Online communities are new media

Websites that create a community around user generated content has fully gained acceptance at media sites:

• News Corp's purchase of Myspace.com
• Yahoo's purchase of Del.icio.us, a popular Web site that helps users share links to their favorite Web sites
• Internet TV sites such as CurrentTV, and other vblogs.
• Odeo.com, where you can record audio and then share it with your Odeo contacts, by email, or by placing it in a Channel for all the world to hear.
• Mike Davidson's Newsvine, a news media site which allows anyone to comment on it like you would on a blog entry

Isn't this what being online and blogging is about? Creating an online community around people with like-interests. Message boards, instant communication, and blogs and comments are what bring people together and keep them there. What started out as continuous, immediate feedback, from product companies via email, then via user comments on sites like Amazon.com, online communities are attracting the attention of old-school corporations that provide products or services to the general public. It's no wonder the next generation of online users are using less email and on blogs.

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