Emerald Management Review:
Weblogging: a study of social computing and its impact on organizations

Abstract:

Purpose - To study the use of Weblogs (blogs), their impact on social networking and organizational computing, and the attractiveness of blogs for young users.

Design/methodology/approach - The origins and nature of blogs, defined as personal diaries kept on the Worldwide Web which can be edited by an end user with few Web publication skills, are discussed, noting some of their popular features. Reports the results of a study to determine bloggers' usage patterns (user behaviour), their motives for using specific blogging technology, and how blogging technology supports these motives. Analyses blog usage data derived from interviews with 33 university students from different universities in Hong Kong, aged from 20 to 22 years.

Findings - On the basis of the usage intensity results, the users were categorized into four types which were labelled habitual (enthusiastic), active, personal, and blogging 'lurkers' (users who kept a blog but would rarely or never post to it). Reports the formulation of a needs-technology fit model to fit the behaviour that is based on the task-technology fit model of Goodhue and Thompson (1995). Discusses the implications of these usage patterns on organizational computing. Concludes that social computing, such as blogging, will have a revolutionary impact on organizational computing.

Research limitations/implications - Future research may be directed towards extending this exploratory study to cover a larger sample of users (including employees) and the impact of other variables, while testing a number of conjectures that have been made about the impact on organizational computing.

Originality/value - Presents an excellent study that provides a sound basis for investigating the fit between social computing technology and social user needs.

Keywords:

Article Type:

Research paper

Reference:

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