Toward Networked Individualism: The Internet in Everyday Life

1. Toward Networked Individualism: The Internet in Everyday Life at Home, the Community & WorkBarry WellmanNetLab Director, University of Torontowww.chass.utoronto.ca/~wellmanllman@chass.utoronto.ca

2. NetLab Goals • Descend from seeing the Internet • As Transcendentally Unique • Towards Immanently Embedded in Everyday Life • Use Real World Social Data • Survey, Network analysis, Ethnography • Evaluate indicators of the turn towardsNetworked Individualism • Bias towards working collaboratively • Interdisciplinary (Comp sci, Info sci, Comm sci, etc • International comparisons: the Non-Universal net • Build (and Evaluate) stuff, as well as Studying stuff

3. This Conference is about The Turn to Networked Societies • Computer Networks, Economic Networks & Communication NetworksAre All Social Networks • Been Doing Social Network Analysisfor 35+ Years • Founded Int’l Net for Net Analysis 1977 • Glad to Have You Aboard! • Conference in Cancun Next Month

4. Outline of Talk • A Conference Theme: What is the Transformed Nature of Work & and Community in a Networked Society? • Transformation Began Before the Internet • From Group-Based to Networked Societies • Door-to-Door, Place-to-Place, Person-to-Person • Transforming Enterprise –Networked Individualism • The Six Socials: Linkages, Capital, Cohesion, Mobilization, Control, Exclusion

5. Door-to Door Groups Place-to-Place Glocalization Person-to-PersonNetworked Individualism

6. Social Transformation:From Groups to Networks • Changing Connectivity • Sparsely-Knit • Loosely-Bounded • Multiple Foci

7. Already Transformed Communities: Pre-Internet • The household’s community, not the individual’s • Community dispersed – regionally, (inter)nationally • More friends, neighbours, acquaintances, workmates than kin • Sparsely-knit: few directly connected with each other • Specialized support • Domestication: Encounters in Private Space • Homes, Phones • Wives organize/serve couples’ get-togethers & ties with in-laws

8. Second Age of Internet Studies: From Transcendence to Imminence • Documenting & Situating • For Government, Academe, Commerce, Public Interest • Ethnographies • Surveys – Access, Users and Uses • Realizations that Reliable Research Data Needed • Grounding Internet Use in Overall Experiences • Integrating Net Use with Other Media Use • Differentiating Types of User Populations

9. Second Age of Internet Studies: From Transcendence to Imminence Is the Internet … • Disconnecting Household Members? • Transforming, Diminishing, Adding To Communication; Community? • Civic Involvement: Voluntary Orgs, Politics? • Alienation: Loss of Control, Sense of Control? • Replacing Everyday Pursuits? • Affecting Structure of Work?

10. Changing Users and Uses • Within-Country Digital Divides Decreasing • Newbies Look Like Rest of Population • SES, Language Remain Important • Gender, Age, Life-Cycle Gaps Closing • North Americans Resemble General Pop. • Other OECD & Non-OECD Countries More: • Male, Better Educated, Younger, Single • Does Ontogeny Recapitulate Phylogeny? • New Catalan & Japanese Research

11. From Newbies to Users • People Rapidly Become Experienced • Users Become Frequent Users • The Real Digital Divide is Know-How – Not Access • AMD Global Consumer Advisory Board: Computer “SATs” Coming

12. National Geographic Survey 2000 and Survey 2001 • “Survey 2000” --Fall 1998 – Cleaned Sample • 15,659 North Americans (US, Canada) 77% • 3,079 Other OECD (Germany, Japan, etc.) 15% • 1,604 Non-OECD (Often Less Developed) 8% “Survey 2001” – Entering Data Analysis Stage Collaborators: Jeffrey Boase, Wenhong Chen, Keith Hampton, Catherine Mobley, Anabel Quan-Haase, James Witte

18. Email Adds on To F2F, Phone • Nearby Interactions Continue to Predominate • 63% of All Contact with Kin are with Nearby Kin • 42% of all Email Contact with Kin are with Nearby Kin • Multiple Media Used • For Daily Emailers • For Nearby Kin, Email is 22% of All Contact • For Faraway Kin, Email is 53% of All Contact • Friendship Data is Similar, but More Contact • And More Email Contact

19. Neighboring in Netville • Keith Hampton & Barry Wellman • City and Community, 2003 • Highly Fast Asynchronous Transfer Mode • 16 MegaBit/Second • Always On • Telco Field Trial in Toronto Suburb

