[Nottingham] Geographical independence of electronic commuincation

[Duncan John Fyfe]

On Fri, 2005-11-04 at 19:33 +0800, Mark O'Shea wrote:

> 
> I don't know what kind of answer you were hoping for but does that help?
> 

Yes it does, thank you.

Smaller group, higher signal to noise, better sense of community, used
to live around Nottingham, found/know some clued up people, all
perfectly normal and kind of what I was expecting.

I'm curious from a psychological perspective really.  Given the
opportunities presented by geographically neutral communication systems
(mailing list, newsgroup ,fora) people still organize along geographical
lines even when there is no real need.

Using Nottingham LUG as the example, but true of <anyplace>LUG , those
interested in meetings (whether they attend or not)  have an obvious
geographical tie but for those interested only in the mailing list the
tie is less obvious (to me anyway) and I'm a curios kind of chap.

A quick look at lug.org.uk, it is all <someplace>LUG (even if only in
name).  If people are looking for smaller groups, better sense of
community, higher signal to noise where are SuSeLUG, MandrakeLUG,
<another special interest>LUG ?

I suspect it comes from the sense of place we all develop ( where I
live, where I work , the places I like to go, those I don't ).  It has a
strong geographical element and this is an example of how we take it
with us even when building communities with a seemingly geographically
neutral medium.

Just an interesting topic over a pint on a lazy Sunday really.

Have fun,
Duncan