Developers and moderators: Observations in the co-development of an online social space

Abstract

Online social spaces have emerged at the confluence of three notable trends: an increasing amount of interaction occurring over digital channels, an awareness of the range of technical and social affordances such spaces provide, and a growing participatory culture that fosters member involvement in the creation and maintenance of digital locales. At the same time, these trends offer both great promise and significant challenges to the creation and maintenance of online social spaces. This paper unpacks the observations from the creation of one such online social space developed with involvement from the moderators tasked with facilitating its operation. Observations run the gamut from the technical (modifying system features to meet described work practices) to the social (fostering a joint ownership in the success of the social space) and set the stage for a broad research agenda for discovering best practice in constructing social spaces online. © 2009 Springer Berlin Heidelberg.