Information Design of Community-Building

Let me first briefly state some definitions of the three important subject areas: virtual communities, community networks and information design. Virtual communities "consist of people who interact over a period of time and form human bounds of some kind through such digital technologies as email discussion groups, bulletin boards, and real-time chat" (Farkas and Farkas 134). A community network, according to the Association for Community Networking (http://www.afcn.net) is a "community-based creation and provision of appropriate technology services." Robert Jacobson (1999) states that the practice of information design "is the systematic arrangement and use of communication carriers, channels, and tokens to increase the understanding of those participating in a specific conversation or discourse" (4). For my purpose, I will treat virtual communities and community networks under the same overall heading of building community, because their information designs share many common ideas.

This article will speak to the issue that there are certain design considerations which are critical for successful, long-lasting community building on the web that may have no importance or may have lesser importance in a non-community-oriented web site. I will address six of the most important considerations here, but it is not meant to be an exhaustive list. Anyone desiring more in-depth coverage of this topic should see the "Other Community-building Resources" section at the end.

So, what aspects of information design influence community-building? Many authors have suggestions. I have summarized information in six key areas.

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