I'm having a hard time getting this project started. I still haven't decided the locale of my research. I thought it might be a good idea to explore a social networking domain that I had never previously visited for the purpose of my research. I figured the fact that I had no previous knowledge of the environment would allow me to form clearer ideas and assumptions about my observations without any (or as much) pre-conceived biases or judgements.
Earlier this afternoon, I decided to give Twitter a shot. I've been hearing a lot about Twitter recently in the media after being initially made aware of it during the American presidential election campaigns last fall. I registered a new account and did a little exploring and site-seeing. Right away, it became clear to me that there were various research question that can be considered from observing that community. Why are members so involved? Why do members find it important to 'Tweet' their thoughts with the rest of the community? How do members choose what thoughts to 'Tweet' and what thoughts to filter out? Is the short length of the Tweets detrimental or helpful to parlaying a message? Are the interactions 'deep' or are they kept on a more superficial level because of the brevity of the Tweets? Are the Tweets intertwined interactions or simply discreet packets of information/knowledge/facts that can either be added to or left to float out there? Actually, Twitter got me thinking a lot about how our society (on and off-line) treats information in the 21st century; We need our info in real-time, short, and to the point.
Having said all that about Twitter and having mentioned some of the interesting questions that arise from the social networking taking place within that community, I think the fact that I had never used the site before might pose too great an obstacle for this course research. There's a learning curve using Twitter that might take too long to master for this course. I'm afraid too much time and energy will have to be spent learning how to navigate this site and becoming completely comfortable within the environment.
Since this course only runs until April, I think it will be wiser to focus my attention within an environment that I am already comfortable with without having to worry about mastering the technology/terminology/practices of the observed online community. I have held a Facebook account for nearly two years and am completely comfortable with that environment, so perhaps I will be well served to conduct my research within that social networking site. As I stated earlier in this post, it would be ideal to observe a community I am not acquainted with in order to be able to view it with a fresh perspective, but unfortunately in this case, the technological impediments would be too cumbersome to overcome within the alloted time frame of my research.
I'll be back with some thoughts on Facebook in a bit!
Twitter's learning curve takes a matter of a few hours I think. It really depends on how you want to use it, and why, and that presents you with your own unique learning curve. Since I had limited and specific uses for it, the time it took to learn how to use the network software was really limited, less than a day for certain. I would advise that you choose a specific subject of interest, and go into Twitter with that subject in mind, and see how it is "cultivated" there. By subject of interest, I mean anything like "bikers" to "anarchists" to "fans of 1940s movies." In other words, you need to know what platform you will stand on, because Twitter has many, and you won't be able to catch every train in Twitter.
ReplyDeleteOne thing about researching twitter is that it can be used in so many different ways, depending on the kind of connections you setup. I see lots of people loving twitter, but I signed up sometime last year and I just haven't been pulled in (yet).
ReplyDeleteI think this is because I failed to tap into enough meaningful connections. The people I connected with on Twitter I had already connected with in the blogsphere. I didn't go out of my way to meet new people using it.
So my recommendation if you are going to tweet, is dive right in and follow as many feeds as you can, then filter them out later. I started small, and it went no where fast.
As part of my fieldwork, I tried to explore how publishers were using twitter to tap into audiences, but it was a little bit too 'tangent' and I didn't develop it. The whole corporate marketing side of twitter is huge though, even though many only use it between friends.
I wouldn't worry about 'mastering' a topic. All your experiences adapting to, and learning about Twitter/facebook/subject can be turned into valuable insights.
ReplyDeleteI am also a failed twit. When I began my fieldwork, Alexandre Enkerli (disparate.wordpress.com) gave me some great advice to see how anthropologists participate online. He suggested Twitter of all things, and I groaned.
I hated twitter before trying it. But i tried it anyways. What I learned was, you need to build a 'personal network'. Depending on what you tap into, twitter changes dramatically. Same goes for Facebook I suppose, but twitter is especially useless unless you tap into some good feeds!
Now you could say this is a failure, in that I never became a twitter 'native' but it could also be turned into "Why I failed at twitter. The ethnography". Such experiences will certainly make it into my own thesis.
So just to say, your experiences good or bad can be turned into great ethnography.