Omegle :)

After hearing about the influx in chat roulette style websites, my flatmates and I decided to join in on the experience and see how chatrooms worked. Here is a print screened example of an omegle conversation that we had with a random person from India.

I was very surprised to discover that people from all around the world join these chat-rooms to engage in normal conversation. It is a new phenomenom. I think that it is perfectly normal to talk to people online aslong as you are sensible with it and dont give out any personal information etc etc. I much prefer a face to face conversation however it is an interesting way to meet new people and start friendships. It is all apart of online culture which interlinks with the subject of SOCIAL CAPITAL!

“Social capital is about the value of social networks, bonding similar people and bridging between diverse people, with norms of reciprocity.” (Dekker and Uslaner 2001; Uslaner 2001). Sander (2002, p. 213)

Everybody knows about the classic social networks like Facebook and Twitter, however most people are totally oblivious to the millions of social networks that are available online. Omegle is just one of the chatrooms that most people would be unfamiliar with.

The arguments surrounding social capital are whether or not social networks can be classified as having value. Some issues that have been raised in the study of social capital are;

Despite these inequalities I believe that social networks do have value. It is just another way of connecting people and an alternative way of gaining information. With twitter becoming a new form of journalism it acts instead of or alongside the newspaper, just because its not a tangable copy doesn't make it any less important and therefore it should not be under-valued.

- Social capital is not equally available to all. Geographic and social isolation limit access to this resource ie. Someone in Barbados won't necessarily have the same easy access as we have here in the UK due to economic status.

 -  Not all social capital is created equally.

The same as true friendships can be made from chatrooms such as Omegle and Chat-roulette, i know numerous people who have made longlasting friendships with people they have met online, all it takes it a similar interest to spiral off a decent conversation that is just as worthy as a face to face communication. We need both strong and weak ties within our lives. Strong ties referring to true friends who we have known for a long period of time and whom we have a strong and true connection to. Weak ties being new and distant friends, socialising networks can be useful in creating both of these factors and can act as a bridge for weak ties to become strong ties.

Blogs are also classified as a kind of social network, blogs act as journals meaning that they allow people to free-lance their thoughts and feelings without feeling pressurised. Facebook can also be thought as a journal as it allows you to write what your thoughts upon subject matters as well as creating a portfolio of yourself.

To conclude; social networks are vital!