What does the word "social" mean online? Around fifteen years ago, I went looking for a narrative to describe a world dominated by social media and online technology. I was looking for better ways to engage people as they pursued their online conversations. My expectation was that online world would be very different to my face-to-face world. But it was not that all that different. Online I found the same social conventions that I struggled with offline. Why this was so?
I discovered two totally unexpected things about us. First... our social structures are carved in stone. That is the social structure we have today is the same as it was in the C19th. Despite all the changes in technology our social mores and social structures remain the same. Second... I discovered that our social structures have three basic components. These three I tag as our open, change, and closed networks.
The open network is where people cluster for an event like a free concert in the park. The change network is where people gather to beta test their innovations. These 'beta release' connect people in ways that lead to global examples of what I mean by change networks. But so too do the daily gatherings in the Apple Store in the local mall where we exchange questions for answers. The closed network is formed by those who coalesce around shared values and around their practiced ways of being in the world. These networks are currently bigger than they have ever been before. And it is the closed network that sustains our online conversations. For example, in the past a closed network has sustained the Roman Catholic Church whereas today it sustains the Climate Change Cult. These closed networks typically bind together a philosophy, ideology, or belief set. They are always energised by the human need to belong.
Twenty years ago my friend Matthew taught me that our social structures are predictable. He stressed that they are a constant not a variable. What else in our lives can we point to that is essentially the same today as it was in the 1960s? Given how much technology has changed in the past sixty years it is hard to accept that the core social structure has not. Gaining this insight changed my life. This insight changed the way I look at social behaviours. Changed the way I look at social networks. Changed the way I look at social cohesion. Changed the way I live within social structures.
Richard.
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