[好文] Online Community: Introduction and Exa
Online Community: Introduction and Example in Taiwan
Online communities play important roles in our daily life. From Uber to
GitHub, those communities attract people with a particular purpose or a
shared interest. When accessing the community, they can share or exchange
information or viewpoints with members. To manage the community, those people
have to follow policies or rules. Also, to make interaction and connection
happen online, the communities are usually supported by information
technologies, such as web browsers or mobile apps. A real-world example in
Taiwan is PTT (telnet://ptt.cc), a bulletin board system (BBS) founded in
1995.
I joined PTT when I was in high school in Taiwan. During that time,
universities had their own BBS site as an information platform. The founders
hated strict rules set by the school so they set up PTT by a 486 computer and
Linux system. After 22 years, PTT has become probably the most influential
online community in Taiwan for users ranged from 18 to 40 years old.
http://i.imgur.com/amq7aXd.jpg
Login Page of PTT. "There are 95241 users online."
The purpose of PTT has also changed from information sharing to general
discussion such as news, sports or video games etc. In peak hours, the
average number of the online user is 130,000. When there is a special
incident happening, the number will dramatically grow and people will flock
to the particular “board” to join the discussion. For example, during
Sunflower Student Movement, there were 100,000 people staying in “Gossiping”
board for latest update of the incident. Just because the assembly of people
is sometimes illogical, PTT users call themselves “villagers”. Naming user
group as a whole is an identity-based strategy formed naturally.
https://i.imgur.com/GGjaBk2.jpg
I'm just a villager! (Source: youtube)
Another strategy used by PTT is that users are allowed to create a new board
as long as enough people countersign the application. This is the main reason
why PTT transform from a single purpose platform to a general discussion
collection. With the diversity of board, villagers stay longer browsing more
boards that fit their interests. The second benefit is that villagers can
create boards for their favorite subtopic. For example, under baseball
topics, there are not only “Baseball” board, but also more boards focusing
on different leagues or teams, such as “MLB” and “CPBL” board (Chinese
Professional Baseball League, a professional league in Taiwan). In fact,
there are four teams in CPBL at the moment, and each team has its own board
founded by its supporters. Therefore, these baseball fans can have more
discussion choices.
http://i.imgur.com/3NlDjZM.jpg
The post list of Baseball board. Coloured numbers indicate the value of
positive comments minus negative comments. Grey colour means this post
attracts more negative comments than positive ones.
The third strategy which encourages villagers to contribute to PTT is the P
coin reward for posts. P coin is a virtual currency on PTT, rewarded by
posting based on word count and its major use is to gamble for sports games
or election results. However, villagers can give their P coins to someone
else. A trick to expolit this system is posting own opinion and offers P coin
giveaway if other villagers comment positively. That way, that post stands
out from other ones so author's idea will be advocated better. By offering P
coin as an incentive, PTT encourage villagers to post more articles.
http://i.imgur.com/hQv6Nfn.jpg
P coin giveaway provokes discussions about nuclear energy policy. "R:"
indicates replying posts.
The last strategy, which I believe that is the most important, is that people
actually like to gossip. This is a strong Need-based commitment which keep
pushing some villagers checking Gossiping board to see is there any new
gossips. This also makes Gossiping board turn into the most popular board in
PTT.
In conclusion, the strategies adapted by PTT can be summarized as follows:
Identity-based commitment
Users calling themselves villagers
Users in a particular board has a shred interest commitment
Normative commitment
Users can create subgroups
Need-based commitment
Users can gossip
All in all, PTT proves that online community can stand the test of time.
Although telnet system is a living fossil for nowadays, with those
strategies, PTT successfully maintains its popularity and offers a free
discussion space for villagers.
References
Online Communities: Design, Theory, and Practice
telnet://ptt.cc (Main site, Mandarin)
https://www.ptt.cc/bbs/index.html (mirror HTTP site of PTT, Mandarin)
https://www.theatlantic.com/technology/archive/2016/11/the-lost-civilization-of-dial-up-bulletin-board-systems/506465/
(https://goo.gl/hrQeFg)
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/PTT_Bulletin_Board_System
http://flipthemedia.com/2014/07/social-media-taiwan/
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LTbVZgCJUMo&t=2m7s
Clip of movie "Hail the Judge", the origin of "villager"
---
拖了好久終於有時間重新把HTTP的格式轉貼到這裡來
每週都有作業要交，真的HEN刺激~
--
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◤◥ ★ ◤ ≡ ◥ 支那不能亡呀! 支那粪青到了最危险的时候
★ ▋ ⊙ ⊙ ▎ ◤ 每个人都被迫着发出最後的吼声
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--
※ 發信站: 批踢踢實業坊(ptt.cc), 來自: 14.202.88.121
※ 文章網址: https://www.ptt.cc/bbs/NCHU-FS100/M.1505097980.A.205.html
※ 編輯: bwlaq (14.202.88.121), 09/11/2017 10:53:59
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