Virtual Community is an Oxymoron?

Published by Rick Meigs on February 13th, 2009 in Missional, Orthopraxy.

Shane Hipps says you can’t be virtual and community at the same time. He challenges to the standard line that the message stays the same even when the medium changes. This is important in understanding the role and limitations of social media like Facebook and Twitter. Take a listen:

Shane is the author of “Flickering Pixels: How Technology Shapes Your Faith” published this month by Zondervan.

Update: Some dialog on the subject can be found here, here, here and here.

HT: Out of Ur

Tags: Virtual Community

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6 Responses to “Virtual Community is an Oxymoron?”

Peggy
February 13th, 2009 at 8:43 pm
The Abbess begs to differ … he may not know how to do it, but that does not mean it can not or is not being done. She tires of zero sum games when it can be both/and rather than either/or.

Face to face is always better, potentially, but that does not mean that virtual can not be a form of “real community” — especially when the physical is not healthy or “real community” either.

The Abbey and Missional Tribe’s Instigators are examples of some of this, in my view.

I would rather say that Virtual Community is a type of paradox, a mystery.
Rick Meigs
February 13th, 2009 at 10:26 pm
Peggy, I understand your point and tend to agree. I do think Shane has a good point in that deep bonds and kinship are best formed when we experience liminality physically, together. That brings the deepness communitas.
Matt
February 14th, 2009 at 3:23 pm
Rick,

Thanks for this post. I recently attended the Innovative3 Conference where one of the guys who was teaching the technology forum was saying, in essence, that community online is replacing community offline and that we better wake up as a church and embrace technology.
Being one who does not shun technology, I felt his conclusion underestimated the value of face to face (or offline) interactions. I see technology as a way to enhance our relationships or connect us with new people, but probably not a good replacement for them.
Peggy
February 15th, 2009 at 11:48 am
Rick and Matt, take a look at John LaGrue’s post (as well as Steve Knight’s comment and link to his own post):

http://www.microclesia.com/?p=561

…as well as my comment there!

This is a very important conversation to have….
John L
February 15th, 2009 at 12:21 pm
Rick, sorry I didn’t see you post earlier or I would have tracked-back. I think there is unnecessary tension here in trying to paint a black & white duality between “virtual” and “community.” I won’t rehash my thoughts here ’cause I just blogged on it. A good conversation to have.
Rick Meigs
February 15th, 2009 at 2:34 pm
Thanks Peggy and John. It is a good conversation to have. For others, hear was my comment over at John’s:

“So very interesting how we all often hear something different in what [a] person says. I understood that Shane was making the exact argument that virtual community is not a substitute for physical community when it comes to Jesus followers gathering. Wasn’t the context of his comments Second Life? I didn’t hear anything in his comments that would lead me to believe he was rejecting technology as a way to enhance our shared community experience. “