Technological changes have radically altered the ways in which people use visual images. One such impact has been the transformation of computer-mediated-communication (CMC) into social networking. With a focus on social networking sites such as Facebook, MySpace, Second Life, and YouTube, this book describes the theoretical and historical background of computer-mediated communication alongside the cultural changes occurring with the introduction of digital media in society.
Designed for students, this text introduces CMC terminology, methods for analyzing online exchanges, and theories on the relationship between CMC, social networks, and culture. By exploring both the meanings associated with CMC and social networks, and the relationship of CMC to culture, the goal of this text is to provide students with methods to better understand the socially-oriented world in which they live and to understand the characteristics that make social networks successful.
Special features including terms, examples, CMC theory, and suggestions for student exercises.

Autorentext

Susan B. Barnes is a full professor in the College of Liberal Arts and Associate Director of the Lab for Social Computing at the Rochester Institute of Technology. She has received numerous grants for both applied and theoretical research on the impact of computers in society. Her publications include Online Connections: Internet Interpersonal Relationships (2001) and Computer-Mediated Communication: Human-to-Human Communication Across the Internet (2003), Web Research: Selecting, Evaluating & Citing with Marie Radford and Linda Barr (2002), and Mediated Interpersonal Communication with E. A. Konijn, S. Utz, M. Tanis (2008). This last book was the winner of a CHOICE Award and called «the most significant study or interpersonal communication to appear in the past 50 years».