I & K Social Net

I read today a post from Ismael Peña i his blog ICTLogy where he makes a summary of the conclusions of a working group on Netweoking cooperation and have posted my comment to it, which I’ve decided to post here too:

Networks are a very common in humans evolution. Networks constitute the way we shape our thoughts in our brain, and social networks are the structure in which we create culture and share knowledge. Social networks need Social Capital to become more productive and increase knowledge.

Like human capital or physical capital, social capital, that is based on the relations of the members in a network, is essential for creating knowledge. Cohesion inside the network must co-exist with bridging, that’s relation outside the network, with other networks.

The Internet makes this kind of Social capital more feasible because members in a network can be spread over the planet and thus belong to other networks.

The reasons why people join a network are based on benefit. We shouldn’t forget that social capital is a concept based on an economical view. People are ready to strengthen their links if they see a possible benefit in two possible senses: first, to gain status or comfort (earn money, make business,etc.) and second, to keep the present status or comfort (Nan Lin, 2001).
Finally, the idea that Social Networks help to bring “disruptive creation” was introduced in 1995 by Clayton M. Christensen who first introduced the disruptive technologies. He classified them in two types: the lower end: for new market niches not considered before, and the lower end: for non existing markets. The web 2.0 was a disruptive technology or a disruptive innovation for lower end. Most of the ITC creations we are discovering in these years are lower end disruptive innovations and that’s why we always get impressed and have to change and learn so quickly. Social Networks make this transition easier by getting the support of the members and learning collectively.
Humans are network animals.

Today’s NY Times edition has an article on the new trends apperaring in Japan where youths are using cellphones for writing novels, some of them becoming best-sellers. This is not suprising in a country where the cellphone has become a common use communication tool.

Some of the authors was a girl who has been writing all the novel with the cellphone and uploaded daily to a special website thought for this kind of writers. Her writings became lots of fans and at the end of the novel, the novel was ranked n.1 on the Internet. When is was printed it was n.5 in Japan.

It’s evident that traditional novelists ans literature experts may consider this kind of writing as an under culture, because it uses the same schematic writing than the sms messages on the cellphone. But from Communication Science this is an interesting event that should be studied as an evolution on how ITC is forcing changes in the way people communicate.

A less sensationalist article on the Japan Times Online explains more about this kind of writing trend called “keitai novels”.

It has been said for years that tools will not force people to change their behaviour, but the trigger for new tools should come from consumer’s needs, and this is not really the way things are happening. Techies may bring good inventions that do not get the immediate acceptance from the consumers, but with their usage consumers can transform technology tools into new instruments.

Kindle is a good idea, the same as the Sony reader, but they force people to carry another widget what makes autonomy more difficult. I was frustrated by beeing banned to have Kindle in Europe, so I decided to check what the offer was to get novels and books on the cellphone. The offer is abundant and to very reasonable prices. The only problem is that you better download these books with your computer and transfer them later to your cellphone, if you don’t want to pay large bills for cellphone data transfer. But there’s available some software where you can read an manage mobile books easily.

Here some links:

http://www.mobilebooks.org/

http://www.mobilebooks.com/

I’ve decided to open a new category called “Facebook” on my Blogroll links where I will add all the URLs of references on the Internet about Facebook’s controversy. (Right sidebar, below the calendar)
I believe that since there’s no discussion it’s better people can read this information and think about it.

O.