Concluding Thoughts
"The “lonely world of cyberspace” is a curious example of the vast gap that every so often opens between an idea’s popularity among pundits (considerable) and its basis in empirical research (very little). In the past few years the New York Times has run multiple op-eds suggesting social media or our phones are eroding human connections (for example, Cohen 2012; Egan 2013; Foer 2013; Franzen 2011; Fredrickson 2013); the Atlantic ran a cover story asking, “Is Facebook Making Us Lonely?” (Marche 2012); Massachusetts Institute of Technology psychologist Sherry Turkle wrote a book titled Alone Together (2011) that is partly about social media damaging “real world” human connections; and Pope Benedict warned youngsters not to replace their real friends with virtual ones (Benedict XVI 2011, 2009). In the meantime, a growing pile of empirical research shows that, if anything, the relationship runs the other way — Internet users are more social and less isolated."
Zeynep Tufekci, 2013, p. 13.
If we view TWS in relation to the above extract, it is clear to see that while the stated aims of TWS would perhaps place it on the same side as Turkle in this debate, it’s actual functionality as a platform for connecting users firmly positions it on the opposite end of the spectrum. There are perhaps few better examples of city-specific, small-scale online platforms as adept at connecting users as TWS.
Being a part of the TWS community has been immensely rewarding both personally and academically. I have met collaborators for my work and formed lasting connections. I am still reasonably regularly in contact with Jen, although our interaction is now mainly via email or dynamic social media platforms such as Whatsapp. Indeed my own experience with the two TWS teatimes which I attended led to making connections within the space of the café and then furthering these relationships through online communication later on. Through social media, the public space of the TWS teatime can be extended and continually accessed once the teatime comes to a close, as Heather Horst notes “new media technologies are not only objects, but they also link the private sphere with the public sphere, and, in turn, facilitate the negotiation of meaning both within and through their use” (Horst, 2012, loc. 1650). Thus, having returned home after our teatime, Chi, Jen, Samar and I were able to continue our conversation – an intense debate on how to best change duvet covers – through our computers via a group email chat and I was later able to ask Jen via facebook whether she would like to participate in my film project. TWS enables new connections to form between strangers through in person interaction, without the degree of anonymity one would experience were one to engage with a stranger online. These new connections can then move to social media, or of course, they can be discarded.
What became very apparent within my research was the cosmopolitan nature of the TWS community and the large proportion of internationals within both the host and attendee community. TWS can offer a point of social contact for new residents of London, such as Chi, who was seeking to engage in in-person interaction and this may account to some extent for the large number of international TWS members in London. Of course, I am aware of my liberal use of the word community in this research project, and acknowledge that, as Vered Amit writes, the idea of community is often “a more comfortable vehicle for defining the limits of participant observation than the indeterminacy of infinitely overlapping tangles of personal relationships” (Amit, 2002, p. 16). However, when dealing with such an expansive topic as Digital London and such a small circle of primary informants it is inevitable that some sort of research boundaries must be laid around the term, and therefore I did not hope to create an all-encompassing ethnography of TWS and those in contact with it, but rather sought to simply view the site and its influence through the observations of those who I have been in contact with, my TWS “community”.
In terms of there being two distinct aspects to TWS, hosting and attending, it is interesting to note that out of the perhaps 15 or so people I encountered, the only two whom I have connected with via facebook are two hosts, Jen and Rollo. Perhaps in future, as TWS London integrates facebook more prominently into its design, facebook connections are more likely to spring up, especially with lists of attendees being visible on facebook. I do not think that through its use of social media and the online TWS undermines its ideals of pushing people to connect in “real life” with "real humans", in fact it stands as a prime example of how new technologies offer new possibilities for connection within the imaginary borders and neighbourhoods of the virtual and real cityscape.
Being a part of the TWS community has been immensely rewarding both personally and academically. I have met collaborators for my work and formed lasting connections. I am still reasonably regularly in contact with Jen, although our interaction is now mainly via email or dynamic social media platforms such as Whatsapp. Indeed my own experience with the two TWS teatimes which I attended led to making connections within the space of the café and then furthering these relationships through online communication later on. Through social media, the public space of the TWS teatime can be extended and continually accessed once the teatime comes to a close, as Heather Horst notes “new media technologies are not only objects, but they also link the private sphere with the public sphere, and, in turn, facilitate the negotiation of meaning both within and through their use” (Horst, 2012, loc. 1650). Thus, having returned home after our teatime, Chi, Jen, Samar and I were able to continue our conversation – an intense debate on how to best change duvet covers – through our computers via a group email chat and I was later able to ask Jen via facebook whether she would like to participate in my film project. TWS enables new connections to form between strangers through in person interaction, without the degree of anonymity one would experience were one to engage with a stranger online. These new connections can then move to social media, or of course, they can be discarded.
What became very apparent within my research was the cosmopolitan nature of the TWS community and the large proportion of internationals within both the host and attendee community. TWS can offer a point of social contact for new residents of London, such as Chi, who was seeking to engage in in-person interaction and this may account to some extent for the large number of international TWS members in London. Of course, I am aware of my liberal use of the word community in this research project, and acknowledge that, as Vered Amit writes, the idea of community is often “a more comfortable vehicle for defining the limits of participant observation than the indeterminacy of infinitely overlapping tangles of personal relationships” (Amit, 2002, p. 16). However, when dealing with such an expansive topic as Digital London and such a small circle of primary informants it is inevitable that some sort of research boundaries must be laid around the term, and therefore I did not hope to create an all-encompassing ethnography of TWS and those in contact with it, but rather sought to simply view the site and its influence through the observations of those who I have been in contact with, my TWS “community”.
In terms of there being two distinct aspects to TWS, hosting and attending, it is interesting to note that out of the perhaps 15 or so people I encountered, the only two whom I have connected with via facebook are two hosts, Jen and Rollo. Perhaps in future, as TWS London integrates facebook more prominently into its design, facebook connections are more likely to spring up, especially with lists of attendees being visible on facebook. I do not think that through its use of social media and the online TWS undermines its ideals of pushing people to connect in “real life” with "real humans", in fact it stands as a prime example of how new technologies offer new possibilities for connection within the imaginary borders and neighbourhoods of the virtual and real cityscape.