Charles, I also think the bartender's remark reflects the continuing dystopian meme that new tech is going to kill off old true community. Sherry Turkle's Alone Together is a recent example, as is the obssessive nature of NYT op-eds and magazine pieces (as distinct from their good news reporting). Leo Marx's The Machine in the Garden first got me thinking about this, and I put a bunch of early internet examples into "Net Surfers Dont Ride Alone" and "Physical Space and Cyber Place" Marx traces back to Tommy Jefferson. One day, I'll do a book on this. Barry Wellman _______________________________________________________________________ NetLab Director FRSC INSNA Founder Faculty of Information (iSchool) 611 Bissell Building 140 St. George St. University of Toronto Toronto Canada M5S 3G6 http://www.chass.utoronto.ca/~wellman twitter: @barrywellman Canadian and American citizen NETWORKED:The New Social Operating System. Lee Rainie & Barry Wellman MIT Press http://amzn.to/zXZg39 Print $20 Kindle $16 Old/NewCyberTimes http://bit.ly/c8N9V8 ________________________________________________________________________