3.Social software – building blocks of online communities

Social Software
In general, the term has some overlap with "new media", "computer-mediated communication" and the likes. All these try to convey the meaning of the new communication technologies on the human interaction and formation of communities.

As pointed out by Boyd, social software is an antithesis of the former collaborative software - instead of being project-based, "top-down" solutions, social software is a tool for individuals to get into spontaneous "bottom-up" co-operation.

Links
BOYD, S. (2003). Are you ready for social software?. Darwin Magazine, May 2003.