review: christian stegbauer (2001). grenzen virtueller gemeinschaft – strukturen internetbasierter kommunikationsforen [boundaries of virtual communities—structures of internet-based communication fora]

In his book, Christian STEGBAUER disputes the conventional wisdom concerning the disappearance of social frontiers and, therefore, structures, via computer-mediated communication. Theoretically well founded and analytically convincing, he takes the magic away from popular myths concerning disappearing structures. He shows new (and old) frontiers and, therefore, structures, in Internet-based discussion forums. STEGBAUER underpins his hypothesis by using network analysis. In all mailing lists he identifies comparatively stable centre-periphery and limited-period sub-group structures, which apply to selected themes. URN: urn:nbn:de:0114-fqs0204133