Communities in Social Media

This upcoming week in class, we are going to be discussing microblogging, which includes Twitter. Here's one great way I use it: I find all kinds of links to interesting posts. I just saw one about the difference between communities and online conversation, thanks to a Tweet from Matt Dickman (@technomarketer).

Here is an excerpt from Beth Kanter's blog (which, BTW, is on using social media with non-profits - pay attention, students, as your final project fits the bill here!). This excerpt should get one thinking - and spark some conversation:

A traditional online community is a group of people who interact
together and have a relationship over time on a site where people can interact around a common interest. A loosely coupled online community is a group of people who are joined together by a common interest and have conversations is different - this might include groups on social networking sites or a network of blogs. It's important to determine if your organization needs a traditional online community or something else.

Later in the post, Beth discusses whether our communities are more like book clubs, where members all discuss the same book (she used movies as her example), or are they more like real social clubs, where we meet and discuss our interests and dreams. There is a big difference!

What do you think, students and readers? In which cases would the first example work vs. the second example? Let's discuss!