Tuesday, December 8, 2009
More on Social Capital
It seems like all my classes are intertwining lately. While researching for my Senior Thesis, I came across this great article on the Government Technology magazine website, entitled "Social Capital: Technology's Impact on Society" by Robert Bell that referenced a lot of the studies we discussed in class such as Nie's work and Netville. I liked it a lot because it combined their conclusions with more updated information, which I know was a criticism we all made of the original pieces. I really enjoyed a quote Bell made about the new generations growing up with the Internet. He references another study writing, "The Net generation is in many ways the antithesis of the TV generation... Rather than leaning back on the couch as passive consumers of media, they lean forward to interact, choose and challenge." I am curious how such generational differences will play out on our network map, will our map help this Net generation more, or can it span different age groups? Anyways, the Bell article is pretty short and definitely worth a look. Check it out at: http://www.govtech.com/gt/734063?id=734063&topic=117673&full=1&story_pg=1
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emily, i really like that quote! i never really thought of the "net" generation as a positive thing because i know i always get yelled at for sitting on the computer too much at home. but now i can just say that i am "interacting, choosing, and challenging!"
ReplyDeleteregarding our map, if we think of the "net generation" in this manner, our map should definitely be something of interest for ppl to be able to "interact" on it and "choose" their connections.