Different Types of Communities

Communities of Purpose are a third type of online community, after "communities of interest" and "communities of practice". These differ from the others by focusing on a common purpose or goal, for example a political cause, rather than on a shared interest or field of expertise.

To make these communities more effective, Nova says we need to "merge the functionality of groupware and knowledge management with emerging community tools for social networking, blogging, and wikis". Yes indeedy! And make it free, easy and fun while you're at it!

I wonder how much of the hype about the potential of online communities is a matter of failing to see the forest for the trees-- I mean, when you consider what motivated people are willing to do to accomplish something they really believe in, does it really make it so much more powerful now that people can post messages to a website? Sure, it's accessible everywhere, to anybody, but so what? What matters is the organization, that is, the people. People can join organizations any time they want. Aren't the motivated people already tying themselves to trees, rather than wasting their days having bull sessions with their internet buddies?