What are blogs, chat rooms, social networking sites and virtual worlds?
Chat rooms
Chat rooms are electronic forums where users can simultaneously share their views on a wide range of topics. They serve as a place for people with a common interest to form a community where they can communicate concurrently. A chat room is a website or part of a website that typically does not need a specifc type of software to run. Upon entering a chatroom, it is common to see a list on the screen with all users who are currently online, meaning that they are currently using the chat room as well. Chatrooms normally alert users when another enters or leaves the room. To communicate, a user must enter text in a textbox. Once the text is submitted it almost instantly appears in a public message area where all other users can read and respond to the message. What makes chat rooms different from instant messaging is the fact that chat rooms allow for a person to converse with multiple people rather than a one on one conversation.
Social Networking Sites
It is important to first understand social networks. The following video gives a brief explanation.
Social networking sites allow users to do three main things:
(1) "Construct a public or semi-public profile within a bounded system (Ellison, 2007)."
(2) "Articulate a list of other users with whom they share a connection (Ellison, 2007)."
(3) "View and traverse their list of connections and those made by others within the system. The nature and nomenclature of these connections may vary from site to site (Ellison, 2007)."
A fundamental feature of social networking sites is a profile page. Each user creates a profile page that displays information such as name, location, interests, photos, etc. Each profile page displays a list of the user's "friends" This term can be taken lightly, because it does not necessarily mean that the two users are friends in the real world, but that they have some type of connection. A unique feature of these sights is that they allow users to view their social networks. These sights can be used to meet new people or to communicate with people who are already a part of their extended social network. On most sites, users can communciate by leaving message on friends' profile pages. Some also have the option of private messages. Other features that some social networking sites have include instant messaging, photo sharing, and video sharing. Some popular social networking sites include Facebook, Myspace, and Friendster.
Virtual Worlds
A virtual world is a genre of online community that often takes the form of a computer-based simulated environment, through which users can interact with one another and use and create objects (wikipedia). They are typically 3-D virtual worlds where users take the form of avatars. Users interact in a modeled world which can mirror the real world or a fantasy world. The following video will help give a better sense of what virtual worlds are. It will examine a popular virtual world known as Secondlife.
Group Inquiry Project
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