The Structure of Online Social Systems (2010) Internet. Communication. Google. Digital Revolution. Web 2.0. Social Networks. Twitter. Facebook.Online Broadcast of Iran Revolution. Opportunity. Exponential growth of audience.Marketing. Brand communication.

The last ten years have seen it all. Supporters and skpetics alike have been overwhelmed by the rapid change created by communication technology in the recent years. However various spontaneous events showed that these strange online communities could surpass even the largest broadcast companies in the world in terms of information diffusion.

This surprising ability was quickly understood as an imense opportunity by commercial entities world wide. Thousands of campaignes have been designed to spread a message in these communities but not as many succeded.

Even non commercial entities that tried to used these communities haven’t had a different conclusion. Even if the message was “for a good cause”, the behaviour of people in these online communities wasn’t the most predictible one. Many solutions were given – better graphics, better deals, better online media buyinf, better content. Yet the results are not a lot more different. Better but not by that much

I think the reason for why we’re missing it is the way we look at social networks is at best underestimating the complexity of which even the users themselves are unaware. They are not just a passive audience. The uses these social networks can have are basically unlimited in potential. However, we can discover this dimension by trying to broad our scope of understanding when it comes to how we define and interact with these networks be it from within or from the outside.

We must understand social networks as real social structures. In order to communicate in the most efficient and targeted way (be it broad or narrow) we must understand the principles these structures are build on. When we understand the principles we will be able to make exact predictions of any future actions taken in this realm. Social networks are not very different than real life social structures or systems.

It is quite obvious that we need to first take a glance at what are social systems and how they work before being able to understand the principles of online social networks.

I have chosen the description and definition Marvin Harris gives to the structure of social systems. It is a very simple system which may not be the best or most recent standard in this field. However I think it will serve it purpose very well. According to Marvin Harris’ view, a social system has 4 key distinguishable elements:

Environment

Infrastructure

Structure

Superstructure

When expanded to their own components one can see that there is a striking similarity between real social structures and online social networks.

1. ENVIRONMENT

All natural limitations that pertain to the physical universe that we live in constitute the environment of a social system. We need to know all physical or logical limitations that we are subject to in order to understand what can and can’t be done.

For example it is imposible to solve algebra equations by chewing bubblegum as Baz Luhrmann said, because it just can’t be – it is beyond the objective limitations everything is subject to, so it can not happen. Things can not appear out of thin air, though you never know as the word goes around these days.

So as social networks have limitations: they are dependant on technology that uses electrical power. If there was no electrical power, the technology that is crucial for the existance of online social networks could not function, thus social networks them selves could not exist.

Of course the environment consists both of limitations and opportunities, but its basically a sum of things that are possible and that are not in the realm of social networks. There is a gread deal of such things, that vary from basic (electricity) to even the most complex (programming, interfaces, connectivity etc.) An understanding of these things can tip the balance in favour of more opportunities rather than limitations. 2. INFRASTRUCTURE consists of 2 major components vital as the other 3 to the existence of social systems and social networks:

A. Mode of PRODUCTION

The technology and the practices employed for expanding or limiting basic substinence production (especially the production of forms of energy – used in human systems for sustaining the person (food, water etc.) but completely different when reffering to social networks where the person is not a physical being requiring physical forms of energy but different types of nourishment or energy for existence – such as better programming languages, better and larger platforms, better coding enhancing user interface or number of users or even the capabilities of that platform – application support, interconnectivity options with other platforms etc.)

B. Mode of REPRODUCTION

The technology and the practices employed for expanding, limiting and maintaining population size. In human social systems we talk about demography, mating patterns, fertility-natality-mortality, nurturance of infants, medical control of demographic patterns, contraception-abortion-infanticide. For social networks could be the ways users are allowed to join a network or ways in which the network owner or even the user can terminate an account etc.

However, there is an interesting point here: one could argue that if real social systems are so similar to social networks why can’t they be similar at the lower levels of the structure, such as matting patterns. Of course there could be an entire field of study to document even the most detailed components of a social network seen as a social system.

For example the matting patterns could be very similar in that of course with the exception of the physical act of matting, courting patterns or communication could be very similar – there are many real life (offline) relationships that started inside a social network and then continued in the offline space. Many of the people involved in such relationships often say that it was some sort of unphysical attribute of the other person, digitalized or able to be used in the online realm, which attracted them and was the only reason why the relationship moved to the offline realm. The implication is clear- the online realm can support, determine and allow for truly significant relationship between persons. STRUCTURE

In most real life social systems the structure of a system is made up by two group structures – primary group structure and secondary group structures.

