The site has been up since March 2006 and been updated fairly consistently, 1-3 times a month. The meat of the site is essays on selected topics on Indonesian history. Most essays are written by Rushdy himself (or if not written originally by him, at least compiled by him). I found this site when I worked on the previous assignment because one of the essays posted on the site concerns an event in Indonesian history whose knowledge production online and offline I intend to examine in my final project.
In observing online identity of the Blogger post, “Our History,” I tried my best to address the focus questions for this assignment: How do we know online identity when we see it?; How are online identities shaped and expressed through online interactions in this community? In doing so, I figured reading comments would be a starting point. I was pleasantly surprised to see the frequency of comments posted by readers (users), and in a few occasions, the author himself wrote responses. It seemed that close to 70% of the posted essays triggered comments of one form or another. To the best of my knowledge, I did not see any repeaters who left comments more than once.
One salient feature of the comments posted on the site is casual and informal conversations responses to the blog posts. The interactions falling into this category commonly start off by thanking the author for making information available and uncovering previously unknown episodes in their national history. Some users were drawn to the images and were quite amused by unseen images of historical figures and landscape (https://www.blogger.com/comment.g?blogID=23220868&postID=6657710124209854077). After reading through comments and looking at user profiles, I came to notice two broad patterns in the demographics of the uses. The first group posted by general (casual) readers, and as far as I could see in their profile, they do not identify themselves as historians, researchers, or academics. [screenshot]
In observing online identity of the Blogger post, “Our History,” I tried my best to address the focus questions for this assignment: How do we know online identity when we see it?; How are online identities shaped and expressed through online interactions in this community? In doing so, I figured reading comments would be a starting point. I was pleasantly surprised to see the frequency of comments posted by readers (users), and in a few occasions, the author himself wrote responses. It seemed that close to 70% of the posted essays triggered comments of one form or another. To the best of my knowledge, I did not see any repeaters who left comments more than once.
One salient feature of the comments posted on the site is casual and informal conversations responses to the blog posts. The interactions falling into this category commonly start off by thanking the author for making information available and uncovering previously unknown episodes in their national history. Some users were drawn to the images and were quite amused by unseen images of historical figures and landscape (https://www.blogger.com/comment.g?blogID=23220868&postID=6657710124209854077). After reading through comments and looking at user profiles, I came to notice two broad patterns in the demographics of the uses. The first group posted by general (casual) readers, and as far as I could see in their profile, they do not identify themselves as historians, researchers, or academics. [screenshot]
Another common thread of the interactions on the site were initiated by what might be called “professional” users, who identity themselves as researchers, scholars, and graduate students. [screenshots of a user profile and her blog tell us about her academic background]
As for user scenarios, I am still not sure how to go about after observing the interactions on the selected site and reading the sample scenarios (http://www.infodesign.com.au/usabilityresources/scenarios). But from what I observed, I could point to a possibly relevant situation in which a user might be drawn to the site (which may have missed the mark) but in any case, these situations would be: a) a lurker and/or blogger who is interested in reading about Indonesian history; b) a grade school student who is interested in history but does not always find lectures at school useful; b) a researchers/scholars/grad student who actively utilizes online resources for their projects.
One course reading that I could relate my observations to is perhaps the Whittaker article, “The dynamics of mass interaction.” Although the article focuses on a different type of online community with much heavier interaction (the largest newsgroup site, Usenet), I found their approach to the study of online interactivity particularly interesting. Two factors they studied in some depth are “conversational strategies” (e.g. how long is a typical message) and interactivity (e.g. how deep is a typical conversational thread, and how often are attempts to initiative conversation successful)? I believe my observations of communication patterns in the blog, “Our History,” may have touched on a fringe of these two factors.
On the question of “online identity,” one conclusion I could draw from this brief exercise is that “identity” can take many different forms. One characteristic of the blog, “Our History,” is its accessibility in a sense that it presents a poplar history of Indonesia and where traditional academic boundaries were taken off and users from various backgrounds visit and learn something about Indonesian history.
