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Our online interactions create new forms of community and knowledge, reshaping who we are as individuals and as a society.
List of contents
Acknowledgments; Introduction; 1. Are online "communities" really communities?; 2. What can online collaboration accomplish?; 3. Should you believe Wikipedia?; 4. How does the internet change how we think?; 5. How do people express identity online, and why is this important for online interaction?; 6. What is bad online behavior, and what can we do about it?; 7. How do business models shape online communities?; 8. How can we help the internet to bring out the best in us all?
About the author
Amy S. Bruckman is Regents' Professor and Senior Associate Chair in the School of Interactive Computing at the Georgia Institute of Technology where she studies online communities. Bruckman received her Ph.D. from the MIT Media Lab in 1997. She is a Fellow of The ACM and a member of the SIGCHI Academy. She founded her first online community in 1993, and has been teaching the class 'Design of Online Communities' at Georgia Tech since 1998. She currently helps moderate a number of large online communities.
Summary
As we interact online, we create new kinds of community and knowledge. How are these communities formed? How do we know whether to trust them as sources of information? What can we as internet users and designers do to help the internet to bring out the best in us all?
Foreword
Our online interactions create new forms of community and knowledge, reshaping who we are as individuals and as a society.
Additional text
'From its birth, Amy Bruckman has understood and explained the Net. This book, both practical and theoretical, offers the most mature account that we have of how community online gets made and corrupted. At a moment when the hope of the Internet has faded for so many, this clear and powerful work gives us at least a path back, and a reason to pursue it.' Lawrence Lessig, Harvard Law School
