Affinity Online. Mizuko Ito
approach complements other studies that have looked at more controversial forms of “geeking out” online (Boero and Pascoe 2012; G. Coleman 2014; Massanari 2017; Yeshua-Katz and Martins 2013).
In addition to supporting specialized and intentional affiliation, another common feature of online affinity networks is that they rely on openly networked infrastructures for communication and content sharing. This characteristic of online affinity networks is what differentiates them from more traditional place-based affinity networks, which generally have much higher barriers to access. Young people of all skill levels are publishing, circulating, and commenting on each other’s performances and creations in a “networked public” (Varnelis 2012). When dancers post their videos on YouTube, fanfiction writers publish on the online platform Wattpad, or gamers screencast their competitive play, the creative production of online affinity networks becomes visible and searchable to broad audiences. While young people are also engaging in private communication and face-to-face encounters with peers they meet through their online affinity networks, the circulation of content and communication on open and public networks is a distinguishing characteristic of online affinity networks.
Openly sharing through peer-to-peer networks is fundamental to the platforms that support online affinity networks. Spaff serves as the community manager of Sackboy Planet, a player-created online design community (the case study appears at the end of chapter 3). He described the value of level sharing for LittleBigPlanet 2 players and the collective: “You can create your own levels, your own games, and then people can play them, but they can’t play them if you can’t share them. So the community really is filled with people who are spending hours and hours and hours building their own levels, their own games, then they publish them onto the Internet.… We have just over 6 million levels and games up there now … other people can find those levels and play them, rate them, be inspired by them, create their own things.” LittleBigPlanet 2 players can access a wide range of levels from which they may be inspired to poach, remix, sample, or build on. In turn, creators are also able to receive feedback through sharing, improving their own craft.
For young people first dipping into an area of interest, online affinity networks give them an opportunity to search, lurk, and become familiar with a scene without risk or exposure. As they get more involved in the online affinity network, they might comment or share some of their own work online and get their first taste of connecting with an audience and getting feedback. In turn, their continued sharing in an open network becomes a beacon for new seekers. Openly networked infrastructures supported these dynamics for Katie, a 15-year-old white teen from Australia. Discovering fanfiction online through the Wattpad app was her first step to becoming an author (see the 1D on Wattpad case study at the end of this chapter). By reading the work of other teen One Direction fans, she found “people who have been writing their own stories and they were people just like me.” Madeleine, a 15-year-old white teen from Canada, was nervous about sharing her work on Wattpad, fearing people would “judge me and post hate comments.” Instead, through sharing her work, Madeleine was able to make “a bunch of friends and people asked me to co-write with them.” Her identity as an author was affirmed, and she felt confident in then sharing her works with a school friend. Madeleine also found inspiration when reading the works that others had created, finding new ideas but also learning from the ways that other authors created stories.
Online affinity networks tend to follow the “Pareto principle,” in which 20 percent of participants contribute 80 percent of the network’s outcomes, with the top 1 percent contributing the most (Gee 2017). Our research has focused on the active participants, with a bias toward the 1 percent, among whom we are most likely to find connected learners. Although the more visible participants carry most of the load for organizing and creating content, casual participants and lurkers also engage in important forms of participation that sustain the reach, visibility, and influence of the network. Sustaining the whole range of participation and contribution in online affinity networks is a constant struggle for community organizers, given the intentional and voluntary nature of affiliation. Later in this chapter we describe some of the challenges that community organizers face in maintaining robust participation. Other studies of youth engagement with digital media indicate that, unlike those in our study, most are not inclined to take an active role in online affinity networks (Ito et al. 2010; Livingstone and Sefton-Green 2016). In particular, young people growing up in less tech-savvy families are much less likely to actively contribute to online affinity networks (Martin, forthcoming). Our study seeks to identify the characteristics of young people who counter this trend so that we can design programs that guide a wider range of young people to these opportunities.
As more and more young people go online, smartphones spread, and online affinity networks proliferate, we can expect that they will become more central to how young people socialize, learn, and pursue interests. In our earlier Digital Youth study (Ito et al. 2010), based on fieldwork in 2006–2007, teens described a stigma associated with meeting new friends online—the pull of local relationships and the status and social capital derived from local place-based friendships exerted a much stronger influence on their online participation than online affinity networks. This dynamic may be changing, however. Our current study focused on active participants in online affinity networks, so it is not surprising that they were comfortable with making online friends through affinity groups. More recent survey research indicates that online friendships have become commonplace, so norms may be shifting. The majority of U.S. teens now say they have met a new friend online (Lenhart et al. 2015). The role of online affinity networks likely is growing in young people’s lives.
Shared Culture and Knowledge
At the heart of any affinity network is a set of shared interests, identities, culture, and values that bind participants together. While online affinity networks exist for every imaginable interest area, our cases suggest they may be particularly active and robust for groups that are specialized, lack a critical mass in local communities, and hold to high standards of knowledge and expertise. In other words, people tend to congregate in online affinity networks when they want to geek out with others who are fellow enthusiasts, and when they lack these relationships in their offline lives. They often feel a particularly profound sense of belonging to these groups because of this shared niche culture and identity.
For example, a shared interest in both fiber crafting and Harry Potter is a niche combination that lacks a critical mass in most local communities but is a magnet for more than 1,000 participants to connect on Ravelry (see the Hogwarts at Ravelry case study at the end of chapter 4). “We all belong here,” said Amazon, a white 28-year-old based in Cleveland and a member of Hogwarts at Ravelry. Her description of why she loves Hogwarts at Ravelry captures how a shared passion for a niche interest binds members of an online affinity network. “The camaraderie and instant friendship, especially in your own house, though inter-house love is also prevalent. I can talk to someone I’ve never met before and because of the history inherent at Hogwarts, we’ve passed each other in the halls [of our virtual school] a thousand times. We go to the same charms class. We know the same lingo, share the same inside jokes.”
Amazon describes the unique pleasure of sharing cultural context and insider references with others with shared tastes, passions, and expertise. These shared cultural elements are important to creating, enriching, and sustaining relationships (Fine 1979). Rich content worlds such as the Harry Potter series offer a trove of specialized knowledge that provides ample fodder for geeking out and social organizing by engaged fan communities (Jenkins 2012).
Anime fandom exhibits a similar dynamic. Although anime has become a popular “meganiche” (Shirky 2006) outside of Japan, the breadth of content and fan activity means that the online world supports a wide range of highly specialized affinity networks within the fandom. The anime music video (AMV) scene is one such niche, a network that centers on the specific practices of video remix within the broader anime fandom (see the Animemusicvideos.org case study at the end of chapter 3). Gepetto,2 an 18-year-old from Brazil who had been an anime fan for some time, describes the moment when he first discovered AMVs. He was shocked to realize that the AMV was created by “a fan just