Blanchard reading

Some community analysts might argue that calling any online group a virtual community represents yet another example of the overuse of the term “community” to the point that concept has lost any real meaning (Harris, 1999).
There seems to be a continual dispute as to what is considered to be a community, is community only associated with face to face interaction? But doesn’t the word ‘virtual’ community clearly state that this type of community is virtual it really doesn’t exist outside cyberspace unless the members choose to expand it in that respect. Sometimes geographical limitations can be said to prevent that sense of community and that virtual communities have helped combat this problem
they would help replace the relationships lost as people became more isolated from their neighbors (Rheingold, 1993; Schuler, 1996

A question that is raised in the reading is that what makes a virtual community? Because not all virtual groups are virtual communities. Certain features distinguish the two.
Jones argues that we can understand virtual communities by understanding the artifacts of its virtual settlement: its postings, structure and content.

SOC (Sense of Community) as consisting of the following four characteristics:
Feelings of membership: Feelings of belonging to, and identifying with, the community;
This sense of membership can be felt but hose using blogs, on one hand one can feel this sense of membership without joining the blog but being a lurker, by adding a blog to ones favourites one can always check if there are any new discussions and just enjoy the reading aspect of the community. In real life not all people interact in a community or share their thoughts or feelings but still feel as though they still have membership within the group, should they be regarded as not being part of the community?
Feelings of influence: Feelings of having influence on, and being influenced by, the community;
Not all influence is good especially online, as previously discussed in my blog last week there as been a raise of pro-anorexia websites which influence people to live unhealthily, if a member belongs to that community and identifies with it doesn’t mean that the same outcomes as the Julie/Julia Project will follow. The next two characteristics can also be applied to this justification.
Integration and fulfillment of needs: Feelings of being supported by others in the community while also supporting them; and
Shared emotional connection: Feelings of relationships, shared history, and a “spirit” of community.


The issue of lurkers seem to be a key argument with the majority of people using blogs being lurkers
Nonetheless, lurkers may comprise the vast majority of participants of a virtual community (Blanchard & Markus, 2003)
Could it be said that lurker also make up part of the community? Or are thety still regarded as outcasts? Despite their vast numbers? Who gets to decide as to who will be frowned upon? Certainly people have personal opinion as to weather they choose to par-take in the discussions or not. Surely the internet was created for people to have access to whatever they chose to read or view. If certain groups do not wish for their material to be read surely passwords and subscriptions can be put into place to prevent the dangerous lurkers.
In the case study the blog used had hundreds of hits everyday but this doesn’t make it a community, a community has to have a minimal number of participants and in the case study conducted most people identified that they did not feel as though they were part of a community but rather visitors to the blog, some even identified the point that I made earlier that not all people in society communicate in real communities why should this change online?
it lacked a large enough group of people who considered it a virtual community. Without a critical mass of engaged, connected, and attached participants, its survival depended primarily on the blog author alone. Clearly, there must be a large enough subset of the members who have a strong enough sense of community for a virtual group to cross over to a virtual community.