

(Digital Communities by Nomad Projects, 2016) Digital communities also known as online communities are a virtual social groups and environments whose members interact with each other primarily via the Internet (Volkman 2011). My university class for this unit for example is a digital community. It is an online unit and we are spread across Australia in physical nature but we are connected via the internet to be able to interact with one another to share ideas, comments and notes at times which are preferable to us as we all live busy lives. How social media aids the growth of digital communities is how many of us have connected and re-connected with people using social media platforms such sites as Facebook, Instagram and Tumblr. Social media allows us to connect with people we have shared vested interest with without the boundaries of geological factors.

(Online Friendships, Real or Fake by Sagoon, 2017)

I personally have been apart of this online community of Tumblr for over 5+ years and even though I haven't been as active on the media site I am still very connected to a few I've met from this site. I have created life long friendships and shared many memories with people all over the world who I would have never met if it wasn't for social media. One of the hardest things about being in an online community and having online friendships is validating the relationship to others. Yes, I know I shouldn't have to validate it to anyone but 15-year-old me didn't understand that concept very well.

In high school it was very hard to talk about my friends I had met online and not feel like an outcast but as social media's popularity grew so did the acceptance of online friendships and even romances.

(Real Life Vs. Internet Friends, Anon)

I honestly wouldn't be alive if it wasn't for the supportive online community of people I've met through Tumblr. Tumblr helped me connect with like-minded people and helped me through the most difficult times of my life. It's amazing how someone could be there for you so much and not even be there physically. Of course it would of been awesome to live down the road to some of my best friends but the world works in mysterious ways and hey, at least it works out when you travel; you always have a place to stay for free :)

References

Creativeteachingsite.com. (2017). Digital Communities. [online] Available at: http://www.creativeteachingsite.com/teach10.htm [Accessed 16 Nov. 2017].

Darnal, A. (2017). Online friendships, fake or real? Let’s find out!. [online] Sagoon. Available at: https://blog.sagoon.com/online-friendships-fake-or-real-lets-find-out/ [Accessed 16 Nov. 2017].

Nomad Projects blog. (2017). Best Resources: 8 communities for Digital Nomads - Nomad Projects blog. [online] Available at: http://blog.nomadprojects.io/best-resources-top-communities-for-digital-nomads/ [Accessed 16 Nov. 2017].

Swinburne.edu.au. (2017). Digital Communities | Units of study | Swinburne University of Technology | Melbourne, Australia. [online] Available at: https://www.swinburne.edu.au/study/courses/units/Digital-Communities-MDA20009/local [Accessed 16 Nov. 2017].

Volkman, E. (2017). What Is An Online Community?. [online] Social Media Today. Available at: https://www.socialmediatoday.com/content/what-online-community [Accessed 16 Nov. 2017].