20. View ofNetville

21. Mean Number of Neighbors: Wired (37) Non-Wired (20) Wired/NonWired Ratio Signif. Level (p <) Recognized by Name 25.5 8.4 3.0 .00 Talk with Regularly 6.3 3.1 2.0 .06 Invited into Own Home 3.9 2.7 1.4 .14 Invited into Neighbors’ Homes 3.9 2.5 1.6 .14 # of Intervening Lots to Known Neighbors 7.5 5.6 1.4 .08 “Wired” and “Non-Wired” Neighboring in Netville

22. Catalonian Web Surfers • Few Use Email Frequently • Most Use Web Services Frequently • Why? • Localistic Society: • Most Friends and Kin Live Nearby • Most Live with Parents • High Touch Society: Smell, See, Feel, Hear • Whys are Conjectures Now

23. Japanese Mobilers • Phone Based Web Services • Small Screens • Phone Based Texting /Short Messages • Frequent short contacts rather than long statements • Young Use Mobiles; Mid/Old Use PCs Cohort or Age-Grade Effect? Richness vs Portability • Incompatible Systems Hinder Social Cohesion

24. The Double Internet Paradox • (1a) First Age Hype Asserted that Internet Would Transform Society • (1b) As, the Internet Became Embedded in Everyday Life • (2a) Second Age Documenting the Embedding of the Internet in Everyday Life • (2b) As Societies Quietly Transforming From Groups to Networks

25. Turn Towards Networked Individualism • Transportation & Communication Have Become Individualized • Dual Careers – Multiple Schedules • Multiple Employers • Sequential and Contemporaneous • Physical Separation of Work, Home, Commerce • Movement of Work away from Workplace: • Teleworker, Flex Worker, Road Warrior • Computerization Allows Personalization • No Over-Arching Social Controllers

26. Place To Place (GloCalization) (Phones, Networked PCs, Airplanes, Expressways, RR, Transit) Home, Office Important Contexts, • Not Intervening Space • Specialized Relationships – Not MultiStranded Ties • Ramified & Sparsely Knit: Not Local Solidarities • Not neighborhood-based • Not densely-knit with a group feeling • Partial Membership in Multiple Workgroups/ Communities • Often Based on Shared Interest • Connectivity Beyond Neighborhood, Work Site • “GloCalization”: Globally Connected, Locally Invested • Household to Household / Work Group to Work Group • Domestication, Feminization of Community • Knowledge Comes From Internal & External Sources

27. Technological Changes Foster Social Affordances forNew Forms of Community • Bandwidth – Information Knowledge? • Anytime – 24 / 7 / 365 • Anywhere – Ubiquity • Globalized Connectivity • Wireless Portability • Convergence – Any Medium Accesses All • Personalization

28. Person-to-Person: Networked Individualism (Mobile Phones, Wireless Computing, Lonely Car) • Individualized Networking • Little Awareness of Context • Private Desires Replace Public Civility • Multiple Specialized Relationships • Partial Membership in Multiple Networks • Long-Distance Relationships • More Transitory Relationships • Online Interactions Linked with Offline • More Uncertainty, More Maneuverability • Less Palpable than Traditional Solidarities: Alienation? • Sparsely-Knit: Fewer Direct Connections Than Door-To-Door • Possibly Less Caring for Strangers • More Weak Ties • Need for Institutional Memory & Knowledge Management

29. The Six Socials • Linkages: Networks, Not Groups • Capital: Networking, not Org. Membership (Putnam) • Cohesion: No Single Commitment; Crosscutting Ties • Mobilization: Interpersonal, Ad Hoc • Control: Maneuverability among Multiple Nets • Exclusion: Informed Use, not Access, to Internet

30. Groups Networks ** Each in its PlaceMobility of People and Goods ** • United Family  Serial Marriage, Mixed Custody • Shared Community  Multiple & Partial Personal Nets • Neighborhoods  Dispersed Communities • Surveillance  Privacy • Control  Autonomy • Voluntary Organizations  Informal Leisure • Face-to-Face Computer-Mediated Communication • Public Spaces  Private Spaces • Visibility  Anonymity • Focused Work Unit  Networked Organization • Job in a Company  Career in a Profession • Autarky  Outsourcing • Office, Factory  Airplane, Internet, Cellphone • Ascription  Achievement • Hierarchies  Multiple Reporting Relationships • Conglomerates  Virtual Organizations/Alliances • Collective Security  Civil Liberties • Cold War Blocs  Fluid, Transitory Alliances

31. The Internet in Everyday Life Barry Wellman & Caroline HaythornthwaiteeditorsBlackwell Publishers, 2002Papers atwww.chass.utoronto.ca/~wellman@chass.utoronto.ca