Archive for April 2008
Community building…. ??
Unstructured thoughts….
The idea that community-building is a by-product of network building…
How does forgr fit into the community model I’ve been on about? It is emplaced: even in its very name–forgr. It is a “community of interest” or a club or service provider–connecting those with something to those who want something, but it is more than transactional in that it requires members to be giving back… the dance club… come in knowing nothing… learn from those who have been there… teach those who come after you… and when the band packs up at the end of the evening and the dancing is done… go out for food and talk about topics other than the dance steps…
That’s where the community building happens… not in the “this is a computer, this is a track pad, e-mail works like this, and you can protect yourself from on-line predation with a few simple steps…” That’s transactional… learning to dance is transactional… teaching someone to dance is the edge between transactional and community… dancing with someone is community… Helping someone attach a picture to an e-mail is the edge between tranactional and community… Learning to shop on-line is transactional… learning to create a blog is on the edge between transactional and community… Creating a map of maple trees on your block with CommunityWalk and sharing it to discuss, say, “nature in the city,” on a blog, or in a discussion group or comment thread is community-building…
Giving people access to these tools is network building… connecting people by threads of interest… needs and desires defined in a way to create a common language…
The network is abstract, and can connect interests… the community is the people in the place… connecting their humanity…
More… what if the networks don’t connect at all or hardly worth talking about…?
