Audience size, moderator activity, gender, and content diversity: Exploring user participation and financial commitment on Twitch.tv

User participation has long been recognized as a cornerstone of thriving online communities. Social live-streaming service (SLSS) communities are built on a subscription-based model and rely on viewers’ participation and financial support. Using the collective effort model and heuristics of social influence, this study examines the influence of streamer and viewer behaviors on viewers’ participation and financial commitment on the SLSS, Twitch.tv. Findings from behavioral data collected over 7 weeks show larger audiences diminish individual participation and financial commitment while moderation may encourage more. Female streamers benefit from increased moderation, earning two to three times more in financial commitment compared to men, who streamed more frequently and for longer durations but attracted much smaller audiences. Viewers’ participation and financial commitment did not differ across streams with more content diversity. Our results demonstrate how group factors influence individual participation and financial commitment in newer subscription-based media.

The Computational Thematic Analysis Toolkit

As online communities have grown, Computational Social Science has rapidly developed new techniques to study them. However, these techniques require researchers to become experts in a wide variety of tools in addition to qualitative and computational research methods. Studying online communities also requires researchers to constantly navigate highly contextual ethical and transparency considerations when engaging with data, such as respecting their members' privacy when discussing sensitive or stigmatized topics. To overcome these challenges, we developed the Computational Thematic Analysis Toolkit, a modular software package that supports analysis of online communities by combining aspects of reflexive thematic analysis with computational techniques. Our toolkit demonstrates how common analysis tasks like data collection, cleaning and filtering, modelling and sampling, and coding can be implemented within a single visual interface, and how that interface can encourage researchers to manage ethical and transparency considerations throughout their research process.

Governable Stacks against Digital Colonialism

Critics have been converging around the logic of colonialism to describe the Internet economy. If we are serious about the laden language of the colonial, we should be ready to learn from struggles against pre-digital empires and colonial regimes. Although acts of insurrection may attract more attention, one thing leaders and theorists of anticolonial resistance have stressed persistently is the centrality of self-governance in everyday life as both a means and an end of their movements. But the dominant platforms for online communities are not well-suited for durable self-governing. Resistance often relies on the same colonial firms it opposes. What would community-governed technologies look like? This article introduces the concept of “governable stacks”, a framework for self-governing as resistance to digital colonialism.

Governable Stacks against Digital Colonialism

Critics have been converging around the logic of colonialism to describe the Internet economy. If we are serious about the laden language of the colonial, we should be ready to learn from struggles against pre-digital empires and colonial regimes. Although acts of insurrection may attract more attention, one thing leaders and theorists of anticolonial resistance have stressed persistently is the centrality of self-governance in everyday life as both a means and end of their movements. But the dominant platforms for online communities are not well-suited for durable self-governing. Resistance often relies on the same colonial firms it opposes. What would community-governed technologies look like? This paper introduces the concept of “governable stacks”, a framework for self-governing as resistance to digital colonialism.

Gay Dating App Users Support and Utilize Sexual Health Features on Apps

Men who have sex with men (MSM) frequently meet sex partners through dating apps. Research has demonstrated an association between app use and greater number of sex partners and STIs, but dating apps also pose an opportunity for intervention. By advocating for sexual health features on dating apps, Building Healthy Online Communities (BHOC) aims to increase communication about sexual health among app users. In partnership with Emory University, BHOC added questions to an annual survey of MSM. The questions assessed awareness and uptake of profile fields and sexual health features on the dating apps. Among survey participants, 67% (6737/10,129) reported using dating apps to meet a partner in the past year. Among this group, 77% (4993/6525) reported awareness of sexual health features. 61% of app users (2866/4721) who were aware of them reported using one or more sexual health features. BHOC continues to advocate for increased uptake of these features.

Employee Online Communities

This chapter seeks to impart understanding of the role of employee online communities for enhanced employee engagement and retention in an organization. The highly engaged and motivated employees would contribute more towards accomplishing the organizations goals. The various research studies conducted in the past across the world identify job satisfaction as a major determinant of employee engagement and retention. The role of internal communication through employee online communities of organizations or intranets is theoretically suggested to be a major influencer for the enhancement of employee engagement efforts. This can help to enhance and support culture, corporate values, mission statement, and annual company goals. The purpose of this chapter is to investigate the role that the employee online communities of organizations play in order to support the twin objectives of employee retention and engagement. Engaging employees can be the catalyst for inducing positive change among employees and, as a result, boosting an organization's success.

Developing the Leadership Potential of African Youth Through Online Communities

This chapter draws on the results of an explorative, qualitative study that investigated how online communities can facilitate civic engagement amongst Millennials. Based on the study's findings, the chapter explores how the use of online communities can assist and empower youth, particularly African young people, to overcome barriers, empower and foster civic engagement. This chapter begins with a review of key literature, and then a summary of the study methodology, followed by a discussion of the study findings and their potential for African youth. Results of the study indicated that five facilitating factors and two barriers were influential towards youth civic engagement in an online context. Adult perceptions of youth and the low credibility of online communities were found to act as significant barriers to online youth participation. Given these key findings from the study, the authors show how to employ online communities to engage African youth civic participation and decision making.

Online Communities. Benefits and Risks

This article reviews empirical studies from 2008 to 2017 on the effects of participating in online communities. The review uses three databases: PubMed, Scopus and ScienceDirect. The criteria are: (1) online community aimed to provide support by and for people with a common problem; (2) the content of the sessions was determined by users; (3) members met via the Internet; (4) online community was available 24/7; (5) online community access was free and open to everyone with an Internet connection. Of the articles, 13 of 105 met the inclusion criteria. Seven studies reported positive changes: informational and emotional support, increased sense of belonging, less isolation, better medical understanding. Six articles also considered risks: the rise of the level of stress because of successes or failures of other users, the addiction to the forum and the consequent isolation from real relationships.