Before moving forward it is important to state that unlike the other components where similarity between offline social systems and online ones is close to an identical match, when it comes to STRUCTURE one could easily argue (and anyone could and should do it) that when it comes to social networks there are not 2 different group structures. And this possibility stems from one of the most important differences between offline and online social systems – the nature of the individual and its place in the social structure. In the online realm, as seen earlier, there is no physical person bound to physical laws or that needs nourishment to exist (of course, there are rules and limitations in the online realm as well, that bind the existence of a person or a self, but they are indeed different ones).

Bellow is my own approximation or view on the similarities with the two group structures in offline social systems although I have not pursued any of the possibilities described earlier.

Primary Group Structure:

It consists of a small number of people who interact on an intimate basis. For offline social systems this group structure perform some of the tasks necessary for the system to exist at its most basic levels. Of course, like in the case of the lower levels of the structure of the modes of reproduction, one could argue they could be just as similar or

completely different or even that this group structure performs completely different tasks inside social networks.

I wanted to focus on intimacy. I think that this is the single most important factor that determines the strength of social relationships between individuals in social networks. Because of higher or lower intimacy between individuals do they add friends or reject friend requests, because of this users get invited to some groups and to some they don’t, because of this some content is shared with some people and not with others.

Intimacy determines different types of primary group structures such as (and I am using as an example the taxonomy employed by Facebook) friends, closed groups, open groups.

The primary group structure in offline social systems performs many functions such as regulating reproduction, basic production, socialization, education and enforcing domestic discipline. Examples of this are the family, the community, voluntary organization, friendship networks etc.

As I said before it is important to keep the debate open in terms of doubting all similarities from the lowest levels of the structure to the highest. However, in the case of the structure of the system and primary group structure, the main differentiator in categorizing primary group structures in online social systems should be intimacy because it explains most of the inherent systemic behavior of internal structures of networks such as Facebook or Twitter.

Secondary group structure

This secondary group structure is made of groups large or small that tend to interact without any emotional commitment to one another. Like in the case of primary group structure, in offline social systems they perform many functions such as regulating production, reproduction, socialization, education and enforcing social discipline. These functions, such as the case of the primary group structure, are suited for offlline structures, but there can be similarities in these tasks with social networks.

The main differentiation for this structure is the lack of emotional involvement characterizing the interactions the groups in this structure have. Thus we can identify such interactions in social network- such as social networks admins, page admins or even hardware admins.

There is a big question where brands fit in this picture. In previous years, when brands just started using social media to communicate with consumers, they were just this – impersonal entities that engaged in unidirectional communication with consumers or users. This kind of communication put brands in the secondary group structure due to the lack of emotion that characterized their entire online existence and interactions.

In recent years, this has changed, brand communication being now, more personal, engaging and relevant to users, it has changed to engaging two-way dialogue. Brands were forced to change both their tactics and strategies and their mentality and understanding of social networks.

This happened because in the realm of social networks, personal relevancy is key for your message to be listened to by consumers/users. In the case of brands, relevancy is what build up intimacy and thus trust. Now, users access information based on personal specific interests and recommendations from trusted sources (mainly friends and other trusted users). Brands can become such a trusted source by building trust and intimacy trough transparent behaviour, honesty and most important relevant content or presence. Mass communication that focuses on one general message for a broad audience is not only inneficient but oblivious in the realm of social networks.

In light of these things, one could argue that brands are of primary group strucures. Brands have begun to build their intimacy and emotional bonding with users much like they did years ago in offline social systems. Because in online social systems,consumers have a larger role in the life and success of brands in terms of relevancy and number of users linked with brands, the latter have started evolving in creating emotional bonds with consumers that could easily put them in the primary group structure.

Another view is that brands, despite their communication (emotional. relevant, two-way) still have a lack of emotional involvement in their relationship with users, thus being part of secondary group structures. In this view, brands still regard users as numbers and don’t establish a real (or comparable in any way) relationship with users like the latter do with other users. However, because some brands understood or just observed the clrearly larger benefits of being a part of primary group structures , some of them have developed a tendency to adapt, change, modify or evolve their communication and their entire online existente in order to gain primary group structure roles.

In offline social systems, secondary group structures are coordinated through bureaucracies and consist of: governments, parties, factions, the military, the police, corporations, businesses, industries, education, media and other formal socialization agents, services and welfare organizations, professional and labour organizations. Like before, the discussion is open whether there are similarities down to these lower levels of the structure between offline and online social systems. One could say that there is a police force in the online realm (although there is an entire debate here if that is good or bad, necessary or even natural for this realm) or businesses have been around in the online realm or social networks for some time. This is a very interesting debate that anyone could and should continue.