This course is designed to

• Introduce students to the theoretical aspects of how online communities operate
• Help students identify those characteristics that make social websites succeed or fail
• Provide experience in becoming part of a social website
• Develop students’ critical thinking and writing, and presentation skills

This course will be taught as a reading class, meaning that students are expected to do reading assignments before each class, and to actively participate in discussion.  Each week one student, the “Lecturer”, will be responsible for presenting the course topic to the rest of the class, and to lead a discussion on this topic.  This student will be responsible for kick-starting an online discussion on this topic, which should begin at lest 72 hours before the lecture.  The rest of the students are expected to contribute to this discussion before the day of the lecture by writing a critique of the material and preparing questions for the class.  In addition, each student must adopt a social website of their choosing, become active members in it, and at the end of term present to the rest of the class an empirical account of how this website works.