One course reading that I could relate my observations to is perhaps the Whittaker article, “The dynamics of mass interaction.” Although the article focuses on a different type of online community with much heavier interaction (the largest newsgroup site, Usenet), I found their approach to the study of online interactivity particularly interesting. Two factors they studied in some depth are “conversational strategies” (e.g. how long is a typical message) and interactivity (e.g. how deep is a typical conversational thread, and how often are attempts to initiative conversation successful)? I believe my observations of communication patterns in the blog, “Our History,” may have touched on a fringe of these two factors.
On the question of “online identity,” one conclusion I could draw from this brief exercise is that “identity” can take many different forms. One characteristic of the blog, “Our History,” is its accessibility in a sense that it presents a poplar history of Indonesia and where traditional academic boundaries were taken off and users from various backgrounds visit and learn something about Indonesian history.
The blog does seem to be a difficult source to study for online identities. I tried to look at the blog, but didn't get far as I can't read the language. I am curious, however, about the identity the author creates through the themes of his posts. In other words, what can we say about the author based on his choice of topics and the value or bias he presents in the articles?
ReplyDeleteThe other thing I noticed is that the profiles of the commentators tended to be very brief, but each had a link to a personal blog. Perhaps the scale for interpreting online identity is much more broad than a profile. Scanning the other blogs would give you a more theoretical approach to online identities surrounding this blog.
Your topic of interest, Indonesian history, seems like a niche interest. By this I mean that it seems to me to be a unique area of study. Because it may be of interest to a relatively small group of people, I took a look at the Hodkinson study to see if the information in that article may apply to your site. Not that I think an interest in Indonesian history is a subculture like the Goths in his study - not at all. I thought there might be some applicabliety because there may be a realtively small group of individuals interested in this topic and that the patterns of intra-group cohesion or identification that could be similar on your site and the one studied by Hodkinson.
ReplyDeleteYou identify different types of users to this site - professional historians, students and casual readers. Is you site one in which professional historians use as a venue for interaction with others of similar interests? Would you be able to have frequent conversations or information sharing opportunities with other professionals? Would frequent visits to this site help the historian develop a stronger interest in the subject and a closer identification with other professionals in this field?
Hodkinson reports that even though particular blogs are typically initiated by one or two authors (which seems to be the case on your site) he states that blogs have become more interative. In terms of identity, on your site possibly the identity of the user could be determined by the person's writing style and the voice in which information is shared through their comments.
I wonder if the shortage of interactivity is because of the blog site features or the subject matter. I couldn't read the language, so I don't know exactly what the material is, but if the readers are either unknown or scholars, then maybe the blog is purely one directional, and people only go there to read and sometimes leave a comment.
ReplyDeleteIt makes user identity a little tougher, if the majority of non-anonymous users are scholars. There isn't much that they can do in a blog site besides reading and commenting, which won't let them express their identity even though they can come from a variety of backgrounds.
Regarding Whittaker's article, it seems like most blog posts have low levels of depth and interaction. From your description though, the site is still active and comments are still posted, so maybe there are a lot of returning lurkers. I'd be curious to know how many people actually read each blog... then it'd be an interesting project to get these lurkers interacting.
I think Carrie brings up a good point about the users' personal blogs as a contributor to online identity. The blog entries in addition to the profile and comments constructs an online identity. Although, I think the blogger website doesn't seem to allow for an easy way of retrieving comments so this component could be difficult to consider.
ReplyDeleteBecause of the lack of repeating comments that you observed, I wonder how much the online identity matters in these cases. Unless the users are invested in some way, the importance of identity for these users casually commenting is not of great significance regardless of the professional or non-professional status. We're on the topic of online identities because it has a role but unless even if it's there, at what point does is provide any value?
okey, i think this is one of may fav part of your blog. interesting topic, thanks
ReplyDelete