BAYM: What/How/But by johnlogie@gmail.com

ON FACE-TO-FACE COMMUNICATION

logie — 2016-10-18 13:11:19 UTC

WHAT: Baym argues that people view face-to-face communication as the most personal and the Internet as impersonal. HOW: She conducted a survey in 2002. BUT people's use of the internet for deeply personal communication has become more common since she conducted the survey. —JL

On online cross-sex friendships

2016-10-20 03:56:08 UTC

WHAT: Baym postulates that cross-sex friendships are more common on the internet because participants face less pressure.
HOW: Data on surveys from Last.fm, MOOs and on Israeli teens.
BUT: The requirements for friendship is also lower:an online friendship may not be classified as as such when taken as a face to face one (such as "friending" someone on facebook").
Kai Ren Lim

On Anonymity and Flaming

2016-10-20 14:47:04 UTC

WHAT: Baym references a sexist and racist Twitter-mediated onslaught of the Chancellor of the University of Illinois and argues that the insults would persist even if commentators were required to use their own names and eschew anonymity.
HOW: Baym makes a casual note that news sites have begun requiring commentators to log in via Facebook or Google+ and notes that the nastiness of comments has not been affected as a result.
BUT: Twitter, for the majority of users, is not anonymous in the first place and the demographics of people who venture to dedicated news sites as opposed to those who gather news from Twitter are two different groups. Thus, Baym has, in my opinion, failed to depict and compare an instance of actual anonymity and how it affects users' comments.
Dillon Rutten

Play in online communication

2016-10-20 15:55:50 UTC

WHAT: Baym identifies digital communication as the start of some literary play, focusing on irregular typography and spelling as unique to online communication.
HOW: By citing multiple studies involving the prevalence of humor in online communication and trends on Twitter. She also detailed the odd grammar of LOLspeak to give an example of mutated grammar.
BUT: This type of literary play has been in place for at least over a century, an example of which would be Marinetti's parole in libertà in which syntax and structure as eschewed. I would argue that these forms of communication have existed for a very long time, but there has been no medium for them to spread rapidly or to reach as many people. While digital communication may have enhanced the ability for this to spread, it was not the foundation of this.
Austin Hovland

On Internet Communities

2016-10-21 01:43:12 UTC

WHAT: Baym argues that online groups often develop a strong group membership feel. These groups often describe themselves as communities.
HOW: Through her research of newsgroup rec.arts.tv.soaps (r.a.t.s.) she too conceptualized these groups as communities
BUT: Some of these communities are just people getting together online and talking, when a community is much more than that. Therefore, to say that these groups are communities when all they do is talk "is to sell our common faith in community vastly short" (81).
Matt Riehle

On Written Communication & Honesty

2016-10-21 03:46:00 UTC

WHAT: Baym states that "even when interacting with those who knows us, the ability to write out one's thoughts and not have to face the other immediately can lead to more honesty." (p. 128)
HOW: A survey of posters to 20 Usenet groups which found that people who were socially anxious felt they could express their "real" selves online, and a report stating that Americans felt they could be more honest with loved ones through e-mail rather than face-to-face.
BUT: One could argue that people are equally likely to be dishonest in written communication, because the intonation and non-verbal cues indicating dishonesty are not available, and a person could have more time to craft a believable lie when writing.

Internet & Language

2016-10-21 05:14:11 UTC

What: Baym contends that “‘Computers are not the cause of contemporary language attitudes and practices,’ ... ‘like signal boosters, they magnify ongoing trends.’”

How: Baym cites surveys of AP and National Writing Project teachers, discusses different forms of mediated communication and their quirks, and presents a case of a Yahoo! executive sending an informal email for important matters.

But: It could be argued that Baym underestimates the influence of social media and other mediated communication on our lexicon. Lots of slang has been birthed and popularized by the internet. “LOL” is a good example of this; it’s quintessentially “internet” but we’ve all definitely heard someone say it out loud in meat-space.

Delaney Facklam

Languages, Cultures, and the Intern

2016-10-21 13:11:47 UTC

What: Baym recognizes that a large amount of written communication on the internet is in English (38.3) this can lead to assumptions about internet culture that the majority of internet users are white, and push the idea that the internet was created for an English-speaking world. (p. 78-80)

How: Baym references a study by the 2009 compilation of data from Translate to Success to examine a variety of blogs and internet spaces to determine the most common written languages used to communicate online.Hirank.com indexed almost 2 million blogs for language data before it was discontinued.

But: Baym fails to account for a large amount of video and photo platforms such as YouTube, Vine, and Instagram. These online platforms are a popular form of communication for a variety of languages and cultures that can’t be indexed by a text-based bulk data search.

Communications and Networks

2016-10-21 14:58:45 UTC

What: Baym states that we doubt social connections through new forms of media. Advancement of communication technologies is taking us farther and farther away from our communities.
How: Through supplemental use of communication technologies as opposed to real connection.
But: Baym also states that these technologies could bring us closer to our communities, as long as they don't take away from "embodied interaction".

- Bilal Abdelqader

Digital language as a mixed modality

2016-10-21 17:02:19 UTC

What: Instead of comparing mediated text directly to face-to-face communication, Baym viewed mediated text as a mixed modality that combines elements of face-to-face conversation to elements of writing. Baym brought up concerns that by combining speech and writing, students will be more likely to write informally like how they would talk, which would lead to a decline in writing standards.

How: By citing a survey that shows that 68% of US Advanced Placement and National Writing Project teachers expressed concern that these new technologies and media will make students lazy and cause them to put less effort by taking shortcuts to their writing. Baym also cited Baron’s studies on the increased use of informal interactions online such as abbreviations, acronyms, contractions, misspellings, emoticons, and missing punctuation in Instant Messaging.

