As I’ve mentioned I’m involved with several communities which live much of their life on-line. Like many human tools they can be used creatively or destructively.
The one Anoushka set up Transport Sparks for young people with transport special interests could not easily have happened in a world Pre-Facebook. It’s brought a lot of community and social value together. We may laugh or be cynical about Zuck’s assertions about the power of connections and Facebook’s mission, but I observe truth to that.
This long form William Davies (Guardian, H/T Anna Gat) looks at the dark side of WhatsApp groups. Where Transport Sparks brings together light. Davies highlights how private groups can breed hate and conspiracy.
One aspect of some successful communities is while there may be a strong on-line component and in fact the group might not survive without a sustaining online platform there is also a real world meet-up component or at least - in COVID times - a video meet up. The group doesn’t remain solely hidden and anonymous, it acts as a catalyst for real world meetups. My own Mingle was a little like that as well.
Anna Gat’s Interintellect has salons as a pivotal focus. Transport Sparks have transport meet ups. Climate Action Tech has meet-ups real world and now online as well. British American Project thrives on its conference.
That said some gaming communities are almost all on-line. The MiiVerse community was a wonderful community. Sadly, there was little money in it - only social value and it was decommissioned by Nintendo.
On balance, I remain positive on humans. From this flows, I feel on balance positive about social media, platforms and communities and I feel positive about free speech and sharing ideas - even bad ones (thoughtful articulation of this importance by recent Paul Graham essay on conformity here) - as I think on balance we can add up to a better world despite all the challenges. Perhaps that’s one theme you can find from Thinking Bigly too.