More Web Proxy on the site http://driver.im/

research-article

We are all lurkers: consuming behaviors among authors and readers in an enterprise file-sharing service

Authors:

Michael Muller,

N. Sadat Shami,

David R. Millen,

Jonathan FeinbergAuthors Info & Claims

GROUP '10: Proceedings of the 2010 ACM International Conference on Supporting Group Work

Pages 201 - 210

https://doi.org/10.1145/1880071.1880106

Published: 07 November 2010 Publication History

Abstract

Most knowledge repositories focus on the role of knowledge-creators. In this paper, by contrast, we examined the work of Lurkers in an enterprise file-sharing service, and we compared their lurking behaviors to the lurking behaviors of users who uploaded files (Uploaders), and users who contributed metadata about files (Contributors). For comparability, we restricted our analyses to the consuming behaviors that are common to the three roles (Uploaders, Contributors, and Lurkers). Independent principal components analysis showed highly similar seven-factor solutions of lurking activities across all three roles, although the relative emphases of those factors varied across roles. Uploaders tended to view and download more groups of files, showed less emphasis on searching for files, and tended to work directly with the file-sharing application, unmediated by external applications. Contributors showed the opposite pattern: more emphasis on searching and responding to recommendations from other users, often via a form of remote access. Lurkers' lurking behaviors were less intense, and showed little difference in emphases among the lurker factors. We use these results, and the published research literature, to motivate a research agenda for lurkers in social media.

References

[1]

Alcoff, L. M., 'The problem of speaking for others,' Cultural Critique (winter 1991-92), 5--32.

[2]

Antin, J., & Cheshire, C., 'Readers are not free-riders: Reading as a form of participation on Wikipedia,' Proc CSCW 2010.

Digital Library

[3]

Bishop, J., 'Increasing participation in online communities: A framework for human-computer interaction,' Computers in Human Behavior, vol 23, no 4, 1881--1893, 2007.

Digital Library

[4]

Bogdan, C., & Bowers, J., 'Tuning in: Challenging design for communities through a field study of radio amateurs,' Proc Communities & Technologies 2007, Springer, 439--461.

[5]

Chi, E. H., 'Information seeking can be social,' Computer, vol 42, no 3, 42--46, 2009.

Digital Library

[6]

Curien, N., Fauchart, E., Laffond, G. & Moreau, F. (2006). 'Online consumer communities: Escaping the tragedy of the digital commons.' In E. Brousseau (Ed)., Internet and Digital Economics. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2006.

[7]

DiMicco, J., Millen, D. R., Geyer, W. G., Dugan, C. Brownholtz, B., & Muller, M. (2008). 'Motivations for social networking at work.' Proc CSCW 2008.

Digital Library

[8]

Kollock, P., & Smith, M. (1996). 'Managing the virtual commons: Cooperation and conflict in computer communities.' In S. Herring (ed.), Computer-Mediated Communications: Linguistic, Social, & Cross-Cultural Perspectives. Amsterdam: Benjamins (1996), 109--128.

[9]

Korth, A., Hirsch, B., & Plumbaum, T., 'A trilogy of webs for machines,' http://www.dai-labor.de/index.php?id=1034&pubID=399, 2008.

[10]

Lantham, R. A., The economics of attention: Style and substance in the age of information, University of Chicago Press, 2006.

Digital Library

[11]

Lave, J., & Wenger, E., Situated learning: Legitimate peripheral participation, Cambridge University Press, 1991.

[12]

Lee, J. (2003). 'An end-user perspective on file-sharing systems.' Communications of the ACM, vol. 46, no. 2, February 2003, 49--53.

Digital Library

[13]

Li, C., & Bernoff, J., Groundswell: Winning in a world transformed by social technologies, Harvard Business School Press, 2008.

[14]

McDermott, M., 'How to measure the success of your web app,' http://www.thinkvitamin.com/features/webapps/how-to-measure-the-success-of-your-web-app.

