Virtual communities are no substitute for real communities
Tom R. Halfhill
Walk through any residential neighborhood built in America over the last 75 years, and you'll notice a revealing architectural pattern: Houses erected before World War II almost invariably have large front porches, while houses that came later don't. Broad, full-frontage porches have given way to simple stoops or abbreviated entryways that are more decorative than functional.
The abrupt demise of the front porch isn't merely symbolic. It says a lot about how America has changed over the last 50 years and how new technology can significantly alter our communities and social relationships.
Consider how front porches once defined our interactions with family members and neighbors. As an external room attached t
o the face of the house, the porch represented an intersection between public and private life. Before air conditioning, porches were a shaded refuge on hot summer days. Before TV, they were gathering places for socializing and courting in the evenings. In urban neighborhoods, they were public parlors, inviting random encounters with passers-by. Porches were designed for a lifestyle that was fundamentally extroverted.
Over the years, that connection to the outside world has gradually been replaced with electronics that span great distances. First telephones, then radio, then TV, and now computers have changed the way we socialize, maintain relationships, and relate to our neighbors. Most recently, millions of people have started communicating with each other via computers and modems plugged into on-line networks--and soon, via the data superhighway.
The interactive networks make it possible to maintain far-flung virtual communities of like-minded people. In itself, this is nothing new. It's the
next logical step in a long trend toward basing relationships on common interests instead of geographical proximity. In the old days, especially in rural communities, folks had to associate with their neighbors, because there wasn't much choice. Nowadays, modern transportation and communication free us to associate with those who share our views and interests, and that's good. But they also threaten to isolate us from our immediate communities, and that's bad.
Unlike some observers, I don't fear that the expanding bandwidth of communications will fracture us into virtual communities that are too narrowly focused. According to this argument, cable TV channels and on-line forums are growing so numerous and specialized that we won't be exposed to differing viewpoints. As viewership declines on broadcast TV networks, say the critics, we'll no longer share a common media culture. We'll lose our national identity and become so enmeshed in self-reinforcing feedback loops that we lose touch with reality.
I don't think that will happen. Sure, some people will maroon themselves on virtual info-islands, but they already do anyway. Most will be liberated by the interactivity and finely tuned narrowcasting of the new media. Whether passive lurker or aggressive flamer, you can't surf the networks for long without stumbling across a spirited debate about something that grabs your attention. Log on and see for yourself: Our virtual communities are lively places that roar with the noise of democracy.
Virtual communities are exciting and healthy, but they become a problem when they displace similar discourse in real communities. No matter how little you have in common with your next-door neighbors, you still have one thing in common: You are neighbors. If that relationship is abandoned, the real community begins to lose its cohesion, just as the virtual community unravels if everyone stops posting messages. It would be a serious mistake to sacrifice the old community for the new.
Turn off your computer,
take a walk around your neighborhood, and observe how dwellings continue to evolve. Prison bars disguised as decorative grilles protect doors and windows from break-ins. Front porches have moved to the back of the house, where they're called decks, and become the centerpieces of backyards walled in by privacy fences. Or they're relocated within the house itself, where they're euphemistically called family rooms (e.g., TV rooms), thereby offering even more privacy--plus easy access to the remote, virtual neighborhoods.
At best, our real communities will become sterile and boring. At worst, they'll become hostile places where criminals fill the void of street life. Isolationism doesn't work any better locally than it does internationally, and the results can be equally self-destructive.
Tom R. Halfhill is a BYTE senior news editor based in San Mateo, California. Contact him on the Internet or BIX at
thalfhill@bix.com
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The Introversion of America
