Notes from: Raine, Lee and Barry Wellman. 2012. Networked: The New Social Operating System. Cambridge, Massachusetts: The MIT Press.

PART III: HOW TO OPERATE IN A NETWORKED WORLD, NOW AND IN THE FUTURE

CHAPTER 10 – THRIVING AS A NETWORKED INDIVIDUAL

• We live in a networked world and being networked is not so scary.
• The “network divide” is wider than the “digital divide.”
  • People must learn to get out from the cocoon of their bounded groups.
• Individuals and institutions exist in information and communication ecologies that are much different from the ones that existed a generation ago.
  • Bounded communities still exist, but they occupy a smaller portion of people’s time.
  • Now it is easier to socialize, get advice, and exchange emotional support at any distance.
• It is not online or face-to-face dichotomy.
  • Communication now combines in-person, internet, and mobile phone contact.
• The variety of information sources and volume of information has grown.
• The amount of people who encounter information, media, and each other across different places and times has expanded.
• Attention is simultaneously more fractured as sources multiply and more focused as searches become more specific.
  • People expect to find information about almost every subject quickly.
• People’s ability to share their own stories has increased.
• The sense of personal efficacy grows as they seek and gain social, emotional, and economic support using new technologies.
  • Seniors and Smart Phones (Pew Research Foundation FactTank, by Monica Anderson, 4/29/2015)
• Networking requires extra effort from individuals.

Linda Evans Becomes a Networked Individual

• In 1995, she divorced after 23 years of marriage with two daughters and a son.
• She rebuilt her life by becoming a networked individual.
• She joined a church class for newly separated or divorced people.
• Friends recommended comforting books and video tapes.
• She researched a trip to Disney World using printed materials and friends.
• She helped out in the divorce group after she felt like she had recovered. She met newly divorced John and a relationship blossomed.
  • John works from home as an online support specialist; Linda also becomes an internet user around this time.
  • They spent a fair amount of time e-mailing each other even though they lived 6 miles apart.
• Both Linda and John seek support and guidance from different groups to navigate the next stage of their relationship.
  • They were married in 2001.
• Linda returns to local university to pursue degree in business while working full time.
• She is encouraged by a former high school teacher to pursue teaching and enters graduate school for instructional technology degree.
  • The coursework entirely online.
  • Her research is driven by talking to friends and searching online.
• After earning her master’s degree, Linda pursues her PhD in education at an out-of-state college (completely online) after consulting with other PhD students online.
• Linda decides to get a broadband internet connection during this time.
• While pursuing PhD, she works at local public school district to facilitate online learning in K-12 classrooms.
• She finds basic investment help through a connection given from an old work colleague.
  • For more advanced investments, Linda reached out to tax consultant Cynthia who had previously helped her with tax preparation.
  • Cynthia connects the couple with Troy, who opens them up to online financial advice.
• Linda’s mobile phone is now connected to the internet.
  • Aids in networking and multitasking.
  • Able to use idle minutes making calls.
  • Can text and send photos to children and use GPS capabilities.
  • No longer tied down to landline – can make calls anytime.
• She runs an online support group for myasthenia gravis after her diagnosis.
  • Once her diagnosis was changed, she stayed active in this support group and created a new online group for people with the same disease as her second diagnosis.
  • Group members document the disease using Flickr.

How People Can Thrive as Networked Individuals

• The social shift toward networked individuals changes the rules of the game for social, economic, and personal success.
• Large and diverse networks (including many weak-ties) helps networked individuals get information, support, and advice from many (and diverse) sources.
• Free to move between different networks.

“Rules” of this new social operating system:

1. Invest in existing relationships via the Golden Rule so that help will be there when it is needed.

• Friends and contacts will help you later if you were there when they were in need.

2. Use ICTs enthusiastically and nimbly.

• ICTs give networked individuals the ability to function in larger networks.
• Those with broadband internet connection and multiple ICTs tend to have bigger and more diverse networks.
• People do well as networkers if they are not timid about technology.

3. Use technology to develop your access to a wider audience that can share your interests.

• Seeking help from strangers and getting it.
• Roughly 2/3 of people have acted altruistically online.
  • Wikipedia
  • Griefnet
  • Forvo

4. Stay active and flexible.

• Be able to identify the people in different segments of your network most suitable to provide the needed information and support.

5. Do not count on a single, tightly connected group of strong ties to help.

• Different needs require the help of different (and often specialized) people.

6. Develop meaningful new ties as you go along and be especially alert to reaching into new social circles that serve your purposes.
7. Develop larger and more diverse networks.