[15]

Muller, M. J., 'Ethnocritical heuristics for reflecting on work with users and other interested parties.' In Kyng, M., & Mathiessen, L., (eds.), Computers and design in context, Cambridge MA USA: MIT Press, 1997.

Digital Library

[16]

Muller, M., Millen, D. R., & Feinberg, J., 'Information curators in an enterprise file-sharing service.' Proc. ECSCW 2009.

[17]

Muller, M., Millen, D. R., & Feinberg, J., 'Patterns of usage in an enterprise file-sharing service: Publicizing, discovering, and telling the news,' Proc CHI 2010.

Digital Library

[18]

Nielsen, J., 'Participation inequality: Encouraging more users to contribute,' http://www.useit.com/alertbox/participation_inequality.html, 2006.

[19]

Nonnecke, B., Andrews, A., & Preece, J., 'Non-public and public online community participation: Needs, attitudes, and behavior. Electronic Commerce Research vol 6, no 1, 7--20, 2006.

Digital Library

[20]

Nonnecke, B., & Preece, J. (2001). 'Lurker demographics: Counting the silent.' Proc CHI 2000, ACM Press, Den Hague, Nederlands, April 2000, 73--80.

Digital Library

[21]

Panciera, K., Priedhorsky, R., Erickson, T., & Terveen, L., 'Lurking? Cyclopaths? A quantitative lifecycle analysis of user behavior in a geowiki,' Proc CHI 2010.

Digital Library

[22]

Pirolli, P., Information Foraging Theory: Adaptive Interaction with Information. New York: Oxford, 2007.

[23]

Porter, J., Designing for the social web, New Riders Press, 2008.

Digital Library

[24]

Preece, J., Nonnecke, B., Andrews, D., 'The top 5 reasons for lurking: Improving community experiences for everyone,' Comp. Human Beh., vol 2, no 1, 2004.

[25]

Preece J. and Shneiderman B., 'The reader-to-leader framework: Motivating technology-mediated social participation,' AIS Transactions on Human-Computer Interaction, vol 1, no 1, 13--32, 2009.

[26]

Priedhorsky, R., Chen, J., Lam, S. K., Panciera, K., Terveen, L., & Riedl, J., 'Creating, destroying, and restoring value in Wikipedia,' Proc GROUP 2007.

Digital Library

[27]

Rader, E., 'The effect of audience design on labeling, organizing, and finding shared files,' Proc CHI 2010.

Digital Library

[28]

Rader, E. 'Yours, mine and (not) ours: Social influences on group information repositories.' Proc CHI 2009.

Digital Library

[29]

Rafaeli, S., Ravid, G., & Soroka, V., 'De-Lurking in virtual communities: A social communication network approach to measuring the effects of social and cultural capital.' Proc. HICSS 2004.

Digital Library

[30]

Schultz, N., & Beach, B., 'From lurkers to posters,' Australian National Training Authority, http://pre2005.flexiblelearning.net.au/resources/lurkerstoposters.pdf, 2004.

[31]

Soroka, V., & Rafaeli, S., 'Invisible participants: Now cultural capital relates to lurking behavior,' Proc WWW 2006.

Digital Library

[32]

Takahashi, M., Fujimoto, M., & Yamasaki, N., 'The active lurker: Influence of an in-house online commu-nity on its outside environment.' Proc GROUP 2003.

Digital Library

[33]

Voida, S., Edwards, W. K., Newman, M. W., Grinter, R. E., & Ducheneaut, N. 'Share and share alike: Exploring the user interface affordances of file sharing.' Proc CHI 2006.

Digital Library

[34]

Whalen, T., Toms, E. G., & Blustein, J. (2008). 'Information displays for managing shared files.' Proc CHIMIT'08, ACM Press, San Diego, CA, USA, November 2008.

