My Expectations and Experiences at the Communities & Social Networks Online Conference

 
 

The Communities and Social Networks Online Conference is almost over. The conference has been running since April 29 and finishes on Sunday.  It has provided myself and my fellow students, the opportunity to contribute a paper to the conference website so that our work can be read and scrutinized by other students and members of the public.  Participating in the conference has been a challenge for me however has granted me a few unexpected benefits along the way.

Not being an avid user of social media, I was somewhat worried about writing a paper about social media and having it read by other people.  I was concerned that my fellow students may find fault with what I had written and putting my article in an area on the web that was not restricted to students meant anyone could read it.  What if my article was read by someone I knew offline.  Perhaps after they read my article their perception of Rachel the student, may change to, Rachel the person who knows nothing about social media.  

Each paper submitted to the conference was to be situated within one of the four subject streams.  The streams were ‘Communities and Web 2.0’, ‘Gaming and Online Communities’, ‘Identity in Communities and Networks' and 'Social Networks’ .  My paper titled ‘2.0 And the Complexities ofIdentity Management’ was situated in the ‘Identity in Communities andNetworks’ stream. 

Since the conference began, feedback has been steady.  All of the comments on my paper so far have been positive, some asking questions and some adding extra material, which is something I did not expect.  Within the community of the conference everyone seems to be really supportive.  Everyone wants to share the information they have found and what they have learned.  It is a very positive environment.  I have responded to comments that have been made about my paper and I have commented on several papers written by other students.   There are some really interesting papers that have been written by other students.  My only problem was, occasionally I would read something I did not necessarily agree with and I wondered about the best way to express myself without making myself sound like I was being overly critical.  I quoted Donath (1999, para 1) in my paper who suggests that online, “many of the basic cues about personality and social role we are accustomed to in the physical world are absent”.  This statement resonated with me and I began to wonder what sort of a person the other students thought I was after I had left comments on their articles.  However my worries were for nothing, as everyone responded positively to my comments.

So as the Communities and Social Networks Online Conference draws to a close, anyone who is interested in learning about Social Media has until Sunday to have a look at the papers that have been submitted and leave a comment if they wish.   You can enter the conference at http://networkconference.netstudies.org/2013/ .  Although I was initially nervous about submitting my paper, the positive feedback I have been given so far has given me the confidence to think that maybe all my initial fears about putting my work out there within the community of the conference, were unjustified.  You can read it if you like at http://networkconference.netstudies.org/2013/2-0-and-the-complexities-of-identity-management/ and feel free to comment if you wish.

Reference:

Donath, J. (1999).  Identity and Deception in the Virtual Community.  In P. Kollock, & M. A. Smith (Ed.), Communities in Cyberspace (pp. 29-59).  New York:  Routledge.  Retrieved from http://smg.media.mit.edu/people/Judith/Identity/IdentityDeception.html

Please be aware that the content featured here are my thoughts on my experiences at the conference and does not represent the position of Curtin University.