As my digital footprint is small, so is my network; “there are more networked devices than people in the world” (Anderson, Dron, 2014, p. 3), I fit into this category.  I have several devices that connect to digital networks, but I am not a member of many of them.  Although my network is small, it does what I need it to do.

Breaking Down my Network

Naturally, I am at the center of my network, which connects to six hubs: school, work, friends, family, Facebook, and Linked-In, with school and work having sub-categories.  I split work and school further since they each have a large role in my network.  I included more than my digital network since I believe that a network comes from many connections.  In each of these hubs, there are people with whom I share a connection.  In many cases, these relationships are ones where we help each other.  The lines that attach the network do not have directions (i.e. arrows) because it is a flexible and the connections go both ways, which helps to build a stronger network.  Danah Boyd said, “physical structures are a collection of atoms while digital structures are built out of bits” (Boyd, 2011, para. 11), my network resides using both physical structures and bits.

References

Boyd, D. (2011). Social network sites as networked publics: Affordances, dynamics, and implications. In Z. Papacharissi (Ed.), A Networked Self (pp. 39–58). New York, NY: Rutledge.

Dron, J, & Anderson, T. (2014). Teaching Crowds. Athabasca University Press. Retrieved from http://www.aupress.ca/index.php/books/120235