Digital Library

Cited By

Li MFu ZGuo WWang LMa JShi L(2023)Dynamic analysis of identifying user roles and evolutionary paths in collective intelligence design communityAdvanced Engineering Informatics10.1016/j.aei.2023.10212657:COnline publication date: 1-Aug-2023
https://dl.acm.org/doi/10.1016/j.aei.2023.102126
Al Khasawneh MAl Hadeed OAbdrabbo TAbu Hashesh MAl-Abdullah M(2022)An Investigation of the Factors That Motivate Users to Participate in Online CommunitiesResearch Anthology on Fandoms, Online Social Communities, and Pop Culture10.4018/978-1-6684-4515-0.ch002(20-36)Online publication date: 2022
https://doi.org/10.4018/978-1-6684-4515-0.ch002
Treem Jvan Zoonen WSivunen A(2022)Examining communication visibility and social technology platform use in organizationsNew Media & Society10.1177/1461444822108927826:5(2633-2658)Online publication date: 9-May-2022
https://doi.org/10.1177/14614448221089278
Show More Cited By

Index Terms

We are all lurkers: consuming behaviors among authors and readers in an enterprise file-sharing service
1. Human-centered computing
  1. Collaborative and social computing
    1. Collaborative and social computing theory, concepts and paradigms
      1. Computer supported cooperative work
2. Social and professional topics
  1. Professional topics
    1. Computing and business
      1. Computer supported cooperative work

Recommendations

Lurker demographics: counting the silent
CHI '00: Proceedings of the SIGCHI conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems

As online groups grow in number and type, understanding lurking is becoming increasingly important. Recent reports indicate that lurkers make up over 90% of online groups, yet little is known about them.

This paper presents a demographic study of lurking ...
Understanding lurkers in online communities: A literature review

In internet culture, lurkers are a special group of website users who regularly login to online communities but seldom post. This study aims to provide an overall understanding of lurkers by explaining the definition of lurkers, discussing the reasons ...
The active lurker: influence of an in-house online community on its outside environment
GROUP '03: Proceedings of the 2003 ACM International Conference on Supporting Group Work

In this study, we focus on participants called lurkers, who do not post any messages in an online community such as interactive mailing lists and bulletin board systems. We propose a method of classifying participants including lurkers based on two ...

Comments

Please enable JavaScript to view thecomments powered by Disqus.

Information & Contributors

Information

Published In

cover image ACM Conferences

GROUP '10: Proceedings of the 2010 ACM International Conference on Supporting Group Work

November 2010

378 pages

ISBN:9781450303873

DOI:10.1145/1880071

General Chairs:
Wayne Lutters
UMBC, USA
,
Diane H. Sonnenwald
UCD, Ireland
,
Program Chairs:
Tom Gross
Bauhaus-University Weimar, Germany
,
Madhu Reddy
The Pennsylvania State University, USA

Copyright © 2010 ACM.

Permission to make digital or hard copies of all or part of this work for personal or classroom use is granted without fee provided that copies are not made or distributed for profit or commercial advantage and that copies bear this notice and the full citation on the first page. Copyrights for components of this work owned by others than ACM must be honored. Abstracting with credit is permitted. To copy otherwise, or republish, to post on servers or to redistribute to lists, requires prior specific permission and/or a fee. Request permissions from [email protected]

Sponsors

SIGCHI: ACM Special Interest Group on Computer-Human Interaction

Publisher

Association for Computing Machinery

New York, NY, United States

Publication History

Published: 07 November 2010

Permissions

Request permissions for this article.

