22/12/2011 21:53David Beer and Roger Burrows: Sociology And, of and in Web 2.0
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Sociology and, of and in Web 2.0: Some Initial Considerations
by David Beer and Roger Burrowsi
University of York; York St John Universityi i i i
Sociological Research Online 12(5)17
<http://www.socresonline.org.uk/12/5/17.html>
doi:10.5153/sro.1560
Received: 14 May 2007 Accepted: 2 Sep 2007 Published: 30 Sep 2007
Abstract
This paper introduces the idea of Web 2.0 to a sociological audience as a key example of a process of
cultural digitization that is moving faster than our ability to analyse it. It offers a definition, a schematic
overview and a typology of the notion as part of a commitment to a renewal of description in sociology. It
provides examples of wikis, folksonomies, mashups and social networking sites and, where possible and
by way of illustration, examines instances where sociology and sociologists are featured. The paper then
identifies three possible agendas for the development of a viable sociology of Web 2.0: the changing
relations between the production and consumption of internet content; the mainstreaming of private
information posted to the public domain; and, the emergence of a new rhetoric of 'democratisation'. The
paper concludes by discussing some of the ways in which we can engage with these new web
applications and go about developing sociological understandings of the new online cultures as they
become increasingly significant in the mundane routines of everyday life.
Keywords: Sociology of Web 2.0, Sociology of Digitization, Digtization of
Sociology, Social Networking Sites, Sociological Description, Online
Cultures
Introductioni
1.1 By the time you get to read this paper in its published form, even in the hypertextual pages of
Sociological Research Online, what it describes may well have become part of the cultural mainstream.
(Keen, 2007) It will be mundane. This is a major challenge for sociology in a world where 'internet time'
(Wellman and Haythornthwaite, 2002) now runs at a clock speed several orders of magnitude faster than
that of academic research. Sociological reactions to this problem of cultural 'speed-up' broadly fit into one
or other of two basic strategies (Gane, 2006). On the one hand, some suggest that the discipline needs
to match the speed-up of the world by 'going with the flow' and becoming more 'technologized' (Lash,

22/12/2011 21:53David Beer and Roger Burrows: Sociology And, of and in Web 2.0
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2002; Lunenfeld, 2000). On the other hand, and seemingly contrary to this, others suggest that in such
times of cultural speed-up the discipline should either call for social and cultural slow-down (McLuhan,
1997; Virilio, 1986; 2000), slow down itself (Baudrillard, 2001; 2002), or perhaps even both. Of these two
options we would probably err towards the first. We at least want to attempt to go with the flow. We are
of the view that the discipline would do well at the present juncture to follow the lead of writers such as
Pickstone (2002), Latour (2005) and Lash and Lury (2007) and embrace a renewed interest in
sociological description (Savage and Burrows, 2007) as applied to new cultural digitizations. This means
that it is necessary for us to 'technologize' ourselves rather more than has hitherto been the case. At a
time of rapid socio-cultural change a renewed emphasis on good ‒ critical, distinctive and thick ‒
sociological descriptions of emergent digital phenomena, ahead of any headlong rush into analytics,
seems to us to be a sensible idea. We need to understand some of the basic parameters of our new
digital objects of sociological study before we can satisfactorily locate them within any broader frames of
theoretical reference.
1.2 Our concern here is with a cluster of contemporary networked technologies which, popular rhetoric
suggests, are reworking hierarchies, changing social divisions, creating possibilities and opportunities,
informing us, and reconfiguring our relations with objects, spaces and each other. If this is indeed the
case then they obviously have a huge sociological significance. However, they are also technologies that
have very quickly become incorporated within the mundane realities of everyday life (especially for many
young people) and, as such, are in danger of quickly sinking from sociological view unless we remain
alert to their broader significance (Wellman and Haythornthwaite, 2002).
1.3 Our focus here is on some significant developments in internet culture which have emerged in the
last two years or so, but which have so far received little in the way of any sustained sociological
investigation. We are interested in trying to ascertain what sociological agendas are relevant to
understanding the large scale shift toward user-generated web content ‒ a movement defined by the
related practices of (to use the argot of the field) 'generating' and 'browsing', 'tagging' and 'feeds',
'commenting' and 'noting', 'reviewing' and 'rating', 'mashing-up' and making 'friends'. Our concern is to
produce some introductory notes for the general sociological reader towards the development of a
sociology of (what has come to be known as) Web 2.0 ‒ a supposedly second upgraded version of the
web that is more open, collaborative, and participatory (O'Reilly, 2005). Here we use this term ‒ Web 2.0
‒ simply as an initial sensitising concept, albeit one that we recognise is already contaminated by the
rhetorical strategies of web designers, the sales patter of commercial futurists, and the new cultures
discourse of the popular media. We use the term simply as a device to refer to a cluster of new
applications and related online cultures that possess a conceptual unity only to the extent that it is
possible to decipher some significant socio-technical characteristics that they have in common. The Web
2.0 we begin to characterise and describe here is complex, ambivalent, dynamic, laden with tensions and
subversions, and, we would argue, of increasing sociological significance.
1.4 The paper is divided into three sections. The first describes Web 2.0 and draws on examples from
sociology to introduce and illustrate the applications that are covered; we call this simply sociology and
Web 2.0. The second section then moves toward how we might begin to think sociologically about these
Web 2.0 applications. We continue to use examples from sociology but the aim of this section is to begin
to sketch out a possible sociology of Web 2.0. We then conclude with a discussion of the various ways
that we might be able to engage sociologically with these new web applications, how we might get inside
these web cultures and use them for sociological purposes (conducting research, finding things out,
teaching, and so on). This final section may then be thought of as a brief discussion of sociology in Web
2.0.
Sociology and Web 2.0i l
2.1 We see through a range of already very well know websites, such as http://www.wikipedia.organd