Content-type: text/html Downes.ca ~ Stephen's Web ~ Coffee, communities, and condescension

Stephen Downes

Knowledge, Learning, Community

Harold Jarche uses a Twitter discussion to make the point that networks are not the same as communities. "Our networks are great places for serendipitous connections," he writes. "But they are not safe places to have deeper conversations or to expose our points of view." I think he is right but I'm not convinced by his example. The tweets are not (for the most part) addressed to him; they constitute a conversation by a set of third parties. Moreover, it felt to me that a number of these participants could easily have been robots autotweeting in response to the mention of an MBA. Jarche writes, "In an open network the potential for online outrage and group orthodoxy is large." Well yes, but that's true in a community as well.

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Stephen Downes Stephen Downes, Casselman, Canada
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Last Updated: Dec 12, 2024 03:12 a.m.

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