When looking at forums to see how people come across online I looked at the newspaper 'The Sun' and their 'News' discussion board.
http://www.thesun.co.uk/discussions/forums/show/News-2.page
The first post I looked at was titled 'Dont give Heather Mills a penny!'
http://www.thesun.co.uk/discussions/posts/list/DON~39~T_GIVE_HEATHER_MILLS_A_PENNY-55376.page
The users expressed themselves in a very open way, they clearlly dont feel they need to hold back their feelings. (Obviously aslong as it is not worded in obscene language!) Most of the people share the same opinion, that Heather deserves no money from her to be divorced Husband, however - the people that do disagree are not afraid to say - although I did notice their way of putting across their opinion did not come across as strong and as passionate as those who went with the majority vote of saying she doesnt deserve a penny. For example - 'I'm not taking sides here'... it's like calming the audience before they disagree with them. Although am sure that the discussion board has seen people disagreeing with each other without the politeness of it all!
People generally speak in proper language, some sounding more intelligent than others by the way they have worded things as if they have experience at trying to put across their argument in the best form. There is a lack of short term text such as 'hwz u' etc and I think that this could be frowned upon if used as personally I'd think they where not very intelligent or mature if they used that type of language when no-oned else was, but if thats what they normally use online, then would that be considered as them witholding some of their values? I guess so! They'd have to transform themselves to use the language everyone else was just so they fitted in.
You dont really get much of an idea of what type of person they are, like I said you could probably guess who is intelligent from the way they have wrote/expressed their opinion, and you would probably think that someone who wrote something along the lines of "He should hire a hitman for her" are going to fill the stereotype of a thug... although they might actually be something of a high class and of high status!
I think they probably would discuss issues in the same way offline, but whilst they are online they are sharing their opinions on matters with people who also share opinions, so it is an interesting 'discussion' for them, if they spoke about it IRL then the people they talked too might not have an opinion on the matter and the conversation might not be very demanding, where as online there is other peoples opinions in which might question yours, or they can question other peoples opinions where as IRL they might feel like they should just nod and agree with everyones opinions. They might also choose a more 'intelligent' and appropriate language online, and not be as 'nice' about things IRL!
Peoples screennames on this particular discussion board are very random, such as 'mad as fish' etc - they give nothing away about the identity that is underneath them. This could be perhaps because they dont want to be flamed and victimized in a personal way by allowing other users to flame them using their name etc, where as if someone is just attacking 'mad as fish' then it might make them feel like it isnt actually them who is being attacked.
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4 comments:
Good work. I hope you are enjoying the unit, you seem to be putting in more effort than many others?
I'm not sure I agree about the similarity of online/offline discussion. I suppose that online is most like offline gossip between people who are not personally affected by the issue they gossip about? People 'egg each other on' and make comments just for effect and amusement as well as from misunderstanding of the issue?
This can be contrasted to more formal discussion, or discussion between people with professional relationships rather than friendships. So on the face of it, it's a bit odd isn't it? Total strangers communicating in ways that would normally be reserved for good friends?
RINCY
Natalie Reilly
RINCY
Dave, I agree that online/offline gossip is the same in terms that people gossip about things which dont effect themselves. I agree that people do egg each other on, but I think this happens in real life too, but perhaps people are more submissive to it when it happens like that?
It is strange that the internet lets people speak to other people as if they knew them in real life, but in real life they might have met and got on too - and after a while they wouldnt have been strangers to each other, so perhaps some people think that after they've spoken to people onlien for a length of time that they are no longer strangers to each other anymore?
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