Well I’d love to blame waiting for ethics approval for my long delays between posts, but I am afraid it is just laziness. When the weather is nice, I’d rather be at the beach and when it rains, I curl up in bed and read beach books. It is really the same story for the blog as it is for my thesis (getting nowhere fast), my job, and my life basically. Oh well, enough moaning.
The good news is that I do have ethics approval (see the new tab), so this is the beginning of my research study. Here are the highlights from my application. Enjoy!
BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE AIMS:
The research study, which is the basis of a Master of Commerce thesis, is to identify the factors which contribute to the development of a blog-based community. Blogs are websites which display regular commentaries (‘posts’) in reverse-chronological order. They provide a community of readers with periodic new posts as well as an archive of posts which can be searched and easily retrieved. Blogs are written and maintained by one or more authors who write the posts, respond to comments and determine other blog characteristics such as design, linked websites (‘blogroll’), general blog themes, and individual post topics. The blogs in this study are public and open for reading and commenting by anyone with internet access.
In order to investigate the characteristics and behaviours of blogging communities a research methodology suited to the study to blogging must be used. This kind of exploratory study of blogging behaviours and motivations requires a methodology, which facilitates the examination of common practices within a blogging community. Established research methods for investigating the feelings, experiences, and perspectives of community members rely heavily on traditional organisational structures and modes of communication. When researching communities in a web environment, which have neither formal boundaries nor face-to-face (FTF) interactions, it is necessary to adapt extant research methods such as interviewing and observation.
Research on blogs and blogging communities is a relatively new field of study and only within the last few years have articles on blogs appeared in management journals. The earliest studies describe blogs as an “emerging form” of computer-mediated communication (CMC), date from the beginning of the decade (Riva, 2002, p. 581). Whilst early blog studies have been generally considered either an extension of CMC research (Blanchard, 2004; Gurak, Antonijevic, Johnson, Ratliff, & Reyman, 2004; Wei, 2004), or focussed on the mechanics of blogging (Riva, 2002; Rodzvilla, 2002), more recent literature has included a greater variety of topics and methods.
This research study uses applied ethnographic methods to study blog community members within a blog environment. The primary technique for interacting with participants is using blog-based interviewing or blogoviewing which is a one-to-many dialogue between the bloggers and readers. It uses not only the technical infrastructure and techniques of blogging, but also relies on the blogging community norms and behaviours. Blogoviews blend the traditional interviewing techniques with ethnographic principles, which are sympathetic with the sensibilities of a blogging community. Thus, blogoviews present a research method, which minimises the limitations of extant research practices, and yet leverages the benefits of the blogosphere environment. Participating in a blog-based dialogue provides not only the narrative of the discussion, but also facilitates observation of related blog communities, narrative and artefacts. Because of the separation of the researcher’s physical and virtual presence, the researcher is able to participate as both an internal member of the blog community and an external observer. Although, as with ethnography and all forms of qualitative research, the researcher’s perspective shapes and influences the interpretation of data generated.
BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE METHOD:
To generate data on blogging behaviours and motivations, this study will develop a blogging community by creating a research blog in which to engage and interact with participants. The blog, http://famartinniemi.wordpress.com/, will be authored by the primary researcher for this study. The topic of the blog and the theme of the posts are motivations and behaviours of members of blogging communities. The posts include the author’s personal thoughts and reflections on blogging as well as elicit comment and feedback of readers. Using the infrastructure, methods and social norms of the blogging community, the primary mechanisms for gathering data will be through blog-based interviewing and discussions as well as the analysis of linked websites, such as hyperlinks within the blog text, commenter blogs, and the blogroll. The blog will be updated regularly with commentary and questions in order to attract participation. The data collection will last for three months.
The study is open to anyone with internet access who wishes to participate within the research blog community. Participants will therefore self-select by visiting the blog website. The level of participation can vary great from reading a single post to regularly reading and commenting on posts. Participants are “recruited” in the same manner as other blogs attract a readership via links to the blog, search engine queries, and discussions in other social media such as Facebook and Twitter. Participants are encouraged through the behavioural norms and accepted practices of blogging to read posts, comment, and link to the blog. There will be no targeted recruitment using email or other personal appeals. Participation is completely voluntary and participants may withdraw at any time without notification by simply discontinuing visits to the website.
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