Villages and Sharing blog post

1. If managers aren’t important anymore towards the formation or control of groups using online tools, what do you consider the main role websites such as Meetup.com, Facebook, or MySpace have provided newly emerging groups?

The social networking websites are a very new and intriguing way of letting groups organize that I don't think has ever been tried before. These websites are very multi-faceted in what they allow groups to do and accomplish. For example, many formalities that once had to take place when forming a group can happen at the click of a button by viewing profile's of those with whom you are collaborating. This can potentially increase productivity because without even talking to other people within your group one can get a basic idea of their opinions, beliefs, and values. Not only that, but since much personal information is usually publicly displayed on these sites, a group can get an idea as to what the response of different individuals might be when posed with an idea.
Another aspect that makes these websites so different for groups is the fact that conversations are on-going. They don't just take place when the entire group meets up, rather they can continue for as long and as quickly or slowly as the members in the group decide for it to take. Conversations are no longer held within a time constraint because discussions no longer require immediate response when using that particular medium. This is yet another reason why management is not needed because the medium manages your messages and you, the individual group member, reply at your leisure.

2. Describe a group you are a member of (online community, church, job, etc.) and how it is organized. Is there management? How is information distributed within the group?

I am part of the Catholic Campus Ministry at JMU and the way that our organization is managed is, like the Catholic Church at large, hierarchical. Starting at the top of our chain of command is our Bishop who is located in Richmond. He placed our campus minister/priest as the head of our particular organization. The priest basically has the final say on all of the day-to-day activities that take place within the organization and any significant changes that should take place. He is basically like the manager of our organization. I fall next in the "chain of command" as the student campus minister. My main role, along with the assistant student campus minister, is to give direction and facilitate our organization's council. So my position could be seen similarly to the role of a supervisor. The council is made up of ten students who oversee six different committees and the committees are comprised of any given number of volunteers from within our organization.

Information is basically distributed through the chain of command, typically starting with our priest (unless the Bishop has something to tell us) and then moving to me which then gets told to the council who then tell their committees. Now we also have services every Sunday where we distribute information to our organization at large through announcements and a weekly bulletin. We also have a lot of our information accessible to anyone through our website.