The prediction, in brief:

One of the Internet’s most widely touted advantages is that an audience member may also be a message producer. To what extent is that really the case? We may discover a fair amount about the producers of the messages from the content of their electronic messages, but what about the lurkers? Who are they, and how big is this group? To what extent do lurkers resemble the more passive audience of television sitcoms? And why do they remain lurkers and not also become information providers? Is there something about the nature of the medium that prevents their participation?

Predictor: Morris, Merrill

Prediction, in context:

In a 1995 article for the Journal of Computer-Mediated Communication, Merrill Morris and Christine Ogan write:”One of the Internet’s most widely touted advantages is that an audience member may also be a message producer. To what extent is that really the case? We may discover a fair amount about the producers of the messages from the content of their electronic messages, but what about the lurkers? Who are they, and how big is this group? To what extent do lurkers resemble the more passive audience of television sitcoms? And why do they remain lurkers and not also become information providers? Is there something about the nature of the medium that prevents their participation?”

Date of prediction: January 1, 1995

Topic of prediction: Community/Culture

Subtopic: Virtual Communities

Name of publication: Journal of Computer-Mediated Communication

Title, headline, chapter name: The Internet as Mass Medium

Quote Type: Direct quote

Page number or URL of document at time of study:
http://jcmc.huji.ac.il/vol1/issue4/morris.html

This data was logged into the Elon/Pew Predictions Database by: Anderson, Janna Quitney