Request Permissions

Check for updates

Author Tags

Qualifiers

Research-article

Conference

GROUP '10

Sponsor:

SIGCHI

GROUP '10: ACM 2010 International Conference on Supporting Group Work

November 7 - 10, 2010

Florida, Sanibel Island, USA

Acceptance Rates

Overall Acceptance Rate 125 of 405 submissions, 31%

Upcoming Conference

GROUP '25

Sponsor:
sigchi

The 2025 ACM International Conference on Supporting Group Work

January 12 - 15, 2025

Hilton Head , SC , USA

Contributors

Other Metrics

View Article Metrics

Bibliometrics & Citations

Bibliometrics

Article Metrics

44
Total Citations
View Citations
494
Total Downloads

Downloads (Last 12 months)12
Downloads (Last 6 weeks)2

Reflects downloads up to 03 Jan 2025

Other Metrics

View Author Metrics

Citations

Cited By

Li MFu ZGuo WWang LMa JShi L(2023)Dynamic analysis of identifying user roles and evolutionary paths in collective intelligence design communityAdvanced Engineering Informatics10.1016/j.aei.2023.10212657:COnline publication date: 1-Aug-2023
https://dl.acm.org/doi/10.1016/j.aei.2023.102126
Al Khasawneh MAl Hadeed OAbdrabbo TAbu Hashesh MAl-Abdullah M(2022)An Investigation of the Factors That Motivate Users to Participate in Online CommunitiesResearch Anthology on Fandoms, Online Social Communities, and Pop Culture10.4018/978-1-6684-4515-0.ch002(20-36)Online publication date: 2022
https://doi.org/10.4018/978-1-6684-4515-0.ch002
Treem Jvan Zoonen WSivunen A(2022)Examining communication visibility and social technology platform use in organizationsNew Media & Society10.1177/1461444822108927826:5(2633-2658)Online publication date: 9-May-2022
https://doi.org/10.1177/14614448221089278
Simsek Caglar PRoto VVainio T(2022)User Experience Research in the Work Context: Maps, Gaps and AgendaProceedings of the ACM on Human-Computer Interaction10.1145/35129796:CSCW1(1-28)Online publication date: 7-Apr-2022
https://dl.acm.org/doi/10.1145/3512979
Liu SSmith BVaish RMonroy-Hernández A(2022)Understanding the Role of Context in Creating Enjoyable Co-Located InteractionsProceedings of the ACM on Human-Computer Interaction10.1145/35129786:CSCW1(1-26)Online publication date: 7-Apr-2022
https://dl.acm.org/doi/10.1145/3512978
Kim CWang H(2022)From Receivers to Givers: Understanding Practice of Reciprocity in an Online Support CommunityProceedings of the ACM on Human-Computer Interaction10.1145/35129386:CSCW1(1-17)Online publication date: 7-Apr-2022
https://dl.acm.org/doi/10.1145/3512938
Méndez Méndez ACartwright MBello JNov O(2022)Eliciting Confidence for Improving Crowdsourced Audio AnnotationsProceedings of the ACM on Human-Computer Interaction10.1145/35129356:CSCW1(1-25)Online publication date: 7-Apr-2022
https://dl.acm.org/doi/10.1145/3512935
Jorge CNisi VHanna JNunes NCaldeira MMarinho A(2022)MStoryG: Exploring Serendipitous Storytelling Within High Anxiety Public SpacesHuman-Computer Interaction – INTERACT 201510.1007/978-3-319-22723-8_27(335-353)Online publication date: 10-Mar-2022
https://dl.acm.org/doi/10.1007/978-3-319-22723-8_27
Nikkilä M(2022)Global Participation in the North: Exploring the Issues of Silent Participation and Building a Zone of Identification in a Hostile Digital EnvironmentShaping the North Through Multimodal and Intermedial Interaction10.1007/978-3-030-99104-3_7(147-165)Online publication date: 31-May-2022
https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-99104-3_7
Bendoni WDuma F(2021)Pivots in the Luxury BusinessDeveloping Successful Global Strategies for Marketing Luxury Brands10.4018/978-1-7998-5882-9.ch008(139-156)Online publication date: 2021
https://doi.org/10.4018/978-1-7998-5882-9.ch008
Show More Cited By

View Options

Login options

Check if you have access through your login credentials or your institution to get full access on this article.

Full Access

Get this Publication

View options

PDF

View or Download as a PDF file.

eReader

View online with eReader.

Media

Figures

Other

Tables

View Table of Contents