One of the greatest strengths of the Internet is the ability to find other people who can help you. In addition to academic and professional experts, there are people who have practical life experience with a subject. You may need to identify people who have undergone certain experiences, or who possess a range of opinions. You can find them in the various types of interactive discussion forums. They share opinions. Lots and lots of opinions - and experiences - about every subject imaginable, some credible, some far from credible, so be on the alert.
The Internet is an ideal medium for accommodating and storing personal opinions, but do not forget that people can and do lie, especially online where it is easy and convenient to create new online identities. This is especially true in chat rooms and newsgroups. It is not easy to ascertain if an online identity is genuine.
If you cannot find something, do not despair: somewhere on the 'Net is someone who knows about the subject you are looking for. There are several types of discussion groups, chat rooms and other interactive resources. Many of them accommodate unconventional points of view and personal accounts. While you can find experts and knowledgeable people in all of them, you can also go on wild goose chases, so be skeptical until a "source" proves its credibility and authority.
Newsgroups are online discussion groups that have nothing to do with news. The beauty of newsgroups is that they accommodate everyone - everyone. Militia members, pornographers, and cultists of every stripe - they are all out there. So are, as Dave Barry likes to say, teenagers, poets, cat lovers, religious people, gays, gay teens who read religious poetry to cats and, of course, guys who have pointless arguments about sports. You can also find eyewitnesses to every experience imaginable.
Newsgroup members talk to each other in groups, and you can read and respond, since newsgroups are public forums. You can "eavesdrop" on the discussion without participating, or respond privately to messages that interest you via email. All newsgroups comprise what is called the "Usenet" portion of the Internet. Hands-down, the ultimate collection of Usenet postings is the former Deja News collection, now a part of Google. It includes more than 845 million searchable postings on thousands of topics cataloged and dating back to 1981.
Online communities are typically a hybrid of a content website and message boards. Often they lure you in with useful articles, which you typically have found via a search engine, then hook you into coming back on a regular basis by connecting you to other people with similar interests through a message board part of their site. These message boards allow you to post messages and respond to posts, much like a newsgroup, but online communities do not use the mainstream Usenet structure of the Internet. Most of these sites are free, but some require registration or a user name.
The power of these sites is that they both offer "professional" content, usually written by staff members, as well as the personal experiences and tips from "regular people" on the message board. Often these do indeed become communities - a place where everyone "knows" everyone and communicate regularly both on the board and off the board. There is not a single catalog of all of these online communities, but you will often discover them as you research your topic. You may find that participating in these communities will bring you a wealth of information not available in the more formal sources of information on the Internet. They also help keep you entertained and may help you locate friends who have similar interests.
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Note: This article was sent to us by: Greg Walder at 08282010
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