Courtesy of CarbonNYC (via Flickr)
According to Merriam Webster, the definition of community is
1 : a unified body of individuals: as
a : state, commonwealth
b : the people with common interests living in a particular area
With the importance given to place, this definition begs an interesting question: can a community be made up of people who are not in the same physical space?
Of course, many of us would immediately say yes. We have Facebook, MySpace, and Twitter. We have friends all over the country and the world, many of whom we may feel closer to than people in our cities, our neighborhoods, or even our own homes. We can share photos on Flickr or video chat across thousands of miles. Some of us are even friends and feel strongly for people we’ve never met in person.
This is new. This is a big deal. And it illustrates just how much our sense of community is changing because of technology.
Web communities develop around things like your favorite or most hated television shows. They form around unique interests that maybe only a small group of people in the world like to do (and then they can grow to be major phenomenons that everyone likes to do).
More profoundly, the web can provide an amazing opportunity to find a community that loves and supports you. Imagine what communities like The Gay Youth Corner must mean to a teen who feels all alone in his or her hometown. The world opens up.
So, all of this is good. But does the fact that people are increasingly finding community in the virtual world degrade community in the physical world? I don’t know. Maybe. Simply the amount of time we spend on the Internet (more than a full day each month) is time taken away from physical interaction.
But you could also argue that sites like Meetup, Groupon, Yelp and others are actually encouraging and building physical communities as well.
Good or bad, there is no denying that our sense of community is changing with technology, and the effects are beginning to be felt.
