NetTribe.it

Individualismo reticolare e comunità digitali

(Networked Individualism and Digital Communities)

By  Paolo Dell'Aquila

"Virtual communities" or "on-line communities" indicate networks of people who gather together electronically in newsgroups or mailing lists to discuss specific topics which range from academic research to hobbies. In these cases, there are no geographic boundaries and participants can be located anywhere in the world. 

In our book we analyse if these networks of computer-mediated communications can product symbolic meanings and a common "ethos" which binds a group. We study particularly some associations, created in the Internet, that have also physical spaces of discussion (because they are part of a civic network, or similar) starting with some case-studies. 

We want to discuss, if community on line can create a "feeling" of belonging, or attachment, by sharing something in common. Communications in newsgroups and mailing lists can build an ethics of the micro-groups, which creates "ambiances" (Simmel, Maffesoli), atmospheres, life-styles that distinguish a local network. 

It's interesting to analyse how "protocommunities"(Willis) can create a common body , or better an "habitus" of values and attitudes and a system of shared values and of social organization. We also aim at discussing, if community networks can increase participation in the democratic process. In this hypothesis, the general pattern towards an "ecology of consumption" can product form of computer-mediated communications which build again form of civic ethics. Virtual communities provide to their members new public spaces, similar to those of the old "civil society" (Rheingold). In these groups citizens can use technology to put pressure on policy making. 

They can lobby directly by contacting decision makers and/or mobilize and educate their members and potential members in favour or against the policies. Volunteers can also "meet" and work from home, writing documents and sending appeals to public and private administration and management. 

This can be interpreted as the birth of new brainframes (de Kerchkove), by which we can select the complexity of the world-wide information. Despite the "virtual identities" of cyberpunk culture (that were always changing, as simulacra), we are entering, perhaps, an era in which a man can manage better the complexity of globalized economy and balance better the relationship between human and natural ecosystem.