Final conclusion
Posted by admin in Uncategorized on 22 November, 2009
Why did I join my community?
For my community I wanted something design related. Ofcourse there are a lot of communities around this, like Smashing Magazine, Deviantart and more. However I rather wanted to join a smaller community, as they can be much ‘closer’. Within large communities it’s usually harder to really to get to know a group of people. I also joined Estetica because they had several active topics. It wasn’t just about design, they also had topics about SEO, coding and more.
You should follow me on Twitter
I think Dustin Curtis is a great blogger. However I kind of forgot about one of his excellent articles untill he was mentioned in of Smashing Magazine’s recent posts. Dustin did a small experiment about how he could get people to go from his blog to his twitter account. And well, that’s all I’m going to say. If you want to know more about it (and you should) you can read it here: You should follow me on Twitter
Oh, and you should me follow on Twitter too here ;)
Twitter’s Retweet function
For those of you who are already on Twitter might be familiar with the Retweet term. In short it’s just reposting a message (called tweets) from someone else while crediting him/her for it. The old way to do this was to copy and paste the tweet while putting the user’s name in front of it.
Ofcourse this could be done much easier. Something that Twitter also realized by adding the new Retweet function. Instead of the copy and paste work, now all you have to do is click the Retweet button. However the message you retweeted won’t be visible as posted by you, but retweeted by you. The name of the original author appears while your name is only mentioned beneath this. Read the rest of this entry »
A lively community
Posted by admin in Community Building on 18 November, 2009
One thing I required from the community I was going to join for this class, was that the community had to be lively. So when searching for a community that seemed interesting I always kept an eye on the numbers of posts placed that day. However now I know that doesn’t have anything to say about the community itself. Sure, people post but that doesn’t makes it a lively community.
Community Moderators
Posted by admin in Community Building on 1 November, 2009
On Estetica there are two different roles; members and moderators. However there’s no indication of who the moderators are and if there are different roles between them. The only thing is that there’s one person who welcomes and greets the new members. When I first registered I received a message that welcomed me, and directed me to another thread with ways to start on Estetica. I think that’s a great way to start.
Reputations systems and the maffia
Posted by admin in Community Building on 20 October, 2009
Most communities use a rating system. This system is used to show how users are integrated in the community; it shows their reputation. Amazon for example gives buyers the option to rate their latest transaction. This makes it easier to see which Amazon seller can be trust and who not. Forums usually make use of specific ranks to indicate the member’s activity. However, I stumbled across an example of the Sims showing that ranking systems also can go wrong.
How badly designed reputation systems create in-game maffia’s.
2009 State Of The Blogosphere
The presentation from the 2009’s State of the Blogosphere showed some research about bloggers.
An interesting fact is that they stated that 60% of those who were interviewed agreed that most people will get news & info from blogs in the next 5 years. 36% already do so now, and 40% believe that newspapers will not survive in the next 5 years.
I personally already get my news and information online. But I find it hard to believe that newspaper won’t survive the next 5 years, as it’s more relaxing than screenreading.
The community-feeling.
Posted by admin in Community Building on 10 October, 2009
When do people feel like they to belong to a community? When you first register? When you’ve a large list of friends? Or maybe when you take part of certain discussions?
I wonder if there’s actually a real answer on this question. Because this feeling depends on so many factors and differs for everyone. Some people want to be recognized, others need a large friendlist, and some even feel part of the community when they feel the need to return (there) every now and then. So the answer actually lies within your expectations. When I asked a couple of people how they feel about this the answers all varied. But there did seem to be a red-line as well; each of them wanted to feel ‘appreciated’ in some way. In most levels it was about receiving feedback from people.
Receiving feedback however is mostly not enough.
I’m on the Estetica forum for a couple weeks now. And to be honest I don’t feel like I’m part of a community. I don’t feel like I’m really connected to the people there. Sure, people respond but is that enough? Through another forum I met a lot people with the same interests in different countries a while ago. And I still talk to some of those people even though the forum closed. This makes me wonder what’s different now. I guess it’s just less personal now. However I do think I should give it some time, after all I just joined a couple of weeks ago.