But: Baym argues that even though there are little concerns in online writing, it’s not the technology/media itself that will cause decline in writing. Baym said that there is no standardized “digital language” and that online languages differ depending on what media/technology the language was used in.

Mai Zoua Vang

Perceptions of Mobile Phone Use in Public

2016-10-21 17:57:07 UTC

What: Baym discuses how attitudes of useage in regards to mobile phones for example in a restaurant is shaped by the perception of our peers.
How: She referenced a cross-cultural study conducted by Scott Campbell at the University of Michigan.
But: Sometimes your peers don't necessarily express their point of views sincerely, thus its challenging to know exactly where they stand. Specially when you take into account the cultural differences in a geographic location such as Minnesota, where Minnesota nice doesn't encourage you to say what you see as wrong or in appropriate.

Hamsa Bayer

Cultural identity and English dominated internet

mcgu0156 — 2016-10-21 18:00:49 UTC

What: Baym argues that due to the fact that the internet is dominated by English that this has causes a loss of cultural identity.
How: The ASCII, which is still widely used, encoding of characters which only encodes latin characters hinders non-latin character based languages ability to communicate online. According to koutsogiannis & Mitsikopoulou there has been outcry in Greece because many write online using "Greeklish" . Greeklish is writing Greek words using English characters.
But: Unicode is the successor of ASCII which currently has encoding for more than 130 writing scripts and over 120,000 characters according to the unicode website. http://www.unicode.org/standard/supported.html
While ASCII is still widely used on the internet unicode is the solution to allow all people to be able to communicate on the internet using their native language.

Once Stigmatized, Online Dating Has Become Normalized

2016-10-21 19:31:37 UTC

WHAT: Baym argues that online dating has rapidly shifted from stigmatization to normalcy.
HOW: Smith and Dugan found in 2013 that 5% of all committed relationships and marriages in the U.S. began online. And a poll shows a "modest majority" of Americans agree that online dating is a good way to meet people, etc.
BUT: A fifth of Americans still think that online dating is for the despirate. That's 23% of Americans. Also, Baym only addressed stigma in the U.S., what about in other countries and cultures who use the internet?
-Nat G

Internet and Intelligence

lars5457 — 2016-10-21 19:41:35 UTC

What: Baym raised the topic that some people believe that an easily accessible internet is draining our intelligence and allowing us to rely on the internet for basic and common knowledge.
How: A study was conducted on usage of Facebook and Twitter. Facebook allowed for the 'working memory' to strengthen itself, while Twitter had no benefits to its use.
But: Some aspects of the Internet, like Facebook, are useful for our working memory and ability to stay in touch with people. The internet may not be all good, but it also does not completely drain our intelligence like some people suggest.
Abby Larson

Flaming and Abusive online behavior (Grace Wilson: wil00303)

wil00303 — 2016-10-21 20:19:25 UTC

WHAT: Baym argues that flaming - messages including swearing, insults, name calling, negative affect, and typographic energy - and abusive online behavior are perceived as more common than they actually are (66). Baym even states that we may be overestimating the amount of flaming.
HOW: Data gathered from a 1987 study by Rice and Love stating that only 0.2 percent of the messages gathered from a computerized bulletin board were actually antagonistic.
BUT: While the abusive behavior may not be "common" in relation to the amount of messages on the internet, I argue that people perceive "common" to actually mean in relation to specific groups. It is common to see at least one "flame" or hostile message in online groups. Though there are a lot of messages within groups that are not considered flaming, it is rare that there will be no flaming in them at some point. Baym points out herself that, in a study she conducted, a predominantly female soap opera discussion group had ALMOST no flaming, and the little THAT WAS THERE came from outsiders. It is common to see flaming within groups even though the group discussion may not be always centered around the flame. I do not think that the aggressive behavior is overestimated, a better term would be emphasized because many people see and react to it.

Identities

2016-10-21 20:39:48 UTC

What: Baym talks about identity being one of the biggest worries and issues people have when it comes to an online community.

How: Baym states (2015) “Though this may seem completely individual, it is shaped through social observations of, comparisons to, interactions with, and feedback form others” (p. 118). As a result, people are able to remain misrepresented.

But: Baym discusses how observational research has shown most people do not usually misrepresent their identities.

-David D

2016-10-22 00:12:18 UTC

What: Online groups cannot be communities.
How: They base their definition of community to have a common geographical element.
But: One can argue that where one is, has noting to do with being a community. A community is just a group of people with shared sense of ideas, likes and dislikes, and so forth( there is some leeway with these) as someone who plays video games I feel very much apart of the games community (Regardless of the type of game.) Video games share a common goals (in non competitive games), common likes and dislikes, and an obvious shared interest. And most of those reasons are why communities form online, it is the same as forming a group of friends in school, location whether physical or not won't stop this shared sense of to togetherness that forms communities. How communities from in real life can happen in these games where you take on a different life.
- Roman E. Simon

Reduced Social Cues

2016-10-22 00:35:28 UTC

What: Baym argues in chapter 3 that one way in which was impoverished is that of reduced social cues.
How: She explains that when the media choice of two theories of Social Presence Theory and Media Richness Theory, tried to match media capabilities and task demands, the face to face idea and way of social cues had begun to be reduced.p.59 Baym then goes deeper into what the Theories are and why they are important. An example is that of facial expressions when in a face to face conversation. By not having these social facial cues, it depersonalizes people and more anonymity grows.
But: Whether or not social cues such as facial cues are seen or diminished through the internet, Baym goes on to state that by simply looking at those Theories without deeper context, suggests that they ignore factors such as how familiar people are becoming with the technology, etc. It also brings about a new way for interpersonal connections. p.63-64.
-Elena Radtke