Concur with denise about reputation building as a motivator for contributing, but not the whole story: -- giving to the collective whole: many of us have worked to build AoIR, for example. Wikipedia another great example -- desire to set the record straight. Every time I see some pundit say that social isolation is increasing, grrrrr I'm sure there are other things too. Barry Wellman _______________________________________________________________________ S.D. Clark Professor of Sociology, FRSC NetLab Director Department of Sociology 725 Spadina Avenue, Room 388 University of Toronto Toronto Canada M5S 2J4 twitter:barrywellman http://www.chass.utoronto.ca/~wellman fax:+1-416-978-3963 Updating history: http://chass.utoronto.ca/oldnew/cybertimes.php _______________________________________________________________________