Networked: My quick review of the textbook

I thought that Rainie and Wellman provide an interesting overview of how sociability has been changing over the last few decades due not only to the rapid popularization of the Web as such, but also to the increasing penetration of wireless technologies in our everyday lives and the establishment of innovative interaction patterns in digital environments. Lovink (2011) suggests that the Web should be investigated in its actual development. In this sense, Networked (2012) gives us an interesting account of the multiplicity of factors converging to shape new social configurations. Rainie and Wellman, in this book, provide analysis of the data that their respective agencies have collected over the years and using them argue that we live in a networked operating system, which is characterized by networked individualism. Our social lives are greatly affected by the triple revolution as Rainie and Wellman describe: Networked revolution, Internet revolution and mobile revolution. They investigate the ever increasing pervasiveness of information and communication technologies and how they have become embedded in the daily lives of the millions of Internet users through the processes of diffusion and domestication of innovation. They do this by using the vast amount of data that Pew has collected as well as the ethnographic research results by NetLab over the years. The result is a thorough analysis of how Web 2.0 and other current ICTs foster both on- and offline practices and influence, simplify or complicate our daily routine information consumption as well as social activities at large.

Scholars often fear that a move away from close-knit social relational structures caused by advancing information and communication technologies lead us towards an isolationist social system. For example, Putnam (2000) and, more recently, Turkle (2011) expressed such a fear of the Internet user base turning into technocratic individualists. Rainie and Wellman put forward an argument that this ‘group vs. individual’ dichotomy is fallacious. They argue that we have moved towards networked individualism, where each person is tied to a large, diverse, sparsely knit network. The person is at the center here, and the person draws upon and contributes to a rich set of resources in various networks to which he or she is attached. People function more as connected individuals and less as embedded group members. Networked individuals are constantly tested by the environment they live in in terms of their abilities to deal with each other and with the information. Some individuals are more likely to be network mavens than others in such a system. The book concludes with two scenarios: one in which human life is pleasantly enhanced, and another of a dehumanized and isolated, hierarchical system.

What I like about this book: I like how it breaks the false dichotomy between group and individuals and eloquently describes the complicated reality that we live in. They have used a very simple and easy to understand language to explain and discuss this shift away from the group. The strength of their argument, I believe, lies in the data that they present in the book. They cover both quantitative and qualitative data to support their argument, which increases the generalizability of their insights. I am a huge advocate of the mixed-methods approach, and this work is a really good reference guide to the empirical realities in the current networked era. A lot of my research deals with user generated content in media communications and change in attitudes and intentions, and I look forward to using this book in my literature review.

Where I don’t necessarily agree with them: There is a quite evident optimistic leaning in this book when weighing the potentials of a networked era. For example, on page 96, they suggest that how people use technology as a buffer between themselves and the physical system they are a part of, and present it as a strength of mobile technologies. The stats they use to support this claim are: “… 13% of the US adult cell phone users pretend to use them for avoiding social interactions,” or “42% of the US adult cell phone users interact on phones to kill time.” While this is one interpretation, but other (obvious) interpretations are kept unexplored, I believe. I would have loved to see more theoretical support to their argument in addition to the rich data that they present. They could have used the critical theories of race, gender, class and their intersections when discussing the social implications of the networked individuals. Some of their examples seem outdated as the book was written in 2012 and the Internet and mobile technologies evolve at a much faster pace. For example, people have moved over emails to ask for help, and gone to more interactive and visual rich tools like WhatsApp, YouTube, etc.

To sum up, I really loved this book and think that it is a timely and important piece of work. The book offers a significant contribution to the social sciences literature.

Lovink, G. (2011). Networks without a cause: A critique of social media. London, UK: Polity Press.

Putnam, Robert D (1995). "Bowling Alone: America's Declining Social Capital". Journal of Democracy. 6 (1): 65–78. doi:10.1353/jod.1995.0002.

Rainie, L. & Wellman, B. (2013). Networked: The new social operating system. Boston, MA: MIT Press.

Turkle, S. (2012). Connected, but alone? Retrieved June 29, 2018 from http://www.ted.com/talks/sherry_turkle_alone_together.html.