I use both "Online Social Network" and "Social Networking Site" in my writing. In my taxonomy, OSN exists a level up from SNS, and I often use SNS as a direct object reference to a "site" - i.e. Facebook, Myspace. However, as the term SNS has been defined, a number of sites that afford "social networking" do not qualify as SNS. I tend to view SNS liberally and view that the definition of a SNS is in evolution. The concept of an OSN was introduced to me by Howard Rheingold (using Wellman's work) in the Virtual Community. I've always felt a strong affinity to the term as it is flexible and crosses sites/domains/ technologies. That is, an online social network can exist in Facebook or Bebo as well as it can exist in a bulletin board, community forum, and so on. The distinction I use when choosing the term is the scope of reference. If I am writing about a "site," I'll often use SNS. If my scope is larger, crosses modes, or describes a process-oriented approach, I'll use OSN. On May 13, 2009, at 10:05 AM, Caroline Haythornthwaite wrote:
As one who tries to make a clear distinction between "social networks" and "social networking", let me see if this distinction makes sense to others.
Social networks are created and maintained by ties between people. They are studied using social network analysis, a formal set of techniques now being more widely used and identified under the label of "network science". There is no online or offline separation for social networks -- they exist, emerge and are maintained based on ties between people whether these happen via online and/or offline means.
Social networking I take to mean a deliberate, active pursuit of ties with other people -- from the business sense of social networking as something you do to make and keep business contacts, to the friend making in MySpace, Facebook, etc.
Social networking sites (SNSs) are online sites which provide the technical infrastructure for social networking. While the term is used, and I'd say reserved for online sites, the concept of a social networking site could also apply to offline settings as well -- after all, what is a pub for if not a social networking site.
And, yes, social networks emerge and are maintained through social networking via social network sites. The distinction is that social networks emerge in lots of ways, not *just* through the deliberate strategy of social networking, nor just through social networking sites.
Comments please as I really do try to make these distinctions clear and bug people not to call my work 'social networking'!
/Caroline
---- Original message ----
Date: Tue, 12 May 2009 22:25:00 -0400 From: Kevin Guidry <krguidry@gmail.com> Subject: [Air-L] Social network site nomenclature To: air-l@aoir.org
All,
Much of the available research refers to services such as Facebook and MySpace as "social network(ing) sites/services (SNS)." Let's ignore for the moment the differences between those four permutations as I'm more interested in learning about why some researchers use "online social networks (ONS)." SNS seems to be much more common, particularly in the wake of the late 2007 JCMC special theme issue focusing on SNSs.
Given that both terms are still in use, is there some sort of subtle cultural or discipline-based divide of which I am unaware? Or is this just an oddity that isn't important or indicative of anything more than personal preference?
Kevin _______________________________________________ The Air-L@listserv.aoir.org mailing list is provided by the Association of Internet Researchers http:// aoir.org Subscribe, change options or unsubscribe at: http://listserv.aoir.org/listinfo.cgi/air-l-aoir.org
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-------------------------------------- Caroline Haythornthwaite Professor, Graduate School of Library and Information Science, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, 501 East Daniel St., Champaign IL 61820 haythorn@illinois.edu OR haythorn@uiuc.edu
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-- Fred Stutzman Ph.D. Student and Teaching Fellow School of Information and Library Science, UNC-Chapel Hill fred@fredstutzman.com | (919) 260-8508 | http://fredstutzman.com/