• Personal networks can now be over a thousand people.
• Quantity = Quality.
  • Individuals with more diverse, broad-ranging networks tend to be in better social shape and more easily solve complex problems.
• Networking is an efficient way to collect and verify information.

8. Act “transitively.”

• Look beyond friends and become more aware of people in their networks who could broaden your own network.

9. Act as autonomous agents to cultivate your personal networks.

• Must actively seek out and nurture new network ties.

10. Monitor and manage your reputation (personal brand).

• Difficult to stay anonymous now – information and people are searchable.
• danah boyd – “everything you’ve ever said has gone down on your permanent record.”
• Dynamic environment where people promote themselves or shroud themselves depending on their intended audience or circumstances.
• Many users have taken steps to manage their online reputation.
• There are benefits to sharing information online.
  • Reconnecting with old acquaintances and quickly learning about others.
• Most users are not overly concerned about their disclosures and see advantages of being findable.
• Too much disclosure harms individuals’ privacy, but too little inhibits their ability to promote themselves and build trust.
• In 2009, 12% of users were required to promote themselves online by their employer.
• Incentive to monitor and control information about us will become more pronounced as more information goes online.
  • Once others have viewed our information, we cannot control how they think about it.

11. Segment your identity.

• Embrace a networked self where different parts of yourself are on display to different audiences in your networks.
• Possibility for mismanagement of these different identities.
  • May miss or be denied opportunities depending on whether not enough or too much is revealed.

12. Develop the knack of functioning effectively in different contexts and “collapsed contexts.”

• Must figure out the contextual knowledge of each different network you belong to, as each will have different histories, norms, folklore structures, and dynamics.
• Acting smartly within your given situation is more complex in the digital era.
  • Statements and actions can now be easily shared beyond the intended audience.
  • Rob Ford
  • Intense scrutiny in unexpected situations is a realistic possibility.

13. Build high levels of trust and social capital in each network segment.

• People need to discover and interact with those who can provide resources.
• Social capital allows us to gain prestige, get things done, and enhance our sense of self.
• Becoming more valuable because networks are essential to success.
• Transparency in online identity is required to develop trust with others.
• Mistakes can now be more widely disseminated and accessed.
  • Builders of digital media urge people and institutions to be transparent, but many networked individuals want to control who has access to what information.
  • Epic Fails.

14. Manage boundaries.

• Distinctions between public and private are much harder to manage in the digital age.
• Understand what information to make public.
• Distinctions between home/work and education/entertainment are also blurred.

15. Be aware of invisible audiences.

• The audience layer of social networks.
• Can be helpful when they are activated and motivated.
• Lurkers may have unwanted access to personal information.
• We have to present ourselves and communicate without fully understanding the potential or actual audience.

16. Manage time well and multitask strategically.

• Must spend more time maintaining ties in your networks.
• Also recognize your own space in others’ networks and the meeting of these individuals’ needs.

New Literacies for Networked Individuals

• Individuals who thrive have a combination of talent, energy, altruism, social acuity, and tech-savviness allowing them to tap into large, diverse networks when they have needs.
• Graphic literacy:
  • Requires networking behavior involving communications and media on screens.
  • Can interpret and feel the need to contribute digital material.
• Navigation literacy:
  • Sense of internet geography that allows you to maneuver through multiple information channels and formats.
  • Helping others navigate through their communications and contributions.
• Context and connections literacy:
  • Weaving together all the information you encounter.
  • Often enlisting the help of other networked individuals to make meaning of  things you encounter.
• Focus literacy:
  • The capacity to minimize the distractions of the digital cacophony and complete the work you need to do for your jobs and your personal enrichment.
  • Being able to turn the “solitude switch” on to stay focused on the task at hand.
• Multitasking literacy:
  • The ability to do several things almost simultaneously.
  • Multiple inputs from family, friends, work, and other institutions and multiple in-person, internet, and mobile sources to provide these inputs.
• Skepticism literacy:
  • The ability of individuals to evaluate what they encounter online.
  • Assess inputs from friends and media sources for accuracy, authority, relevance, objectivity, and scope.
• Ethical literacy:
  • Building trust and value by being accurate and thoughtful with the information created and passed along.
• Networking literacy:
  • Knowing how to move resourcefully through one’s network operating system (personal, institutional, and digital) without getting locked into one world.
  • Balancing being on the grid and off the grid.

Chapter 11: The Future of Networked Individualism

Back to The Networked Society Lecture Notes

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