Comments on: Ghetto 2.0 — Black Power & White Flight Online

By: susanbrooksfrank

susanbrooksfrank — Fri, 04 Sep 2009 02:50:42 +0000

I am still fairly new to the virtual world and came across facebook because I heard it mentioned in the news. I did not even know about My Space. So…I guess my experience refutes your theory.

By: francislholland

francislholland — Fri, 04 Sep 2009 00:53:34 +0000

There's a lot of white male supremacy in the discussions over who uses the Internet and how. For example, I heard about a study published at NetRoots Nation (WhiteRootsNation) saying that women, Blacks and Latinos use the Internet differently from the "general population."

"Netroots Nation Study: White Men are 'the general population' of the United States"

Now, I'm no math wiz, but I know that if you add up women (51% of the general population), and (Blacks 13% of the general population) and Latinos (15%), then you've got about 65% of the general population, (since half of Black and Latinos are women and we can't double count them), and all other groups together don't account for more than 35% of the population.

But that 35% of the population is white and male, then whatever the do is inherently the norm.

I'd like the authors of that study to explain how, If white men are less than 35% of the population, THEIR behavior is defined as "the behavior of the general population"?

It reminds me of South African Apartheid, where the twenty percent of the population that was white was considered the political "majority", in spite of being outnumber by Blacks by a factor of 4:1, (because Blacks weren't allowed to vote).

By: susanbrooksfrank

susanbrooksfrank — Thu, 03 Sep 2009 22:50:42 +0000

I am still fairly new to the virtual world and came across facebook because I heard it mentioned in the news. I did not even know about My Space. So…I guess my experience refutes your theory.

By: francislholland

francislholland — Thu, 03 Sep 2009 20:53:34 +0000

By: Anonymous

Anonymous — Wed, 02 Sep 2009 22:15:00 +0000

What does it mean to be segregated in a space where language and culture are perhaps more important than in the real world?

When people here think of the internet, we automatically think of sites like Google or Twitter than are American English language sites and talk as if they are universal when people in other countries and cultures have their own websites that they use.

How many Americans use Orkut? Why should someone in Brazil care that we don’t use it? Why would/should that be seen as a “divide”? If it works for them so be it.

And why shouldn’t that thinking apply to the sites that brown and black use?

If there are sites that POC frequent more than whites that work just fine then why is that a thing to worry about?

I can understand being concerned about a divide if that separation translates into a lack of innovation or opportunity online but that doesn’t seem to be the articles contention.

By: Lyndon Johnson

Lyndon Johnson — Wed, 02 Sep 2009 19:27:52 +0000

This post and the research blew my mind. What an interesting conclusion to draw. I don't know if it was as much race-based as it was that Myspace looks like a teenager's room: disorganized, full of posters of bands, and lots and lots of inane chatter.
Facebook is where the adults can gather and calmly and rationally discuss which Scorcese movie they're most like.

By: evita

evita — Wed, 02 Sep 2009 18:57:35 +0000

I think there might be an intolerance by some groups in accpeting the unrestricted nature of myspace like friend requests, html code, and people who are just collecting friends. With Facebook- you can pretty much avoid all that.

I also admit that there I have heard people use the stereotype that MySpace is ghetto. I didn't leave because of it the researcher suggests, I left because of the rampant friend requests by scantily clad women and the overuse of html code.

By: Taya Tennille

Taya Tennille — Wed, 02 Sep 2009 18:38:07 +0000

Is My Space ghetto?

By: Taya Tennille

Taya Tennille — Wed, 02 Sep 2009 18:36:36 +0000

Is My Space ghetto?

By: Kala Nation

Kala Nation — Wed, 02 Sep 2009 17:07:11 +0000

Yes as the Kalagenesis wrote the internet threads are really the writing on the wall.

By: facebook-1538052557

facebook-1538052557 — Wed, 02 Sep 2009 17:04:16 +0000

Did the report take into account that many of us fled MySpace because we didn't want to deal with 339847234 friend requests from metal bands every day?

By: spirit_55z

spirit_55z — Wed, 02 Sep 2009 16:44:26 +0000

“The Internet belongs to everyone, and as we continue moving toward racial equality in the real world, we should make sure the same things are happening in the digital world.”

That's the TRUTH. They can run, but there's nowhere to hide.