Online Community Pioneer Asks for Proportionality in Dealing with Lurkers

February 15th, 2007

A British online community expert is calling for restraint by online community managers as lurkers are booted off a Web-based Hyperlexia support group.

Jonathan Bishop, director of e-learning firm Glamorgan Blended Learning who has been developing and researching online communities since the 1990s says the actions of the Hyperlex online community’s manager to delete any member who did not post a message to the community was not proportional, “Participation inequality is a serious problem for the new media society, but banning people from using online communities if they do not post content is not the best approach to dealing with it”, he said, “it would be like a government trying to increase turnout in an election by disqualifying those who did not vote in the last one, which would only mask the problem and not actually deal with it”

Discussing participation inequality, Web Usability Guru Jakob Nielsen said, “The first step to dealing with participation inequality is to recognize that it will always be with us. It’s existed in every online community and multi-user service that has ever been studied.” Dr Nielsen believes that participation inequality can be tackled by the webmaster making it easier to contribute, making participation a side effect, letting users build their contributions by modifying existing templates rather than creating complete entities from scratch, rewarding people for contributing, and by displaying all contributions equally.

Mr Bishop has carried out research into lurking, which is currently being considered by the Computers in Human Behavior journal, claiming that the reason that people do not post messages in online communities is that they hold beliefs that lead them to experience a cognitive response called ‘temperance’, which means they do not act out their plans to post messages. Mr Bishop’s study, which investigated online communities including Hyperlex found that lurkers in online communities share much in common with those who have social phobia in real-world communities, though lurkers do not necessarily hold the same beliefs as those with social phobia. He said, The extent to which an online community member finds a social phobic belief characteristic of them can be predictive of whether they will be a lurker in that community, as for example lurkers are likely to find the belief that they appear clumsy during social situations and the belief they what they say to be interpreted as stupid to be more characteristic of them than those who are not lurkers”.

Summarising his study Mr Bishop said, “Leaders and elders in online communities should take into account the beliefs held by lurkers and encourage them to become novices and go on to become regulars as it is important that all members of online communities be encouraged to play a part in the community as they all have unique perspectives to share.”

Source: Newswire Today

| No Comments »

How should children be disciplined and protected?

February 6th, 2007

I was interested to read on Kirsty Williams AM’s website about her visit to Pentwyn School in Clyro, near Brecon, where she presented achievement awards to the school pupils and praised the staff.

It is amazing how schools can turn around under a Labour Government, as when the Tories were in power the methods used by the school to control behaviour were like something from the Middle Ages and I know this literally from first hand experience.

While I was at Pentwyn the staff of the school changed, which for any child would be difficult, but for children with forms of autism even more so. The change in staff led to a regime where children, like myself were regularly slapped for’misbehaving’. I can remember my bed being tipped over and being told to remake it, and once I was punished by being made to take my shirt off and sit by my bedroom window - they called this the ‘cold treatment’. Treating children with emotional and behavioural problems in this way does not teach them right from wrong; it is more likely to make their behaviour worse. My parents were getting glowing reports about my educational and behavioural progress up until the change in staff, and then my challenging behaviour which was normal for a young boy with autism, and why I was going to that school, became worse because of the way I was being treated and then my reports suggested I was to blame!

You’re probably thinking, “if you were being abused this way, why didn’t you say something about it?” Well the staff were very clever, they would assault me and then say that my parents would be disappointed in me if they found out how I was behaving, knowing my parents were very proud of me and that I wanted them to be.

I think that most adults smack children because they have problems
communicating a message to them, which makes children with autism more open to abuse because of the communication difficulties they face. I believe if children are hit rather than reasoned with, they will be more likely to use violence to solve conflicts rather than think or talk their problems through.

A child that is assaulted is more likely to assault as an adult. This is less likely if they go through a behaviour modification process as I did, but the cost to society of those that slip through the net is great. There needs to be a deterrent to adults hitting children and teaching them that violence is the way to solve conflicts in order to prevent the social, cultural and economic costs to society of the cycle of abuse. Like the NSPCC, I think that there should be equal protection from assault for children under the law and that the law on assault should be modernised to give children such equal protection.

| No Comments »

Technological Lifestyles – Should the elderly and disabled live an e-enhanced life?

February 2nd, 2007

It is now 5 years since I launched the PARLE system, a revolutionary e‐learning
system and assistive device that sought to make technology compatible with the
social model of disability.
As a disabled child the education authorities decided it was in my interests for me
to be sent away from my home to a residential school, and this is something that
many elderly and disabled people experience today who are often forced to leave
their homes and go into institutions.
Nigel Praities on href="http://www.firstscience.com/home/articles/technology/technology‐togrow‐
old‐with_8887.html">FirstScience.com talks about using technology to
support the elderly in their homes in the future, but I don’t think we should have to
wait over 40 years for the elderly to be able to live in their own homes, both the
elderly and disabled should be supported in their homes so they don’t have to go
into institutions to be cared for if they don’t want to.
The elderly and disabled should not be seen as problems to be solved, and they
should not be denied the opportunities of others just because they may have
problems with their mobility or personal care. Why should it just be the most
physically able people that get the best jobs or that get to go abroad on holiday?
There are probably a lot a disabled people with the potential to be the best
scientists, the best writers and even the best politicians, but because of the
barriers they face are not able achieve what they are capable of. There are
probably at lot of elderly people that deserve to see the world, deserve to take up
an interest and deserve to contribute to society, but they often also experience
barriers in society.
I believe a disabled person only able to work 20 hours a week should have the
opportunity to have the same lifestyle as someone working 40 hours a week. I
believe an elderly person that worked all their life should be able to enjoy their
retirement as well as undergraduates who have never worked enjoy their lifestyles.

Source: Jonathan believes that some economic principles can be applied to online communities.

| 1 Comment »